Nick Stahl: A career of playing scarred, traumatized teens, with being gay as one of the traumas. Plus zombies, DeKay dick, and a glory hole

 In the summer of 2001, everybody in the East Village was talking about Bully, starring 22-year old Nick Stahl.  The South Florida teenager beats his friend Marty (Brad Renfro) until he is unconscious, sexually assaults him, and humiliates him by forcing him to become an entertainer in a gay bar. They even make a porn video to sell at adult bookstores.

 Bobby also rapes Marty's girlfriend Ali, while forcing her to watch gay porn, and when his own girlfriend Lisa announces that she is pregnant with Marty's child, watch out!  The three friends set out to murder him, with the help of Ali's new sex buddy (Michael Pitt).

It was not a pretty movie -- girl parts outnumber boy parts ten to one, and the gay world is portrayed as unfailingly sordid and decadent.  Nevertheless, every gay magazine -- In Touch, XY, The Advocate -- gave it a favorable review as a cautionary tale about the effects of internalized homophobia.  If only Bobby had the guts to come out...

Nick was born in Harlingen, Texas, in 1979 (Texas...ugh!), moved to L.A. in 1992, and was cast in a few small roles before his big break, playing opposite the then-famous Mel Gibson in The Man Without a Face (1993).  The Man and the boy are both gay in the original novel by Isabelle Holland, but straight in the movie.

My Son is Innocent (1996), Eye of God (1997), Promised Land (1997), and Disturbing Behavior (1998) cast Nick as scarred, traumatized, victimized, violent teenagers, leading to Bully.  Afterwards he did a horror movie (Taboo, 2002) and a true crime (Bookies, 2003), but found himself being schtupped by manipulative older women ( In the Bedroom), having sex with men but denying being gay (Twist), or raping and murdering young girls (Sin City). Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) must have come as a welcome relief.

In the Terminator mythos, John Connor manages to save the human world after it is destroyed by a sentient internet, so Arnold Schwarzenegger is sent back in time (naked) to kill him.  In T3, he returns (naked) as an ally, to protect young adult John and his future wife Kate (who is unfortunately engaged to someone else). 

Nick was the second actor to play John Connor.  There have been several others, including Thomas Dekker (left) and Christian Bale.

Carnivale (2023-25) features paranormal beings working in a carnival during the Dust Bowl of Depression-era Oklahoma.  Nick plays Ben Hawkins, a farmer, chain gang fugitive, and healer who joins the carnival and eventually becomes an Avatar of Light.  He's heterosexual, but one of his girlfriends, Sofie, is a lesbian.

Tim DeKay (left) plays Jonesy, who runs the ferris wheel, and Michael J. Anderson, the backwards-talking dwarf on Twin Peaks, his boss, Samson.

More after the break.  Caution: Explicit.

Angel Mock Curiel: LGBTQ and Latinx roles culminate in Lil Pappi on "Pose." Not much after except nude modeling and Denver.

It's the late 1980s in Manhattan, the era of Reaganomics, Tough on Crime, and the AIDS crisis.  It's cold outside.  Especially if you're poor, a racial minority, and femme, trans, or gay: "the world hates you.  When you die, it breathes a sigh of relief."

All you have is a "house," a family of choice with a "mother" and her children.  And ballroom.

 Pose (2018-21) is set in the ballroom subculture, where African-American and Latinx trans women, drag queens, and occasionally gay men "posed,"modeled, house against house in the quest for realness.  Some brought home gigantic trophies, and became legends. 

Li'l Papi (Angel Bismark Curiel) was living on the streets, surving through drug sales and hustling  (he preferred women, but accepted male clients).  After stumbling upon the ballroom subculture, he was entranced, and petitioned Blanca of House Evangelista to "adopt" him, even though he wasn't gay or trans.  She agreed, with the rule that he stop dealing, and pose occasionally as a muscleman. 

In Season 2, Li'l Papi starts dating Angel (Indya Moore), a sex worker whose previous plot arc involved an affair with a married man (Evan Peters).  After various arguments and breakup-reconciliations, they get married.  He opens a talent agency specializing in LGBTQ models, with Angel as his top client.  They have a happy ending (sort of), a welcome relief in a show that too often emphasized people being rejected by family, murdered, or dying of AIDS.

 This was Angel's first exposure to trans people.  In an interview with Attitude, he notes that he grew up in a "very cis, very heteronormative, very rough" Afro-Dominican community in Little Liberty, Miami.  He was bullied for being short and artistic, and for having asthma, and escaped into the world of the theater.  At the Miami Arts Charter School, he performed in The Rose Tattoo, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Jesus Hopping the A Train,and upon graduating in 2013, he enrolled at Pace University in New York as a drama major.

He dropped out in 2015 due to inancial problems, was homeless for awhile, survived anyway he could (he doesn't specify, but I imagine that hustling was one of his survival jobs), and finally found a job in a hotel.  But he still auditioned, and in 2016 landed his first on-screen role in America Adrift.  He played a middle-class teenager on Long Island who drifts into heroin addiction and drug dealing.

And loses his clothes.

Davi Santos, who is gay in real life, played his older brother, giving Angel his first close contact with LGBTQ people.  

Next came the short Louie's Brother Peter (2017).  Peter (Andrew McLarty) has Asperger's Syndrome, but that doesn't stop him from helping his brother with the drug deliveries.  Angel plays Zeke, one of their customers.

Andew McLarty is gay in real life.  .

Night Comes On (2018) is a "slow, painful, grim" indie drama about an African-American, lesbian girl nameed Angel, who is released from juvenile detention at age 18 with no money and no place to stay.  She gets a girlfriend, tries to find social connections, and seeks out her father to punish him murdering her mother.  Dad is played by John Earl Jelks, who often plays gay characters

You're pushing up the LGBTQ representation, Angel buddy

Our Angel played a store clerk. 

Monsters and Men (2018) is not about James Whale and the Frankenstein movie - that's Gods and Monsters.  It's about an incident where six police officers corner a black man and "accidentally" kill him during an arrest.

You're pushing up the Black/Latinx representation, too.

When Angel saw the casting call for L'il Pappi, he thought, "That's me!  Those are my experiences!"  He got the part, and since he had so little exposure to trans people, tried to educate himself, hang out with them, ask about their lives -- and he ended up in a relationship with producer/writer Janet Mock, an African-American transwoman -- while she was still married to her husband.  She is the one who suggested expanding Papi's role by giving him a romance with Angel Evangelista.

Pose turned out to be the high point of Angel's acting career.  He was starring in a popular tv series, but more importantly, he  had found a community.  

More after the break

Gemstones Episode 4.7: Pontius and Kelvin have their nards threatened, Teenjus meets the Devil, and Jordanians show their junk

 

Title: "For jealousy is the rage of a man," Proverbs 6:34, KJV.  

The full verse, NIV: "For jealousy arouses a husband's fury, and he will show no mercy when he takes revenge."  Husband? I think we're going for Cobb as the Big Bad.

Left and below: Michael Sayfou, who plays Ash, Pontius' friend (and Abraham's boyfriend in my fan fiction)

The plotlines in this episode are not thematically linked, so I'll separate them by character.

Cobb's Story:  

We open with the gaping mouth of an alligator!  Various hooks, tools, skins, and Lori's ex-husband Cobb practicing boxing on a mannequin labeled "Feel the Pain."  

Lori drives up and yells "Nope!  We're not doing this again!"  She yells at him for trying to scare off every man she gets involved with.  She's probably referring to the brick through the her window and the car set on fire, but you never know.

He tries flirting with her - "You can't stay away.  Must be my animal magnetism."  But she says next time she's calling the cops. Next time?  I'd be calling the moment it happened.

Later, Cobb puts on a show at the Gator Farm. He rings a bell to signal "dinner time" to his favorite gator, the huge, ornery Big Gus.  "Gators are territorial.  Invade their territory, they'll bite you."  Uh-oh, Eli is in the audience!  The connection to Eli and Lori is too easy.  It must be a misdirection.

Cut to Cobb bagging up a toy alligator in the gift shop.  Shouldn't he have someone working during the show?   Eli approaches and explains that Lori is with him now, so "no more trouble." 

Cobb lays into him, noting that Lori has been with a lot of men since the divorce, and she was doing "sick, nasty stuff" up in Pigeon Forge.  He hands Eli a newspaper ad for her escort service: "Adult companionship -- wealthy men.  Call, click, connect.  First half hour free."

Ok, this has to be fake.  Prostitution is illegal in the U.S., so she couldn't advertise openly.  Escorts usually work from a standard client list.  You would neveer specify "wealthy men."  And what does "first half hour free" mean?  You charge by the act, not by the hour.

Cut to lunch. Eli asks Lori about the escort business ad. She claims that it's fake: "Cobb made up those ads to try to smear me."  There's not much call for 65-year old hookers in Pigeon Forge.

Eli also ran a credit check.  "You're broke.  You declared bankruptcy last year."

This makes Lori angry.  Accusing her of being a "whore," and then of being a gold-digger!  "Aimee-Leigh used to tell me how much you care about money.  I thought she was exaggerating."  She throws some money on the table to pay for her lunch and walks out. 

Kelvin's Story

Keefe arrives at Kelvin's treehouse, but the rope ladders and platforms have been pulled up, so he can't get in. 

Kelvin: "This is what cowards do.  They hide in their forts."  In what way was the round table debacle cowardice?  

Keefe points out that everyone at Prism is worried about him, but Kelvin doesn't believe it: "They're not concerned.  They just realized that I am a failure."

Tonight is the final event in the Top Christ Following Man promotion: the Night of Testimonies. "Nope, not going.  Now go away."

Cut to Keefe morosely turning off the lights at the Prism Prayer Room and puting a sign up: "No Prism today.  Maybe tomorrow or maybe another day or something."

The Monkey's Story

In the kitchen, the Monkey feeds BJ pretzels, gets him some water, and kisses him on the lips -- five or six times, yuck! -- while Judy fumes.   

Later, she is in her bathroom, primping in front of the mirror, when the Monkey starts flinging its treats at her.  Then it jumps onto her vanity and throws her makeup onto the floor.  She rushes out into the dining room to tell BJ what's happening -- he's cleaning the Monkey's butt.  Gross!  

BJ says that it's not a competition.  He loves both Judy and the Monkey.

Then he brings up Kelvin's round-table debacle: "Poor guy.  Vance Simkins is a self-righteous bigot and a homophobe."  Judy is angry with Kelvin due to his insults earlier, so she refuses the Monkey's suggestion that she visit and talk to him.

Vance's Story 

At the Cape and Pistol Society, Vance gloats: "Getting rid of Kelvin gives me a clear path to victory (in the Top Christian Man Contest).  He was the only real competition."  Plus, he enjoys hurting Kelvin, because it hurts Jesse. 

But Jesse counters that he hates Kelvin due to his insults from earlier, so "it doesn't hurt me at all.  It strengthens me."

Vance continues, evoking the Night of Testimonies: "I'm going to ruthlessly dismantle Kelvin -- if he has the nards to show."   He takes a meatball from Jesse's plate and, pretending that it is a testicle, eats it.  "Tasty."

Left: Kelvin's nards.

Gideon's Story: 

At the back entrance to the Salvation Center, Pontius and his friends, including Ash (Michael Sayfou) and Edge (Alexander Matoussian), are skateboarding and getting high on air duster spray. 

 

Jesse, Amber, and the kids arrive.  Jesse yells at him for disrespecting a sacred place, and Gideon agrees.  

Pontius: "What happened to you, man?  You used to be cool.  Now you're just like them -- a sellout.  Look how they cut your balls off."  

Jesse threatens to cut off Pontius' balls and shove them in his friends' mouths.  I'm sure they have been in his friends' mouths already.

He and his friends walk away jeering.  Jesse: "I hate Pontius so much!"

Cut to another of Gideon's inept Prayer Time Powerpoint presentations to an audience of a few oldsters. The powerpoint is on "The Lord's Divine Power."   It looks like he proved that God exists and is eternal, and that Jesus made an expiatory sacrifice -- all in 40 minutes?  And the takeaway from all that complicated theology: "Love one another." 

He concludes: "You can stay or you can go, but it's over."  Agreed.

Afterwards Amber praises the clarity of his speaking voice, but Jesse found the sermon boring.  Too much crammed in.  Make it simple.

Next Amber asks about his feud with Pontius.  "I don't know.  I tried being nice to him for a long time, but now I sort of keep my distance."  Try "love one another"?

"You need to work it out."

'But he says the most awful things to me."

"That's the problem with siblings,"  Jesse says.  "They know your weaknesses, and can fuck you right in the asshole with them."  It wouldn't be the first thing that's been in Gideon's asshole.  Seriously, why has this guy never expressed any interest in men or women since Season 1?  

Amber suggests that Jesse reconcile with his brother Kelvin, to be a role model for Gideon and Pontius. 

Cut to the freeway underpass where Pontius and his friends are skating to the song "Suck  my dick.  Suck my motherf*king dick."  Sure, no problem.  Who wants to go first?

Gideon appears in a suit and asks them to church.  But you lead Prayer time, not the church service.

 "Go back to Sunday school and start sucking Daddy's dick some more."  Sure, no problem.  Tell Jesse I'm free around 10:00.

But he takes a skateboard, steals a dude's sunglasses, and does some harsh shredding, proving himself an badass.  Pontius and the guys are shocked, and hug him.  Dudes, don't you remember the blackmail schme with Scotty?  The Cycle Ninjas?  Smashing the militia compound?  Gideon has always been a badass.

This is why Gideon was terrible at preaching: he was trying to be a "good Christian boy."  In every season, he is torn between Charleston and California, the life his family wants for him and the life he wants for himself.  I can relate, having grown up with a constant litany of "job, house, wife, kids."   Like Kelvin, he has now found a way to meet family expectations while being true to himself.

Jordanian dicks after the break

"American Gigolo," 1980 and 2022: Frontal nudity and homophobia, or underwear shots and gay erasure. Which do you prefer?

 

In 1980, American Gigolo became famous for Richard Gere's biceps, chest, abs, and penis -- the first  full frontal shot in any mainstream movie!   

Every gay magazine had an article on The Nude Scene, with a screen shot.  This was before you could buy a DVD or stream the movie, so every gay guy in the country, probably in the world, marched down to the Cineplexto see it.  Gere plays Julian, a hustler who specializes in women, and in fact rejects any assignment involving "fag tricks."  The plot involves Julian falling in love with one of his clients (of course), and being framed for murder.  (He was with a client that night, but she refuses to come forward.)

Gay men of the era didn't mind that the hustlers have 100% female clients, while in real life 97% of their clients are closeted gay/bi men.  They were used to being erased.

They didn't consider homophobic slurs a problem. You weren't allowed to mention gay people, even in slurs, before the 1960s, so in the 1970s and 1980s, most movie characters threw in a few "fags" and "fruits" to demonstrate that they were cool.

Nor did they get upset when the villain turned out to be gay: Julian's pimp (Bill Duke), whom he pushes out a window to his death. Straight people hated us; it was a given, a simple fact of life.  You couldn't escape it,  unless you managed to live and work in a gay neighborhood and avoid mainstream media altogether.  The rest of us would hear homophobic jibes, slurs, scandals and jokes from family and friends, from coworkers, from random strangers on the bus, so what difference did a movie make?  You got to see a dick on screen!

Writer/director Paul Schrader has been involved with a number of other homophobic projects, such as Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters, about the gay writer who developed a fixation with bodybuilders.  Again, being gay is all about darkness, destruction, death. Being gay is evil.

But not Richard Gere.  A year before American Gigolo,he  starred in the gay-themed (and not homophobic) Bent on Broadway, about gay men who are sent to a concentration camp in Nazi Germany.  In 1993 he appeared in And the Band Played On, about the first years of the AIDS crisis.

How did he manage all three?  Does he hate gay people, or not?  

In an interview in Entertainment Weekly.  Gere reveals that he took the part because Julian was so different from himself, into fashion and languages (which Gere was not), and with "a gay thing flirting through it," and he knew nothing about "that community."  Good enough explanation, I guess.

In 2022, an American Gigolo tv series appeared.  15 years after the events in the movie, the middle-aged Julian (Jon Bernthal) tries to find out who framed him (I thought Leon confessed?) and to reconnect with The Girl of His Dreams.  

Paul Schrader was not involved, so no homophobic slurs and no gay villain. But gay men are still erased; 100% of the hustlers' clients are women.  There's a lesbian cop, which is not nearly adequate representation.

And no frontal nudity, just a butt shot.

Is that progress?

Richard Gere's dick after the break

"Down Low": Netflix bait-and-switch movie that turns a gay hookup into something dark. With Simon Rex's dick.

 

Down Low, on Netflix (2023). "An overeager massage therapist guides a client with repression through his first queer encounter, but their hookup has a less-than-happy ending." 

A downlow guy lives as a "family man" who has achieved the entire heterosexual trajectory of house, job, wife, and kids, but has sex with men secretly.  Unless "down low" means something else here.

So the family man tells the masseuse that he likes guys, so she hooks him up, and things go south?  Sounds interesting.  But before I jump in, I always conduct some research, to avoid nasty surprises.

WTF?  This plot synopsis on wikipedia sounds like a completely different movie!  There are like a dozen nasty surprises, any one of which would have me "noping" out of there.  

Zachary Quinto stars as "family man" Gary.  I've seen Zachary Quinto in Star Trek, American Horror Story, and The Boys in the Band. Something about his smug, weasly expression grates on my nerves.  Nope #1

He's not on the downlow at all.  He is dying of a brain tumor. Nope #2: no movies about people who are dying of incurable diseases.  Why would anyone ever want to see a movie like that?  How could anyone stand to act in it?  Or write the script?

When he discovers that he is dying, Gary decides to come out, whereupon his wife dumps him.  Not a nope, but really homophobic of the lady to dump him just because he's gay.

The massage therapist is actually a hustler, Cameron (Lukas Gage).  Maybe they do massage too.  This promotional still makes him look like a trans woman, but in the synopsis, the character is always described with he/him pronouns.  Maybe it's a misdirection, so viewers will think that Gary is hooking up with a lady.    

The Hustler uses a dating app to find Gary a hookup  (Sebastian Arroyo).  Wait -- why not just have sex with him yourself?  That's what you're being paid for.

Unfortunately, the hookup does not find Gary attractive enough to screw.  Everyone argues, and he is accidentally killed Nope #3: the abrupt death of a major character. 

Gary and the Hustler hire a Necrophiliac (Simon Rex) to have sex with and then dispose of the Corpse. Nope #4: it's never really come up before, but necrophilia is a big nope.

Due to plot complications, the Necrophiliac can't do his job until the next day, so they spend the night mopping up the blood and smoking crack.  Nope #5: amoral major characters aren't a major "nope," but if I'm already annoyed from watching Zachary Quinto... 

By that time, the Corpse has come back to life and is trying to get away.  The necrophiliac kills him again, and then Gary and the Hustler kill the Necrophiliac.  Nopes #6-7: too many people killing each other too eagerly.  This is definitely not a comedy.

Then they have sex with each other.  You could have just done that at the start, and avoided the multiple murders.  

Later, after Gary dies, the Hustler shows up at his funeral, yells at the ex-wife and the church that abandoned him when he came out, and steals the body.  He dumps it in the lake, which he thinks is a better memorial. Nope #8: portraying gay people as perpetual outsiders, rejected by church and family.  Not really a nope, but way homophobic.

Moral: Always read more than one plot synopsis or watch more than one trailer.  They often make completely contradictory claims.  Remember when Road to Terabinthia was advertised as a fantasy like Harry Potter or The Chronicles of Narnia?  It's about a girl who is dying.

Down Low is not about a guy in the downlow.  It's about a guy who is dying. 

Bonus bulge and dick pics after the break.  Warning: explicit.