August 1999 Cover
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By
Mitzel
A standard feature of childhood is a wish for a simple explanation for things-- a key to the mysteries of life-- like, why, for
example, grown-ups act as they do. And why other kids seem so bizarre. And why you can't fly. Somehow, somewhere, there simply must be The Secret Key; it would open the door to the Answer Room.
When childhood fades, a daily process, you expect this wish for a Grand Unitary Explanation to fade away too. And I think it mostly does. Except in the
mysteries of sexual labeling.
First example: my friend Will, who formerly lived and taught in Boston, moved to North Carolina. Will writes librettos for operas. He was commissioned to
write the libretto for the opera that would celebrate the centenary of the Wright Brothers' plane flight at Kitty Hawk. One day I got a call from Will. He told me all about
his latest project. Then came the question: "Mitzel, were the Wright Brothers gay?" I paused, had a swig of my Mountain Dew, and said: "Let's look at the profile.
Two bachelor guys, neither married, and they have a bicycle shop in Dayton, and all the local boys start hanging around, and they love publicity..."
"I'm beginning to see the picture," said Will.
"Think of George and Ira Gershwin," I noted, hoping to clarify the picture by adding a musical dimension. I finally gave away my Secret Key, which I do now
here for all: when you get that "Is He/She Gay?" question, the correct response is: if you have to ask, he/she is! "By the way," I continued, "what's the title for the opera?"
"Don't have one yet. Got any ideas?"
I did. "Why not call it The Tinker
Queans!" Will liked the idea, though I doubt that, on opening night in 2003, that title will top the marquee and the programs.
The Tinker Queans got their buggy up in the air in 1903; if memory serves, that was the launch year for James M. Barrie's odd play
Peter Pan ("I'm flying!"). Must
have been something in the air at that time for closeted homosexual men and taking flight.
Next up? Ricky Martin. At the gay and lesbian bookshop wherein you will find me cheerfully assisting customers, I was recently visited by Nanci, one of
my favorite publishers' representatives. She had brought the fall catalogues for ordering. Nanci paused at our magazine rack and took notice that we had two magazine
titles devoted to Ricky Martin. Both covers featured large pix of Rick and his choppers. I like a good-looking young man as much as anybody else, but I had not heard of
Ricky Martin until the day before we had received the magazines (he did a spot on the "Today" show).
Nanci perused the mags, put them down, then asked me: "I've heard all the rumors. Tell me: Is Ricky Martin gay?" Nanci and I are old friends; we know each
other pretty well. But I found it a little shocking that she would expect that I, who had only learned of
Señor Martin's name the day before, would be on familiar terms
with his patterns of sexual behaviors. I guess faggots are supposed to know all about everyone.
I did not know how to answer Nanci, but I considered using Tallulah Bankhead's line when some reporter asked of her if Tennessee Williams, her great friend,
was "a homosexual." Tallulah replied: "Well, darling, he's never sucked my cock." It's a funny answer, but it should be noted that in the South, and in the era in
which Tallulah grew up-- early 1900s-- the word "cock" was slang for the female sexual organs, items today's slang would call "pussy," unless it has changed once again
and nobody told me.
I am looking at pictures of Ricky Martin right now, and if Ricky would
like to give me a blow job, I would think such an event could be arranged-- though I do
worry about those teeth. I'm sure Ricky is a man of worldly experience.
Next up is John Singer Sargent. All Boston, in this season, is atwirl with "Sargent Summer." There is the fabulous show at the Museum of Fine Arts, the
landscapes at the Gardner Museum, the drawings at the Fogg, and on and on. Sargent painted everybody and everything to look pretty-- what's that old line from
Boys In The Band? "It takes a quean to make something pretty!" My dear friend and colleague, David, himself more visually acute than I and more educated about the artists, asked
me: "You think Sargent was gay?" That's when Hilliard showed up.
Hilliard was co-curator of one of the Sargent shows. Hilliard had read all the Sargent letters. I asked H. why the paintings of the black men and the Arabs were
so powerful. H. told me: "In one letter, Sargent wrote: 'I'm tired of painting white people,'" which is, of course, what he did for a living. Like Sebastian Venable, tired of
the light ones, famished for the dark ones. On a visit to Boston, back in the 1880s, poor Sargent was asked to leave the fashionable Vendome Hotel, the result of
some impropriety. I suspect he brought back to the hotel his boyfriend, a black man who worked as the doorman for another hotel. Liberal Boston? Times were different
then. But were they? At any rate, even my dear friend David, who has everybody's number, be it Larry Kramer, Boze Hadleigh, Andrew Sullivan, and other such
personalities on the up, couldn't read Sargent.
To gild the lily, a completely appropriate phrase in writing about Sargent, has anybody ever asked this question: "Was
Picasso heterosexual?" For the gay ones, just remember the rule: if you have to ask, he is. But the real Secret Key is: How "Is" is the is? Izzy is
or Izzy ain't? **
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