"Angels in America": A tearjerker about AIDS, Mormon angels, and some 1950s guy. With dicks and butts to keep your spirits up

 

Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes, won numerous awards during its run at the Mark Taper Forum and then on Broadway.  I saw it in 1997.  Well, the first 300 hours, anyway -- it's divided into two parts, Millenial Approaches and Perestroika, each requiring superhuman endurance and thinking about butts and cocks to sit through.  

Very, very depressing: people dying have never been my idea of entertainment, and this dude is dying of AIDS, very slowly, with all of the symptoms displayed in graphic detail.  Meanwhile he thinks he's a Mormon prophet and turns straight, having sex with a female angel with multiple breasts and vaginas, and this guy named Roy Cohn is dying of AIDS, too, and an elderly lady in a 1950s outfit is comforting him although she hates him.

Are we supposed to recognize these people?

Plus the names are bizarre and off-putting, and you never know what's really happening and what's an AIDS fever dream, and people are dying.  Help!

Ok, very slowly, let's try to get through this mishmash of obscure history, with illustrations of actors from the tv miniseries that appeared in 2003:

Part 1: Millenial Approaches. Not the year 2000, the 1000 year reign of Christ on Earth.

1. New York, of course, in the 1980s. the Jewish Louis, played by Ben Shenkman, discovers that his Mormon boyfriend Prior -- prior to what? --  has AIDS, and dumps him.

Prior is played by Justin Kirk, top two photos.  He will have delusions of becoming a Mormon prophet.

2. Prior is comforted in the hospital by an ex-drag queen nurse named Belize.

3. Meanwhile, Joe Pitt (Patrick Wilson, butt and dick left), conservative Republican Mormon politician in Boyfriend Louis's office, becomes interested in him, which causes friction with his crazy wife and conservative mother, and causes him to dream about meeting Prophet Prior. 

Republican Joe comes out to his mom, who travels to New York to coddle him, and to his wife, who flees from the house and believes that she is in Antartica.  Then he starts dating Boyfriend Louis.

4. Joe's boss is Roy Cohn.  Yes, that Roy Cohn, played by Al Pacino.  I had never heard of him at the time, but he was one of the instigators of the Red Scare in the 1950s.  He was gay in real life, but closeted and homophobic. 

In the play, he  claims that he is dying of liver cancer, but actually it's AIDS.  

The elderly lady who is comforting him, although she hates him, is Ethel Rosenberg.  In 1953, Roy prosecuted Ethel and her husband Julius as Soviet spies, and got them the death penalty.  They were widely presumed innocent, being railroaded because they were Jewish. 

5. Prophet Prior has a lot of disturbing fever dreams.  He meets his ancestors, also named Prior, and a Mormon angel with several breasts and vaginas, who has sex with him and tells him to prepare for the Great Work.

Left: Simon Callow, one of the prior Priors

The first play ends there.  Sort of a cliff hanger, innit?

Perestroika after the break

Marcus Adair: finance major, stuntman, bodybuilder, Jabari warrior, nude model (probably)

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Gemstones Future Memes: a gay resort, dog cousin's night, a nude wedding, a demon in the sack, and "Who dreamed it?"

This is a series of memes -- jokes -- featuring Kelvin and Keefe of The Righteous Gemstones and a few random hunks.  Most don't require you to have any background knowledge of the show.

1. Random nude dude

2.  The Nude Dude Review

Link to the full story

Kelvin: Coming to this gay resort was a good idea.  Keefe's going to be sorry that he missed the Nude Dude Review.  I wonder where he went.

Keefe: Threw my back out in the sauna....I knew it didn't bend that way.  Must get to Kelvin...missing the Nude Dude Review...must see dicks.

3. In French class we called them "false friends"

At a conference in Montreal, Kelvin discovers too late that Le Spectacle des Trainées does not feature hot male interns.

4. Best dog friend of a cousin

Keefe: We have to bring him to Cousin Night, Kelvin.  He's the best dog friend of a cousin.

For this one, you need to know that Kelvin started to call Keefe his boyfriend, then chickened out and said "best...dude.. .friend of a cousin"

5.  Doubtful, but you never know.

Kelvin: Keefe is a good teacher.  He's done everything: oral, anal top, anal bottom...

BJ: Anything with...

Kelvin: 69, frottage, split roasting, intefemoral...

BJ: Anything with...

Keefe: Bondage, S&M, CBT, WS, Princeton Rub...

BJ: Anything with women?

Kelvin: Gross!  No, of course not!

6. Intermission

More after the break

Ryan Pinkston: Hottest of the Short Guy Brigade, martial artist, gigolo, gay cop. With some costar dicks

 

I've never been interested in tall guys; I like them short, the shorter the better, and in the 2000s, the 5'4" Ryan Pinkston was one of the hottest of the Short Guy Brigade

Born in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of Washington DC, Ryan got his start in martial arts: he received his black belt in Wushu Kung Fu at age nine and went on to championships in karate, kung fu, and tae kwan do.

An interview on the Jenny Jones talk show landed him an agent, and within a month he had roles in Spy Kids: 3D (2003) and Bad Santa (2003), and he was helping Austin Kutcher play celebrity pranks on Punked.

But there was a problem.  Although handsome, muscular -- and short -- Ryan was typecast as an aggressive wise guy, basically a jerk. So that's the sort of role he received

In 2004, the 16-year old got his own tv series, Quintuplets, about teenage quintuplets with conflicting personalities.  His Patton was pushy and aggressive; brother Parker (Jake McDorman, left) was the athlete, and Pearce (Johnny K. Lewis, below) was the nerd, who actually danced with another boy in a "prom" episode.

Left: Johnny K. Lewis today

Next came the boorish Felch in Revenge of the Nerds (2006), chronic liar Sam Leonard in Full of It (2007), and Fletcher in the homophobic College (2008), which paradoxically offered an extensive homoerotic subtext.

Ryan's guest spots on the teencoms Out of Jimmy's Head and Hannah Montana were a little better, jerks with a soft, sensitive side.

But then he hit the bottom of the barrel: teen sex comedies. Foreign Exchange (2008), Extreme Movie (2008) with Frankie Muniz, Adventures in Online Dating (2009).

At least he had no problem with shirtless, shower, and swimsuit shots, though he drew the line at nudity.  And he was ok with rolling around with other guys naked.  Teens could sigh over the homoerotic subtexts even if they didn't like his characters.
 
But then, in 2010, something remarkable happened: a complete turnaround.  Ryan's characters changed from jerks to nice guys, and coincidentally some buddy-bonding was added to the girl-crazy schtick.

Boy Band (2010): in 1982, his Greg buddy-bonds with Brad (Michael Copon) to form the first boy band in history.

Tower Prep (2010), about a school for kids with paranormal powers: his Gabe has a crush on Ian Archer (Drew Van Acker).

Cougars, Inc. (2011): his Jimmy and best friend Sam (Kyle Gallner) can't afford college tuition, so start an escort service pairing older women with teenage boys.  Hey, is that legal? Of course, they get in on the action, too.  We get a nice shot of Ryan's butt as the camera lingers on his supine body, but this only nudity in any movie.

Frontal nudity after the break

Young Rock Episode 2.12: Dwayne calls out a bully, works on his bluster, and offends his boyfr...I mean buddy. With bonus Crane cock

 Young Rock (2021-23), about the early years of "The Rock," Dwayne Johnson,is one of my favorite comedies: an insider view of the 1990s pro wrestling subculture, a deliberate gay subtext between the modern-day Rock and his boyfr...best friend Randall Park, a near-absence of heterosexual romance, and endless vistas of locker room beefcake.  I reviewed "You Gotta Get Down to Get Up," Episode 2.12 of Young Rock, because it stars two of my favorite actors from the old days, Sean Astin and Ryan Pinkston.

Scene 1: Randall is upset because Dwayne didn't invite him to lunch with his best friend Forest Whitaker. They're boyfr....buddies.  Shouldn't he be invited by default?  Besides, it's only 24 hours until the presidential election; shouldn't Dwayne be out there, campaigning in battleground states?  

No, Dwayne says, he always goes his own way.  A story to illustrate:

Scene 2: In 1996, Dwayne is getting some wrestling experience in Memphis, living with his buddy Downtown Bruno, Ryan Pinkston, in a decrepit trailer with no ceiling.

Bruno is down on his luck.  He moved from playing a heel, Dr. Harvey Winkelman, to managing heels, but now he is just a referee for Jerry "The King" Lawler, Michael Strassner.

They discuss Dwayne's ring name.  Since his dad was Rocky, maybe Rocky Junior?  His family suggests Little Chief, his friends the Wild Half-Samoan.

Scene 3: In the locker room, Dwayne has been booked on a tag team, but they still need his name. He says "Flex Kavana."  

Back in 2034, Randall is surprised that it wasn't the Rock right away. No, Flex, because he's muscular, and Kavana, because it sounds Polynesian.

His tag team partner, Brian Lawler, played by Marcus Molyneaux, approaches. They knew each other as kids: Brian used to set up rings for Dwayne's Dad.  He's hot now,  so his ring name is Too Sexy Brian.    

They film one of those bragging promos, but Dwayne flubs it by saying "We're naughty by nature but violent by decision."

More after the break. Caution: explicit

Simon Rex: From gay-ish porn to homophobic comedy to gay necrophilia to Bupkis

I don't know who Simon Rex is, except that he starred in Down Low, a Netflix bait-and-switch movie where everybody dies, and maybe Jackass?  But seeing or hearing his name gives me a vaguely disquieting, uncomfortable sensation, as if there's something wrong about him.  Let's do some research to find out why. 

Wikipedia gives a full, lenthy biography.  Born in San Francisco in 1974, started out modeling nude and wanking in four gay porn videos -- not having sex with any guys, just wanking.  Wikipedia mentions his girlfriend right off to assure readers that it's ok, he's straight, he never did any actual gay stuff.

Maybe that's where the disquiet comes from -- reading articles that mention his "disreputable" and "sleazy" past, without specifying that it's just some j/o videos.

He's not bad looking here. 

Modeling gigs for Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfinger followed.

In 1995, at age 21, Simon became a VJ, like a disc jockey for videos, on MTV.  He says that this  made him a household name, "because I was on tv every day from 3-4."  Prime after-school time.

  

The VJ gig lasted for only two years, but it pushed Simon into a movie career:

He played "Slab O' Beef" in Shriek if You Know What I did Last Friday the 13th.

George Logan, a rapper/ women's boxing promoter in Scary Movie 3 and 4.  He commits suicide by overdosing on Viagra and jumping off a  balcony.  Also, there's a lot of homophobic rhetoric.

National Lampoon's Pledge This  is about the breasts of college girls. Simon plays Derek, who dumps one college girl with breasts when he falls in love with another.  A review notes that it presents lesbians as sexual predators and gay men as easily turned straight by the right pair of breasts.

I'm getting an idea of the reason for the disquiet.

His days of frontal nudity far behind, Simon rarely even took his shirt off. Here's one of the few examples, in Boy Toy, 2011. 

The title is misleading: it's not a gay movie.  It's about an unsuccessful but well hung underwear model who tries a new career as a gigolo. No, we don't see his dick.

2020s dick after the break. Warning: explicit.

Gangs of London: A gay assassin, his boyfriend, a gay mafia son, some sex parties, and a lot of violence and dicks

 

In dramas about crime families, the youngest son is traditionally gay -- think Deran in Animal Kingdom, Ian in Shameless, and Kelvin in The Righteous Gemstones.  So I'm reviewing the first episode of Gangs of London, on Netflix, to see if the traditionl continues.

Scene 1: An upside-down view of a cityscape.  Telling us that this is an alternate world?  No, it's a guy hanging upside down from a tall building, crying and begging Sean (Joe Cole, left) not to kill him.  But he says "What choice do I have?", douses him with gasoline and sets him on fire.  Soon the rope snaps, and the burning body falls. Kind of an overkill.

Scene 2: Irish Traveler Darren (Aled ap Stefan), who apparently works as a hit man, gets a new assignment -- "nobody, just some pedo," and invites his Buddy ( Darren Evans) along.  They park, and Darren goes up the stairs to an apartment, where he waits to shoot the guy.

Downstairs, the Buddy has trouble from a group of toughs.  Then Finn Wallace arrives!  The hit is on the head of the biggest, most important, most brutal crime family in London!  He tries to call Darren, tell him to cancel the job, he's not who they said,  but it's too late, Finn Wallace goes upstairs, and Darren shoots him.

Meanwhile, his Driver Jack ( Emmet J. Scanlan) is terrorizing the Buddy.  When he hears the shot, he runs to the car for his gun.  All the Buddy can think to do is run him over. 

Scene 3: While Darren soaks in a tub, being horrified, the family gathers for the funeral.  

We meet Family Advisor Alex (Paapa Essidue) and a little boy named Danny, who may grow up into a main character.  The costumes seem a little quaint, so I'm thinking that this is all a flashback

They watch the guests arriving, wondering if any of them ordered the hit.

Scene 4: Sons Billy and Sean (Brian Vernel, Joe Cole) play Dad's favorite song, "Suzy Q," so loud that everyone is disturbed.  

We saw Sean being brutal in Scene 1.  Billy is the gay one, and a recovering heroin addict, naturally.  

Left: Horror Hunks claims that this is Brian Vernel, but the one in Gangs of London is younger, with black hair

Family Advisor Alex advises them to not look for the killer, or they'd have a war on their hands.

More dicks after the break

"English Teacher": Gay teacher, his ex-boyfriend, and his homophobic buddy face woke culture and get naked

I spent the worst year of my life teaching English at Homophobe State University in Hell, aka a far northern suburb of Houston, Texas. The minute I submitted the last of the final grades, I got in my car and drove nonstop until that blessed "You are now leaving Hell" sign was receding into the distance.

So the new Hulu series, English Teacher, about an English teacher in small town Hell...I mean Texas...piqued my interest.  I could relive how hideously horrible it was, from the safe distance of my living room a thousand miles away.

Score -- none of the promotional materials let on, but this English teacher, Evan, played by Brian Jordan Alvarez,  is gay.  Let the rampant homophobia begin.

Left: the worst place in the world

And Brian Jordan Alvarez's cock, to take your mind off the horror.

Wait -- in English Teacher, everyone knows that Evan is gay.  Not a problem.  The problem is, he's kind of a jerk.

The much more woke students want to cancel him, for instance, because he said that he couldn't understand why lesbians aren't attracted to men.  Lots of people aren't attracted to men, idjit!

In the first episode, a parent wants him fired, claiming that he turned her kid gay by kissing his then-boyfriend and current hookup, played by Jordan Firstman, in front of the class. 

Left: Jordan's dick.

More after the break