Legendary performer Taylor Mac and musical director Matt Ray’s A 24-Decade History of Popular Music broke ground with its monumental scope and vision, earned the duo a slew of awards (including a Pulitzer Prize nomination) and became the subject of a fascinating HBO documentary made by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman which premiered at Tribeca... Continue Reading →
TIFF 2023 Film Review: Summer Qamp ★★★1/2
With regressive politicians in the United States seeking to implement legislation targeting queer and especially trans youth, including bans on gender affirming health care, participation in sport, bathroom use, book bans, and even forbidding the mention of the words "gay or trans" in schools, the loud voices of bigoted adults often overpower the kids themselves.... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Oscar-winning filmmaker Roger Ross Williams “the real Cassandro is such a proud, out, gay man who embraces everything about who he is”
When Roger Ross Williams met Saúl Armendáriz, better known as Cassandro, for a 2016 documentary he was directing for The New Yorker—The Man Without a Mask—the filmmaker immediately knew he'd found the subject of his first scripted narrative feature. Making the move from amateur wrestling in El Paso, Armendáriz became a Mexican-American icon with the... Continue Reading →
Mucha Libre – Film Review: Cassandro ★★★1/2
Who would have ever expected a film set in the ultra macho, extremely homophobic world of lucha libre wrestling to serve as a celebration of women and effeminate gay men? Director Roger Ross Williams along with co-writer David Teague have crafted such an experience with their biopic, Cassandro, the true story of Saúl Armendáriz, an... Continue Reading →
TIFF 2023 Film Review: Frybread Face & Me ★★★★★
Billy Luther's richly evocative 1990-set narrative feature debut, Frybread Face and Me, follows 11-year-old Benny (Keir Tallman) whose dreams of catching his favourite band, Fleetwood Mac, live in his hometown of San Diego are crushed when he's abruptly sent away for the summer by his divorcing parents to stay with his grandma Lorraine (Sarah H.... Continue Reading →
TIFF 2023 Film Review: Dicks The Musical ★★★★
Not for the easily offended, or those lacking a sense of humour, Dicks: The Musical—which opened the Midnight Madness section of the 48th Toronto International Film Festival last night—is a delectably outrageous, endlessly kooky, and thrillingly depraved instant queer cult classic. Some movies feel like they are actively trying to achieve cult status, Dicks never... Continue Reading →
TIFF 2023 Film Review: Toll (Pedágio) ★★★★
Following last year's Charcoal (Carvão), Brazilian filmmaker Carolina Markowicz returns to TIFF for the world premiere of her captivating sophomore feature Toll (Pedágio) and to receive the festival's Emerging Talent Award. Maeve Jinkings in Carolina Markowicz's Toll (Pedágio) which receives its world premiere at the 48th Toronto International Film Festival. Courtesy of TIFF. Luis Armando... Continue Reading →
Sort Of star & co-creator Bilal Baig to receive Barrier Breaker Award at 2nd annual Trans Filmmakers Summit x TIFF
The Trans Film Mentorship (TFM) will stage the second annual Trans Filmmakers Summit x TIFF, at the 48th Toronto International Film Festival on Sunday, September 10th at Malaparte at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. Open to all trans and non-binary creators, filmmakers, actors, industry partners and allies, Trans Filmmakers Summit x TIFF will be an afternoon... Continue Reading →
Book Preview: Gay Aliens & Queer Folks, How Russell T Davies changed TV by Emily Garside
The world of Russell T Davies has always been very queer…and always fairly nerdy. So the below extract from my new book seemed fitting…on Nerds in the Russell T Davies universe. Beyond nerds, Gay Aliens and Queer Folk, how Russell T Davies changed TV (published by Calon Press on September 21st, 2023) is a dive... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: playwright Tommy Murphy on the legacy of queer Australian classic Holding The Man
Tim Conigrave’s 1995 memoir, Holding The Man, inhabits a special place in the gay Australian psyche. Telling the story of his 15 year relationship with his partner John Caleo, from their meeting in high school to Caleo’s untimely death during the height of the AIDS crisis, the book - published posthumously - has become a... Continue Reading →
Book Review: Why Mariah Carey Matters by Andrew Chan ★★★★
I’ve spent the last few days in a Mariah Carey shaped hole, chronologically working my way through her discography on Apple Music (other music services are available), while reading Andrew Chan’s adoring and insightful book, Why Mariah Carey Matters. Chan has convinced me that we have never really given the elusive chanteuse her due as... Continue Reading →
TIFF 2023: LGBTQ+ highlights at 48th Toronto International Film Festival
The 48th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) opens on Thursday, September 7th with the international premiere of Oscar-winning director Hayao Miyazaki's animated epic The Boy and the Heron (Kimitachi wa Do Ikiruka) and comes to a close on Sunday, September 17th with the world premiere of Thom Zimny's Sylvester Stallone documentary Sly, exploring the close... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Aitch Alberto on Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe “owning my authenticity made me capable of directing this film”
One of the standout queer films at the 47th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) was writer-director Aitch Alberto’s adaptation of Benjamin Alire Sáenz bestselling YA novel, Aristotle And Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe. Produced by Alberto, alongside Lin-Manuel Miranda, Eugenio Debrez, and Kyra Sedgwick, the emotionally potent coming-of-age tale explores the bond that builds between two... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Max Pelayo & Reese Gonzales on starring in Aristotle & Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe
One of the LGBTQ+ highlights at the 47th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), was writer-director Aitch Alberto's adaptation of Benjamin Alire Sáenz bestselling YA novel, Aristotle And Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe. Produced by Alberto, alongside Lin-Manuel Miranda, Eugenio Debrez, and Kyra Sedgwick, the powerful coming-of-age tale explores the bond that builds between... Continue Reading →
Film Review: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe ★★★★
UPDATE: Aristotle And Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe opens in US theaters on September 8th, 2023. When the poignant, defiantly hopeful sound of Smalltown Boy by Bronski Beat kicked in early on in writer-director Aitch Alberto's Aristotle And Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe, I settled deep down into my seat at... Continue Reading →
Bittersweet Shimmer Zone – Album Review: Tension by Kylie Minogue ★★★★★
The last time we left our sonically savvy heroine she had saved our pandemic stricken romances and mothballed nightlives with the diva divine album Disco - though the cliffhanger of what she would do next hung in the air like smoke machine vapor in a laser maze. What strange mutant strain of pop would come... Continue Reading →