Sunday, April 30, 2017

Speedo Sunday


One more shot of the ginger Ninja HERE.


Friday, April 28, 2017

On the Rag, Vol. 455

A weekly look at what's making news in the gay mags:



Get Out!: Meet the drama queens of "Fire Island"


Winq (U.K.): Doctors in the 1980s thought poppers might be causing AIDS. Now they (really) think they're increasing the risk of cancer in older gay men 


DNA (Australia): Meet Insta-stud Alex Cypriano, who seems to hate clothing


Metro Weekly (D.C.): Thirty years ago, Jeremiah Tower forged the celebrity chef culture that pervades today's society. A new documentary celebrates the life of the playful, irascible perfectionist.


Gay Times: Get a 360 view inside these half-naked rugby players’ locker room


Why Siobhan’s return to Bananarama completes the bunch


QX (London): This week, they've got cover boy Marcos Santos! Plus, how to survive in London on 50 quid a week!


Out in Jersey: Where are the gay beaches in New Jersey?


Passport: Exploring Sri Lanka and the Maldives


Outlook Ohio: Are you ready for Columbus Pride?


The Gay U.K.: Former O-Town member Ashley Parker is all grown up ...


Q Salt Lake Magazine: South Salt Lake Police seeking driver of Chevy Sonic in murder case


Lavender (Twin Cities): The sports and fitness issue is out now


Attractive Men: Find out about the best and worst foods for your skin


Attitude (U.K.): Todrick Hall leads the LGBT fightback in the May issue 


HIV Plus: Even short-term use of steroids can be risky


Edge Media: Democrats reboot effort for national ban on gay-conversion therapy


Têtu (France): The moving homage by the hubby of Xavier Jugelé, the policeman killed on the Champs-Elysées


MetroSource: "How to Survive a Plague": AIDS and hard lessons learned

Song of the Day: 'Anymore' by Goldfrapp


Damian scored some last-minute Goldfrapp tickets last night. I'll let you know how the show was when I wake up!

Morning Wood


Page 1 Roundup (04/28)


The New York Post: Man fatally stabs teen at Internet cafe, goes right back to computer game: cops


The Daily News: William Tolley’s 8-year-old daughter wears his hat to honor lost FDNY hero at funeral


The New York Times: Who are they kidding? The deficit only matters when Democrats are in power


The Wall Street Journal: A Miracle at the World’s Largest Church: People Are Showing Up

Thursday, April 27, 2017

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!


Hey, everybody!

We would like to invite you to take a new survey about your opinions and preferences, from an LGBT perspective. There's power in our Pride! Participating in this study helps open doors-and minds-around the world, and influences positive changes for our community. Previous surveys have yielded 45,000 respondents from 150 countries! You may have seen Community Marketing & Insights quoted in the New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, etc. 

Click HERE to start the survey, or paste the following into your browser: 


It should take 10-12 minutes to complete. 

Everyone who completes the survey by May 15th, 2017 may opt to be entered into a drawing to win one of twenty US $50 cash prizes, or if you win, you can designate a charity to receive the $50.

Please forward this message to LGBT friends around the world who may be interested in participating. And please post it to your Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts!

Many thanks from the (212)!
xo

These (Gay TV) Friends of Mine


USA Today takes a fun look at gay sitcom characters both before and after "Ellen." Read HERE.

Coffee Stalk


Someone's ready to ASSUME the position!

Caitlyn Jenner's on Sale


They're practically giving away tickets, but if I wanted to listen to a crazy old lady who thinks Obama was born in Kenya speak, I'd just go to my parents' retirement community in Arizona.


Song of the Day: 'Ticket to the Tropics' by Cristina

I blogged about the sexy post-punk singer back in 2011, but I couldn't find the video for this MTV favorite ... until now! Cristina, the daughter of a French psychoanalyst and an American illustrator-novelist-playwright, was described by one blogger as Lydia Lunch "if Lydia were a debutante," whose lyrics are "bitchy, aloof and hilarious." (Her second album opens with the pulsating "Don't Mutilate My Mink"!) Cristina was a Harvard drop-out who was writing for the Village Voice when she met and married a wealthy British retailing heir who had recently started ZE Records. The cynical "Disco Clone" was her (and the label's) first single, which led to two classic albums -- one produced by August Darnell (aka Kid Creole) and one ("Sleep It Off") by Don Was. After her second album bombed -- the LP was such a commercial failure, in fact, that the sleeve designer ended up reusing the concept for Grace Jones' "Slave to the Rhythm" -- she retired to domestic life in Texas before divorcing and returning to Manhattan. TimeOut New York reported in 2004 that she is battling a "debilitating illness," but I'm not sure what her status is today. 


The long-lost video, above.

 

Although she was a gifted songwriter, her covers certainly didn't go unnoticed, like this deadpan version of "Drive My Car" by the Beatles ...


And her downtown take on this Peggy Lee classic -- with a rare-for-its-era same-sex twist and a romance that makes "He Hit Me (and It Felt Like a Kiss)" sound like a nursery rhyme -- is also worth a listen. In fact, songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller were so furious when the original lyrics of their 1969 Grammy-winner were changed this way, they had an injunction against the recording that lasted for 24 years.



One reviewer wrote “If Jackie Kennedy had made a record, it would sound like this.” 

Morning Wood


Page 1 Roundup (04/27)


The New York Post: Are you ready for more trickle-up economics?


Michael Mantenuto, an actor and hockey player who starred in Disney’s 2004 film “Miracle,” was found dead of a self-inflicted gun wound. He was 35.


The Daily News: City still pays full salaries to two teachers in jail for crimes against students as NYC fails to fire bad educators 


The New York Times: Who stands to gain the most by Trump's tax plan? Trump.


The Wall Street Journal: It’s Prom Time! Don’t Forget to Read the 21-Page Rulebook

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

Madonna's Trump Card?



The Material Girl's taking exception to one of her direct quotes in a script for a biopic about her reminds me of some other big New York City personality who was a lot more fun in the 1980s ...
[Elyse] Holland’s script had Madonna telling Dick Clark, “I was born in Detroit, and I’m a famed high school dropout.” 
In her [Instagram] caption, Madonna called out Hollander for the line, writing, “I was born in Bay City Not Detroit. And i did not drop out of high school in fact I went to University Of.Michigan. Why would Universal Studios want to make a movie about me based on a script that is all lies??” The caption goes on to say: "The Writer Elyse Hollander should write for the Tabloids. Anyone who supports this film is supporting lies and exploitation. Lies have no legs!!” 
Madonna was, of course, born in Bay City, Michigan, and she didn’t drop out of high school. In fact, according to Biography.com, she graduated a semester early and was a straight-A student. The only thing is, Hollander’s script borrows from that 1984 “American Bandstand” appearance, where the queen of pop definitely told Clark she was born in Detroit and was a high school dropout, even though those things aren’t true. It’s pretty much word-for-word what she said. 
And how do we know this? Well, the internet is a wonderful place filled with old clips, like this one:

I feel like most of Madonna's problems could be avoided if she'd just stay off social media. (Please tell me she isn't on Snapchat!)  I'm certain this film's commission would have been a one-day story if she'd not erroneously complained about it -- now she's coming across as humorless and thin-skinned. (She sure knew how to poke fun at herself with Dick Clark.) I get that she feels vulnerable right now, but hasn't 35 years in the spotlight prepared her for anything? Or is her real fear that nobody will give two shits about this movie -- as opposed to "Coal Miner's Daughter," "What's Love Got to Do With It?," "8 Mile," "I'm Not There" and "Straight Outta Compton," which were widely embraced -- and that its potentially bombing would somehow reflect poorly on her? (How the public reacts to biopics has very little to do with the subject, in my opinion.) 


UPDATE: It looks like even she had the good sense to delete the rant. But then she followed it up with an equally puerile post that also reeks of the Cheeto in chief, attacking the very people she is tacitly admitting quoted her correctly. Sad!!!

Rupert Says Relax


The Wall Street Journal has tips for men on how to not get stressed out by your company's casual dress code. Read HERE.

Inmate Believes Hernandez Left Him a Note, Gifted Him $47,000 Watch


I'm still not 100% convinced of the "jailhouse lover" angle. But I do find it curious that Aaron Hernandez's lawyer swears up and down that one of the suicide notes wasn't for "close friend" Kyle Kennedy when everything suggests it was.


Attorney Larry Army Jr. told reporters that he believes Aaron Hernandez left a suicide note for his client and intended to leave the man a substantial gift. Army said Monday that his client, inmate Kyle Kennedy, believes he was the intended recipient of one of Hernandez's three suicide notes. However, Army has declined to describe the relationship between Kennedy and Hernandez.

"My client does firmly believe that one of the letters was written to him," Army said. "My client believes that, based on the closeness of the relationship that he and Aaron Hernandez had, there would be nobody else that he would have written to."

Army also asserted that Hernandez intended to leave a $47,000 watch to his client. The attorney displayed a photo of Hernandez in which Army said the watch was visible.


"Aaron Hernandez has told my client he was giving him this watch," Army said.

David Wedge, a spokesman for Kennedy's attorney, said Wednesday the two inmates at the maximum security the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley, Massachusetts, had asked to be cellmates last September. He said the request initially was approved, but then denied.


Army told reporters that Hernandez and Kennedy were friends and that Hernandez had written to Kennedy's family, but said that additional information about the relationship between the two inmates will come directly from Kennedy at a later date.

Hernandez's attorney has vehemently denied that any of the letters were intended for Kennedy.

"I am reaffirming, unequivocally, no such letter to Mr. Kennedy, or any other individual, in our out of prison, exists," Jose Baez wrote in a statement. Baez also suggested that "malicious" rumors about the relationship are being "used to tarnish someone who is dead."

Jonathan Demme, Oscar-Winning Director, Is Dead at 73


Fellow John Sayles actually referenced the battle over "Swing Shift" at the Quad on Sunday.

Sad to read about the passing of Jonathan Demme, one of the generation's most eclectic writers and directors. Although he's best known for "The Silence of the Lambs," for which he won an Academy Award, it was a pair of his earlier films that I will always love. The Goldie Hawn-Kurt Russell wartime romance "Swing Shift" was the first, which ironically Demme wanted his name removed from after Hawn demanded a more lighthearted re-cut to be done, which she got. (I'd love to see the bootleg Demme version.) But even better was "Something Wild," which certainly made up for the missing darkness in "Swing Shift," and ranks as one of my favorite films of the 1980s. RIP.


Wrestle Wednesday


Reminds me a little of my favorite Olympic wrestler.

Empire Diner Re-Re-Re-Reopens


Have always adored the landmark West Chelsea building, but the food at the Empire Diner has always been as lacking as it's been overpriced. Sounds like the people behind Cafeteria -- which I also don't get excited about -- are giving the joint yet another makeover. Here's hoping the fourth time's the charm. 


Previously: 

  • Empire Diner: Now and Then 

  • New York's Disappearing Diners

  • Empire Diner Reboot Closing After Less Than Two Years

  • Another One Bites the Dust

  • The Empire Strikes Back ... Yet Again

  • The Empire Diner Strikes Back ... Again

  • Remembering the Empire Diner

  • The Empire Strikes Back!

  • Empire State of Mind




  • Super 'Stache!


    Henry Cavill's sexy mustache is just one of the perks of following him on Instagram!