We got up at about 9:30 and MMMMMMMM, and it was an MMMMMMMMMMmer. Whew. We had “sausage biscuits” with cheddarbrats on rolls. Yummy.
Robert brought his television and VCR in and we watched Boys in the Band. What an amazingly gay movie. I totally enjoyed it.
“The Boys in the Band is not a musical” read the film’s original advertisements. Because it adheres so slavishly to Mart Crowley’s original stage play, Boys in the Band isn’t really a movie, either, but this doesn’t adversely affect its dramatic intensity.
The film is set in the apartment of Michael (Kenneth Nelson), a homosexual who holds a birthday party for his friend Harold (Leonard Frey). As Michael and his gay buddies prepare for Harold’s arrival, Michael’s old college chum Alan (Peter White) makes a surprise appearance. Alan is straight, so Michael tells the revelers to watch their step.
Alan’s uptight reaction to “flamer” Emory (Cliff Gorman) foments a confrontation. The embittered Michael tries to prove that Alan is a latent homosexual by staging a perverse game in which all the partygoers are required to declare their affections for the persons that they love the most. As it turns out, the person most injured by this game is Michael himself, who is incapable of loving anyone.
As the first major-studio production to deal frankly with homosexuality, Boys in the Band created a stir in 1970; when seen today, the play’s contrivances, stock characters and lapses in logic are more apparent than they were 25 years ago (everyone obeys Michael when he orders them to stay in his apartment until his sadistic game is over; in “real life,” the joint would be empty in fifteen seconds). Contrary to standard Hollywood policy, every member of the original Broadway cast appears in the film, including Lawrence Luckinbill as an out-of-the-closet husband and father.
I met Joe at Flex at 6:00 for free pool. We played so many games. Doug and a friend of his named Robert came a little later, as did Michael M. and Andre. We played some games of doubles, some singles, just a lot of games.
The Karaoke Idol competition finals were tonight, but we weren’t so impressed that we even paid any attention to them. We didn’t even vote on the final three. We were just waiting for them to be done so Joe could sing his song, which he finally did, and was cheered on by all.
I left there between 11:30 and 12:00.