BlackmanVision Film Production

My top three that you have to see and if you cannot see them at the BFI London Film Festival make sure you see them at the cinema or snag a DVD with your very last pennies. These are in no particular order because they are all amazing.

1. Pariah – Stunning coming of age story about a middle class African American lesbian teenager. Dee Rees’ first feature shows a maturity and skill most of us take years to achieve. Book now to see Pariah.
   
2. The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 – Powerful Swedish documentary using rare archive footage of the Black Power movements in the USA. White European filmmakers with an Afrocentric gaze! Whoa!  See The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 here.
   
3. Weekend – sencond feature by Andrew Haigh (Greek Pete). One of THE best gay films ever made. There is one exquisite moment in the sex scene which makes it the most authentic I have ever seen in cinema. See Weekend here.
   

STUD LIFE – CASTING CALL – LONDON ACTORS
Mates b4 Muff
Writer/Director: CampbellX
Producers – Stella Nwimo & Nadya Kassam

BD Women Clip from BlackmanVision on Vimeo. One of Campbell’s award-winning films

Stud Life is the new feature length film on queer street life in London written and directed by CampbellX. The film is a post-modern LGBT She’s Gotta Have It for the YouTube generation. Stud Life asks the perennial queer question, how do you choose between your lover and your best friend?

Stud Life is filmed over 10 days in London. Please note Stud Life contains lesbian, gay male and transgender content and scenes of a sexual nature and is a lo-budget independent film shot on HD video.

AUDITIONS
Dates of auditions will be 19, 21 22 July 2010 in London.
22 July will be the call back day.
Please email head shots and CVs to studlifethemovie@gmail.com stating what role you are auditioning for. Please include links to any videos of yourself online.
DEADLINE 16TH JULY 17:00 HOURS

CHARACTERS
JJ – 20 something Black butch masculine female, often mistaken for a guy.
Seb – JJ’s best friend and confidante and side-kick is a white ethnic 20 something emo gay man.
Smack Jack – 20-something Anglo English posh boy. He is smitten by Seb, who takes no notice of him.
Elle – 20-something lesbian hi-femme professional dominatrix. JJ falls for her but realises she is very hot to handle.
Manchester Joe – 30 something chavvy and thug sort of guy, Has anger issues and internalised homophobia.
White Man – 60 something
Thai Woman – 20 something
Bouncer – 30 something Black man
Iranian gay guy – 20 something
Older white boyfriend of Iranian guy – 50 something
Butch Boi – 20 something masculine woman
Hooded Youth 1 – 18-25
Hooded Youth 2 – 18-25
Flirty beautiful feminine woman – 20 – 60 something
1950’ s Bride – 30 something tattoed burlesque type woman
1950’s Groom – 30 something 1950’s style and vibe
Woman in Loo – 30-something
Barber 1 – 20 something – African
Barber 2 – 40 something – African
Hairdresser 1- 20 something Jamaican woman
Hairdresser 2 – 20 something – Black woman
Buppy woman – 30 something – Black aspirational woman
Buppy man – 40 something – Black aspirational type man
Old Skool Butch – 60 something woman
Chic Femme – 60 something woman
Hippy Femme - 30 something woman
Toi Boi – 30 something transman (FTM)
Asian bride – 20 something Asian woman
Bride’s Mother – 40 something Asian woman
Bride’s father – 40 something Asian man
Bridesmaid 1 – 20 something Asian woman
Bridesmaid 2 – 20 something Asian woman
Bridesmaid 3 – 20 something Asian woman

Vanity Fair - kd lang and Cindy Crawford

Stealing Beauty was a panel discussion chaired by Diva magazine Editor Jane Czyzselska. I was on the panel with Artist, DJ and performer Sadie Lee and fashion historian and cultural critic Elizabeth Wilson.

The event explored how LGBT culture plunders dominant straight culture and uses it to create something new and vibrant.

In my presentation I brought up three concepts. And here is a sample of my talk.

• The Guerilla Gaze
• Analog Duplication of Dominance
• Dominant Dilution

The Guerilla Gaze
My definition of The Guerilla Gaze is the ability of LGBT people to derive pleasure from images not intended for us. We queer the

Grace Jones - still looking fabulous

images in our imagination subverting the inherent (hetero)sexuality of the dominant narratives presented in movies, music videos, adverts and TV shows. In movies highly femininised women become objects of desire for women, as well as objects of identification. Butch lesbians may model their image according to the “thug style” as seen by hip hop stars like Fifty Cents or Flo Rida. They sometimes mimic the pose presented by the brute force of masculinity of Brad Pitt in Fight Club or Marlon Brando in A Street Car Named Desire usually in a vest.

The Guerilla Gaze also throws light on people within film or TV narratives or within culture who are not considered objects of desire by mainstream heterosexual commodified desire. Our eyes are drawn to men and women who are “othered”. We elevate women in particular who defy the odds – who are older yet fierce, who bend gender, who are rebels. Do we do this because we feel they are the “Ugly Ducklings” of mainstream culture, and in our eyes they are transformed into Swans as we would hope to be perceived?

Analog Duplication of Dominance
The definition of analog duplication of dominance is that oppressed peoples often steal traditions from dominant cultures and with time the original meaning often changes or is subverted. I say this because with each generation our memories become increasingly more faint to the point that contemporary people often do not know the origins of particular behaviours, images, styles and traditions.  Our collective memories are thus analog.  If our memories were digital we would remember everything accurately all the time.

In the USA the system of the Houses eulogised in the movie Paris is Burning, recreates the notion of nuclear family with House Mothers and Fathers and children. Houses are made up of queer African American and Latina Americans rejected by mainstream LGBT cultures or their own bio-families. The Houses host balls in which people parody or mimic images of (WASP) power in the USA. For example one of the categories is Executive Realness. The participants perform “Business man” but always with flair. They cannot resist that extra flourish and transpose beauty and colour over the drabness of a grey suit. Popular gay slang now refers to LGBT people being “one of the children” or “family” possibly not realising their origins in Houses in the ghettos of the USA in the 1980s.

Fem - Eve relishes the apple

My work especially Fem is about stealing iconic images of femininity from dominant culture including fairy tales, religion, movies, fashion. I queer them with a particular lesbian sensibility – Eve does regret eating the apple and will not be punished. Eve is also a Black woman, reminding us that we all came from Africa and subverting the dominant Eurocentric Biblical image of Eve.

Dominant Dilution
Mainstream straight culture sucks off cultures of marginalised peoples, and regurgitates it back to everyone bleached and ironed out for mass capitalistic consumption.

August 1993 issue of Vanity Fair with k.d. lang and Cindy Crawford

Words like naff whose original meaning was dull, heterosexual, mundane or trade meaning same sex partner were from Polari the language spoken by LGBT people and people in the underworld in the past. Prince gained major popularity in the 1980s but how many people know that his style was very similar to Little Richard from the 1960s who sang songs with coded queer lyrics. Madonna appropriated vogueing a dance style created by queer African American and Latina Americans for her video Vogue, while not mentioning anyone of colour in her homage list.

Sometimes, very rarely, a queer image, created by a queer person, with a queer sensibility is used by a mainstream company to sell their product. This happened once with the Vanity Fair which had on their 1993 cover, kd lang and Cindy Crawford photographed by Annie Liebovitz. If you can think of any others please let me know. The image is particularly interesting because it is gender queer, and kd lang a butch woman is also being used to sell glamour to a straight audience.

From 2 July – 18 October 2009 the National Portrait Gallery has an exhibition Gay Icons and related events all celebrating the notion of gay iconic. Sandi Toksvig explains in a Guardian article she hopes the exhibition will “..give courage to those people who still struggle with their sexuality. It might make people feel better about themselves and it might make other people rethink their perceptions of gay life.”

I will be chairing the panel Fade to Black on 9th August 15.00 – 17.15 at the National Portrait Gallery.  On the panel will be film director Pratibha Parmar, writer Andrea Stuart and performer Maria Rosa Young after the screening of Cheryl Dunye’s The Watermelon Woman.

My icons were not about making me feel better about being gay as Sandi recommends. I loved the people listed here because they appeared deviant, quirky, trashy, transgressive or were just plain ornery.

1. Lena Horne – She got married dressed entirely in black. How recalcitrant is that?  Here she sings Stormy Weather from the movie of the same name.
2. Sylvester – An African American man who was not afraid to sing in falsetto and wear make up and fabulous costumes and look like a girl. Here he sings You Make me Feel Mighty Real. I defy anyone to stay still while this is playing!
3. Nina Simone – civil rights activist, Pan Africanist and fierce diva. I had the pleasure of seeing her perform. After throwing her usual tantrums she settled down into a goosebump raising gig. Nina Simone Performs I Put a Spell on You live in 1992.
4. Liberace - The Daily Mirror columnist “Cassandra”!!!(William Connor) described Liberace as “a deadly, winking, sniggering, snuggling, chromium-plated, scent-impregnated, luminous, quivering, giggling, fruit-flavored, mincing, ice-covered heap of mother love.” 1950′s code for er.. gay. Liberace sued the Daily Mirror for libel and won! Ha!
5. Anna Nicole Smith – didn’t fair as well in the courts. In May of 1994, Maria Antonia Cerrato who was Smith’s housekeeper/nanny, sued her for $2 million, charging sexual assault and sexual harassment. Anna Nicole Smith lost and filed for bankruptcy. Anna Nicole Smith sings My Heart Belongs to Daddy badly, but looking fabulous.
6. Marilyn Monroe – The original and much imitated blonde bombshell. She was smart, witty and only wore Channel No. 5 in bed, even when bleeding much to the consternation of her maids. Marilyn Monroe being interviewed  in the Person to Person program about her own production company.
7. Grace  Jones - Jamaican artist and performer who remains androgynous, fierce and raw. I love the fact that she has never forgotten her Jamaican roots and pushes the boundaries of how an African descent woman can ‘perform’ sexy in the music industry.  Pull up to the Bumper is still rude. No? OK it’s really about cars.
8. Beth Ditto – out, loud, proud, fat  femme lesbian who is into butch dykes and is not afraid to say so on every occasion.  Writes her own songs too. Bet somehow she doesn’t end up being sectioned. Just sayn! Beth Ditto talks about bullying.
9. Marlon Brando – just loved his beautiful sensuous face, animal sexuality, surly ways and politics. I think he must have really, really,  worked out for A Streetcar Named Desire judging from how he looked before and after this role.
10. Derek Jarman – Any gay person who can get funding to make an homerotic film entirely in Latin and then have it shown on TV back in the day deserves just iconic status. Sebastiane was made in 1976!

So who are your gay icons?