Who's no lady?

I found a great resource on line, a blogsite called History of Gay Bars in New York City. All sorts of interesting links to other gay history sites and quotes from books and photos of the "Olden Days". Whether you're gay or not, you ought to check it out. As a social history nerd, I eat this stuff up and it doesn't matter if it's gay or straight; books about HOW people lived their lives, from the big stuff to the mundane, has always fascinated me...I remember asking my 6th grade social studies teacher, "What kind of underwear did the Romans wear?" She wasn't mad at the question; she thought it interesting and legitimate and was honest enough to admit she didn't know but it would be interesting to find out...I think the reason so many people HATE history and studying it in school is because of the boring way most teachers and schools insist on teaching it, with way too much droning on about dates and battles and treaties and elections...no wonder people zone out. I've always encouraged people to study histories on their own and search out the answers to the questions they are interested in...and to always remember, history is really just very old gossip.

Quentin Crisp returns from the dead...

John Hurt is set to reprise his role as legendary, pioneer queer writer and bon vivant Quentin Crisp in the sequel to the acclaimed 1975 television production of "The Naked Civil Servant" which focused on the early years of Crisp living in Britain as a frank and open queer man. "An Englishman in New York" will focus on Crisp's life after the publication and fame of "The Naked Civil Servant" when he emigrated to New York and became a fixture of the downtown arts scene in the 1980's. Title of the show is from the Sting song which was written about the writer who acted with Sting in the film, "The Bride". Crisp died in New York in 1999 at the age of 90.

For anyone who ISN'T aware of Crisp and his writings, you're missing out on the work of a brilliant and fascinating literary stylist. Dryly witty and only slightly acerbic, he wrote several volumes of his memoirs and worked regularly as a movie reviewer in New York. His take on the films of the 80's and 90's is very, very funny and he isn't afraid to poke fun at movies he appears in, which is probably the healthiest way to look at the experience of making a film like "The Bride" with the likes of Sting and Jennifer Beals...

Filming for "Englishman" begins in August in London and New York.

Read more about it at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7373997.stm

Noel Coward: Big, Gay, Anti-Nazi Spy!!!

Stephen Koch had a great essay in the NY Times Sunday Book Review about the bon vivant actor, performer and playwright and his work doing espionage work during World War II.

“Celebrity was wonderful cover,” Noël Coward said near the end of his life. “My disguise would be my own reputation as a bit of an idiot ... a merry playboy.”

Check it out here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/13/books/review/Koch-t.html?_r=1&ref=review&oref=slogin