'Next Stop,' Streaming?

I finally got to see Paul Mazursky’s hard-to-find “Next Stop, Greenwich Village” (1976), a film I first learned about decades ago from a poster hanging in my quasi-local pub (Julius’), where scenes from it were filmed. 

I thoroughly enjoyed it. Shelley Winters is sublime as the overprotective mother who’s absolutely beside herself because her adult son is moving a whopping 12 miles(!) away from home and might have had sex(!); Antonio Fargas, whom I grew up watching as Huggy Bear on my brother Bill’s beloved “Starsky & Hutch,” is notable for playing a 1950s gay black man; and the depiction of abortion at the time is revelatory. (Also fun to see mid-70s NYC dressed up as the mid-50s!)

Lenny Baker is sympathetic as our aspiring-actor protagonist -- although I could have done without the domestic violence scene that seemed to depict the victim as almost feeling as though she deserved it. (It’s loosely based on Mazursky’s life, so I fear to think how accurate that part was.)

Was also taken aback to read afterward that Baker died in 1982 at just 37, which as a gay man who was alive at that time immediately got my mind racing. Come to find out I am not the first, with Wikipedia including this tidbit about his demise:

Decades after Baker's death, commentator David Ehrenstein incorrectly speculated in LA Weekly that Baker had suffered from AIDS, then known as "gay-related immune deficiency" (GRID), for approximately two years before his death.

There is no reliable source to confirm that his illness was HIV-related, and HIV is not mentioned anywhere in Baker's death certificate. He died on April 12, 1982, at the Community Hospital of South Broward in Hallandale Beach, Florida.

Hmm. The entry doth protest too much, methinks. Pretty sure the human immunodeficiency virus wasn’t isolated  until the following year, so don’t think it could have been mentioned. (Don’t let anyone tell you shame doesn’t still exist around this disease.)

A big thank-you to the person who uploaded the film to YouTube four months ago. The music is occasionally muted to avoid copyright removal, but it’s still decent otherwise. Look for it before it gets taken down. (It’s not streaming anywhere -- I was more than happy to pay.) 

 (UPDATE: A friend found another upload with the music intact HERE.)

Julius's remembers one of its own

And last but not least, condolences to the friends, family and colleagues of sweet Julius’ bartender Adan Garcia, whose untimely death led me to the film on this rainy afternoon. May he rest in peace. 🙏

On Jan. 19, 2017, we toasted President Barack Obama for all he had done for LGBT Americans.

Read the 2003 L.A. Weekly article HERE.