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BAYAREAREPORTER

Vol. 40

. No. 52 . 30 December 2010

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Serving the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities since 1971

Gov. leaves tortured LGBT legacy 2011 ushers in P new laws

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Rick Gerharter

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Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger missed key opportunities to support major issues such as marriage equality.

2010’s events predict less in 2011

by Lisa Keen

Senators Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins were the force behind the Senate’s standalone bill to repeal DADT.

f past is prologue, 2011 should turn out to be a fairly decent one for the LGBT community. It’s not that everything turned out so rosy for the community in 2010, but the gains registered more powerfully than the losses.

Here’s a look at the top five national news stories for the LGBT community in 2010 and why, in many cases, they could signal a better tomorrow:

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Congress passes a bill to repeal DADT Anyone who was paying attention in 1993 knows what a devastating setback the community suffered with the codification of the military’s ban on gays into what is known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The community itself had asked the newly elected Democratic president, Bill Clinton, to end the military’s long-standing policy banning gays from service. But instead, Senator Sam Nunn (D-Georgia) orchestrated a parade of testimony and innuendo to suggest that the mere presence of gays would violate the “sexual privacy” of heterosexual service members. One female Naval petty officer testified that, “You are asking me to sleep and shower with homosexuals. You are asking me to expose my sexuality...” Not surprisingly, 56 percent of the public opposed allowing “homosexuals” to serve “openly” in the military in 1993. In December 2010, only 21 percent of Americans felt that way. And Democratic President Barack Obama, using a strategy of sticks and carrots that sometimes angered the LGBT community, helped drive through passage of a bill that will eventually lead to a dismantling of the ban.

What does that say about 2011?

Given the shaky economy, high unemployment, and intense partisan divide in Congress,

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there is little likelihood the Obama administration will take on another piece of pro-LGBT civil rights legislation in 2011. The presidential election campaign of 2012 begins in earnest now and Obama must tend to a wide variety of constituencies, as well as Middle America in general. But he has shown – even before repeal of DADT – that his administration is willing to use its power to adopt more LGBT friendly regulations and policies that will advance the LGBT civil rights ball down the field. And that is likely to be where the action will be, for the Obama administration, in 2011.

Federal judge rules Prop 8 unconstitutional U.S. District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker ruled August 4 that California’s voter-approved constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage violates the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection and due process. The result came following a three-week trial in San Francisco during which famed conservative attorney Theodore Olson and famed liberal attorney David Boies mounted a comprehensive case

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against Proposition 8, passed in 2008. They showed how the initiative harmed gay people as a minority and was driven by the fear and animus of those who sought its passage. The participation of Olson and Boies has made this the most high-profile legal challenge in LGBT history. And it seems almost certain to bring before the U.S. Supreme Court the question of whether the bans in California and in 44 other states (by law or decree) are permissible. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will weigh in on the dispute in 2011.

What does that say about 2011?

The appeal before the three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit, on December 6, seemed to go well for opponents of Prop 8. Questions from the judges seemed to indicate they are seriously considering whether Yes on 8 proponents even have standing to bring their appeal. But regardless of how they rule – on standing and/or on constitutional issues – their decision(s) will almost certainly be appealed to the full 9th Circuit bench and then, eventually to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The composition of the current Supreme Court, coupled with the activist tendencies recently demonstrated by its conservatives, makes an outcome there completely unpredictable. A ruling on the constitutional issues will probably not be in front of the high court until late 2011 at the earliest, and more likely 2012. But a win at the 9th Circuit level – even if later overturned by the Supreme Court – would go some distance to undermine the political argument that Walker was just an “activist judge.” It would also provide another boost of momentum for public opinion to continue its journey toward getting

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utgoing Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed several LGBT-related bills this year that are set to take effect January 1.

Among the most significant to the LGBT community is legislation that should make it easier for students to seek mental health help.

Out state Senator Mark Leno (DSan Francisco) authored Senate Bill 543, the Mental Health Services for At-Risk Youth Act. Among other provisions, the act will allow Mark Leno youth ages 12-17 to obtain counseling without parental consent if the attending professional believes the youth is mature enough to participate.

“Especially in light of the tragic suicides in recent weeks, the counseling that will now be afforded young people without parental consent may save lives,” Leno said in October, referencing the news of several suicides by young men this year who were reportedly bullied by classmates because they were gay or perceived to be gay.

A statement from bill sponsor Equality California on SB 543 included concern that current parental consent requirements may put LGBT youth at risk of abuse by coming out to their parents prematurely or without support.

One of the bill’s co-sponsors was the Gay-Straight Alliance Network.

“This bill is for me, for my friends, for every young person who called 911 at the last minute like I did,” Giuliana “G” PeBenito, 16, said in a statement from the organization.

The governor also signed Assembly Bill 2055, the Unemployment Benefits Act. Currently, couples who are engaged to be married are eligible for unemployment benefits if one of them has to leave their job so they can move closer to their future spouse.

The act extends the same rights to couples who plan on entering into a domestic partnership. It especially benefits same-sex couples, who are currently prohibited from legally marrying. Former Assemblyman Hector De La Torre (DSouth Gate) authored the legislation.

Among legislation making headlines this year was AB 2199, which calls for the repeal of a section of the California Welfare and Institutions code that instructs the state Department of Mental Health to conduct research into the “causes and cures of homosexuality.” That code was originally written in the 1950s.

Schwarzenegger signed the bill earlier this year.

Assemblywoman Bonnie Lowenthal (D-Long Beach) authored the bill.

Schwarzenegger also signed AB 2700, the Separation Equity Act. The bill, by As-

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by Seth Hemmelgarn

erhaps the best way to summarize Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s LGBT rights legacy during his seven years in office is by borrowing a famous Dickens phrase. It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

The film star and Republican political newcomer coasted on a wave of voter discontent to win election in 2003 following the recall of Governor Gray Davis. At the time, he was largely an unknown entity when it came to gay issues.

He has confounded his LGBT supporters and detractors ever since.

He later appointed Susan Kennedy, an out lesbian Democrat, as his chief of staff, and numerous other LGBT people to high profile positions in his administration, the courts, and various state oversight panels. And he signed into law 42 bills backed by the statewide LGBT advocacy group Equality California, the most of any governor in the state’s history.

His signatures on a series of bills aimed at strengthening anti-discrimination laws for LGBT residents introduced by former openly gay Assemblyman John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) paved the way for several pro-gay court victories in matters dealing with gay parents and access to health care services.

Schwarzenegger also proved amenable to

Lydia Gonzales

by Matthew S. Bajko

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

COMMUNITY

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SF Pride admits errors, moves ahead

by Seth Hemmelgarn he treasurer for the San Francisco LGBT Pride Celebration Committee essentially admitted to the Bay Area Reporter this week that longtime board members are incapable of overseeing the organization’s finances.

The revelation comes a week after the city controller’s office released a report putting Pride’s debt at $225,000, with “inadequate operating reserves.”

Meanwhile, a former staffer describes dysfunction within the group in the last year. Even so, additional board members are being sought, and people are expressing confidence in Pride’s leadership going forward.

In response to an e-mail asking about why the board had allowed the debt to pile up, Jamie Fountain, Pride’s treasurer, wrote, “We received reassuring reports from staff that minimized the situation.” He noted former Executive Director Amy Andre had an MBA, though he didn’t mention her by name.

“We gave too much leeway and did not have adequate benchmarks for measuring whether fundraising initiatives were being successful, or re-adjusting spending downward when targeted income budgets were not met,” he wrote. “This was our biggest mistake.”

He also admitted that nobody on the board “understood how to read financial reports, and could not independently evaluate the reports which said cash flow was tight but Pride would be okay.”

“We relied on staff ’s interpreting financial conditions and assurances that fundraising efforts and new hires would perform, and we just needed to give it some time. We gave it too much time,” he added.

Brooke Oliver, Pride’s general counsel, responded to an e-mail to her and Fountain asking about who specifically Fountain was referring to by writing, “It is SF Pride’s policy ... not to comment on specific employees or their performance, and so [we] cannot be more specific.”

In his e-mail, Fountain said the debt is now about $212,000. He said Pride has about $17,000 in the bank.

Supervisors Bevan Dufty and David Campos had requested the controller’s assessment in October, after Andre and board President Mikayla Connell announced their resignations.

Their departures followed a “misunderstanding” that saw several of Pride’s 2010 beverage partners receive payments that were thousands of dollars less than they had expected. Pride has pledged to make up those payments.

No additional payments have been made to Pride’s beverage partners, and the amount owed to beverage partners remains $46,000, Nikki Calma, Pride’s board chair, said in an interview this week.

The city’s Grants for the Arts office awarded $58,400 to Pride this year.

Former staffer speaks out Andre didn’t respond to interview requests made through her website.

But Troy Coalman, who joined Pride as the associate director of development and then became director of external relations before seeing his position cut this month, did respond to questions. Coalman also wasn’t named specifically in Fountain’s email, but spoke to the B.A.R. in a phone interview after reviewing Fountain’s remarks.

Coalman, who had played a key role in fundraising, said that in both his roles at Pride, he was “in constant contact” via phone and e-mail “with almost all the board members, and they were very well aware of what

Jane Philomen Cleland

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SF Pride officials say the parade will go on, but finances need to be stabilized.

Above, the Aguilas contingent marches in this year’s event.

fundraising was doing and the performance of fundraising.” He said he also regularly provided them with reports.

He said he frequently requested information from Andre and the board of directors “but we were not kept informed.” He said that he and Pride’s sponsorship director “needed to know specifically where the organization stood financially, and we were never supplied that information.”

“I had stressed upon my arrival at Pride last January that I wanted and needed the board to be fully involved in fundraising efforts,” Coalman added.

Among other things, the controller’s report said Pride’s board should be responsible for meeting yearly fundraising goals and receive training to gain better financial oversight skills. The report noted that Pride “supports many of these recommendations and is already implementing several of them.”

Coalman said of Andre, “I think Amy did the best she could with the resources she had, but this was her first time being executive director, and she lacked some of the necessary knowledge,” in areas including development.

Eddie Valtierra joined Pride’s staff as sponsorship director around August, replacing Lindsey Jones, who had taken that position in 2009 after serving as Pride’s executive director.

Valtierra’s currently on furlough, as are other paid Pride staff. He declined an interview request, citing Pride’s policy prohibiting staff from speaking to the media.

Jones, also not named specifically in Fountain’s e-mail, reviewed his remarks. She described tough times for sponsors but said, “Because of SF Pride’s reputation and return on investment received we were able to retain most of our sponsors and recruit new ones ... .”

Dorian Fund backs Pride The Dorian Fund has contributed $45,000 to Pride and made a loan of $55,000 in case Pride needs it, according to Chris Kollaja, the fund’s trustee. The controller’s report said the loan was pledged.

Kollaja said the contribution was based at least in part on the B.A.R.’s coverage of Pride. He didn’t refer to Andre by name, but he said he was talking about the most recent executive director and “what a horrible job she did.” He also said he hadn’t spoken to Pride officials about Andre and knew of her performance only through the B.A.R.’s stories.

He said she “single-handedly harmed Pride.”

Kollaja also said, “I was disappointed that even our politicians would jeopardize [Pride] for us.”

Supervisors Dufty and Campos have been among those expressing concerns about Pride, and requested

the controller’s report largely because they wanted to help Pride raise money. Kollaja said he didn’t know which politicians he was referring to, but again pointed to the B.A.R.’s coverage.

“What did they do?” he said. “Did they give money to Pride? ... Did they scare away donors? Did they really help?”

Kollaja said Pride has been “really quite significant in my life.” He estimated that he had gone to his first Pride in the city in the late 1970s.

The Dorian Fund, started about five years ago, is private and sponsors gay and lesbian community projects “on a limited basis,” said Kollaja. The fund stands at about $2 million, he said.

The money comes from the estate of Joe Gianelli and Bill Wegele. He said the two domestic partners died in 2004 or 2005.

Kollaja said Pride approached the fund a month or two ago, and presented a “thorough, well-thought out” business plan. He said he didn’t have a copy of the plan and couldn’t share it with the B.A.R. even if he did.

Pride hasn’t provided a copy of the plan, either.

“I think that based upon the new plans the board has developed, they have reconnected with the fundraisers that they had in the past who were quite successful for Pride, and I think with them and the existing board, we should see an outstanding Pride event this year,” said Kollaja.

Calma said the organization’s coming up with a plan “so we can make sure the bills are paid,” commitments are fulfilled, and everything goes on “as it should.” She also said the board is becoming involved in fundraising, as the controller’s office recommended.

Expanding the board Pride can have up to 15 people on its board, but there are currently only six. The controller’s office recommended bringing in more board members and spoke of the importance of having people who have legal, financial, and other knowledge.

Calma said Reginald Johnson, a Pride general member for two years, joined the board of directors in December. Calma also said as an African American, Johnson will add to the board’s diversity, and he has “some experience with management and operations.” She said Johnson works in Stanford University’s benefits department as a service delivery analyst. Johnson couldn’t be reached for comment.

Joey Cain, who served as the board’s president from 2003-2007, said he’s agreed to become part of a community advisory board.

Cain said he told Calma that Pride needs to provide “a thorough explanation” of how they arrived at the current situation.

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

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by Matthew S. Bajko n advisory panel tasked with determining whom, or what, to commemorate with U.S. postage stamps is considering the late gay Supervisor Harvey Milk for such an honor, the Bay Area Reporter has learned.

This fall the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee contacted Milk’s family to gather more information about the San Francisco politician, who in November 1977 became the first out person to be elected to public office in a major U.S. city. A year later disgruntled former Supervisor Dan White gunned him down in City Hall along with then-Mayor George Moscone.

The committee also notified the Harvey Milk National Stamp Campaign that it was looking at issuing a Milk stamp at some point.

“We received official communication from the postal commission that he is under consideration,” said San Diego resident Nicole MurrayRamirez, who chairs the national Milk stamp campaign. “It could be in 2013 or 2014.”

Milk’s openly gay nephew, Stuart Milk, told the B.A.R. that his family has been asked by postal officials about upcoming significant milestones that the issuance of a Milk stamp could commemorate. November 8, 2012 would mark the 35th anniversary of Milk’s historic electoral win, while May 22, 2015 would coincide with Milk’s 85th birthday.

“I can tell you that the family has been told that stamps are issued around major milestones for an individual getting a stamp. The query that came in was records indicate he would be 82 [in 2011], which is not a milestone,” said Stuart Milk in a recent interview.“I think, personally, without it being officially communicated to me, but we will see a stamp once a milestone is agreed upon.”

Neither Jean Picker Firstenberg, who chairs the stamp advisory panel, nor vice chair Ira Michael Heyman, a former UC Berkeley chancellor who chairs the stamp panel’s subject subcommittee, responded to requests for comment this week.

U.S. Postal Service spokesman Roy Betts told the B.A.R. he was unfamiliar with whom the stamp panel has contacted regarding its deliberations for future stamp subjects. But he said

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if the Milk family and stamp campaign had heard from the panel, then that was a positive sign.

“If they have received notification from the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee that the subject is under consideration, it is a positive step in the direction of the stamp being issued,” said Betts.

Momentum for a Milk stamp has been building since the B.A.R. first reported in March 2009 that Ohio resident Daniel Drent had created a Facebook page in an effort to see one be issued in time for Milk’s 80th birthday this past May 22. As of this week, nearly 14,000 people had signed on to the online group, though the page appears to be dormant.

A Milk stamp idea has been kicking around since the late 1980s, when San Francisco artist Jim Leff, a gay man who knew Milk, painted a mock-up of what such a stamp could look like. In 2005 San Francisco’s 11-member Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution calling on the U.S. postmaster general to issue one for the gay rights leader.

After the B.A.R. interviewed Leff and ran a photo of his Milk stamp in April 2009, the Imperial Court Council picked up the cause at the behest of Murray-Ramirez, who serves on his city’s Human Relations Commission and is on the board of the Harvey B. Milk Foundation. Known as Nicole the Great within the Imperial Court System, Murray-Ramirez is executive director and international spokesperson of the International Court Council.

The Milk foundation signed on as a supporter of the national stamp campaign, and Stuart Milk serves as an honorary chair. Other honorary chairs include former Milk confidante Cleve Jones; National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Executive Director Rea Carey; Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center CEO Lorri Jean; the Reverend Troy Perry, who started the Metropolitan Community Church; openly gay state Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco); openly gay state Assembly Speaker John A. Perez (D-Los Angeles); and Dustin Lance Black, who won an Oscar for his Milk biopic screenplay.

In addition to reaching out to LGBT people across the country, the Milk stamp campaign has enlisted bipartisan support from elected leaders throughout the U.S. Both openly gay

Planning begins for 2nd Harvey Milk Day

by Matthew S. Bajko lanning is already under way for San Francisco’s second observation of Harvey Milk Day on Sunday, May 22.

Leaders of the Harvey B. Milk Foundation told the Bay Area Reporter they hope to expand on last year’s celebration and include a broader range of people in the day’s events. As for specifics, they have yet to be revealed.

“Yes, we are working on something,” said Stuart Milk, the openly gay nephew of Milk, who added that as for details, “I can’t tell you now.”

Stuart Milk has asked Anne Kronenberg, who was Milk’s campaign manager for his successful 1977 supervisor bid, to lead the planning locally.

Kronenberg, whom Mayor Gavin Newsom recently named to be executive director of the San Francisco Department of Emergency Management, said she would like to see a “major” Milk Day event take place in the city, similar to San Diego’s citywide brunch held each year in honor of Milk or last year’s Milk Day-timed gala in Sacramento.

“A major Milk Day event should happen here,” said Kronenberg, who is also working with the group behind

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this year’s Sacramento event.

Milk was the first out person to win elective office in a major U.S. city.

He was killed, along with then-Mayor George Moscone, in November 1978 by disgruntled former Supervisor Dan White.

The state observance – it is not a state holiday – is timed to coincide with Milk’s birthday. He would have turned 81 on May 22, 2011.

Last year the Milk foundation, which Kronenberg and Stuart Milk helped launch, canceled a lavish awards ceremony and dance party it planned to host in San Francisco the Friday night prior to Milk Day. The cancellation was blamed on a lack of timing to pull off the event.

A brunch held that Saturday morning was limited to 200 people due to space constraints, while in the Castro initial suggestions to have a neighborhood-wide street party were scaled back to just the block in front of the Harvey Milk Civil Rights Academy.

Instead, a dedication ceremony was held to lay a larger historical marker in front of the storefront at 575 Castro Street where Milk owned his camera shop and ran his political campaigns.

The event attracted a sizeable crowd of nearly 1,200 people.▼

Courtesy Jim Leff

Momentum builds for Harvey Milk stamp

Jim Leff ’s painting of a Harvey Milk stamp.

Democratic New York state Senator Tom Duane and Republican San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, an out lesbian, have sent in letters backing a Milk stamp.

In her letter to the stamp advisory committee, dated June 18, 2010, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) called Milk “a San Francisco hero” who continues to inspire people the world over. She urged the panel to make Milk the first person to be recognized for their work on LGBT rights with a stamp.

“The United States Postal Service has yet to honor an LGBT American hero with a stamp, commemorating the life and efforts of Harvey Milk would be a testament to Harvey’s courage and a symbol of pride to anyone who has ever felt discrimination or cared about those who have,” wrote Pelosi.

New Jersey’s two Democratic U.S. senators, Robert Menendez and Frank Lautenberg, both wrote letters in support of a Milk stamp. Other elected leaders who have sent in letters include Congressman Bob Filner (D-San Diego), outgoing Colorado

state Representative Joel Judd (DDenver), and Republican San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders, who has a lesbian daughter.

Lautenberg, in his letter dated November 19, 2010, wrote that, “Mr. Milk’s courageous devotion to LGBT civil rights will serve as a proud reminder of the dedication to justice and equality that has come to define our nation. Harvey Milk left an indelible impression upon history, one that is certainly deserving of consideration for a commemorative stamp.”

In his letter urging the creation of a Milk stamp, dated August 10, 2010, Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon, a Democrat, noted that California already has honored Milk with an unofficial state holiday every May 22, which was his birthday, and that President Barack Obama in 2009 posthumously awarded Milk a Presidential Medal of Freedom.

“Harvey Milk is revered nationally and globally as a pioneer of the LGBT civil rights movement for his exceptional leadership and dedication to equal rights,” wrote Gordon, who urged the stamp panel to “soon” issue a Milk stamp.

It is unclear exactly how many letters the stamp advisory committee has received in support of a Milk stamp. The postal service’s Betts said he didn’t know.

Nor did Murray-Ramirez, who said the national campaign group is continuing to urge people to write in letters of support.

“The feedback we have gotten is they are very impressed so many handwritten letters have been sent,” he said.

“The last couple of years or more there has been a constant flow of letters from all over the United States.”

This week, Tuesday, December 28, the postal service announced the commemorative stamps that have been approved for release in 2011.

Among the list are ones honoring former California governor and Presi-

dent Ronald Reagan; famed author Mark Twain; the 150th anniversary of the Civil War; the 50th anniversary of America’s first manned spaceflight; and the 100th anniversary of the Indianapolis 500-mile auto race.

As for the 2012 selections, Betts said he would not know what the advisory panel has decided until next August.

“Usually, that is when our stamp services department starts to share the info with me,” he said. “The Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee will receive tens of thousands of suggestions for stamp subjects. They narrow that down to 20 to 25 subjects annually and recommend those subjects to the postmaster general, who makes the final decision.”

Of the 12 stamp selection criteria listed on the stamp advisory panel’s website, two would appear to directly apply to a Milk stamp. One states that events of historical significance shall be considered for commemoration “only on anniversaries in multiples of 50 years.”

The other specifies that only people with “widespread national appeal and significance” will be considered. Those fitting this description would be people “who have overcome great challenges or active discrimination to enter a field or accomplish an aim and thus created opportunities thereafter for others similarly situated.”

Supporters of various stamps can wait a decade or longer before their selection is approved, said Betts, such as backers of a stamp honoring Motown star Marvin Gaye, who died in 1984.

“They’ve been waiting well over a decade. There are other subjects that people have been waiting quite a number of years for,” he said.

For more info on how to send the stamp panel a letter urging it to commemorate Milk, and to see copies of letters already sent in by various politicians and local groups, visit www.impcourt.org/icis/info/Harvey Milk/index.html.▼

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

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BAYAREAREPORTER Volume 40, Number 52 30 December 2010 eBAR.com PUBLISHER Thomas E. Horn Bob Ross (Founder, 1971 – 2003) N E W S E D I TO R Cynthia Laird A R T S E D I TO R Roberto Friedman ASSISTANT EDITORS Matthew S. Bajko Seth Hemmelgarn Jim Provenzano CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Dan Aiello • Tavo Amador • Matt Baume • Erin Blackwell Roger Brigham • Scott Brogan • Victoria A. Brownworth Philip Campbell • Chuck Colbert • Richard Dodds Raymond Flournoy • Brian Gougherty David Guarino • Liz Highleyman • Brandon Judell Robert Julian • John F. Karr • Lisa Keen Matthew Kennedy • David Lamble • Michael McDonagh Paul Parish • Lois Pearlman • Tim Pfaff • Jim Piechota Bob Roehr • Donna Sachet • Adam Sandel Jason Serinus • Gregg Shapiro • Gwendolyn Smith Robert Sokol • Ed Walsh • Sura Wood

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Arnold, we hardly knew ye Schwarzenegger spent considerable energy overnor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who going back and forth on his position on samedrove up in his Hummer and vowed to sex marriage. He said the people should decide. “blow up boxes” in Sacramento followHe said the courts should decide. When the Leging the historic 2003 recall election, is packing up islature – not once, but twice – approved bills his own boxes this week as he prepares to vacate that would legalize same-sex marriage, the govthe Capitol after seven years. ernator vetoed them. When the California We won’t miss him all that much.

Supreme Court upheld the right of gays to Many Californians were optimistic wed, the governor was supportive. When when Schwarzenegger announced he same-sex marriage opponents put was running for governor in the sumProposition 8 on the ballot, the governor mer of 2003, when more than 100 came out against it, but not very forcefulcandidates sought to replace Democly. He did not appear in any campaign ratic Governor Gray Davis. A moderate materials for the No on 8 campaign. Of Republican, business-friendly, and a popular course, by then, he had basically abanmovie star, Schwarzenegger brought charisdoned the state Republican Party, ma and humor to the campaign trail. which had never completely trusted We remember thinking that he could E DITORIAL Schwarzenegger and his moderate do great things for the LGBT compositions on social issues. munity, both in helping move the ReNow that he is departing, Schwarzenegger publican Party toward supporting equal rights seems to have found the courage to support for gay Americans and in signing pro-LGBT legmarriage equality. When a federal court judge islation. In those early years of his administration, Schwarzenegger was a political rock star.

As it happened however, Schwarzenegger proved himself to be just as ineffective in governing California as critics said Davis was. As he leaves office, Schwarzenegger leaves the state billions of dollars in the red. He never did tear up the credit cards, in fact, just the opposite occurred; Schwarzenegger resorted to budget gimmicks and borrowing to balance the state budget that hasn’t truly been balanced in years.

But the governor was most disappointing when he failed to stand up for equal rights. We probably should have seen it coming: during the recall campaign he told radio host Sean Hannity, “I think that gay marriage is something that should be between a man and a woman.” In 2004, shortly after Mayor Gavin Newsom ordered city officials to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, Schwarzenegger went on national television, claiming there was “rioting” in the streets of San Francisco. That was wildly inaccurate. Sure, some of the fundamentalists were protesting that first weekend, but there were no riots. In fact, most of the crowd that waited in line that rainy Presidents Day weekend was made up of happy couples waiting to get married, and their families and friends.

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ruled Prop 8 unconstitutional this summer, Schwarzenegger said, “For the hundreds of thousands of Californians in gay and lesbian households who are managing their day-to-day lives, this decision affirms the full legal protections and safeguards I believe everyone deserves. At the same time, it provides an opportunity for all Californians to consider our history of leading the way to the future, and our growing reputation of treating all people and their relationships with equal respect and dignity.”

It’s too bad that Schwarzenegger didn’t make that statement six years ago, when he could have actually influenced public opinion.

We have long wanted to interview the governor, without success. During his re-election campaign four years ago, his campaign declined an interview despite our repeated requests, and his staff continues to refuse as the administration’s days dwindle, although he has found time to talk to just about every other media outlet.

Hasta la vista, governor. ▼

Is a generation without HIV within our grasp?

by Dana Van Gorder, Matt Sharp, and Alan McCord xciting developments in HIV prevention research, combined with a renewed commitment on the part of gay and bisexual men and transgender women to collective action against HIV, could make 2011 a turning point in the steady march of new infections that looms over our communities.

In November, the iPrEx study showed that, overall, 44 percent fewer infections occurred among 1,248 high-risk gay men and transgender women who took the daily HIV pill Truvada and were counseled to consistently use condoms.

Among study participants who took Truvada 90 percent of the time, new infections fell by a stunning 73 percent. Participants reported that their condom use increased and number of sex partners decreased, enhancing the preventive benefits of PrEP, or pre-exposure prophylaxis. Side effects and development of drug resistance were not problems.

In July, the CAPRISA study G UEST showed that women who applied a gel containing the HIV drug Tenofovir before and after sex were 39 percent less likely to become HIV-positive. Effectiveness increased to 54 percent among those who consistently used this microbicide gel.

It is now understood that HIV-positive people effectively treated with antiretroviral medications can be up to 92 percent less likely to transmit the virus to their partners. San Francisco’s model programs to encourage gay and bisexual men and transgender women to know their status and enter care and treatment early if positive are helping to slow new HIV infections.

PrEP and microbicides require additional research before they become widely available. San Francisco could become the site of a demonstration project to determine whether iPrEx’s thrilling results, along with increased adherence to daily pill taking, can be achieved outside the confines of a rigorous, placebo-controlled study.

In separate research, PrEP will be examined to see whether taking Truvada less frequently is as effective as daily dosing. And microbicides are being studied to assess their effectiveness in the

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rectum – an environment in which it is more difficult to achieve protection than in the vagina.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plans to issue guidance to physicians by February describing how they can deliver PrEP to patients who want to consider it now. It may be several years, however, before public and private insurers actually pay for this costly intervention. In the meantime, it is extremely important to remember that PrEP should not be tried at home because it requires the advice and active clinical supervision of a doctor. It is critical that HIV-positive people not share their meds with HIV-negative people wanting to try PrEP, thereby threatening the health of both individuals.

And there is currently no evidence suggesting that taking HIV medications less often than daily is effective in reducing one’s chances of becoming infected.

Many issues have been raised about widespread use of PrEP. In addition to concerns that it may backfire by further reducing condom use, many wonder how we could even consider delivering expensive HIV medications to HIV-negative people when waitO PINION ing lists for meds for HIV-positive people are growing nationally.

One answer, of course, is that we cannot possibly hope to keep pace with the cost of care and treatment for HIV-positive people if we do not invest more money in slowing the rate of new infections. Spending on prevention currently represents only 4 percent of overall HIV expenditures. Additionally, unless the incoming Congress unravels health care reform, both PrEP and the cost of care and treatment of people with HIV are likely to shift from discretionary programs subject to annual budget-making whims to better guaranteed funding sources.

PrEP has been met by concerns that only the worried well will seek it out rather than people who are at highest risk for infection. Clinical guidelines and outreach for PrEP should favor people at highest risk for infection, particularly those who have genuinely tried other forms of prevention but are nevertheless vulnerable to engaging in receptive anal intercourse without condoms. Concern has also been expressed that only those who can afford PrEP will get it, further exacerbating disparities in the health of youths,

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low-income people, and people of color. Advocacy for payment for PrEP in those groups that most need it must be strong. At the same time, everyone who wants to remain HIV-negative deserves support to do so, and PrEP should not be denied to anyone who can benefit from it.

PrEP will be met by great moralizing among conservatives who wonder why taxpayers should be asked to pay for something that, never mind the evidence, may increase promiscuity or risktaking. The fact is that gay men and others at risk for HIV are hardly the only people who engage in behaviors they know can result in disease, but to which they are still susceptible. Taxpayers are paying dearly for the cost of prevention, care, and treatment of heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, and smoking – far more than for HIV. Finally, the high cost of PrEP causes many to ask an obvious and fair question: Why pay for a prevention intervention that may cost $10,000 to $20,000 per year when a condom costs 10 cents?

It is easy to see that community norms of safe sex and condom use are not as strong as they once were among gay and bisexual men. Saving PrEP as a prevention intervention only for those who truly need it, our community already has significant power to usher in the first generation of gay and bisexual men and transgender women who can live without the fear of HIV. Five things would help. We need to rededicate ourselves to using condoms when we have sex with partners whose HIV status is different from our own or whose status we are not sure of. We need to continue to build a culture in which we value protecting one another from HIV. Each of us can commit to knowing our HIV status and being re-tested regularly. And those of us who learn we are positive can enter care immediately and carefully consider early treatment. And finally, we can dedicate ourselves to participating in ongoing research on PrEP, microbicides and vaccines that offer hope of eliminating new cases of HIV once and for all.▼ Dana Van Gorder is the executive director of Project Inform; Matt Sharp is director of treatment and advocacy; and Alan McCord is the director of information and outreach. For more information about PrEP and HIV treatment as prevention, visit www.projectinform.org.

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

POLITIC S

New judges prepare to take their oaths

by Matthew S. Bajko wo out judges who won hard fought election battles to secure their seats on local courts will take their oaths of office next week.

Across the bay in Alameda County, Victoria Kolakowski will become the nation’s first elected transgender trial court judge when she takes her oath of office in a private ceremony Monday, January 3. She will also be the Alameda County Superior Court’s only out member.

Her public induction into the court’s office #9 will take place the following day, Tuesday, January 4, and her first full day on the job will be Wednesday, January 5.

“Day by day it becomes more real,” said Kolakowski, 49, who has been sitting in on her soon-to-be colleagues’ courtrooms and has been given a loaner robe until hers arrives.

In San Francisco, former deputy public defender Linda Colfax will also be sworn in Monday, January 3 to Seat 6 on the San Francisco County Superior Court. She has been assigned to the court’s Department 525 at the Civic Center Courthouse, 400 McAllister Street, and will oversee civil trials.

Colfax was on vacation with her family this week and could not be reached for comment.

She defeated three opponents in the June primary to win her court seat outright. Her public investiture ceremony and reception will begin at 5:30 p.m. January 14 in the Milton Marks Auditorium inside the state building, 455 Golden Gate P OLITICAL Avenue.

The out lesbian will be the 13th openly gay member of the court following the gubernatorial appointment this fall of Angela Bradstreet to fill a judicial vacancy.

Due to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointing this month two deputy district attorneys from the Alameda County District Attorney’s office to fill court vacancies on the Alameda court, Kolakowski had her court assignment changed last week. The appointments upended the initial decision by the court’s presiding judge of where to assign Kolakowski.

That upended the initial decision by the court’s presiding judge of where to assign Kolakowski.

Rather than handle juvenile dependency cases, she will now hear criminal cases at the Wiley W. Manuel Courthouse in downtown Oakland.

“It was a surprise to all of us; that wasn’t the initial expectation,” said Kolakowski, who was meeting with the judge she was to have replaced when they learned about the gubernatorial appointments. “The truth is it is a humbling thing when you realize you are being entrusted with making decisions involving putting people in jail. It is a very serious thing. I knew that going in to the election, but I think the reality of it will probably hit me fully the first time I am actually sitting there and have to make a decision.”

Kolakowski, the wife of Bay Area Reporter news editor Cynthia Laird, had been working as an administrative law judge for the state’s Public Utilities Commission. She surprised

Rick Gerharter

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Judge-elect Victoria Kolakowski

her two opponents in the June primary by coming in first place and defeated the second place finisher in the November runoff election.

To help her mark the historic occasion of her swearing-in, Kolakowski has invited the following speakers to address the audience at her public ceremony: National Center for Lesbian Rights legal director Shannon Minter, an out transgender man; Chief Administrative Law Judge for the California PUC Karen V. Clopton, the first African American to hold the post; Equality California Executive Director Geoff Kors; and state Senator Ellen Corbett (DSan Leandro).

The ceremony, which is open to the public, will begin at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, January 4 at the Oakland Asian Cultural Center at 388 9th Street, N OTEBOOK Suite 290 (Pacific Renaissance Plaza) in downtown Oakland. A reception will immediately follow.

Quan plans two-day inauguration Oakland Mayor-elect Jean Quan will celebrate her inauguration over two days as she becomes the East Bay city’s first female and Asian American mayor.

This Sunday, January 2, Quan is hosting an Inaugural Eve bash at the Chabot Space and Science Center in the Oakland Hills. The observatory and museum lies within her City Council district, and the party is doubling as her annual District 4 holiday party.

The science center will be open to the public that day from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m. Quan has invited local youth and other music acts to perform and she is cooking food for the event herself.

There is a $10 suggested donation per person. The center is located at 10000 Skyline Boulevard.

At 8:30 a.m. the following morning, Monday, January 3, Quan’s family and friends will march alongside her as they walk from Chinatown, where her great-grandfather took refuge following the 1906 earthquake that destroyed San Francisco, to the Fox Theatre for her swearing-in ceremony. The procession will take off from the Pacific Renaissance Plaza at 9th Street between Franklin and Webster.

Doors to the theater open to the public at 10 a.m. that day, and seating will be available on a first come basis.

The ceremony is expected to last from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

That evening, from 5 to 9 p.m.

Quan will open her new offices in-

Judge-elect Linda Colfax

side City Hall to the public. Once again musical acts will perform and there will be talks on Oakland’s history and a reception line for those wishing to greet the new mayor.

Oakland City Hall is located at 1 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza.

SF supes panel to vote on gay appointees Openly gay Supervisor David Campos has scheduled an emergency meeting of the board’s Rules Committee at 10 a.m. Monday, January 3 to vote on 10 nominations Mayor Gavin Newsom has made to various city boards and commissions so that the current board can finalize the picks at its last meeting Tuesday, January 4.

Not only is a new board expected to be sworn in at noon Saturday, January 8, Newsom will have resigned by that date in order to become the state’s new lieutenant governor. [Just when he will actually step down remains in flux due to his concerns about whom the current board may appoint as his replacement.]

Among the mayor’s final appointees of his term are former lesbian Supervisor Leslie Katz and gay Castro business leader Herb Cohn.

A certified public accountant, Cohn is up for a seat on the San Francisco Relocation Appeals Board.

The oldest of its kind in the nation, the five-person board meets once a year unless individuals and families whose residence or business is displaced by public action file an appeal.

Katz is up for a seat on the city’s Port Commission. Should she be confirmed, she will be the oversight body’s only LGBT member and its first in recent memory.

To shore up support for her nomination to the high-profile panel, Katz has been dialing supervisors to line up the votes she needs.

“I don’t take anything for granted,” said Katz, a member of the Democratic County Central Committee.

The Rules Committee, which also includes Supervisors Michela AliotoPier and Eric Mar, meets in Room 263 at City Hall. ▼ Political Notes, the notebook’s online companion, is on a holiday hiatus. It will return Monday, January 10.

Keep abreast of the latest LGBT political news by following the Political Notebook on Twitter @ twitter.com/politicalnotes.

Got a tip on LGBT politics? Call Matthew S. Bajko at (415) 861-5019 or e-mail m.bajko@ebar.com.

www.ebar.com

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

COMMENTARY

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Don’t Tell,” and – more than anything – over a single six-letter word: tranny, and when and who could use hen I sat down to write it. The latter fight seems to be a batabout 2010, I wanted to tell tle not yet truly over. you how horrible the year I would be remiss if I did not also has been. Indeed, I could not help but mention that anti-transgender violook at the personal situations of my lence continued at the same rates as friends and myself, and conclude that many other years. We saw reports like the year was one of increasingly bad that of the murder of 17times. month-old Ray A. Jones, alIt’s not to say there isn’t legedly killed by his 20some truth to that. With the year-old babysitter beelection year politics, the Tea cause this supposed careParty, the return of the right giver was “trying to make and a president who seems him act like a boy instead of to be willing to comproa little girl.” mise away well, On top of all this everything, one was a study put out T RANSMISSIONS does find themthis year by the Naselves feeling that tional Center for there are not even table scraps left.

Transgender Equality in conjunction Certainly, to borrow a refrain with the National Gay and Lesbian heard from many, this is not the Task Force. Its findings were equally change that was voted for in 2008. distressing, with half of those surMeanwhile, the volume was veyed reporting discrimination in the raised within our community. Transworkplace, transgender people being gender people pitted themselves twice as likely to live in poverty, and against our gay and lesbian siblings harassment being common in school. in an increasingly vocal war of In the midst of such awful news, words. People fought over inclusion, however, there were some positives. over the still dead Employment NonAt first, I wished to dismiss them as Discrimination Act, over “Don’t Ask, mere crumbs. Yet the more I looked

by Gwendolyn Ann Smith

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at them, the more I had to realize their overall importance.

One – actually coming in December 2009 – was the appointment of Dylan Orr as special assistant to Assistant Secretary of Labor Kathleen Martinez in the Office of Disability Employment Policy at the Department of Labor. That was followed shortly by the appointment of Amanda Simpson to a senior technical adviser post in the Commerce Department under President Barack Obama. Both openly transgender people have now weathered the first year in their positions, with initial attempts to derail them largely going unnoticed.

Second was the tax season victory of trans woman Rhiannon O’Donnabhain, with the courts agreeing that treatment for gender identity disorder is indeed medically necessary and deductible from one’s taxes.

The third was in the middle of the year, as the U.S. Department of State issued new policies around passports. The change in rules allows for a transgender person to get the gender marker changed on their passport with certification from an attending medical physician.

Finally, in the November 2010 election we saw transgender candidates victorious. Stu Rasmussen won re-election as mayor in Silverton, Oregon; Kim Coco Iwamoto was reelected to the Hawaii Board of Education; and Victoria Kolakowski was elected as a Superior Court judge in Alameda County.

Each of these shares a common thread. The appointments of Simpson and Orr, as well as the victories at the ballot box, demonstrate that we do have the ability to serve in public office. The religious right particularly took Simpson to task, but has long since moved on. Rasmussen and Iwamoto showed that their transgender status did not affect their ability to serve their areas well, and Kolakowski has broken new ground, becoming the first elected transgender trial court judge in the country.

Meanwhile, in somewhat mundane matters like passports and taxes, we’ve seen transgender people

Christine Smith

2010: Hope to be found

gain. The new rules on passports are the first real instance where the federal government has clearly understood the need for transgender people to be recognized legally in their preferred gender regardless of surgical status, while tax law now acknowledges the necessity of transgender-related procedures.

These aren’t the sorts of victories one can easily shout from the rooftops. None of these stories exist above the fold in major newspapers, although Kolakowski’s win garnered national and international media attention. Tax law, passports, and school board elections are, well, considered mundane by many. These are not as big a deal as, say, the repeal of DADT, a victory that will not benefit transgender people directly, but will have some indirect benefits to us. It is not like the passage of a transgender-inclusive ENDA, nor any other big-ticket protections for transgender and gender variant people.

Yet that is the importance of them as well. These may be viewed as less than extraordinary, but their value is huge. More so, that they’re so far out

of the mainstream radar speaks well to each of us being viewed as, well, just people. People who need rights, or can serve the president and the people of this country.

Don’t get me wrong. After some 16 years, I would much prefer to see ENDA pass. But knowing that transgender people can write off medically necessary expenses and can get a passport in their preferred gender without surgery are huge advances in their own ways. Likewise, the fact that we can be mayors, school board members, judges, and presidential appointees should send hope to transgender people young and old, showing that they, too, can reach for greater things.

So in 2010, perhaps it was really about the quieter victories over the shouting matches – and maybe these are stepping stones ahead of advancements in 2011 and beyond. So ever onward I say, to bigger and even better things to come.▼ Gwen Smith wishes all the happiest of new years. You can find her online at www.gwensmith.com.

SF Gay Men’s Chorus to hold auditions compiled by Cynthia Laird he San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus will soon hold auditions and invites “men with a love of song and community” to add their voices to the multi-octave range for which the chorus is known.

The chorus will hold an open rehearsal and get-acquainted party on Sunday, January 9. People who are interested in trying out can attend and will have an opportunity to sing and enjoy a fun afternoon.

“We are welcoming tenors, baritones, basses, and questioning for these new auditions,” quipped Timothy Seelig, the chorus’ new artistic director and conductor. “Just show up and we’ll help you figure out just what you are.”

The open rehearsal and party takes place from 2 to 5 p.m. at First Unitarian Universalist Church, 1187 Franklin Street (at Geary).

The following day, Monday, January 10, there will be a special preaudition clinic at 7 p.m. Auditions will be held Tuesday, January 11 at 6

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p.m. Both take place at 44 Page Street in San Francisco.

In addition to singing beautiful music and changing lives, the chorus provides a unique and affirming social opportunity, attracting and welcoming men of diverse backgrounds, ethnicities, and ages.

“We are folks who might not normally hang out together, brought together by our love of music and love of community,” said chorus member and N EWS board President Michael Tate. “When we gather and sing, it’s magical.”

For more information, visit www.sfgmc.org.

For participants who qualify, AHP will hold a weekend-long training in late January that focuses on the fundamentals of support group facilitation. Volunteer facilitators then apply their skills in weekly support groups for people living with HIV; a prevention-focused group for people who are uninfected or untested; substance abuse and recovery groups for people regardless of HIV status; or, monthly workshops.

In addition to the B RIEFS training, volunteers must commit to 10-12 hours a month for a minimum of six months.

People living with HIV and those with daytime availability are especially encouraged to apply. Experience participating in a group is helpful, but not necessary.

Those interested in receiving a training application should call Chris Lynch at (415) 502-7576. The deadline to submit applications is Friday, January 7. To learn more about AHP, visit www.ucsf-ahp.org.▼

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Volunteers sought to lead HIV support groups The UCSF AIDS Health Project is looking for volunteers interested in facilitating peer-led support groups and workshops. AHP conducts HIVpositive groups, HIV-negative groups, and mixed-status groups and workshops.

Check out the Bay Area Reporter online at:

www.ebar.com

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

INTERNATIONAL

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NEWS

UN General Assembly overturns anti-gay vote sued a statement following the vote.

“President Obama applauds those countries that supported the he United Nations General amendment offered by the United Assembly on December 21 States to ensure that ‘sexual orientaoverturned its recent vote that tion’ remains covered by the United removed a reference to sexual orienNations resolution on extrajudicial, tation from a resolution against exsummary and arbitrary execution,” trajudicial, summary or arbitrary exthe statement said. “Killing people ecutions. because of their sexual orientation The resolution urges member cannot be rationalized by diverse restates to protect the right to life of all ligious values or varying regional people and calls on governments to perspectives. Killing people because investigate killings based on disthey are gay is not culturally defensicriminatory grounds. For the past 10 ble – it is criminal. While today’s years, the document included sexadoption of an inclusive resoual orientation in a list of dislution is important, so too criminatory grounds on are the conversations that which killings are often have now begun in capbased. itals around the world But last month, a about inclusion, equalGeneral Assembly comity, and discrimination. mittee composed of all “Protecting gays and U.N. member nations lesbians from stateremoved the gay refersponsored discriminaence in a vote of 79-70 W OCKNER’ S tion is not a special right, with 17 abstentions and W ORLD it is a human right.

26 absences. That led to Today’s vote in the Unitan intense campaign, ed Nations marks an important moheaded by the United States, to reinment in the struggle for civil and sert the reference. human rights. The time has come The reinsertion vote was 93-55 for all nations to redouble our efwith 27 abstentions and 17 absences. forts to end discrimination and vioThen, the vote to pass the full resolence against lesbian, gay, bisexual lution with the gay language back in and transgender people,” concluded place was 122-1 with 62 abstentions. the statement.

The document is believed to be The United States’ former amthe only UN resolution ever to refbassador to Romania, Michael erence “sexual orientation.”

Guest, who is openly gay and now Most opposition to acknowledgworks with the LGBT-oriented ing anti-gay killings came from Council for Global Equality, called Arab, Islamic, and African nations, the U.S. campaign to rescue the gay whose representatives complained language “remarkable.” that they don’t know what “sexual “The United States took a very orientation” means or that sexual principled position, and our diplobehavior is an inappropriate basis mats worked very hard at the U.N. upon which to grant official recogand in capitals around the world to nition or human rights protections. explain to other countries why this Notably, South Africa and Rwanis an important human rights da reversed their previous votes cause,” said Guest. “The State Deagainst gay inclusion. partment and the White House “Countries that tried to roll back should be commended.” crucial protections for gay and lesbian The International Lesbian, Gay, people have been defeated,” said Boris Bisexual, Trans and Intersex AssociDittrich, acting director of Human ation said: “We want to celebrate the Rights Watch’s LGBT Rights Program. victory over the forces which tried to “The resolution does justice to gays, push the reference to sexual orientalesbians, and transgender people in tion into oblivion one month ago countries where they are targeted for [and which] still refuse, in theory assaults and killings simply because and in practice, to acknowledge that they love someone of the same sex or human rights are truly for all, LGBTI because they are transgender.” people included, and – what is perThe White House press office ishaps worse – grotesquely mask their

by Rex Wockner

SF Pride ▼

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In an interview last week, Cain referred to Andre as “woefully unqualified” and said her hiring needs to be part of Pride’s explanation to the community of what’s gone on.

He also said he has “complete faith” in Calma.

“I think she really gets what needs to happen, and there are some drastic things that need to happen,” in terms of fixing Pride’s finances, he said.

Calma said she hadn’t been part of the board’s “interview team” when Andre was brought on, but she said, “We hired her because we thought when we interviewed her she was the best candidate.”

Debt to the city According to Calma, the money Pride owes to the city includes about $54,000 to the Department of Public Works for cleaning costs and ap-

proximately $30,000 to the San Francisco Police Department for detouring, signage, and fire department services.

She expressed hope that Pride can negotiate a deal to repay the money, such as a payment plan.

“If they can excuse the debt, that would be great ... but we know we owe money,” said Calma.

Mohammed Nuru, operations director for the DPW, confirmed the amount Pride owes.

“We’re open to a payment plan for sure,” said Nuru. “The city will definitely want to recoup its costs for providing those services.”

The SFPD figure could not be confirmed by Wednesday morning, December 29.

Asked about the city forgiving Pride’s debt or arranging a payment plan, Dufty, who leaves office next week and is running for mayor, said, “I guess it’s an issue that can be on the table. I just don’t know what the precedents are.”

“I think we really have to work at trying to bring revenue and sponsor-

Courtesy Human Rights Watch

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Boris Dittrich commended the UN General Assembly for its vote.

homophobia and transphobia by referring to the universality of the Human Rights Declaration.”

Brazilian gay leader wins National Human Rights Prize The head of the Brazilian Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans Association was honored December 13 with the National Human Rights Prize.

Toni Reis received the bronze statuette from Culture Minister Juca Ferreira at a ceremony in Brasilia, the nation’s capital. He also received personal congratulations from Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Human Rights Secretary Paulo Vannuchi.

The prize is the nation’s highest decoration for individuals and organizations working in the human rights field.

Moscow blocks gay rally Moscow City Hall banned a gay rally that was planned for December 17.

Members of the Russian LGBT Network wanted to gather in front of the headquarters of the former KGB to demand that Russia legally rehabilitate people who were convicted under the former Soviet Union’s law that banned gay sex.

The old law, Criminal Code Article 121, was enacted in 1933 and repealed in 1993.

Earlier this year, the European Court of Human Rights ruled

ship into the organization, and that’s what our goal is, and based upon that we can evaluate Pride’s availability to pay the city,” he said.

Campos said, “The city should remain open to helping Pride, but before we start talking about debt forgiveness” or a repayment plan, Pride’s board needs to “properly” address the issues raised in the controller’s report.

“Until that happens, in my view it would be premature for us to start talking about anything else,” said Campos.

In response to e-mailed questions, District 8 Supervisor-elect Scott Wiener said he intends to discuss the fees with Pride and city staff.

“The city, like Pride, is struggling financially, which has resulted in detioriated Muni service, cuts to public health, and reduced rec center hours,” wrote Wiener. “I’m not prepared to support blanket waiver of the fees, though I am open to discussion of how to resolve this issue in a way that keeps Pride stable and that doesn’t harm the city financially.”▼

www.bartabsf.com

against Moscow’s yearly bans on public gay Pride events.

In a group of cases brought by Moscow Pride founder Nikolai Alekseev, the court determined that the city’s pride bans violate guarantees of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the areas of freedom of assembly and association, right to an effective remedy and prohibition of discrimination.

Russia was ordered to pay Alekseev 12,000 euros ($15,928) in damages and 17,510 euros in costs and expenses.

The ruling has not yet come into final force.

British House of Commons deputy speaker comes out A deputy speaker of Britain’s House of Commons, Conservative Nigel Evans, came out December 19.

He said he was “tired of living a lie” and was worried about threats from a Labour MP to out him.

A day later, Evans, 53, attended the launch of a new group for gay MPs called ParliaOut. Evans represents the Lancashire constituency of Ribble Valley and becomes the 22nd openly gay mem-

ber of the current House of Commons.

EU Parliament again denounces Ugandan anti-gay bill The European Parliament on December 16 again denounced the pending “Anti-Homosexuality Bill” poised to pass Uganda’s Parliament.

The legislation would imprison for life anyone convicted of “the offense of homosexuality,” punish “aggravated homosexuality” (repeat offenses or having gay sex while being HIV-positive) with the death penalty, forbid “promotion of homosexuality” and incarcerate gay-rights defenders, and jail individuals in positions of authority for up to three years if they fail to report within 24 hours the existence of all LGBT people or sympathizers known to them.

“The European Parliament is united against this draconian piece of legislation: left, right, center, everyone agrees that LGBT people must not be criminalized,” said Raül Romeva i Rueda, co-president of the European Parliament’s Intergroup on LGBT Rights.▼ Bill Kelley contributed to this report.

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

TRAVEL

A sculpture in front of the Bayside Marketplace in downtown Miami appears like it wants to climb onto the historic Freedom Tower.

y trip timing wasn’t so good.

When I arrived in Miami two weeks ago, Florida was in the middle of a cold snap. The famed Miami Beach was deserted except for a few surfers in wetsuits and tourists posing for pictures in winter clothes. It had gotten down to 34 degrees that morning. It wasn’t predicted to go above 53 degrees all day and was going to be another night in the

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30s. San Francisco’s low temperature that day was the same as Miami’s high temperature.

But the typical year-round summer weather in Miami returned two days later. The “crisis” was over. Summer was back. The beaches were full of people soaking in the Florida sunshine in the middle of December.

Barring a rare cold snap, Miami is a great escape from the Bay Area cold and rain. It is also a very gay welcoming getaway. And the gayest thing to

happen in Miami in a while is happening this week. A gay hotel, Lords South Beach, is scheduled to have its official grand opening, following a soft opening that began last month.

It is the only gay hotel in the greater Miami area and is already generating a lot of buzz.

Miami is an easy getaway and like San Francisco, you can get along fine without a car.

The gay beach, as well as several gay bars and nightclubs, are all in easy walking distance.

And it is getting even easier to get along in Miami without a car. A bike-sharing program called DecoBikes will begin any day now.

Getting from the Miami airport without a car is also easier and cheaper than ever. The city recently inaugurat-

ed a new $2.35 airport shuttle to Miami Beach.

Most of the action in the greater Miami area is centered in South Beach, in the city of Miami Beach, which is part of a barrier island between the ocean and the city of Miami. Parking and traffic can be challenging in South Beach, and gets more difficult the farther south you go, so a car is more trouble than it’s worth.

Miami Beach is a living monument to the Art Deco style.

With rare exceptions, the city won’t allow the old 1920s and 1930s hotels to be torn down. Instead, developers have kept the exteriors and lobbies of the hotels intact while completely gut-

ting and renovating the interiors with all the comforts people have come to expect in the 21st century.

Ocean Drive is the most famous ocean front street in South Beach known for its art deco hotels. The Carlyle is the hotel where The Birdcage, the remake of the La Cage Aux Folles, was filmed. Tragedy struck on Ocean Drive in 1997 when Andrew Cunanan gunned down Gianni Versace. The Versace Mansion on 1116 Ocean Drive is now an upscale hotel called The Villa by Barton G. South Beach has an official gay beach. It’s easy to find. Just look for the two rainbow flags on the beach opposite 12th Street. It is one of the most crowded sections of Miami Beach. It is directly across from the Palace Food Bar, a gay bar and restaurant that is most popular during the day, especially in late afternoon as people start to return from the beach.

If you stay in South Beach and don’t have a car, don’t let that deter you from seeing some of the best sights of Miami. A guided tour is the best way to get around without getting lost. The Grayline hop-on, hopoff bus is a great way to spend a day or two exploring the best sights of the city including Little Havana, Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, and the Jungle Island theme park/zoo. Grayline offers a tour that loops downtown and another that loops Miami Beach.

The Grayline transfer point is the Bayside Marketplace in downtown Miami. That’s a stop not to be missed. Downtown has undergone a revitalization. Bayside Marketplace is the city’s version of Pier 39. The Freedom Tower, which was once the tallest building in Florida, is across the street. It was the former newspaper building. It got its name because it was used to process more than a half-million Cubans fleeing Castro in the 1960s and early 1970s. You can ride the futuristic people-mover around the skyscrapers downtown for free.

If you plan on doing a lot of sightseeing, be sure to buy a Go Miami Card. It includes a number of tours including the famous Duck Tour and your choice of everglade tours. The Duck Tour cruises along Miami’s canals for a peek at the private front lawns of the rich and famous. Most of the celebrities don’t like their houses being pointed out, but Rosie O’-

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by Ed Walsh

Ed Walsh

Miami is a great wintertime escape

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

TRAVEL 1988. It is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For Asian food lovers, the China Grill (www.chinagrillmgt.com) is the southern spin-off to the China Grill in Manhattan. If you like a good, filling breakfast, don’t pass up the Greenstreet Outdoor Lounge and Restaurant (www.greenstreetcafe.net) in Miami’s Coconut Grove neighborhood. Try their famous blueberry pancakes.

Miami Donnell has been know to buzz the Duck Tour and “quack” a greeting to the tourists. The Go Card also includes admission to several attractions, including Jungle Island and area museums. It will more than pay for itself if you plan on taking in a lot of sights.

While you are in Miami Beach, be sure to check out the World Erotic Art Museum (www.weam.com). It boasts the world’s largest public view collection of erotic art and includes gay and lesbian sections. Photos are not allowed inside except in front of the giant penis near the exit!

Miami provides many opportunities to glimpse into the early days of the state. A good example is the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens (www.vizcayamuseum.org). The property’s centerpiece is an Italian Renaissance-style mansion surrounded by 10 acres of gardens.

James Deering, of the Deering tractor company, wintered at the property between 1916-1925. Deering, by the way, was a “lifelong bachelor.” He may have been gay, but like so many other gay men of his era, he kept that part of his life well hidden.

If you are in the mood to shop and can afford to splurge, the city of Bal Harbour, just outside Miami, has Florida’s version of Rodeo Drive set in an open-air mall called the Bal Harbour Shops (www.balharbourshops.com). Most of the shops there are designer upscale and expensive but they also have a Gap store for us mere mortals. Even its lushly landscaped parking lot is upscale ($4 per hour or $1 per hour with validation), with palm trees that gently shade cars from the South Florida sun.

Hotels

Carlos Estrada, Howard Tonkin, Javier Bautista are on the staff of the 721 bar in Miami.

Ed Walsh

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Gay dates for 2011 >> Winter Party Festival March 2-7 Miami Beach Gay Pride: Saturday, April 16 Aqua Girl: May 11-15 Sizzle Miami: May 26-29 Miami Beach Bruthaz: July 2011 (exact dates TBA) White Party: November 23-28

A path to the gay beach in Miami is well traveled; the beach is easy to find because of the rainbow flags.

go earlier in the evening. It also does a brisk daytime business. It closes at midnight most weekdays, depending on how busy it is, and at 1 a.m. on weekends. The Palace is famous for its Saturday “Drags Gone Wild” drag show with crowds that spill out into the street.

South Beach has a couple of weekly events geared towards lesbians. Every Sunday, Score hosts “Panty Raid,” a tea dance that is run by the locally wellknown club promoter Lynn Bove. On Thursday nights, Mova hosts “Sweet Thursday.” Aqua Girl (www.aquagirl .org) is the East Coast version of Dinah Shore. It runs May 11-14 next year and benefits the Aqua Foundation for Women. The Women’s White Party takes place in March.

Dining A word to the wise when eating out in Miami, more and more restaurants

automatically add in a tip to the bill.

That began about 20 years ago in response to foreign tourists who didn’t tip because they came from countries where it was not customary. Unfortunately, most restaurants don’t go out of their way to tell you that the tip is included, so be sure to check the bill closely before leaving a tip.

Fine dining aficionados will find plenty to chew on in South Beach. The La Marea Restaurant is part of the Tides Hotel (www.tidessouthbeach .com), a beautifully restored art deco treasure conveniently located just across the street from the gay beach on Ocean Drive near 12th Street. La Marea features northern Italian and Mediterranean cuisine. Farther south along Ocean Drive at 8th Street, you will find the landmark News Cafe (www.newscafe .com). It paved the way for the other Ocean Drive restaurants when it opened in

Ed Walsh

Nightlife The two most popular gay clubs in Miami are Twist (www.twistsobe .com) and Score (www.scorebar.net).

The clubs are about a mile apart in South Beach but it’s an enjoyable walk with plenty of people-watching and window shopping along the way. Twist is the longest running gay club in Miami Beach and it’s a place where you can bar hop without ever leaving the building. It has two levels with seven bars, including a bar in the back with exotic dancers. There’s never a cover.

Score is a cavernous dance club along South Beach’s pedestrian Lincoln Road shopping area. The upstairs lounge at Score is Creme. Its Thursday night party, Creme and Sugar, draws a big crowd after midnight. Score and Twist stay open until 5 a.m. and are busiest late at night.

The Buck 15 Lounge is behind Score. It has different themes on different nights. By the way, for a great overall nightlife guide to South Beach, be sure to check out www.SoBeSocialClub.com. It is run by Edison Farrow, South Beach’s unofficial gay social director.

Mova is an upscale lounge bar near Score just off Lincoln Road. College night on Wednesdays always attracts a big crowd.

South Beach’s newest gay club is across the street from the Buck 15. It’s called the 721. (It gets its name from its address, 721 Lincoln Lane.) Although it’s about 90 percent gay, it draws a more mixed crowd on Saturdays.

The aforementioned Palace restaurant and bar is the only gay bar on Miami Beach’s famed Ocean Boulevard. It’s open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It is the perfect place to people watch in South Beach. It’s the place to

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The aforementioned Lords Hotel is in a perfect location in South Beach. It’s a 54-unit property on Collins Avenue, just a block from the gay beach. The art deco building was formerly the Nash Hotel. The hotel now has a gold and white motif with a picture of Elizabeth Taylor in every room. The Lords bills itself as the first gay hotel chain in the U.S. They hope to open other Lords in New York, Chicago, and West Hollywood. The hotel is in a promotional partnership with Absolute Vodka, Levi, and L magazine. The Lords is pledging to donate 10 percent of the proceeds of select rooms to LGBT charities.

Amenities include three small pools.

The middle one is a Jacuzzi. Even if you are not staying there, be sure to stop by the restaurant or bar.

The Tides Hotel is directly across from the street from the gay beach.

The upscale property is known for its white coral rock steps and exterior.

Amenities include a pool and small gym. The rooms are extra big here and offer great views of the ocean and the scene on Ocean Drive. With only 45 rooms, the hotel’s employees give all guests very attentive service.

Z Ocean is a modern trendy hotel at the end of Ocean Drive. It has a beautiful courtyard pool that is sheltered from the wind, making sunning and swimming comfortable even on a rare cold day. The trendy upscale deign of the 80-unit hotel has earned it a gay following and the hotel has an LGBT section of its Web site geared to the gay traveler.▼ For more information, including a video tour of the Lords South Beach, view Ed Walsh’s multimedia blog: www.gaymiamitravel.blogspot.com.

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by Matthew S. Bajko federal judge for the Northern District of California heard arguments this month in a lawsuit that could strike a blow to the anti-gay federal Defense of Marriage Act, which forbids the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.

During a hearing December 17 in San Francisco, U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey S. White signaled he was grappling with how the Justice Department could be defending DOMA in court while President Barack Obama has called the law “abhorrent.”

The case, Golinski v. U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), centers on the now two-year-long fight by Karen Golinski, a 19-year employee of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, to add her wife, Amy Cunninghis, to her employer-provided health insurance. Having married Cunninghis, her partner of now 21 years, when samesex marriage was legal in California in 2008, Golinski requested that her health plan include her wife.

Her application was denied because the federal government argued that, due to DOMA, she was not in a valid marriage and her spouse, therefore, did not qualify to be covered by her health insurance.

In January 2009, 9th Circuit Chief Judge Alex Kozinski ruled that denying Golinski spousal health insurance for Cunninghis was illegal discrimination. He ordered the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts to submit Golinski’s health benefits election form to her insurer, Blue Cross/Blue Shield.

But OPM disagreed with Kozinski’s order and told Blue Cross not to comply. In November 2009, Kozinski issued a further ruling explaining that he has the authority, under both the 9th Circuit’s employment dispute res-

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olution plan and the constitutional separation of powers doctrine, to interpret laws governing the rights of judicial employees.

Once again OPM refused to adhere to the judge’s order, this time claiming that it was not binding and that the U.S. Department of Justice had advised it not to comply because of DOMA. When OPM failed to appeal by the December 2009 deadline, Kozinski held that his prior rulings had become conclusive and binding against OPM. Golinski then launched an enforcement case in federal district court to seek an injunction against OPM and its director, John Berry, to force them to comply with Kozinski’s rulings. The Obama administration, however, is asking that the case be dismissed.

At the hearing White asked Justice Department attorney Christopher Hall how the federal government could discriminate against Cunninghis based on her sex, since if she was a man there would be no issue with adding her to the health insurance plan. Hall replied that she “does not meet the definition of a covered member” under the health plan nor does she meet how it defines a spouse.

Even if it was sex-based discrimination, Hall said it is allowable under DOMA. To which White interjected, “unless it is found to be unconstitutional.”

In defending DOMA, Hall argued that Congress had the right to essentially “adopt a wait and see approach” toward same-sex marriage. Preferring to see how the debate played out at the state level, Hall said that the passage of DOMA was Congress’ way of signaling that it wanted to “freeze the status quo.”

“We are 15 years into this debate but the debate is not over yet. Congress quite reasonably said, ‘We don’t

Jane Philomen Cleland

SF federal judge hears DOMA challenge

Attorneys Rita Lin and Jennifer C. Pizer talk with their client, Karen Golinski and her wife, Amy Cunninghis, after Golinski’s case was heard in federal court.

want to commit to an extension of benefits. We want to wait and see,’” said Hall.

However, White expressed disbelief with Hall’s reasoning.

“Even if discriminatory, as long as it is consistent it is okay. That is your argument?” he asked.

At the same time, White also questioned whether the issue of DOMA’s constitutionality was “properly before the court.”

Jennifer C. Pizer, senior counsel for Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund and part of the legal team representing Golinski, told the judge it was under his purview to decide whether or not DOMA violates the U.S. Constitution. If not for DOMA, Pizer argued, the federal government would have no grounds to make its claims.

“Maintaining the status quo is a means not an end. There needs to be a legitimate purpose here and there is

none,” she told the judge. “The denial of benefits based on the sex of a spouse is sex discrimination and requires higher scrutiny.”

Rita Lin, an attorney with Morrison & Foerster LLP who is also representing Golinski, argued before the judge that irrespective of the DOMA issue, a key issue in the case is maintaining the separation of powers doctrine enshrined in the Constitution.

Since OPM is part of the executive branch, Lin argued it does not have authority over the judicial branch, and thus, cannot dictate what health insurance the courts provide to their employees.

“Who has that authority? Judge Kozinski and the judicial council have the authority to do what it needs to do in its judicial circuit. There is no limit on the orders of the judicial council,” said Lin. White is under no timeframe to

issue his ruling in the case. It is certain to be appealed to the federal appellate court.

Pizer said that based on the hearing, she doesn’t expect the judge to strike down DOMA. Rather, he could rule that DOMA does not bar the 9th Circuit from providing health benefits to the married spouses of its LGBT employees.

“Judge White also skewered another piece of twisted logic on OPM’s part: that the executive branch agency’s duty to negotiate contracts with insurance plans to cover federal workers somehow authorizes it to meddle in and to thwart individual enrollment decisions ordered by top managers of a different branch of the federal government,” said Pizer.

“OPM’s facilitation and support functions go nowhere that far.”

Outside of the courthouse, Golinski, 48, told reporters that she was “absolutely delighted by the judge’s questions.”

She said she is particularly perturbed with the Obama administration’s position in the case considering it would cost the government nothing to add her wife to her plan, which she already pays for and covers the couple’s son.

“It doesn’t cost the government one penny to add my spouse,” said Golinski. “We didn’t want a federal lawsuit but the government forced us to do it. This is costing federal taxpayers money to hurt my family.”

Working as a private contractor, Cunninghis, 48, said she cannot afford to buy her own health insurance. She said she is “really grateful” that Golinski works for an employer who believes its employees, no matter their sexual orientation, deserve the same health care coverage.

“We feel it is only fair that everyone who works for the 9th Circuit be treated fairly,” said Cunninghis.▼

North Carolina ruling jeopardizes same-sex families

by Dana Rudolph n another messy child custody dispute, a court ruling could throw a wrench into second-parent adoptions in North Carolina.

Earlier this month, the North Carolina Supreme Court voided the adoption by a lesbian mother of the child who she and her former partner, the biological mother, were raising together. The ruling jeopardizes the legality of all other such second-parent adoptions in the state.

State Senator Julia Boseman and her former partner, Melissa Jarrell, planned for a child together, and Jarrell consented to Boseman adopting the child in 2005, when he was almost 3, according to court documents.

Boseman was the first out member of the state General Assembly but did not seek re-election this past fall.

The couple split in 2006, and Boseman sought joint custody. Jarrell first tried to initiate a class action lawsuit to invalidate all second-parent adoptions in the state. Under pressure from the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina and others, however, she dropped the suit.

Jarrell acknowledged in court that Boseman was “a very good parent” but nevertheless petitioned for sole custody, claiming the adoption should never have been granted to Boseman because North Carolina law does not permit second-parent adoptions. A trial court granted joint custody but did not rule on the adoption, which had been granted in another district.

Jarrell first appealed to the state Court of Appeals, which upheld both the custody order and the validity of the adoption. Then, she appealed to the state Supreme Court, which upheld the lower court ruling granting Boseman joint custody. But a 5-2 ma-

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jority overturned the appeals court ruling in regards to the adoption.

In its December 20 opinion, the majority said the adoption granted to Boseman was invalid from its beginning. State statutes, said Associate Justice Paul Newby, writing for the majority, permit adoptions only if the existing parent gives up all parental rights or is married to the person seeking to adopt, as in the case of a stepparent. Because this was not the situation for Boseman, the adoption court did not have the authority to grant the adoption, said the majority.

Two justices dissented. Patricia Timmons-Goodson and Robin E. Hudson said Jarrell had not appealed within the proper time limits. And Timmons-Goodson noted that state law requires adoptions to be final because that is in the best interest of minors. The law allows challenges, she said, only “in narrow circumstances,” none of which applied here.

Hudson also wrote that she felt the matter of the adoption court’s jurisdiction was, at most, “an error of law” and should not have led to a voiding of the adoption.

The ruling calls into question the validity of all other second-parent adoptions in North Carolina. Such adoptions have been granted in only two counties and impacts perhaps several hundred families, according to Ian Palmquist, executive director of Equality North Carolina. (An exact count is not possible because most adoption records are sealed.)

Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said the court was unclear about whether existing adoptions are now automatically void but he believes they are now more vulnerable to challenge. Minter urged all parents who have obtained second-parent adoptions in North Carolina to consult a

Groups submitting briefs in support of Boseman included Lambda Legal, the Equality North Carolina Foundation, the American Academy of Pediatrics (North Carolina Chapter), the ACLU of North Carolina Legal Foundation, the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers, and several adoption policy centers.

Judges’ backgrounds

State Senator Julia Boseman

knowledgeable family law attorney.

Greg Nevins, supervising senior staff attorney at Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, agreed the status of the other adoptions in the state remains unclear at this point, but “at a minimum, [the ruling] is causing a lot of anxiety.”

Nancy Polikoff, a law professor at American University, said, however, that she believes the ruling makes all second-parent adoptions in the state “void.”

“When the issue of legal parentage arises,” said Polikoff, “... the adoption decree will be a meaningless piece of paper.”

A separate North Carolina law prohibits unmarried couples from jointly petitioning to adopt a child, although gay and lesbian people may do so as individuals.

A number of ultra-conservative organizations submitted friend of the court briefs in support of Jarrell, including the American College of Pediatricians – a group of conservative doctors who split from the mainstream American Academy of Pediatrics when the latter endorsed adoption by gay parents.

Of the five justices who voted against the adoption, two hold leadership positions in churches with strong anti-gay views.

Associate Justice Edward Thomas Brady devotes an entire section of his official court biography to “Religious Convictions.” He sits on the board of directors of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, which in 2006 voted to sever ties with churches that approve of homosexuality. The group has also promoted the work of Exodus International, a well-known umbrella organization of so-called ex-gay groups that claim to offer “freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ.”

Brady has also represented his church at the national Southern Baptist Convention, which believes that homosexuality is “not a ‘valid alternative lifestyle,’” according to its website.

Newby, who wrote the majority opinion, is an elder, Sunday school teacher, and youth leader at Christ Baptist Church in Raleigh, according to his court biography. The church is a member of the Southern Baptist Convention and an offshoot of Providence Baptist Church, which lists Beyond Imagination, an Exodus member ministry, among its local ministry partners.

Neither of the dissenting justices lists their religious affiliations in their court biographies.

Minter called the decision “a complete outlier.” Even when second-parent adoptions have been challenged in conservative states, such as Texas, he said, courts have refused to set aside existing adoptions.

In a similar recent case in Minnesota, an appeals court ruled against a woman who was trying to void her former partner’s second-parent adoptions of their twins. The court said the partner had waited too long to challenge the adoptions, but did not rule on her claim that second-parent adoptions are unlawful.

In two other states where secondparent adoption was ruled illegal – Colorado and Connecticut – the legislature then stepped in to allow them.

In North Carolina, however, Republicans have taken over the General Assembly and are considering a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex couples from marriage.

“We don’t anticipate any legislation related to adoption to be put forward in the near term,” Palmquist said.

Polikoff noted that conservative groups like the Alliance Defense Fund “are willing to work on any case seeking to undo any parenting by a nonbio mom” but does not believe the attack on second-parent adoptions in North Carolina heralds a trend.

Nevins said that, because Boseman’s custody was upheld, “This won’t be much of a rallying cry.”

And Minter said anti-gay groups are unlikely to succeed with similar suits because “most LGBT parents have too much integrity to attack second-parent adoptions.”

The decision, he said, is “callously oblivious to the impact of its decision on children and families. I don’t think it will have much if any effect outside of the devastation it has wreaked in North Carolina.”▼

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NEWS

Senate OKs Feldblum for EEOC post

by Lisa Keen efore adjourning last week, the Senate gave final approval to out lesbian law professor Chai Feldblum as President Barack Obama’s nominee to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Feldblum, 51, has been serving on the five-member commission since April, when Obama put her onto the commission using a recess appointment, a procedure that enables him to circumvent a Senate confirmation vote temporarily because it can be done while the Senate is on recess.

But appointees who take their positions via a recess appointment still have to go through the confirmation vote in the Senate. That vote, for Feldblum and three other nominees to the EEOC, has been held up for months by an unidentified Republican senator – or senators – using the Senate rules that enable any senator to put a hold on an appointee’s confirmation vote.

The Senate, on December 22, con-

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firmed the appointments of Feldblum and three other EEOC nominees by unanimous consent, a process by which the Senate can vote on a number of routine matters at once.

Interestingly, one letter in support of Feldblum late in the process came from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest federation of businesses. The group has been in the news in recent months for funneling millions of dollars into the midterm elections, mostly in support of Republican interests.

Randel Johnson, senior vice president of the chamber, sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nevada) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Kentucky) December 21, urging the confirmations of Feldblum and two other nominees.

“The chamber has not, and know that we will not, agree with them on every issue,” wrote Johnson, “but it has been our experience that each is open to hear and consider the concerns of all interested stakeholders.”

Another December 21 letter came

EEOC Commissioner Chai Feldblum

from the head of the Society for Human Resource Management, Henry Jackson. Jackson said his organization had worked with Feldblum on “critical workplace issues such as retirement security and workplace flexibility,” when Feldblum headed

Georgetown University Law Center’s Federal Legislation and Administrative Clinic. Jackson said that Feldblum and the other EEOC nominees “have provided a fair hearing to all viewpoints and serve as thoughtful and constructive arbiters of equal opportunity issues in the workplace.”

Numerous right-wing groups voiced opposition to Feldblum shortly after she was nominated last fall. The Traditional Values Coalition called her a “radical,” saying she would “use her power to strip nearly all First Amendment rights of freedom of expression/free exercise of religion from businesses.” Concerned Women for America said she “represents one of the most serious threats to religious freedom we have seen in a long time.” And the Family Research Council said Feldblum “openly admitted to supporting polygamy.”

But, strangely, no opposition surfaced during Feldblum’s public confirmation hearing last November. Instead, numerous pro-civil rights groups, including the Leadership

Conference on Civil Rights, lobbied hard for her appointment.

Feldblum is probably best known for her work on the Americans with Disabilities Act, which passed in 1990, prohibiting discrimination in employment, public accommodations, and other areas against people with disabilities. The law also covered people with HIV infection.

She is best known to the LGBT community as a key counsel on the drafting and negotiations over the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. She also served for a time as legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union in Washington, D.C. Feldblum served for a year as a law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun. And, prior to joining the EEOC, she was a professor of law at Georgetown University.

The Human Rights Campaign issued a statement December 22 praising the Senate for confirming Feldblum to a full term. Her current appointment term will continue through July 2013.▼

n a recent brisk morning at Ocean Beach, a dozen men arrived early in the morning, grabbed work gloves and a stack of orange buckets, and fanned out across the sand to pick up trash after a night of steady rain.

It was the one-year anniversary of the San Francisco chapter of Gay For Good, an organization for LGBT individuals who are united in their dedication to community service.

Each month, Gay For Good chooses a beneficiary, and dispatches volunteers to assist these worthy causes.

Gay for Good originated in Los Angeles, where the founding chapter boasts 1,500 members. That group caught the eye of San Francisco’s Don Spradlin, who was visiting LA as the founder of the Mr. Gay competition.

During that time, Spradlin’s boyfriend volunteered with Gay For Good, and described cleaning the LA River basin and helping at food banks.

“When I moved back home, I

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semblywoman Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco) eliminates legal barriers for same-sex couples who want to dissolve their domestic partnership and civil marriage simultaneously by creating a consolidated form and procedure.

In addition to the EQCA-sponsored legislation, Schwarzenegger also signed SB 1449. The bill, authored by Leno, reclassifies the possession of less than an ounce of marijuana as an infraction, rather than a misdemeanor. That law has already gone into effect.

Looking ahead to 2011 Following November’s elections, the state Legislature now has seven out lawmakers, which is a record.

After lawmakers were sworn in December 6, several have introduced bills in recent weeks. One of the issues on the agenda for 2011 is antibullying legislation.

Leno introduced SB 48 on December 13. The legislation, known as the Fair, Accurate, Inclusive, and Respectful Education Act, adds the LGBT community to the existing list of under-represented cultural and ethnic groups already listed in the

asked them if I could bring the concept here,” Spradlin said. “I started my career as an investment banker, but about 12 years ago I shifted and began raising money for nonprofits.

I wanted to get more involved in community service.”

Spradlin’s other recent projects include dot429, a group for professional LGBTs to socialize and provide mentoring.

As the group’s beach cleanup began, National Park Service ranger Marcus Combs explained the importance of beach stewardship to the assembled volunteers. Tiny plastic items can kill albatross chicks, and a gray whale that recently beached in Olympia, Washington, had a stomach full of plastic bags, towels, gloves, and even a golf ball.

A key aspect of Gay For Good is working outside of the usual LGBT community charities.

“Sometimes we get stuck in our own community, and we’re helping ourselves but not helping others,” said Aaron Baldwin, one of the chapter leaders.

The organization can serve as a means of introducing LGBTs to po-

state’s inclusionary education requirements.

In addition, the bill adds sexual orientation to the state’s existing anti-discrimination protections that prohibit bias in school activities, instruction and instructional materials. EQCA and the GSA Network are co-sponsors.

On December 6, out Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco) introduced AB 9. The bill, sponsored by Superintendent of Public Instruction-elect Tom Torlakson and EQCA, would require school employees to intervene when they see bullying and report it to the school principal and notify the parents of both the bully and the victim.

It would further encourage school districts to establish anti-bullying policies.

Schwarzenegger, a Republican, vetoed some bills this year that could be introduced again in 2011 and find support from Governor-elect Jerry Brown (D), who will be sworn in Monday, January 3.

Schwarzenegger has twice vetoed Ammiano’s AB 633. Known as the LGBT Prisoner Safety bill, it would have amended an existing act to include inmates’ safety concerns related to sexual orientation and gender identity on the list of factors for consideration when assessing whether

Park service ranger Marcus Combs, center, assists Aaron Baldwin, left, and Daniel Loftus as they work on cleaning up Ocean Beach during a recent Gay For Good outing.

tential allies, Spradlin explained.

After the passage of Proposition 8 in 2008, analysts and many community members criticized the No on 8 campaign’s failure to connect with

they’re at a heightened risk for assault.

Along with EQCA, the Transgender Law Center and the National Center for Lesbian Rights co-sponsored the bill. Ammiano has said he would try to get an LGBT prisoner safety bill signed by Brown.

Schwarzenegger also vetoed Leno’s SB 906. The bill would have ensured religious leaders would not be punished for refusing to marry same-sex couples. The legislation had been designed to protect churches from losing their tax-exempt status for refusing to perform any civil marriage.

Backers of Prop 8, the state’s same-sex marriage ban that voters passed in November 2008, had purported that if the measure didn’t pass, clergy would be forced to perform same-sex marriages.

After the veto, Leno had indicated he was considering re-introducing the bill.▼

www.ebar.com

non-LGBT communities.

“I think that unless we can build awareness in these other places, then we’re just going to continue to lose battles,” said Spradlin. “What really

works here is that so many gay people want to provide community service. And we have a lot of fun places to do that.”

Past service projects have included weeding at the Presidio and painting walls at the Oakes Children’s Center, a Mission area school for developmentally delayed kids.

It was a moving experience for volunteer Daniel Loftus. “The room that I painted was used to calm children down,” he said. His repairs and fresh coat of paint will go a long way toward helping children feel comfortable.

During the recent cleanup on Ocean Beach, a passing family with two children saw the group collecting trash, and joined in the effort alongside Gay For Good’s volunteers.

When Combs coordinated volunteers for the park service a year ago, Gay For Good was the first organization that he worked with. He was thrilled to have members back, and in ever-growing numbers.▼ Learn more about volunteering or nominate a beneficiary organization by visiting www.g4g-sf.org.

Yee recognizes TLC

Jane Philomen Cleland

by Matt Baume

Matt Baume

LGBT volunteers build partnerships through giving

tate Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco), right, presented a certificate of recognition Tuesday, December 28 to Transgender Law Center Executive Director Masen Davis on the occasion of the organization’s eighth anniversary. Yee, a candidate for San Francisco mayor, has reached out to the transgender community in recent years and has become a strong ally of the LGBT community. In 2001 as a city supervisor, he voted against adding transgender health benefits to the insurance coverage provided to city employees. However, during his first campaign for state Senate in 2006, he acknowledged his vote caused “pain” in the transgender community and that he had been wrong. He has secured a 100 percent ranking from Equality California during his time in the Legislature.

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used to the idea of same-sex couples obtaining marriage licenses.

History has shown that, to be successful at passing pro-gay legislation, it’s best to have a Democratic president and Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress. For two years, the LGBT community has experienced that generally supportive political climate in Washington. But on November 2, Republicans won enough seats in the House to take over majority control starting in January. They also increased their margin in the Senate, from 41 seats to 47.

What does that say about 2011?

Immediately, there will be “zero” chance of any pro-gay legislation passing in the next Congress, out Representative Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts) and others have said. No movement on the Employment NonDiscrimination Act, no movement on immigration rights for same-sex couples, no movement on ending tax penalties for gays who provide health coverage to their partners or spouses through work. It also means the LGBT community must switch from an offensive mode in Congress to a defensive one.

Given the largely unbroken Republican opposition to repeal of DADT (eight GOP senators voted for the final motion to repeal), it would not be a surprise to see the new Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Representative Buck McKeon (R-California), hold a hearing about whether DADT repeal can, in fact, be implemented without negative consequences to military readiness. He said in November that he would hold a hearing to examine the Pentagon’s re-

Governor ▼

page 1

changing his position over time. At first opposed to the use of state funds to pay for clean needle exchange programs, considered a key tool in the fight against HIV transmission, he relented and signed into law bills allowing the money to be used for such purposes.

Schwarzenegger at first vetoed efforts by openly gay state Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) to create an unpaid state holiday honoring the late Supervisor Harvey Milk, who became the state’s first openly gay elected leader when he won a seat in 1977 on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. It wasn’t until after the movie Milk came out and won two Academy Awards, with direct appeals from actor Sean Penn, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of Milk, did

Incoming House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon might fight implementation of DADT repeal.

port regarding repeal implementation. How far might Republicans try to leverage their power in the new Congress? Note this: The incoming chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security just announced he would hold a hearing on the “radicalization of the American Muslim community.”

U.S. Supreme Court issues two gay-helpful decisions The nation’s highest court issued two decisions in June that bode well for the LGBT community, both on cases from the 9th Circuit. First, in Doe v. Reed, it upheld a Washington state law that requires that petitions for putting issues on the ballot be made public. And second, in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, it upheld a California college’s policy banning discrimination based on sexual orientation in campus group membership.

In Doe, the high court held that state laws requiring public disclosure of petitions for ballot measures protect the integrity of the electoral process. A group opposed to domes-

the governor switch course.

He not only signed into law the bill creating Harvey Milk Day each May 22, but Schwarzenegger inducted the gay rights leader into the California Hall of Fame.

The governor took the same tortured path on the issue of same-sex marriage. While he personally professed that he was not against the gay nuptials, he claimed it was not up to leaders in Sacramento to overturn the state’s anti-gay marriage statutes.

He twice refused to sign into law bills that would have allowed LGBT couples to marry in California, arguing that voters should be the ones to decide the matter.

When the issue did reach the ballot box in 2008, Schwarzenegger came out against Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment that defined marriage as between a man and a woman. But he was largely invisible during the campaign that fall

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Republicans win control of the House

Senator Scott Brown changed the dynamics of the 111th Congress.

Attorneys David Boies and Theodore Olson brought star power and legal acumen to the federal Prop 8 lawsuit.

tic partnerships had argued its petitions should be protected from disclosure, claiming petition signers would be harassed by people with a different view.

In Christian Legal, the decision was of greater symbolic value than legal: It refused to say that religious beliefs always trump non-discrimination policies. A Christian student group at a public law school in San Francisco had claimed free exercise rights to get around the school’s non-discrimination policy.

right-wing religious entities, will find a way back, too. Such a group has a petition pending before the court now, challenging the city’s right to prevent them from mounting a ballot initiative against D.C.’s marriage law.

Scott Brown wins Ted Kennedy’s seat

What does that say about 2011?

As much as the Doe decision was helpful, it was also indecisive. Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the 8-1 majority, suggested to plaintiffs that they might get a better result if they limited their challenge to how the state law impacted petition signers for the domestic partnership referendum specifically. The plaintiffs said they would, so the case is almost certainly going to be back, probably in 2011. And there seems little doubt that Christian Legal, or some other

Martha Coakley, Massachusetts’ pro-gay attorney general, was supposed to be have been a shoo-in to win Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy’s seat after his death in 2009. But a relatively unknown Republican state senator, Scott Brown, trounced her in the special election last January. The Boston Globe called it “one of the biggest upsets in Massachusetts’ political history,” but it was bigger than that. It completely changed the dynamics of the 111th Congress and quashed the “hope and change” prospects the LGBT community expected from the inauguration of Obama and a Democratic majority in the House and Senate. Brown’s election took from Democrats the 60th vote they needed to

when the LGBT community and its allies mounted an unsuccessful bid to defeat the measure.

Since then Schwarzenegger has won plaudits for refusing to defend the anti-gay law in the federal courts, arguing that it is instead unconstitutional and should be struck down.

The overall picture, to some, portrays a man who once derided his Democratic opponents as “girlie men” as surprisingly cowardly when it comes to LGBT issues.

“It is great that Arnold has been on our side in the last few years. But, he has never been willing to put any of his own political capital on the line. Instead, he’s content to wait it out,” argued Democratic Party official Brian Leubitz, the gay publisher of the Calitics blog, in a post on his website in August titled “Arnold Schwarzenegger: ‘Gay friendly governator’ or frenemy? You be the judge.”

Openly gay state Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco), whose disagreements with Schwarzenegger led to a profane hidden phrase in one of the governor’s veto messages of an Ammiano bill, told the Bay Area Reporter that he deserves a failing grade for his handling of the marriage equality issue.

“I give him about a D. The most important thing he did, or not do, was signing the gay marriage bill. I think what hurts about that is he could have done better,” said Ammiano. “His lesbian aide Susan Kennedy was part of his decision not to sign it. That’s always reprehensible.”

However, Dan Brown, president of the gay Log Cabin Republicans San Francisco chapter, said the governor deserves praise for bucking the extremely anti-gay right wing faction of the GOP. “In general, the governor has been much more supportive than especially past Republican governors on LGBT issues. He has always been in the forefront of that in the party,” said Brown, who volunteered on

Schwarzenegger’s first gubernatorial campaign. “A lot of people were not happy with him vetoing a number of LGBT bills, specifically around marriage equality back before Prop 8 was enacted. He said the voters had already spoken so he wanted it to be a voter initiative.

“And he was very strongly against Prop 8 and refused to defend it in court. That, more than anything, speaks to his legacy in the LGBT perspective in supporting our community and trying to advance rights as much as possible,” added Brown.

For Laird, who praised Schwarzenegger for the fact that he signed every LGBT rights bill he sent to his desk, the governor’s time in Sacramento has nonetheless been disappointing. Rather than “blow up the boxes” in the Capitol as he promised to do during the recall campaign, Schwarzenegger saddled the state with an ongoing fiscal crisis, said Laird.

“The irony is as unhappy I was about his election in the recall, I thought he would have the political strength to do the hard things needed to raise taxes and balance the budget going forward. He never did that. He never had the political will to balance the budget,” said Laird, who to this day slams Schwarzenegger for doing away with the state’s vehicle license fee as soon as he took office. “He [recently] said, ‘I inherited a deficit of $16.8 billion and am leaving a deficit a little bit less than that now.’ That is just nonsense.

When he came in the deficit was $10 billion and he raised it $4 billion in the first minutes of his term.”

Overall, Laird said he gives the governor at best a B-minus, at worst a C-plus, in how he handled LGBT issues.

“In the end he came through on marriage and he signed a lot of LGBT friendly bills along the way and he made high profile LGBT appointments,” noted Laird. “He has been in that Republican box, which

ensure that legislation reached the floor of the Senate. And Republicans used that advantage throughout the year to thwart the advancement of numerous pieces of legislation, including a measure to repeal DADT before a standalone bill was passed this month. The Senate became a quagmire of partisan warfare for the sake of partisan gain though neither side really gained much from it.

What does that say about 2011?

For the foreseeable future, Congress is like a ship on a stormy sea of waves, rolling to one side and then the other.

The LGBT community has already demonstrated it knows how to shift its own balance in order to keep that ship moving in the right direction. It somehow convinced Brown and five other Republicans to jump the GOP ship and join the Democrats to enable DADT repeal to come to the floor of the Senate and be passed. Strengthening those alliances, however temporary and issuespecific, will be important to defending current civil rights gains and pushing for others in the future.▼

is that he wants to cross over and do pro-gay things but he doesn’t want to rub it into the face of the Republican base. That is the box he built for himself.”

As for what the governor’s thinking is on his LGBT legacy that remains unclear. The B.A.R.’s request for an exit interview was not granted.

In fact, in the eight years since Schwarzenegger burst onto the state’s political stage, he has not once granted a sit down interview to an LGBT news outlet.

“I am very critical of him for some of the budget votes and his petulance the last two years of his term and was really unhappy with his environmental issues,” said Laird, whose chances for capturing a vacant coastal state Senate seat held by the GOP this year were made more difficult when Schwarzenegger scheduled the election over the summer rather than combine it with the fall general election. “My global thought would be he had the chance to be the Pat Brown of his time and instead he is the biggest missed opportunity of a governor in modern times. He could have taken some really unpopular steps in the beginning and lived through it.”

Instead, said Laird, he struggled to balance budgets and fought never-ending battles with the Democratic-controlled Legislature.

“He just blew the opportunity,” said Laird.

For Brown, who knew the governor had many gay friends from when he lived in Los Angeles and was involved in Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan’s failed 2002 gubernatorial primary campaign, he has been pleased overall with Schwarzenegger’s time in Sacramento.

“I already knew Arnold was pretty supportive of the gay community.

That made it much easier to support him in the recall,” said Brown. “I have been quite pleased for how it turned out.”▼

▼

30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER 13

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LEGAL NOTICES STATEMENT FILE A-033192200 The following person(s) is/are doing business as NOBLE, 600 Polk Street, San Francisco, CA 94102. This businees is conducted by a corporation, signed Naresh Ahadhal . The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/07/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/07/10.

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The following person(s) is/are doing business as ANNEX FUND MANAGEMENT, 14 Jersey Street, San Francisco, CA 94114. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Moe Alsumidaie. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 11/01/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/22/10.

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LEGAL NOTICES NOTICE OF APPLICATION TO SELL ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES To Whom It May Concern: The name(s) of the applicant(s) is/are: LIVE AWAKE LLC. The applicants listed above are applying to the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control at 71 Stevenson Street,Suite 1500, San Francisco, CA 94105 to sell alcoholic beverages at: 203 Octavia Blvd., San Francisco, CA 94102. Type of license applied for:

41 ON-SALE BEER AND WINE EATING PLACE DEC.16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033175900 The following person(s) is/are doing business as BARK SF, 1405 Franklin Street,#307,San Francisco, CA 94109.

This business is conducted by an individual, signed Julia Carcich. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/01/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco ,CA on 12/01/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033148000 The following person(s) is/are doing business as FRONTLINES NEWSPAPER, 3311 Mission Street, Suite 25, San Francisco, CA 94110. This business is conducted by an individual, signed Chris Finn.

The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 10/11/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco ,CA on 11/01/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033168400 The following person(s) is/are doing business as HAYES VALLEY PET CARE, 55 Page Street, #625, San Francisco, CA 94102. This business is conducted by an individual, signed Mark A. Morris. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on NA. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 11/24/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033175200 The following person(s) is/are doing business as REAL LIFE AUTHOR/PUBLISHING, 371 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA 94102. This business is conducted by an individual, signed Donald D. Conely. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/01/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/01/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033179200 The following person(s) is/are doing business as TARAVAL PIZZA, 1115 Taraval Street, San Francisco, CA 94116.

This business is conducted by an individual, signed Sameer Beru. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/01/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/02/10.

STATEMENT FILE A-033178300

STATEMENT FILE A-033205300

STATEMENT FILE A-033187000

The following person(s) is/are doing business as CAFE CAPRICCIO, 2200 Mason Street, San Francisco, CA 94133.

This businees is conducted by a corporation, signed Vinal Patel. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 10/16/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/02/10.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as LBE TRANSPORTATION, LLC, 660 4th Street, San Francisco, CA 94107. This businees is conducted by an limited liability company, signed Jagtar Chandi.

The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/14/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/14/10.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as PASSPORT FOLDER,1680 Post Street, Ste. C,San Francisco, CA 94115. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Lao Xin. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/01/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/06/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011

DEC. 16,23,30,2010,JAN.06, 2011

STATEMENT FILE A-033173600

STATEMENT FILE A-033196600

STATEMENT FILE A-033198000

The following person(s) is/are doing business as D.S. SERVICES, 354 22nd Avenue, #2,San Francisco, CA 94121.

This businees is conducted by an individual, signed David Schneider. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 11/29/10.The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 11/3010.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as NICE COLLECTIVE M.S.U., 2544 3rd Street, San Francisco, CA 94107. This businees is conducted by an limited liability company, signed Riley JohnDonnell. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/09/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/09/10.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as ML TRADING COMPANY, 717 Cayuga Avenue ,San Francisco, CA 94112. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Mike Hoy Lau. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/09/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/09/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011

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STATEMENT FILE A-033194400

STATEMENT FILE A-033215800

The following person(s) is/are doing business as NEW ALTERNATIVES,1600 Guerrero Street,San Francisco, CA 94110.

This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Luz A. Bourne-Ruiz. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/08/10.The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/08/10.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as TARSIER TRAVEL & TOURS, 1048 Folsom Street, San Francisco, CA 94103. This businees is conducted by an husband and wife, signed Crisostomo Ibarra. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on NA. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/20/10.

DEC. 16,23,30,2010,JAN.06, 2011

STATEMENT FILE A-033218800

Happy 2011!!!

STATEMENT FILE A-033176700 The following person(s) is/are doing business as STUDIO RONSKY, 324 Collingwood Street, San Francisco, CA 94114. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Ronald S. Hermenau. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/01/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/01/10.

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011

STATEMENT FILE A-033195400 The following person(s) is/are doing business as MYSMTSHOP.COM, 1255 Polk Street,#26,San Francisco, CA 94109. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Aleksey Severyukhin. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on NA.The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/08/10.

DEC. 16,23,30,2010,JAN.06, 2011 STATEMENT FILE A-033196100 The following person(s) is/are doing business as GREEN CONSTRUCTION AND LANDSCAPING, 176 Capistrano Avenue ,San Francisco, CA 94112. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Lawrence Situ. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/08/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/08/10.

DEC. 16,23,30,2010,JAN.06, 2011 STATEMENT FILE A-033198700 The following person(s) is/are doing business as PETER JONES COMPUTER CONSULTING, 558 29th Avenue,San Francisco, CA 94121. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Peter Jones. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/09/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/09/10.

DEC. 16,23,30,2010,JAN.06, 2011

STATEMENT FILE A-033213800 The following person(s) is/are doing business as MOTTERSHEAD CONSULTING, 101 Lombard Street, #409W, San Francisco, CA 94111. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Terri Mottershead. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 07/30/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/20/10.

STATEMENT FILE A-033188900 The following person(s) is/are doing business as TRAVELING CAMEL PUBLICATIONS, 335 Berry Street, Suite 301, San Francisco, CA 94158. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Victoria Northridge. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 11/18/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/06/10.

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011 STATEMENT FILE A-033213500 The following person(s) is/are doing business as RAZORS, 4249 18th Street, San Francisco, CA 94114. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Everett C. Stone III. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 01/31/06.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/20/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010

Payment must accompany ad.

No ads taken over the telephone. If you have a question, call 415.861.5019.

Display advertising rates available upon request.

STATEMENT FILE A-033147600

RATES

The following person(s) is/are doing business as URBAN OM, 1661 Tennessee Street, #3E, San Francisco, CA 94107.

This businees is conducted by an individual, signed H.R. Baker. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 10/30/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 11/15/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 STATEMENT FILE A-033188800 The following person(s) is/are doing business as SUTRO HOMETECH, 141 Topaz Way, San Francisco, CA 94131.

This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Satoshi Okano. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/06/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 12/06/10.

DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010

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STATEMENT FILE A-033219000 The following person(s) is/are doing business as STAGE LOUNGE CATERING, 408 29th Street, San Francisco, CA 94131. This businees is conducted by a corporation, signed Tom Basso. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/22/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/22/10.

NOTICE OF APPLICATION TO SELL ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES To Whom It May Concern: The name(s) of the applicant(s) is/are: AKINAI INC. The applicants listed above are applying to the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control at 71 Stevenson Street,Suite 1500, San Francisco, CA 94105 to sell alcoholic beverages at: 2092 3rd Street, San Francisco, CA 94107. Type of license applied for:

STATEMENT FILE A-033215200 The following person(s) is/are doing business as WILLIAMS ELECTRONICS, 760 Church Street,#3, San Francisco, CA 94114. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Charles M. Williams. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on NA. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/20/10.

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011 STATEMENT FILE A-033192200 The following person(s) is/are doing business as NOBLE, 600 Polk Street, San Francisco, CA 94102. This businees is conducted by a corporation, signed Naresh Ahadhal . The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/07/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/07/10.

47 ON-SALE GENERAL EATING PLACE DEC 30,2010 JAN 06,13,2011 NOTICE OF APPLICATION TO SELL ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011 STATEMENT FILE A-033214000

To Whom It May Concern: The name(s) of the applicant(s) is/are: SWEET LIME INC. The applicants listed above are applying to the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control at 71 Stevenson Street,Suite 1500, San Francisco, CA 94105 to sell alcoholic beverages at: 2100 Sutter Street, San Francisco, CA 94115-3120.

Type of license applied for:

DEC. 23,30,2010,JAN.06,13, 2011

The following person(s) is/are doing business as ANNEX FUND MANAGEMENT, 14 Jersey Street, San Francisco, CA 94114. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Moe Alsumidaie. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 11/01/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/22/10.

41 ON-SALE BEER AND WINEEATING PLACE DEC 30,2010 JAN 06,13,2011

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47 ON-SALE GENERAL EATING PLACE DEC 30,2010 JAN 06,13,2011

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The following person(s) is/are doing business as 1.WHIMSY MEDIA, 2.GIRLS THAT ROAM, 3.SIGNATURE NOTARY PUBLIC, 322 12th Avenue,#3,Street, San Francisco, CA 94118. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Heather Cassell. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/23/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/23/10.

To Whom It May Concern: The name(s) of the applicant(s) is/are: AMPARO VIGIL, WILLIAM VIGIL. The applicants listed above are applying to the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control at 71 Stevenson Street,Suite 1500, San Francisco, CA 94105 to sell alcoholic beverages at: 546 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA 94110. Type of license applied for:

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DEC. 9,16,23,30, 2010 The following person(s) is/are doing business as BRANDON HAIR STUDIO, 660 Market Street,#202, San Francisco, CA 94104. This businees is conducted by a corporation, signed Mario Ibarra. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 11/11/10. The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco,CA on 11/16/10.

The following person(s) is/are doing business as CLIMB REAL ESTATE GROUP, 251 Rhode Island Street,#105, San Francisco, CA 94103. This businees is conducted by an individual, signed Tiffany Combs. The registrant(s) commenced to transact business under the above listed fictitious business name or names on 12/22/10.

The statement was filed with the City and County of San Francisco, CA on 12/22/10.

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Best of the year in the arts, part 2

Promises, promises

Transcendental music

Highlights in film, classical music, the fine arts, and of course, gay male pornography.

Looking ahead to offerings in Bay Area theatre in 2011.

Composer Eric Whitacre and his unique choral music on disc.

page 19

page 21

pages 17, 21, 22, 27, 28

ARTS&ENTERTAINMENT

BAYAREAREPORTER

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Vol. 40 . No. 52 . 30 December 2010

A wall of images depicting San Francisco from 1935 to the present greets visitors at the entrance to The Anniversary Show: 75 Years of Looking Forward at SFMOMA.

Best of the year in the Bay Area arts world ~ by Sura Wood ~ ell, 2010 is nearly out the door, and the time has come to reflect on the year that was. An eclectic year at the museums, 2010 was also a year of milestones. SFMOMA celebrated its 75th anniversary with expansive shows that repackaged and re-examined the museum’s holdings in painting, sculpture and photography, especially California photography. The anniversary shows dominated the galleries for the better part of the year. We were

Scene from Javier Fuentes-Leon’s Undertow.

Most outstanding show: Although it was overshadowed by the Impressionist d’Orsay hoopla at the de Young, Impressionist Paris: City of Light at the Legion, which transported lucky visitors to the Paris of the late 1800s and early 1900s through a series of marvelously evocative prints, drawings, photographs, paintings, books, richly informative text labels and the Legion’s superb scholarship – the best seen at any museum this year – was one of the most thrilling events of the year. Bravo!

Hands-down best photography exhibitions: Henri CartierBresson retrospective and Exposed at SFMOMA; Marc Riboud Photographs at the UCB Journalism School.

Best formal introduction: Maira Kalman. Artist, illustrator, diarist and inveterate New Yorker, Kalman may be Manhattan’s answer to Alexis de Toqueville, but even those familiar with her

page 22

Seeing double Top 10 films (x 2) of 2010 ~ by David Lamble ~ ur list of the best films of the year produces a first-place tie. A romantic tragedy fueled by magic realism, celebrating the taming of the Latin macho, is paired with the dark view of a digital urchin who’s up-ended our lives with motives perhaps as base as Welles’ media tyrant Charles Foster Kane.

Several picks are followed by “Oscar bait” tips.

Two worthies whose films didn’t make the list: Patricia Clarkson as a beautiful lady approaching 50 whose platonic affair grandly overshadows mere sins of the flesh, in Cairo Time; and neglected funny man Jim Carrey, for a mesmerizing queer con man in I Love You Phillip Morris.

1. Undertow Javier Fuentes-Leon nestles a quixotic ghost story on Peru’s pristine Pacific beaches. A married fisherman must choose between his male lover and his tiny seaside community’s immutable moral codes.

Fuentes-Leon abandons his tale’s realistic moorings, and substitutes the confounding dilemma that Santiago has died at sea, and that his ghost confronts his guilty lover at the most inconvenient moments. Watch a master filmmaker reinvigorate hoary clichés about closets and the sins of unrepentant machos.

Oscar bait: This film deserves a Best Foreign Film nod.

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also treated to a sampling of late Gap founder Don Fisher’s immense modern art cache that’s to fill a new wing slated for 2016. The Oakland Museum opened its freshly renovated facility in May with changes that set off its art collection to brilliant effect. The de Young marked its fifth anniversary in its Herzog & de Meuron digs, where visitors flocked for blockbuster exhibitions, by now less interested in the building’s controversial architecture than what they found inside.

Here, in no particular order, are some noteworthy events of the past year.

The GLBT Historical Society’s reopening: After months of delays, the museum/archive finally launched in its new, larger, and much more optimal location in the Castro in December.

An official opening and additional installations are promised for Jan. 13. Stay tuned.

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Rick Gerharter

The finest arts, 2010

page 28

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

OUT

THERE

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The Italian touch & others

by Roberto Friedman isten, we’re not suggesting that these are the best CDs of the year by any means. They’re just the discs we found ourselves spinning most over the past 12 months, alphabetized by artist.

Laurie Anderson, Homeland (Nonesuch): “If somebody asked me to design a religion,/ I would make it all about snow./ No good or evil and no suffering,/ Just perfect crystals spinning/ In ecstasy ecstasy ecstasy ecstasy.” – from “Bodies in Motion.”

Antony and the Johnsons, Swanlights (Secretly Canadian).

O UT Autolux, Transit Transit (TBO).

Erykah Badu, New Amerykah Part 2: Return of the Ankh (Motown).

Issac Delgado, L O V E (Calle 54/Masterworks).

Dungen, Skit I Allt (Mexican Summer).

L

Frazey Ford, Obadiah (Nettwerk).

Peter Gabriel, Scratch My Back (Real World).

Vittorio Grigolo, The Italian Tenor (Sony Masterworks): Once you get past the “Is he the next great tenor?” publicity-generated nonquestion (read: hype), you can just enjoy the freshness and musicality of Grigolo’s voice, which he uses to splendid effect in famous arias by Verdi, Donizetti and Puccini. OT favorites are “Firenze e come un albero fiorito” from Gianni Schicchi, and “Da quella pira” from Il trovatore, supported by Maria Cioppi and Luca Casalin.

Leela James, My T HERE Soul (Stax).

Cyndi Lauper, Memphis Blues (Mercer Street), with such great bluesmen sitting in as Charlie Musselwhite, Allen Toussant and B.B. King.

Lylit, Unexpected (Kedar).

Gustav Mahler, Songs with Or-

chestra – San Francisco Symphony, Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor (SFS).

Nelly McKay, Home Sweet Mobile Home (Verve).

Miniature Tigers, For Trees (Modern Art).

Jason Moran, Ten (EMI).

Chris Pureka, How I Learned To See in the Dark (Sad Rabbit).

Recoil, Selected (Mute).

Robyn, Body Talk Pt. 1 (Interscope): “Don’t Fucking Tell Me What To Do.” Sade, Soldier of Love (Sony).

School of Seven Bells, Disconnect from Desire (Vagrant).

Rufus Wainwright, All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu (Decca).

Straight goods Time for calendar shopping, and here’s one that caught our eye! In its publicist’s own words: “The STR8 Against H8 2011 Charity Calendar shows homofriendly straight guys stripped down and oiled-up, looking picture-perfect sexy for a good cause. The FCKH8.com website sells the 13month charity calendars online, and also features a four-minute, behindthe-scenes video featurette that captures all the sexy shenanigans that happened during the photo shoot.

The hot and humorous ‘making of ’ video features athletic, good-looking, half-nude straight models in compromising positions, and pushes the line with straight men’s junk needing to be blurred out.”

Half-nude? But which half? Compromising positions sound promis-

ing. Straight men’s junk – oh, story of our life. Why should 2011 be any different?

“Who hasn’t wanted to get their hands on some hot straight boys walking around in just their underwear and jockstraps?” asks video director Luke Montgomery, we assume rhetorically. “We loved every minute of it, and it shows in the calendar’s sexy photos. Was it awkward at times? You bet!” The calendar donates $2 from each one sold to fund the fight for equal marriage rights and queer youth suicide prevention.

We’d say that’s a right good use of straight men’s junk, although we can think of a few more.

Provocateur, 10%, Big Daddy and Alluvial publishers want you to know that they also issue 2011 calendars that will make your tongue hang out. The Latin Men calendar for 2011 features portraits of Latin male specimens by openly gay photographer Paul Culver, who lives and works in SF, home to so many a calendar model.

could lead to accidental groping, there is no legitimate reason for a wrestler to get as intensive” as the boy is accused of getting.

“There’s absolutely no advantage to doing that,” a former wrestling coach told the Times. “And we don’t want guys like that in the sport anyway, if they’re probing.” But enquiring minds want to probe.

Holiday ins We hope your Christmas week was happy. Out There was up to our usual tricks, because partaking of

Wrestling ring “The trial has been pushed back for a Central California high school wrestler charged with the sexual battery of an opponent during a practice match,” reported the AP last week. “Defense lawyer Stephen Quade told the Fresno Bee that his 17year-old client is scheduled to go to trial on Jan. 13 in juvenile court. Clovis police say the boy is accused of ramming his fingers into the rectum of his opponent during a July practice, but Quade argues he used a legitimate move called the ‘butt drag.’ Quade said the move is commonly used in wrestling.

“Prosecutors had offered to dismiss the case if the teen stayed out of trouble for several months, but Quade said his client would reject the deal because he didn’t do anything wrong. On Thursday, the judge placed a gag order on the case.”

Butt drag? Gag order? Out There’s sports-minded correspondent offers some color commentary. “When I was in high school, my mother wanted me to go out for wrestling. She said it would broaden my shoulders (it did that to my older brother). If I’d have known it would have broadened my sphincter, I might have taken up her advice.” TMI? The New York Times picked up the story sans sphincter in its weekend editions. “Wrestling coaches say that while grabbing the backs of the legs and buttocks during a match

cultural riches is our preferred form of holiday-making. On Christmas day, the Contemporary Jewish Museum was open and free. We enjoyed touring the exhibits Curious George Saves the Day: The Art of Margret and H.A. Rey, Black Sabbath: The Secret Musical History of Black-Jewish Relations, and Reclaimed: Paintings from the Collection of Jacques Goudstikker, all of which greatly repaid our interest. Info can be found at www.thecjm.org.

For our holiday cinema choice, we went to the Lumiere Theatre to see Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, a Finnish import that The New York Times wrote “turns Santa into a savage troll, and his elves into naked, wrinkly graybeards.” The movie might have been made in the snowy Northern landscape of Finland, but savage troll? Naked, wrinkly graybeards? We were transported right back to present-day San Francisco!

Happy 2011!▼

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

19

THEATRE

Coming theatrical attractions Looking ahead to the year 2011 in Bay Area theatre Utter Kander

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42nd Street Moon’s Salon series moves into more recent times with its tribute to John Kander, who, with the late lyricist Fred Ebb, wrote such musicals as Cabaret, Chicago, Zorba, and the recent The Scottsboro Boys. Artistic Director Greg McKellan will direct and narrate the musical revue, which will feature Tony Award-winning Karen Ziemba and Broadway performer Noah Racey, both of whom starred in Kander and Ebb’s Steel Pier. Severregulars will also B ACKSTAGE albeMoon Bipolar express offering musical contriHow to follow up butions. Only perforon the jolly, cartoon-inmance on Jan. 27 at the Alcazar Thespired Shrek the Musical? With a musiatre; www.42ndmoonstmoon.org. cal about bipolar disorder, of course.

Best of Broadway continues its season Nuclear family with the touring edition of Next to NorNew Conservatory Theatre Cenmal, the 2008 Broadway musical that ter gets serious with Henry Murray’s won the Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Treefall, a post-apocalyptic variation Award for its star Alice Ripley. Good on Peter Pan in which three young news for us: Ripley is continuing in her male survivors try to recreate society role as the afflicted housewife whose illbased on fragments from the past, ness creates divergent coping mechanisms within her family. “The bravest and most surprising musical on Broadway,” wrote critic Ben Brantley in The New York Times. Runs Jan. 25-Feb. 20 at the Curran Theatre; www.shnsf.com.

Beyond ‘Raisin’ Playwright Bruce Norris audaciously riffs off that most sacrosanct of African-American plays, Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, to examine the plus-ca-change nature of race relations. The critically acclaimed Clybourne Park is set in the home that the black Younger family so triumphantly bought in a white neighborhood. The first act takes place in 1959, before the Youngers have moved in and neighborhood factions worry about their pending arrival. The second act takes place 30 years later, as a white couple wants to buy the house in what has become a predominantly black neighborhood. Cal Shakes’ Jonathan Moscone is guest director of the ACT production. Runs Jan. 20-Feb 13; www.act-sf.org.

Veterans’ play The Dresser is a play about a life in the theater, and two actors who know the subject very well will star in San Jose Rep’s production of the Ronald Harwood play. Bay Area legend Ken Ruta is cast as a Shakespearean actor-manager whose fading days are overseen by his devoted dresser, being played by the estimable James Carpenter. The Dresser is built for memorable performances, and Ruta and Carpenter are an ideal pair to deliver on that. Runs Jan. 27-Feb. 20; www.sanjoserep.com.

Marriage-go-round Stephen Sondheim is the protective sort when it comes to his work, so it was a bit of a surprise when he granted the Celebration Theatre of Los Angeles permission to turn the lonely heterosexual couple in Marry Me a Little into two gay men aching for love. Theatre Rhino and director John Fisher have secured similar permission for its production of the all-sung musical journey crafted from songs cut from Sondheim musicals. Runs at Feb. 9-20 at the Eureka Theatre; www.therhino.org.

Marsh madness Two solo lesbian performers, the highly regarded Sara Felder and the NEA-notorious Holly Hughes, are bringing new shows to the Marsh.

Felder’s Out of Sight (Jan. 13-Feb. 13) is the story of a nearly blind mother and her juggler-lesbian daughter who have passionately differing opinions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Hughes’ The Dog and Pony Show (Feb. 3-27) is the radical artist’s unlikely gentle tale of lesbians and their relationship to the

Local legend Ken Ruta plays an aging Shakespearean actor being held together by his loyal companion in The Dresser at San Jose Rep.

and whose social and gender order is upset with the arrival of a headstrong girl. This is the SF debut of the play that had its premiere in 2009 in Los Angeles. Runs Jan. 21Feb. 27; www.nctcsf.org.

Mall rats The seemingly mundane issue of

Craig Schwartz

hat’s the opposite of a baker’s dozen? A miser’s dozen – as in 11. The years 2010 and 2012 are ripe for Top 10 and Top 12 lists, and even 2013 can get the baker’s dozen treatment.

But 2011 is kinda on its own. Yes, I know these numbers are totally arbitrary, but a hook is a hook is a hook. Here, in no particular order, are 11 theater productions that promise good things in the first weeks of the new year.

dates;

Jeremy Kushnier, Alice Ripley, and Asa Somers play a family torn apart by mental illness in the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Next to Normal, arriving at the Curran Theatre in January.

where to place the air ducts in a new mall becomes a story of workplace pitfalls, the teetering status quo, and relationships between men and women in the world premiere of Theresa Rebeck’s What We’re Up Again. The New York playwright has become a Bay

Area regular, and last season the Magic Theatre produced her successful stamp-collecting thriller Mauritius.

Runs Feb. 2-March 8 at the Magic; www.magictheatre.org.

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canine species. Various www.themarsh.org.

Peter Prato

by Richard Dodds

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

BOOKS

Wedding bell blues

by Jim Piechota A Passionate Engagement by Ken Harvey; Pleasure Boat Studio, $18

en Harvey’s sullen, resonant memoir about coming to terms with life, love, and marriage equality A Passionate Engagement is as timely as it is moving.

Born in Lynn, a factory town in suburban Massachusetts, the author’s earliest memories of feeling “not like any other boy I know” took root even before elementary school. Soon after, it was gym class and the dreaded locker room that would become both a burden and a secret center of carnal pleasures. Almost pornographic in detail, Harvey describes one of his early teachers as “a beefy weightlifter who liked to parade around the locker room in skintight shirts and shorts

K

to display his bulging biceps and legs.” Shower time was horrific as Harvey discovered that the sight of other naked boys made him rockhard with an erection that inspired cruel taunting, name-calling, and towel-snapping, a classic form of childhood “torture,” as his therapist would pronounce many years later.

This “torture” also plagued Harvey at home, where his homophobic, abusive father would beat his mother, ignore him and his sibling, and never bother to disclose the truth to his sister that she was actually adopted.

After filing for bankruptcy, his father died, leaving his mother to answer uncomfortable questions raised by a son who was sexually confused and desperate for parental guidance, which his mother was psychologically and emotionally unable to provide.

Harvey’s contention about gay

marriage and the right to marry seeps its way into several chapters, almost as an afterthought or a coda to each slice of his adolescence. There’s no missing his belief system, and though a few of these references are clunky and seem haphazardly sewn into the narrative, there are other instances when he clearly correlates this fight for equality with his early years struggling with his own identity crisis. The author’s strict Roman Catholic upbringing became challenged after learning about the widespread, horrific sexual abuse scandal that rocked the Church.

Though it’s compelling and interesting, the author struggled a bit with the clarity and structure of his memoir. Harvey’s timeline lacks a linear structure and awkwardly

jumps from the contemporary, as Massachusetts hotly debates marriage rights and he and his lifetime

love Bruce seek a formal union, back and forth to his younger days placing personal ads in the Boston Phoenix seeking romance and a long-term boyfriend.

But that’s a minor quibble for a book that intimately details the life of a man who, at one point, looked at marriage as merely a disastrously antiquated institution that failed his own parents.

Toward the book’s conclusion, Harvey describes the three small strokes he suffered at age 50, and how he would never have survived the traumatic event and its aftermath had it not been for his husband Bruce’s presence at his bedside in the hospital. The vital importance of the availability of marriage to everyone shines through in this important story of true love and political activism. ▼

The original love goddess

by Tavo Amador ita Hayworth (1918-87), hailed as “The Love Goddess,” was classic Hollywood’s reigning sex symbol between the comically tough Jean Harlow (1911-37) and the seemingly naive Marilyn Monroe (192662). Hayworth wasn’t blonde, hard, or innocent. At her best, she smoldered knowingly. Five of her movies have been packaged in The Rita Hayworth Film Collection on DVD. They show why she was called “The Intellectual’s Glamour Girl.”

Born Margarita Cansino in Brooklyn, New York, she grew up in show business. Her Spanish father, Eduardo Cansino, had an acclaimed dance act. While performing with his troupe in Tijuana, she was spotted by producer Winfield Sheehan and signed to a movie contract. For two years, she worked in B pictures without making a mark. In 1937, her first husband secured her a long-term contract with Columbia. Her thick, wavy dark hair was dyed copper red, and her hairline

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raised via electrolysis. Within two years, she was getting better parts and attention. Stardom came when, photographed in color, she created a sensation as the seductress opposite Tyrone Power in Blood and Sand (1941).

The first film in the set, Cover Girl (1944), is a musical co-starring Gene Kelly, and featuring a Jerome Kern-Ira Gershwin score. Hayworth plays Rusty Parker, a hoofer who wins a cover girl contest and becomes a Broadway star. There’s a flashback set in the Gay 90s with Hayworth playing Rusty’s vaudeville headliner grandmother. Although her singing was always dubbed, Hayworth was a terrific dancer. Fred Astaire twice partnered her, and she was equally brilliant with Kelly, whose earthy persona suited her better. The score includes the haunting “Long Ago and Far Away.” With Phil Silvers, Eve Arden, and Lee Bowman. Directed by Charles Vidor.

Travis Banton designed Hayworth’s gowns. Lush cinematography by Alan M. Davey and Rudolph Mate.

The tremendous success of Cover Girl was followed by the disappoint-

Legendary movie star Rita Hayworth.

ing Tonight and Every Night (1945), set in London and based on a club that never canceled a show during Britain’s World War II fight with Germany. She looked gorgeous and danced superbly, but her co-star was the dull Bowman, and the score was forgettable. Victor Saville directed.

“There never was a woman like Gilda!” proclaimed the ads, and this 1946 noir is her most famous film. As the temptress who breaks up the surprisingly homoerotic relationship between her husband Ballin Mundson (icy George Macready) and her former lover Johnny Farrell (virile Glenn Ford), she’s unforgettable. Mundson picks up Farrell on the docks of Buenos Aires and brings him to his mansion. He walks into the master bedroom, asking, “Gilda! Are you decent?” The camera pans to Hayworth, sitting in bed, wearing a revealing negligee. She tosses back her extraordi-

nary hair and replies, “Who, me?” Her reaction to Farrell is coolly electric.

When he resists her advances, she flees to Montevideo to work in a nightclub.

She dances sensationally to “Amoro Mio,” and unforgettably performs what Pauline Kael called “a fully dressed striptease” singing “Put the Blame on Mame.” She only removes one glove, but the number is among the most subtly erotic ever filmed. Directed by Vidor. Jean Louis designed her classic gowns. The movie was a smash, and she eclipsed her rival pinup girls.

Her marriage to Orson Welles ended in 1948, and two years later she and Aly Kahn became the most famous couple of the day. Their marriage cost her Born Yesterday (1950), which won Judy Holiday the Best Actress Oscar, although it’s doubtful Hayworth had the hard vulgarity the part required. Back in Hollywood, she was Salome (53), which had little to do with the Biblical story or Oscar Wilde’s play. At 35, she looked great, but was hardly a teenager. Rather than being obsessed with John the Baptist, she falls for a Roman commander (Stewart Granger), and they convert to Christianity. Charles Laughton is a

Backstage ▼

page 19

Harper’s ferry The title character in Simon Stephen’s Harper Regan is a housewife who leaves her suburban London family without warning, but for seemingly benign reasons. Her journey to visit her ailing father includes unexpected adventures and revelations of secret motivations for her flight. Stephens’ play had its premiere at London’s National Theatre in 2008, and this is its West Coast premiere. Runs Jan. 25-March 5 at SF Playhouse; www.sfplayhouse.org.

splendidly lascivious Herod, lusting for his stepdaughter. Judith Anderson is the jealous Herodias. Sir Cedric Hardwicke plays Tiberius Caesar. Jean Louis designed Hayworth’s lavish costumes, and her Dance of the Seven Veils is memorable. The film is a great guilty pleasure. Directed, with no sense of camp, by William Dieterle.

Gay author Somerset Maugham’s short story “Rain” had been adapted as a play for Jeanne Eagles and Tallulah Bankhead, and filmed with Gloria Swanson (1928) and Joan Crawford (1932). Hayworth stepped into their high heels as Miss Sadie Thompson (1953), the set’s final movie. She’s effective as the fallen lady of the South Pacific, much better than prestigious co-star Jose Ferrer’s hypocritical Reverend Davidson. She performs the sultry “The Heat Is On.” Aldo Ray plays a GI who lusts for Sadie. With a young Charles Bronson (billed as Charles Buchinski). Directed by Curtis Bernhardt.

Hayworth worked in movies and television into the 1970s, but with few exceptions, her later performances were rarely exciting. She was glorious stripping to “Zip” in the poor Pal Joey (57), billed above Frank Sinatra – her last film at Columbia. She was touching as an aging beauty tormenting Burt Lancaster in Separate Tables (58), and excellent opposite Gary Cooper and Tab Hunter in the Western They Came to Cordura (59).

Her five marriages ended in divorce. “Every man I’ve ever known has fallen in love with Gilda and awakened with me,” she lamented. She suffered from alcoholism and Alzheimer’s Disease. Daughter Yasmin Khan became an early advocate for victims of that horrendous affliction. Despite her success, Hayworth’s career suggests that Hollywood didn’t fully exploit her gifts. Still, her legacy was confirmed when the American Film Institute named her 19th in its top 25 female legends of the 20th Century.▼

miere by Allison Moore that delves into a family’s crisis of pink slips, infertility, and the arrival of a renegade relative with luggage including contraband.

Runs Jan. 28-March 6 at the Aurora Theatre; www.auroratheatre.org.

The act of the act Z Space leaps into uncharted territories with The Companion, a piece being created during rehearsals by Beth Wilmurt and Mark Jackson about a vaudeville duo developing an act. It’s risky business, and improbably inspired by the scientific analysis of human connection in the book A General Theory of Love. Runs Jan. 18-Feb. 13 at Theatre Artaud.▼

Bridge to nowhere The 2007 Mississippi River Bridge collapse in Minneapolis provides the background for Collapse, a world pre-

Richard Dodds can be reached at BARstage@comcast.net.

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

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Gaily forward with classical music

by Philip Campbell ime flies when you’re having fun. Actually, it flies by regardless, but sometimes, especially in the presence of great music, it can feel like time is standing still. Those are the moments we live for, when music lifts us from the ordinary and offers a glimpse of the sublime.

The San Francisco Symphony is nearing the halfway mark on its 2010-11 season, and the San Francisco Opera has already wrapped up its fall repertory. Both organizations have given us some timeless moments to date, and there is still plenty to look forward to in the new year.

The junction of Grove and Van Ness continues to corner the market on world-class music-making, and the War Memorial Opera House and Davies Symphony Hall have been lively as ever.

At first, the SFS appeared to be moving at a low-key but steadily increasing pace. It was almost as if the season were deliberately hanging fire.

Perhaps, at some level, energy (and budget) is being conserved for the upcoming, massive and ambitious centennial celebrations. Still, right out of the gate, we got the chance to spend an opening night with the great soprano Jessye Norman. The diva may have lost some of the old vocal mega-wattage, but seeing her new slimmed-down look and hearing her sing Duke Ellington proved memorable anyway. It was a glamorous gala with a pleasantly intimate atmosphere.

After that, guest conductors provided most of the interesting concerts of the first quarter. Semyon Bychkov returned with a program that featured pianist Kirill Gerstein in a truly refreshing interpretation of Rachmaninoff ’s “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini.” Bychkov also led a rousing performance of William Walton’s problematic but exciting Symphony No. 1. It was one of those unexpectedly delightful concerts that force us to make critical reappraisals of works we thought we knew too well, and others we ought to know better.

James Conlon breezed through town with violin superstar Joshua

San Francisco Symphony

T

Yuri Shkoda

Pianist Helene Grimaud will play the Schumann piano concerto.

Coming up in January at Davies Symphony Hall: conductor Kirill Karabits.

Bell, and managed to make his own impressive mark by combining three tone poems of Dvorak into their original performance mode. The Triptych almost eclipsed Bell’s predictably winning performance of Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1.

The highly anticipated premiere of pop star/serious composer Rufus Wainwright’s Five Shakespeare Sonnets, rescheduled after a delay from last season, proved a little underwhelming.

The musical setting was earnest and seductively lush, but Wainwright missed an unqualified triumph by performing his own score, ironically written for a voice with greater vocal range. Bad microphones and amplification didn’t help, either.

It was late in the year and quite recently that the season came to full and thrilling life. American composer John Adams returned to the SFS, cradle of his earliest successes, to take

his honored place as composer-inresidence with the organization’s Project San Francisco. Hearing his magnum opus Harmonielehre after 25 years, and knowing that it was recorded with Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas conducting, provided one of the greatest highlights of this or any other season.

Looking forward to 2011, the SFS has got some more tempting goodies in store, and as earlier in the season, it looks like some of the tastiest will be served up by guest conductors. In January, conductor Kirill Karabits is joining with the wonderful pianist Helene Grimaud (playing the Schumann Concerto) and bringing Elegie, a work by Valentin Silvestrov, to DSH. David Robertson is conducting the world premiere of a SFS Commission later in the month. Avner Dorman’s Uriah will share the bill with violinist Leonidas Kavakos play-

Lithe, rich & reverberant t’s so rare to spot reasons why the time we live in is exactly the right – even the best – time to be alive, that when one comes along, you’ve just got to sing about it. That’s what people – more of them, literally, by the minute, around the world – are doing with Eric Whitacre’s transcendental and not a little narcotic choral music. If this were the pre-’Tunes days, you already wouldn’t be able to lay your hands on a copy of his new CD, Light and Gold (Decca), because Decca couldn’t make them fast enough. But now you have to duck to get out of this music’s way – and you’d be a fool to.

Whitacre the composer has found his voice, and now he’s looking for yours. If you submit an video audition (everything you need is at www.virtualchoir.org) by Dec. 31, you could be part of his next, biggestto-date virtual choir event, scheduled for “release” in April. Both an offshoot and a rich, new tributary of MTT’s YouTube Orchestra, Whitacre’s online chorus made a trial run earlier this year with a performance of “Lux aurumque” (“Light and Gold” in Latin) by 185 singers from 12 countries.

Light and Gold, the CD, is a compilation of 16 pieces Whitacre considers his core repertoire, performed by a chorus comprised of his own Singers, Laudibus, and the King’s

Decca

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Composer Eric Whitacre.

Singers. Together they make what he considers his ideal sound: lithe, rich, and reverberant, yet a leaner, tighter sound than that of Stephen Layton’s Polyphony, which recorded the first major CD of Whitacre’s music for Hyperion in 2006. (But Whitacre fans would sacrifice a limb before giving up that disc, Couldburst, which contains a half-dozen of the same pieces that are given new voice on Light and Gold, including “Lux Aurumque,” as well as what for many is his greatest composition yet, the narrative, 16-minute “When David heard.”)

“Sleep,” the closing track on Light

and Gold and one of the highlights of Cloudburst, has all the fundamental Whitacre fingerprints: close harmonies with ample, pillow-soft dissonances; “cloud chords”; avalanches of shattered, decaying harmonies; keening, high-treble descants offset by the bass rumbles usually associated with Russian choruses. The almost literally hypnotic text, by Charles Anthony Silvestri, a Whitacre “find” and regular collaborator, is both in English and easily understandable.

The only significant downside to music as rapturously dense as Whitacre’s is that it’s often impossible to make out the texts being set, except in tantalizing part. And then, the texts Whitacre chooses are as often as not in other languages, sometimes more than one per piece.

As with Cloudburst, most of the pieces on Light and Gold are miniatures (five-minute-ish), a cappella (chorus only), and, textually, highly impressionistic. But when instrumental sounds do make their telling appearances, as they do in the Five Hebrew Love Songs (set to poems by Whitacre’s wife, Hila Plitmann, who also is their narrator), the effect is electrifying (and erases any doubt that Whitacre knows what he’s up to compositionally). Carryovers such as “i thank You God for most this amazing day” (to e.e. cummings) “hope, faith, life, love,” and “A Boy

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by Tim Pfaff

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ing Prokofiev’s Concerto No. 2.

Marek Janowski is passing through with an all-Beethoven program in February, and returning conductor Bernard Labadie will appear with an all-Mozart bill.

I’m especially looking forward to MTT and the Mozart Requiem at the end of February because he has included Morton Feldman’s Rothko Chapel. Oh please, maestro, please, will you do your hilarious Morton Feldman impersonation before we get started?

April brings one of my favorite young pianists, Jonathan Biss, back for Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto (No. 5, in E-flat Major). The month of May will provide another celebration of Mahler with MTT on the podium. Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Symphony No. 2 in C minor, Resurrection, and Symphony No. 6 in A minor all add up to something of a Mahler festival, and should add a sense of closure to the luminous and historic collaboration of MTT, the SFS and Gustav Mahler.

The season ends with another promising collaboration, Beethoven’s glorious Missa solemnis played by the SFS, conducted by MTT, and featuring Ragnar Bohlin’s wonderful SFS Chorus.

Opera notes Starting in June, the San Francisco Opera’s full presentation of Wagner’s four-opera Der Ring des Ni-

belungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) makes good on the promise of the already well-received presentation of the first two operas in the cycle. Das Rheingold and Die Walkure have played the War Memorial to great acclaim as part of Francesca Zambello’s American Ring, and her Walkure alone would be enough reason to take a summertime stay-cation in San Francisco. Stunningly designed and intelligently staged, the SFO’s Ring is shaping up to be a welcome relief from all the crazy sci-fi Eurotrash productions that seem to pop up everywhere else.

The SFO’s recently ended season went from success to success, with some major highlights along the way.

We give thanks for the unforgettable Makropulos Case and Karita Mattila’s fabulous star turn; thanks for not messing with The Marriage of Figaro by adding fashionably dark psychosexual psychology (though bassbaritone Luca Pisaroni as Figaro certainly was sexy enough); and a great big thanks for giving us a chance to see Placido Domingo in what may be his SFO farewell, as Cyrano de Bergerac in Franco Alfano’s operatic retelling of the ageless tale.

Other outfits might be counting their paperclips and nursing their recession-era wounds, but the SFO is rolling right along, and the lure of a major Ring cycle should do some wonderful things for the tourist trade this summer.▼

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

Art world 2010 ▼

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witty New Yorker covers and her alter ego, Max the Poet Dog, the incurably romantic canine with an affinity for Paris, didn’t know her name until the Contemporary Jewish Museum’s entrancing retrospective arrived. An American original who followed her bliss long before it was fashionable, she makes a living and has produced an amusing body of work through her voracious intellectual curiosity, artistic eye and sly wit. Her latest project: a book on the best places in the world to have breakfast in bed. And she gets paid to do this? Where do I sign up?

Best art doc: Exit Through the Gift Shop, a wild ride with the wily, canny British street/graffiti artist Banksy, pulling our leg and giving a generous tug to the pretensions of the commercial art world and its wannabes.

Vive La France!: We have the Musee d’Orsay’s renovation project to thank for a major injection of Franco adrenaline in 2010, with their loan of over 200 masterpieces in a pair of terrific, back-to-back shows at the de

Young, the only US venue to host both. If Birth of Impressionism was an academic wind-up, then Part 2, Van Gogh, Cezanne and Beyond, hit it out of the park. In an age when people experience the world virtually and are physically attached to their computers and smart phones, the impressive attendance numbers (Birth: 432,389; Van Gogh, etc.: 298,075 as of last week) attest to the power of art and value of up-close and personal encounters with those glorious brushstrokes and colors.

You had to be there and still can, if you missed Part 2. It closes Jan. 18.

Best naughty fun: The Bodies Are Back. In 1971, the London police shut down a solo exhibition by feminist artist Margaret Harrison, who dared to tread the fine line between “irony, sexuality, transgender, transvestism, power, masculinity, objectification and exploitation.” For her show at Intersection for the Arts, she resurrected her predominantly female forms, trussed up and spilling out of scanty, sexualized outfits, and her diabolical genderbending from that notorious exhibit, along with new works that carried forward a mischievous, transgressive spirit. Clearly, the 70-year-old Harrison, a native Brit trained at the high-brow

Royal Academy, is no less of a shitstarter now than she was 40 years ago.

Biggest double-take: SFMOMA’s How Wine Became Modern begged the question: Does an assortment of wine labels and a paean to the marketing of the elixir of the gods really belong in a modern art museum?

Artist to watch: Brent Green. For his digital video Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then, Green built a movie set, an enormous crescent moon that glowed, and hung wooden stars on wires. His Perpetual and furious refrain, also shown at the Berkeley Art Museum, was an enthralling installation whose elements recalled the battered time-traveling contraptions filmmaker Terry Gilliam is so fond of. A “choir” of 13 willowy, elongated wooden figures were linked by copper tubing to a rotating drum (actually a salvaged water tank), a creaky sound machine that emitted musical sounds. Wow! Most dramatic back-story: Reclaimed at CJM tells a critically important narrative of the ongoing restitution of works owned by Dutch artdealer Jacques Goudstikker. His collection was stolen by Herman Goring and his cabal of thieves and murderers when they entered Amsterdam, perpetuating the Nazis’ pernicious program of seizing artworks belonging to deported or fleeing Jews, then hoarding the booty for their own selfaggrandizement. It was an epic crime of the 20th century without adequate resolution or punishment. Nearly 100,000 works remain unaccounted

Rick Gerharter

A museumgoer looks at linz diary, a 2003 series of photographs by Emily Jacir, part of the show Exposed: Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera since 1870, at SFMOMA.

ART

Rick Gerharter

FINE

“The Sleep of Caliban” by Odilon Redon, part of the show Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cezanne and Beyond: Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the Musee d’Orsay at the de Young Museum.

From Pixar: 25 Years of Animation at the Oakland Museum.

for. Returning them would seem a moral imperative.

Shanghai’d: The Asian Art Museum’s much-touted showcase of art from Shanghai was a confusing mishmash of cool stuff that didn’t hang together. It was both an unusual stumble and an admirable attempt by this museum, which usually focuses on ancient masterpieces, to mount a show rooted in the modern age. The chronology and organization were difficult to follow, and surprisingly, the work by Shanghai’s younger generation of artists was its weakest link. Rumors

have been circulating that the museum is facing bankruptcy, but here’s hoping they pull through and thrive.

Best glimpse behind the scenes, ever!: Pixar: 25 Years of Animation at the Oakland Museum offered a chance to see Woody and the Gang as well as other Pixar characters in their embryonic stages, and illuminated the Emeryville-based studio’s ingenuity and humor. The show, like their movies, was entertaining for both kids and their parents. Hey – those Pixar folks are classically trained artists who can really draw. Who knew?▼

Under a tropical sun

by David Lamble edhi Ben Attia’s The String (TLA), a witty X-ray of the social/sexual pecking order among the North African upperclass and their former French rulers, won the 2010 Frameline audience award for best feature. With its subtle evocation of the region’s centuriesold tradition of same-sex relations plopped down in a breathtakingly lovely Mediterranean setting, enhanced by Karol Beffa’s original score, The String begins with a moody mama’s boy having serious second thoughts about returning to the tensions and taboos that defined his adolescence and drove him abroad in the first place.

Malik (the elegant Antonin Stahly) settles down in his family’s comfy Tunisian seaside villa hoping to impress the powers-that-be with his newly minted French architecture degree, all the while deflecting scrutiny of his Parisian-cultivated taste for frisky boys. Confronting disturbing memories of his newly dead Arab dad, Malik spends long, hot nights knocking down booze with his irritable European mom (Claudia Cardinale, still bearing traces of the verve and beauty that allowed her to star for Fellini, Visconti and Blake Edwards).

M

Dive in to our January BARtab in this issue and online:

www.BARtabSF.com

Malik is drawn to mom’s young handyman, Bilal (Salim Kechiouche).

Their fling commences on an odd note when Bilal entreats Malik to lend him some proper shoes so he can evade the local disco’s anti-Arab dress code. Soon Malik and Bilal are sneaking off to enjoy midday shagging with the help of the architect’s peppy little motorscooter. This couple-in-the-making must confront their discordant backgrounds and mom’s horror that her baby would defile himself with a household servant.

Suddenly, a film that appears trolling for tragedy takes an unexpectedly blissful turn, switching from melodrama to a party-down climax where all problems melt away like cocoa-butter lotion under a sultry tropical sun.

This unrated feature comes with

its theatrical trailer, in a widescreen format, with a running time of 90 minutes. The handsome package is topped off by easy-to-read white subtitles, bordered in black. It’s a format that all foreign-language DVDs should feature.▼

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

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Remember the 1990s?

by Gregg Shapiro ni DiFranco dominated the altfolk singer/songwriter scene of the 1990s. But don’t forget about Dar Williams, who released three amazing studio albums during the 90s (including End of the Summer and Mortal City) and four more in the 2000s (The Green World, My Better Self). The double-disc set Many Great Companions (Razor and Tie) refers not only to the 32 songs compiled here, but also to the fine musicians with whom Williams has worked. The first disc, Songs Revisited with Guitar and a Few Friends, consists of a dozen acoustic renditions of Williams favorites rerecorded with guest musicians including Mary Chapin Carpenter, Gary Louris, and Sara and Sean Watkins. Songs range from “The Babysitter’s Here” and “When I Was a Boy” (featuring out singer/songwriter Patty Larkin) to “As Cool As I Am” and “What Do You Hear in These Sounds?” The second disc, The Best of Dar Williams, draws from her seven albums.

If Williams and DiFranco had a male equivalent in the alt-folk world, it was probably the late Elliott Smith.

The Oscar nominee’s tragic death in 2003 remains an unsolved mystery, but his musical legacy lives on, including a 2004 posthumous release.

The new 14-track An Introduction to Elliott Smith (Kill Rock Stars) includes an early version of his Academy Award-nominated “Miss Misery” (from Good Will Hunting), as well as songs from his independent and major-label releases.

Is it fair to call the Dandy Warhols

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a one-hit wonder? The 2000 hit single “Bohemian like You” from their third album was inescapable (and subsequently used in a few TV commercials), and introduced us to the band from Portland, OR, with the clever name. But nothing from their albums that followed captured the Rolling Stone-like energy of “Bohemian.” But the band has earned a 15-track compilation, The Capitol Years 1995-2007 (Capitol), which includes “Not If You Were the Last Junkie on Earth” and “We Used To Be Friends.” Filter, on the other hand, could lay claim to two hits, “Hey Man Nice Shot” and “Take a Picture,” both of which can be found on The Very Best Things: 1995-2008 (Reprise/Rhino).

At the beginning of the 1990s, it seemed like the decade might belong to Nirvana, Pearl Jam and other Seattle bands. But lo-fi heroes Pavement arrived with warped melodies and distinctive style, and changed the scene forever. The 23-track collection Quarantine the Past (Matador) draws on the band’s independent and major-label recordings, and provides a thorough overview. You can find everything from Pavement’s “hit” single “Cut Your Hair” and “Unseen Power of the Picket Fence” (from the various artists Red Hot AIDS benefit disc No Alternative) to early tracks “Debris Slide” and “Frontwards,” as well as fan favorites (“Range Life”) and later standouts “Fight this Generation” and “Spit on a Stranger.”

By now, Blur, probably Oasis’ greatest rivals during the 1990s, have released two hits compilations. With the complete singles collection Time Flies, 1994-2009 (Big Broth-

er/Columbia), Oasis catches up with them. Although not in chronological order, the anthology definitely strikes the right chords, beginning with essential cuts from the band’s superb first two albums, such as “Supersonic” and “Wonderwall.” The rest of the set celebrates both the sensitive (“Stop Crying Your Heart Out”) and raucous (“The Shock of the Lightning”) sides of the brawling brothers Gallagher.

Like Liam and Noel Gallagher, the late Gerald LeVert was part of a brother act (LeVert, with brother Sean and friend Marc Gordon), beginning in the mid-80s. By 1991, Gerald released his first solo album featuring the hit singles “Private Line” and “Baby Hold on to Me.” The Best of Gerald LeVert (Atlantic/Rhino) compiles 16 of his

21st-century nostalgia

by Gregg Shapiro little more than 10 years into the 21st century, if you’re already feeling nostalgic for the early years of the 2000s, the following discs should be able to provide you some comfort.

The Best of Nelly Furtado (Geffen) is a doubledisc set featuring the hit singles and popular songs by the versatile young singer/songwriter. At the beginning of the century, Furtado established herself as one to watch via her massive debut single “I’m Like a Bird,” from her 2000 debut album Whoa, Nelly!

The single “Turn Off the Light,” also included in this collection, followed soon after. Even though her second album didn’t yield the same kind of hits, “Powerless (Say What You Want)” and “Try” showed her maturing as an artist. It wasn’t until 2006’s Loose that Furtado began to rack up hit singles once again, including her Timbaland collaboration “Promiscuous” and the derivative “Maneater.”

The bonus disc in this compilation features more than a half-dozen collaborations.

Grammy Award-winner Norah Jones found time in her busy solo career to team up with a number of other artists for duets and cameo appearances. Featuring Norah Jones (Blue Note) collects 18 of those musical alliances. The album begins with “Love Me,” a track by The Little Willies, a side-project of Jones’. “Virginia Moon” is a gorgeous duet with the Foo Fighters (!), and the Willie Nelson duet on “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” is

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playful. Associations with three hiphop acts – Outkast, Q-Tip and Talib Kweli – yield interesting results. Other choice cooperative efforts include “Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John” with Belle and Sebastian, “Dear John”

with Ryan Adams, “Creepin’ In” with Dolly Parton, and “Court & Spark” with Herbie Hancock.

Before he was a sexually ambiguous solo pop star, Robbie Williams put in his time in as a member of Brit-

boy band Take That. On his own, he broke out and even had a couple of hits Stateside. The double-disc anthology In and Out of Consciousness: Greatest Hits 1990-2010 (Astralwerks) compiles almost 40 tracks from his lengthy career, including his monster 2000 smash “Rock DJ” and 1999’s “Millennium.” A much bigger star in his homeland, Williams gets the star treatment here, and might increase his domestic audience as a result.

Country superstar Trace Adkins is the polar opposite of Robbie Williams. Adkins is Nashville through and through. The Definitive Greatest Hits: Til The Last Shot’s Fired (Capitol Nashville) boasts almost 30 charting tracks, from suggestive good ol’ boy cuts “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” and “Ladies Love Country Boys” to the double entendre of “I Left Something Turned on at Home” and the political/patriotic “Arlington.”

Since the release of her celebrated 1986 Leonard Cohen tribute disc Famous Blue Raincoat, Jennifer Warnes has released only two albums, the underrated The Hunter in 1992 and the brilliant The Well in 2001.

Reissued in an expanded, handsomely packaged 24 Karat Gold Edition, The Well (Impex) has retained its depth. Warnes’ voice, familiar to so many from her soundtrack work (Dirty Dancing, An Officer and a Gentleman, Norma Rae), is a marvel. She works wonders with her interpretations of “Invitation to the Blues,” “You Don’t Know Me” and “The Patriot” (a duet with the song’s composer, Arlo Guthrie).

The additional track “Show Me the Light,” a duet with Bill Medley, is indeed a bonus.

Rated R (Interscope/Ume), the second album by modern metal band Queens of the Stone Age, has been given the expanded deluxe edition

classics, and the previously unreleased “Can It Stay.”

In-between releasing three self-titled albums whose only distinguishing marks were the colors of the covers, Weezer deigned to give titles to albums Raditude, Maladroit and Make Believe, and Pinkerton (DGC), which has been reissued in an expanded deluxe edition. Described as Rivers Cuomo’s struggle with his “inner Pinkerton” (the name of the betraying sailor in Madame Butterfly), the disc is notable to LGBT fans for the song “Pink Triangle.” The song, which details Cuomo’s attraction to a lesbian, contains the clever if misguided line, “If everyone’s a little queer, can’t she be a little straight?” The original album is expanded with the addition

of nine “B-Sides and More,” while the second disc boasts previously unreleased live tracks and alternate takes.

Weezer’s latest disc Hurley (Epitaph) features Cuomo’s songwriting collaborations with out music legends Desmond Child (“Trainwrecks”) and Linda Perry (“Brave New World”), as well as Mac Davis (!), Ryan Adams and Dan Wilson.

Minneapolis’ The Jayhawks reached their creative peak in the mid-90s with a pair of unforgettable albums, Hollywood Town Hall and Tomorrow the Green Grass (American), both reissued in expanded editions. Former Jayhawk Mark Olson’s newest solo disc Many Colored Kite (Ryko) is also deserving of your attention.▼

treatment. Deservedly so, for the way it shows that head-bangers can have a sense of humor. Just listen to the drug-shopping list of opener “Feel Good Hit of the Summer” (get it?).

The same holds true of “The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret,” “Better Living through Chemistry,” “Quick and to the Pointless” and “I Think I Lost My Headache.” And they do it all in a fistthrusting setting. The second disc of the set consists of six B-sides, including a respectful cover of Romeo Void’s

“Never Say Never,” and songs recorded live at the 2000 Reading Festival.

Scotland’s Snow Patrol had been at it for 10 or so years before their breakthrough hit “Chasing Cars” reached our shores. So while it might seem a bit premature for a compilation such as Up to Now (Fiction/Geffen), here it is. The double-disc collection includes songs from 2008’s A Hundred Million Suns, as well as the Martha Wainwright duet “Set the Fire to the Third Bar” and more from earlier albums.▼

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

Mads Tolling, Wed.

OUT&ABOUT Annus homobilis

by Jim Provenzano

Marga Gomez, Natasha Muse, Casey Ley

t’s been a very gay year, even if you’re not gay. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell got its butt kicked out the door. Gay marriage got judicially tossed hither and yon, but remains on the “yet to be for real” list. Teen suicides and Smithsonian censorship saddened. We got freshly-out celebs Chely Wright, Ricky Martin, and even Ken Mehlman, who proves that monstrous hypocrites can also come out. How nice.

Celebrate the good, and flush the bad down like a moldy fruitcake, as 2011 parks its naïve butt down. Celebrate at one –or, if you’re ambitious, a few– of these homobilicious December 31 events. More at Friday listings, and on www.BARtabSF.com

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Bearracuda @ Deco Lounge Fifth annual beartastic New Year’s Eve party, with DJs Steve Sherwood, Debacy and Medic; snacks, party favors, midnight champagne and balloon drop, chunky visuals and lots of guys! $20-$25. 8pm-4am. 510 Larkin St. at Turk. www.bearracuda.com/NYE Cockblock @ Rickshaw Stop Lesbo-rific queer homo dance night rings in the new year with Natalie Nuxx, DJ China G (Rebel Girl), DJ Motive, and host the Gaysha. $20. 21+. 10pm-2am. 155 Fell St. www.rickshawstop.com Ghetto Disco @ The Endup DJs Hawthorne, Kio Kio, James Torres and David Harness spin the new year in with Playmates Dianna Brooks and Hiromi Oshima, with hosts Donna Sachet and Cassandra Cass. $15-$20. Free until 10m. 9pm-6am. 401 6th St. at Harrison. 646-0999. www.theendup.com Glitter, Glam & Bow-Ties @ The Lexington Club Hosts Aimee and Chandra help ring in the New Year with DJs Durt and Pony Boy at San Francisco’s favorite lesbian bar. 9pm-late. No cover. 3464 19th St., San Francisco.

(415) 863-2052. www.lexingtonclub.com Marga Gomez New Year’s Eve Spectacular @ Victoria Theatre The queen of queer comedy is joined by special guests Natasha Muse, Casey Ley, host John Fisher and DJ O’DJ. $30-$35. 7pm & 9pm. 2961 16th St. at Mission. (800) 838-3006. www.therhino.org New Year’s Eve @ The Lookout DJs Luke Johnstone and Paul Goodyear spin tunes into 2011; gogo dancers, confetti, party favors, champagne toast. $5-$8. 10pm-2am. 3600 16th St. at Market. 431-0306. www.lookoutsf.com The Rocky Horror Picture Show @ Clay Theatre A toast… to Rocky!

Don’t dream it, be it, at the classic midnight movie about sweet transvestites from transsexual Transylvania. The Bawdy Caste performs live as well. $10. 12am. 2261 Fillmore St. 267-4893. www.bawdycaste.org Roller Disco @ Cellspace Wheel in the new year with a disco roller party; a back room of New Wave and punk, and a roller disco music dance floor. Disco & New Wave garb encouraged. Skate rentals available. $10.

8pm-2am. 21+. 2050 Bryant St. at 18th. 820-3907. www.sfindie.com www.brownpapertickets.com/event/139834 Some Thing @ The Stud Dragtastic show hosted by Glamamore, and a New Year’s party, and DJs Juanita More, Sidekick and Stanley Frank. $10.

9pm-2am. 399 9th St. at Harrison. www.studsf.com Sundance New Year’s Eve Dance @ Hotel Whitcomb Ring in the new year with your Sundance friends, family and twosteppin’ community. Optional four-course dinner at 6:00 pm, followed by country-western dancing from 8:00pm to 1:00am. Dinner & dance $50 (limited capacity); dance only $25 in advance, $30 at the door. 6pm-1am. 1231 Market St. www.sundancesaloon.org Sunset and Honey @ Public Works DJ collective Sunset and Honey Soundsystem conspire to present a music-focused night, with Kim Ann Foxman (Hercules and Love Affair) and Tim Sweeney (Beats in Space). $30.

9pm-5am. 161 Erie St. www.honeysoundsystem.com www.publicsf.com Trannyshack-Big Top at DNA Lounge It’s two clubs for one; drag shows galore on stage, cruisy fun in the upstairs room, a midnight champagne toast, and dancing until 3am. 11pm Trannyshack show (Putanesca, Fauxnique, Holy McGrail, Suppositori Spelling and more); electro band Ejector, and hostess Heklina debuting her new single. DJ Omar and visuals

by Vis-à-Vis. Upstairs in the Big Top room, Joshua J’s DJs include Errol & Casey, Manicure Versace, Robert Jeffrey, and Jinks. The Big Top lounge comes with hot go-go studs. $20-$30. 9pm-3am. 375 11th St. www.trannyshack.com www.dnalounge.com▼

New Year’s Eve at The Lexington Club

Fri 31 >>

with Staedler performing, plus gay composer Karl Brown; also, DJed funk and hiphop.

Free. 8pm. 1668 Haight St.

1984 New Year’s Eve @ Mighty

Kim Nalley @ The Rrazz Room

Retro celebration with two dance floors of ‘80s music; videos in both rooms, all 80s in the main room; plus ‘90s and new Alternative, Indie and Electro in the second room, with DJs and VJs spinning the best Dance, Pop, New Wave, Synth-Pop, Goth, Industrial, Rock and One Hit Wonders; Dangerous Dan (Temptation), Skip (New Wave City), Mark Andrus (Trigger), Rafael Fierro (Icon), Ryan B (Temptation). Free admission, so it’ll be packed. 9pm-2am. 119 Utah St. www.mightysf.com

Soul, blue and jazz singer extraordinaire performs classic cabaret songs, with a special New Year’s Eve show. 7pm $32.50. Dec 29 & 30, 8pm, $35. Dec. 31, $135, 10:30pm (includes NYE party favors, champagne, post-show buffet). 2-drink min. Hotel Nikko, 222 Mason St. (800) 380-3095. www.TheRrazzRoom.com

Lavay Smith, Casino Royale @ Bimbo’s

Mash-up master Adrian spins in the new year, plus his band Smash-up Derby; also, Brass Tax, Grandpamini, Baby Gaga, and more. Pirate balloon drop, confetti, etc. $20$40. 444 Jessie St. 625-8880. www.bootiesf.com

North Beach club welcomes LaVay Smith and her Red Hot Skillet Lickers, Casino Royale, JP and the Rhythm Chasers, Mr. Lucky and the Cocktail Party, and Kitty Kitty Ban Bang Burlesque, plus the usual New Year’s stuff. Cocktail attire; retro themes encouraged. $60. 21+. 9pm-2am.

1025 Columbus Ave. 474-0365. www.bimbos365club.com

Cavalia @ AT&T Park

Mango @ El Rio

Sweeping and acclaimed multimedia show in a gargantuan tent, with 100 human performers, 50 horses, music and pageantry, aerialists, acrobats, and family entertainment. $64.50-$229.50. 24 Willie Mays Plaza at Embarcadero. (2:30pm only Dec. 31). Thru Jan. 4. (866) 999-8111. www.cavalia.net

Women’s dance party with an optional earlier private dinner and live entertainment by Deuce. Hiphop, salsa and more from DJs Marcella and Edaj; dessert bar, champagne toast and more. $15-$50. 7pm-2am. 3158 Mission St. 282-3325. www.elriosf.com

Bootie @ Mezzanine

Chris Isaak @ The Fillmore Local pop music fave headlines his annual New Year’s Eve show. $99. 9pm-1:30am.

1805 Geary St. www.livenation.com

Colossus @ Space 550 DJs Joe Gauthreaux, Phil B and Lee Decker Alexander spin grooves toward the climax with a countdown and balloon drop at midnight. Champagne toasting, sushi and treats all night long with party favors galore and confetti storm. $50-($80 package for the later Underworld, Jan. 1 and Mass, Jan. 2.

8pm–8am. 550 Barneveld Ave., San Francisco. www.guspresents.com

Coraline @ SF Playhouse Musical stage version of the story and animated film about a girl whose family changes in an alternate reality; extended thru Jan. 15. $30-$40. Tue-Sat 8pm (including New Year’s Eve). Sat & Sun 3pm.

Some 7pm weeknights. 533 Sutter St. 6779597. www.sfplayhouse.org

Country Western Dance @ Humanist Hall, Oakland Women, transgender and friends social dancing with a country twang, and twostepping lessons; midnight celebration with a biffet, champagne and non-alcoholic beverages.

Formal attire open to interpretation. $5$10. 9pm-1am. 390 27th St. at Broadway. www.texasrosedance.com

Forever Tango @ Marines’ Memorial Theatre Luis Bravo’s dance show stars local instructor (and Dancing With the Stars pro) Cheryl Burke, with 12 dancers, a live band, and hot tango dancing. $55-$100. Tue-Sat 8pm, Sun 7pm. Also Wed, Sat, Sun at 2pm. Thru Jan. 9. (Special New Year’s Eve dinner and dancing packages $100-$250.) 609 Sutter St. 2nd floor. 771-6900. www.marinesmemorialtheatre.com

Heavy Liquid @ The Stork Club, Oakland Rock band with front man-lead localist Kent James (formerly Nick Name) rocks in the New Year. 2330 Telegraph Ave. (510) 444-6174. www.kentjames.com www.storkcluboakland.com

HotBox @ Bench and Bar Women’s night with DJs Ai-Lo, Astro, Olga T, Rapture, Val G rock the night with Club Anthems, Top 40, Hip Hop, Latin, R&B on the main floor and with Jazz and Neo-Soul in the Love Lounge. A special surprise performance at 12:30 a.m. Guests will enjoy complimentary food by kain’bigan and a chocolate fountain; money balloon drop at midnight. 9pm to afterhours.

510 17th St., Oakland. www.hotboxinthebay.com

The Introverts @ The Spinnaker Betty’s List and Olivia Travel cohost a women’s New Year’s Eve night with DJ Lori Z spinning retro hits, and a new queer band performing; food, cocktails plus a Bayside fireworks view. $125. 8pm1:30am. 100 Spinnaker Drive, Sausalito.

503-1375. www.bettyslist.com www.thespinnaker.com

John Staedler @ Tika Masal Jon Sugar MCs a New Year’s Eve party

Masquerade Ball @ Davies Symphony Hall Start the New Year with a magical concert and dinner packed with music and guests disguised by mystical masks. Sing along to “Auld Lang Syne” and dance the night away on the gorgeous stage creating a night of delight and surprises; live music by the Peter Mintum Orchestra, violinist Dmitry Sitkovetsky and soprano Katie van Kooten, dancing

by Dance Through Time. $80 to $195. 8pm1:3am. 864-6000. 201 Van Ness Ave. www.sfsymphony.org

New Queers Eve @ Club 93 David Hawkins hosts the ribald racy gay comedy night at the tiny dive bar, with talents Tony Koester, Ils Goldberg, Morgan, Justin Simpson and token heterosexual Alexis Von Fierce. $7. 9pm-2am. 93 9th St.

Sea of Dreams @ Concourse Exhibition Ceter Thievery Corporation, Balkan Beat Box, Modeslektor, MiMosa perform, along with dozens of DJs, live acts, and costumed attendees in the groovy New Year’s Eve party with fantastic décor. $75-$150. 9pm-5am.

8th St. at Brannan. www.seaofdreamsnye.com

Shaken, Not Stirred @ The Edge New Year’s Eve party with DJ Chris Zachos, midnight champagne toast, party favors $5 Stoli Martiunis. 21+. 9pm-1:30am. 4149 18th St. 863-4027. www.edgesf.com

Standing on Stardust @ Crescent Hotel Straight New Year’s event gets its groove on with a Studio 54 theme, and gay DJ Bus Station John (Perle Degli Squalor, Tubesteak Connection). $85 includes 4 drinks, toast, hors d’eouvres. Marvel at the unicorn ice sculpture and the vodka luge.

Getting totally smashed? Room and tickets for two $250-$300. 9pm-2am. The Burritt Room, 417 Stockton St. 400-0500. www.crescentsf.com/#sanfrancisco

Cookie Dough at Q Comedy, Mon.

Streets of San Francisco @ Fort Mason Party like a giant monster as the Festival Pavilion is transformed into a scale model of the entire city. DJ Steve Aoki and lots of fancy-dressed straight Marina types dance in the new year. $200-$300. Marina Blvd. at Bay. www.sanfrancisco newyearseve2011.com

Truck 54 @ Truck Studio 54 retro disco theme at the intimate gay SoMa bar, with 70s rock disco dancing, live shower shows. $3. 10pm-2am. 1900 Folsom St. at 15th. www.trucksf.com

White Cloud @ The Lab Live psychedelic band, along with Andrew Benson and the LAG Ensemble. $15 or free with membership. 9pm,-12:30am. 2948 16th St. 864-8855. www.thelab.org

Xavier Toscano @ Club 1220, Walnut Creek Gay singer performs live, along with porn stud Michael Brandon, comic Bruce Vilanch, a drag show and New Year’s celebrations, at the East Bay gay club. 10:30pm-2am. 1220 Pine St. (925) 938-4550. www.club1220.com

Sat 1 >> Curious George Saves the Day @ Contemporary Jewish Museum Fascinating exhibit of 80 drawings by Margret and H.A. Rey, cocreators of the impish monkey books, and how their daring escape from the Nazis in Europe was aided by their drawings. Also, Reclaimed: Paintings from the Collection of Jacques Goudstikker and Black Sabbath: The Secret Musical History of Black-Jewish Relations (both thru March). Thu-Tue 11am-5pm. Thu 1pm-8pm.

736 Mission St. at 3rd. 655-7800. Thru March 13. www.thecjm.org

David Mills @ Stagewerk Theatre Former San Franciscan pops back from London to perform The Bigger Picture, his darkly funny comic cabaret show. $10. 8pm. Also Jan. 2. 533 Sutter St. at Powell. www.thevisibleTheater.org

Ice Skating @ Union Square Rink Celebrate the holidays (or exhaust visiting relatives) at the retail center of town, with a round of ice skating. $4.50-$9. 10am-10pm.

Powel St. at Geary. Thru Jan. 17. www.unionsquareicerink.com

Le Perle Degli Squallor @ Hot Spot DJ Bus Station John’s intimate monthly (1st Saturdays) retro disco night starts the new year off right. The cozy dive bar is transformed into a cool dance hangout and upstairs cruise space; popular with bear cubs and friendly hipsters. 2 for 1 drinks 9pm11pm. Open til 2am. $5. 1414 Market St. at Van Ness.

Lemony Snicket’s The Composer is Dead @ Berkeley Rep Strangely amusing musical comedy based on the author’s orchestral narrative work; starring Geoff Hoyle and 100 puppets; developed by Phantom Limb Company; music by Nathaniel Stookey; directed by Tony Taccone. $14.50-$73. Tue, Thu-Sat 8pm. Wed & Sun 7pm. Thu, Sat, Sun 2pm. Thru Jan. 16. (510) 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org

Queer Contra Dance @ Humanist Hall, Oakland Enjoy same-sex folk dancing; English country dancing 4:30-6:30pm, and Contra dancing 8pm-10:30pm. $10. 390 27th St. www.queercontra.org

Recovery Brunch @ The Lookout Enjoy a hair of the dog (we recommend the Bloody Marys), a tasty buffet hosted by Gladys Bumps, and relaxing New Year’s Day grooves with DJ Steve Sherwood. No cover. 12pm-4pm. 3600 16th St. at Market & Noe. 431-0306. www.lookoutsf.com

Shrek, the Musical @ Orpheum Theatre The hit musical based on the Disney animated film plays through the holidays. $30$99. Tue-Sat 8pm. Wed, Sat, Sun 2pm.

30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

Siddartha. Sun. Sun 7:30pm. Thru Jan. 2. Market St. at 8th. www.shnsf.com/shows/shrek

recording. $40. 8pm. 2-drink minimum.

Hotel Nikko, 222 Mason St. at Ellis.

(800) 380-3095. www.therrazzroom.com

Tron: Legacy @ Castro Theatre

Funny Tuesdays @ Harvey’s Ronn Vigh hosts the weekly LGBT and gay-friendly comedy night. One drink or menu item minimum. 9pm. 500 Castro St. at 18th. 431-HARV. www.harveyssf.com

Disney’s sequel to the video game adventure flick is shown in digital 3D (3D glasses included), with Jeff Bridges. $10-$12. 1pm, 4pm, 7pm, 9:45pm thru Jan. 6. 429 Castro St. 621-6120. www.castrotheatre.com

Great Than One Meet & Greet @ Blackbird Informal information and meet and greet for previous and potentially interested participants in the SF AIDS Foundation’s triathlon fundraiser event, the AVIA Wildflower Triathlon (April 30-May 1, 2011). 5pm-7pm. 2124 Market St. www.greaterthanone.org

Twisted @ Lot 46 New Year’s recovery party all day at one of SF’s newest clubs, with two floors of fun, guest DJ Kio Kio, plus Hawthorne, Paul Goodyear, Frank Wild and James Torres. $15-$20.

6am-3pm. 46 Geary St. at Kearny. www.lot46sf.com

Meditation Classes @ Kadampa Buddhist Temple

Sun 2 >>

Tessa Logan teaches drop-in meditation classes. $10. 7-8:45pm. 3324 17th St. 503-1187. www.meditation innortherncalifornia.org

Design & Wine 1976 to Now @ SF MOMA

Yoga Classes @ The Sun Room

Doug McKechnie

Exhibit of the rich culture of wine, with historical artifacts, art, installations designed by Diller Scofidio and Renfro. Special contests with prizes, including hotel stays in Napa, SF and Sonoma. 151 3rd St. www.sfmoma.org

Dirty Little Showtunes @ New Conservatory Theatre Tom Orr’s wicked and wacky musical revue of campy parody songs includes six special guest performers. $24-$40. Wed-Sat 8pm.

Sun 2pm. Thru Jan. 16. 25 Van Ness Ave., lower level. 861-8972. www.nctcsf.org

Happy Hour @ Energy Talk Radio Interview show with gay writer Adam Sandel as host. 8pm. www.EnergyTalkRadio.com

Outlook Video @ Channel 29 LGBT news show; this month, segments on author Jallen Rix, singer Sharon McKnight, Prop 8, and antigay bullying issues. 5pm.

Also streaming and other dates/times elsewhere. www.outlookvideo.org

Photo Show @ Good Vibrations Exhibit of works by photographers Rink Foto and Kija Lucas and painter Sholeh Asgary.

Thru Jan. 20. 1620 Polk St. at Sacramento.

345-0400. www.events.goodvibes.com

SF Hiking Club @ Marin Join GLBT hikers for a 6-mile hike along Crown Fire Road, Huckleberry Trail, Blithdale fire road with spectacular views, and narrow Hoo-Koo-E-Koo Trail. Dogs welcome and allowed off leash for much of the hike.

Bring water, lunch, hat, layers, sturdy shoes, sunscreen. Carpool meets 9:15 at Safeway sign, Market & Dolores. (510) 985-0804. www.sfhiking.com

Siddhartha, The Bright Path @ The Marsh Revival of the uplifting popular 2007 Youth Theatre adaptation of the story of the Indian prince and his journey to become the Buddha, with Bollywood dances, music and scenery. $10-$50. Mon-Sun 3pm. Thu-Sat 7:30pm. Thru Jan. 9. 1074 Valencia St. at 21st. (800) 838-3006. www.themarsh.org

Sunday’s a Drag @ Starlight Room Donna Sachet and Harry Denton host the fabulous weekly brunch and drag show. $45.

11am, show at noon; 1:30pm, show at 2:30pm. 450 Powell St. in Union Square.

395-8595. www.harrydenton.com

Heated, healing weekly yoga classes in a new location. Suggested donation $1020. 12pm-1pm. Tue & Thu. 2390 Mission St, 3rd floor. 794-4619. www.billmohleryoga.com 9:30am-5:15pm. Thru Jan. 18, 2011. 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive, Golden Gate Park. www.famsf.org

Mon 3 >> Japanesque @ Legion of Honor Exhibit of Japanese prints from 1700-1900, and its relationship to Impressionism. Thru Jan. 9. $6-$10. Tue-Sun 9:30am-5:15pm.

100 34th Av. at Clement, Lincoln Park. www.legionofhonor.org

Jeremy Novy @ LGBT Center Exhibit of gay street art stencils by the local artist. Thru Jan. 18. 1800 Market St. www.sfcenter.org

Little Gems @ Underglass Framing Exhibit of 17 small works by different artists. Sales proceeds benefit Visual Aid. Thru Jan. 7. Mon-Fri 11am-7pm. Sat 11am-5pm. 268 Church St. www.underglassframing.com

Q Comedy @ Martuni’s Hostess Cookie Dough welcomes Marie Lake with Kurt Weitzmann, Nick Leonard and other LGB or T comics. $5-$16. 8pm. 4 Valencia St. at Market. www.Qcomedy.com

Ten Percent @ Comcast 104 David Perry’s talk show about LGBT local issues. Mon-Fri 11:30am & 10:30pm, Sat & Sun 10:30pm. www.davidperry.com

Tue 4 >>

Wed 5 >> A-List Martini Nights @ Various Bars Antoine Delaitre’s roving weekly cocktail events for gay men and their pals, held at different stylish venues. Sign up for email updates. www.sfalist.com

Angels in America at 20 @ Museum of Performance & Design Exhibit documenting the award-winning Tony Kushner drama, with an array of original costumes, props, manuscripts, video clips, photos, designs and audio interviews.

Wed-Sat 12pm-5pm. Thru Mar. 26. 401 Van Ness Ave. 255-4800. www.mpdsf.org

Mads Tolling @ The Rrazz Room Jazz fusion band performs a tribute to JeanLuc Ponty. $25. 8pm. 2-drink minimum.

Hotel Nikko, 222 Mason St. at Ellis. (800) 380-3095. www.therrazzroom.com

Our Vast Queer Past @ GLBT History Museum See the new exhibit from the GLBT Historical Society, with a wide array of rare historic items on display. Free for members-$5.

Wed-Sat 11am-7pm. Sun 12pm-5pm. 4127 18th St. www.glbthistory.org

Reprise @ Robert Tat Gallery Favorite photographs on display at the fine art gallery of historic prints. Thru Feb. 26.

Tue-Sat 11am-5:30pm. 49 Geary St. #211.

781-1122. www.roberttat.com

Blue Room Comedy @ Club 93

Thu 6 >>

Weekly adults-only jokes at the divey small bar; David Hawkins hosts. 10pm. 93 9th St. at Mission.

It’s all a Blur @ SOMArts Cultural Center

Franc D’Ambrosio @ the Rrazz Room

Exhibit of works by Guillermo Gomez-Peña, Dale Hoyt and Tony Labat. Exhibit Tue-Fri 12pm-7pm. Sat 12pm-5pm. Thru Jan. 28.

934 Brannan St. at 8th. www.somarts.org

Renowned singer (former star of Phantom of the Opera) performs “I’ll be Seeing Youz,” a World War II musical show and live CD

www.ebar.com

Nightlife @ California Academy of Sciences Weekly parties with different themes at the new museum of life sciences. Enjoy the exhibits while drinking and schmoozing; Life: A Cosmic Story, narrated by Jodie Foster in the Planetarium. $12. (Reg, admission $20$30). 21+. 6pm-10pm. Golden Gate Park. www.calacademy.org/nightlife

Swing-out Sundays @ Rock-it Room Slim Jenkins and other bands play weekly for your same- and opposite-sex swing dancing pleasure. $5 includes a lesson. 8pm11pm. 406 Clement St. www.SwingChampionships.com

The Three Degress @ The Rrazz Room

Teatro Zinzanni @ Pier 29

Classic soul and R&B band (“TSOP” aka the Soul Train theme song, “When Will I See You Again?”) perform their hits.

2-drink minimum. Hotel Nikko, 222 Mason St. at Ellis. (800) 380-3095. www.therrazzroom.com

License to Kiss II is the new show at the theatre-tent-dinner extravaganza with Kevin Kent, twin acrobats Ming and Rui, Vertical Tango rope dance, plus magic, comedy, a five-course dinner, and a lot of fun. $117-$145. Saturday 11:30am “Breve” show $63—$78. Wed-Sat 6pm (Sun 5pm). Pier 29 at Embarcadero Ave. 438-2668. www.teatrozinzanni.com

Note: some events may have different hours through the holidays. Please check in advance.

Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cézanne and Beyond @ de Young Museum

To submit event listings, email jim@ebar.com.

Deadline is each Thursday, a week before publication.

Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the Musée d’Orsay, the second of two exhibitions from the Paris museum’s permanent collection, thru Jan. 18.

Also, Developed and Undeveloped: Photographic Landscapes, thru March 6. $10-$25. Tue-Sun

For more bar and nightlife events, go to www.bartabsf.com

David Mills, Sat.

Siddartha. Sun.

www.bartabsf.com

25

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

LEATHER+

Was 2010 good for you?

by Scott Brogan 010 probably won’t go down in the annals of history as anything approaching a great year. But it wasn’t the worst, either. For our community, it was a good year. Here are a few (out of many) highlights.

On the international scene, International Mr. Leather (IML) shook things up last May when they chose the first transgender man, Tyler McCormick, to win the title of IML. McCormick is also the first wheelchairbound winner, but it was his transgender status that immediately polarized the community. Many were horrified and angry that a masculine title was won by someone born female, while many others were completely supportive. The debates still rage, but so far McCormick has represented the title with honor, and hasn’t been nearly the total dud that some previous non-transgender IMLs have been.

On the local side of things, our own Ms. SF Leather Mollena Williams won International Ms. Leather 2010 (IMsL) right here in San Francisco last April. Williams was one of eight women competing in the best contest I’ve seen in a long time. It was amazing. I look forward to the 2011 contest and Williams’ continued positive presence in the community.

A new tradition started here in SF just a week prior to IMsL, titled “Renegade.” The brainchild of Truck bar co-owner Paul Miller, Renegade was a feeder to IML but with a twist: It was more a celebration of kink and fetish rather than a traditional leather contest. The night was a bit rocky, but everything new is not without growing pains. Mr. Deviant George Schaeffer won and went on to IML as “Renegade 2010.” I hope Renegade continues to tap into the more kink/fetish side of our community.

Speaking of traditional leather contests, how could I leave out our own Mr. SF Leather Lance Holman?

Holman has been the embodiment of what a Mr. SF Leather should be to our community, and was First Runner-up at IML. He’ll be a tough act to follow.

My personal favorite interview was with Jorge Vieto, focusing on the psychology of his third suspension ritual scene. In short, that’s when the subject has shark hooks hooked into the skin and is suspended by chains.

Scott Brogan

2

Int’l Ms. Bootblack 2010 Jayson DaBoi, Mr. SF Leather 2010 Lance Holman, Int’l Ms. Leather 2010 Mollena Williams, and Ms. SF Leather 2010 Tracy Wolf welcome partygoers to the Pride in Unity event at Mr. S Leather last July.

Scott Brogan

Renegade 2010 George Schaeffer

Each hooking ritual is different, and for Jorge the focus was the release of negative energy. See the May 6 column in the archives section at www.ebar.com for the details.

2010 was my first year as the full-

time leather columnist for the B.A.R. I can’t thank everyone enough for the amazing support and encouragement. I wish I had the space to list everyone by name. My wonderful

page 27

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26

Coming up in leather & kink >> Thu., Dec. 30: Underwear Night at The Powerhouse (1347 Folsom), 10 p.m. Wet undie contest and drink specials. Go to www.powerhouse-sf.com.

Thu., Dec. 30: Edges Wet Munch at Renegades Bar (501 W. Taylor St., San Jose). 7 p.m. Happy hour for the sexpositive and alternative communities: 4-7 p.m. Go to: www.edges.biz or www.renegadesbar.com.

Thu., Dec. 30: Cheap Ass edition of Locker Room at Chaps Bar (1225 Folsom). The SoMa Guardians will be working the complimentary coat check. Pumping music at 9 p.m. with DJ Hotwire. Cheap Ass Contest, $100 winner.

Go to: www.chapsbarsanfrancisco.com.

Fri., Dec. 31: Happy New Year!! All the SoMa bars have New Year’s Eve Specials (Chaps, Powerhouse, Truck, Lone Star, Hole in the Wall, The Eagle). Barhop around the area, and be sure to hit them all at least once. And be sure to kiss a stranger at Midnight!

Fri., Dec. 31: New Year’s Lounge with Maestro Stefanos at the SF Citadel (1277 Mission). 8:30 p.m.-2 a.m. Go to: www.sfcitadel.org.

Fri., Dec. 31: Auld Lang Suck Party at Blow Buddies (933 Harrison). 3 p.m.-4 a.m. Play til 6 a.m. Go to: www.blowbuddies.com.

Sat., Jan. 1: Back Bar Action at The Eagle Tavern (398 12th St.). Back patio and bar open to all gear/fetish/leather.

10 p.m. to close. Go to: www.sfeagle.com.

Sat., Jan. 1: Boot Lickin’ at The Powerhouse, 10 p.m.

Go to: www.powerhouse-sf.com.

Sun., Jan. 2: Castrobear presents Sunday Furry Sunday at 440 Castro. 4-10 p.m. Go to: www.castrobear.com.

Sun., Jan. 2: Leather, Boots & Uniform Night sponsored

by BLUF and Hot Boots at the SF Eagle (398 12th St.) No cover. 9 p.m.-2 a.m.

Sun., Jan. 2: PoHo Sundays at The Powerhouse. DJ Keith, dollar drafts all day. Go to: www.powerhousesf.com.

Mon., Jan. 3: Cheap Ass Happy Hour at Chaps Bar. Mon.-Thu., 6-9 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., 4-9 p.m. Go to: www.chapsbarsanfrancisco.com.

Tue., Jan. 4: 12-Step Kink Recovery Group at the SF Citadel. 6:30-8 p.m. Go to: www.sfcitadel.org.

Tue., Jan. 4: Ink & Metal followed by Nasty at The Powerhouse. 9 p.m. Go to: www.powerhouse-sf.com.

Tue., Jan. 4: Skins N Punks at Chaps Bar. Drink specials. Go to: www.chapsbarsanfrancisco.com.

Wed., Jan 5: SF D/s (Dominant/sub) Discussion Group at the SF Citadel. Doors open, 7 p.m.; discussion, 7:30-9:30 p.m. Go to: www.sfcitadel.org.

Wed., Jan. 5: Naked Buddies at Blow Buddies (933 Harrison). Doors open 8 p.m.-12 a.m. Play til late. Go to: www.blowbuddies.com.

Wed., Jan. 5: Nipple Play at the Powerhouse (Dore & Folsom), 10 p.m. Go to www.powerhouse-sf.com.

Wed., Jan. 5: Busted! at Chaps Bar. This week’s edition: Fisting, hosted by Hell Hole. Greasy fun starts at 9 p.m. Go to: www.chapsbarsanfrancisco.com or www.HellHoleSF.com.

Wed., Jan. 5: SoMa Men’s Club. Every Wed., the SoMa Clubs (Chaps, Powerhouse, Truck, Lone Star, Hole in the Wall, The Eagle) have specials for those who wear the Men’s Club dogtags.

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

KA RRNAL

Best of the sexos 2010

by John F. Karr t’s a wrap, as they say. So, herewith, my ruminations on all things sexo in the past year.

Fave Movies: Falcon’s sexually sizzling INNtriqued, in its entirety; much of the beautifully realized White Hot, and certainly The Best of Aden and Jordan Jaric. Lucas Entertainment’s Men in Stockings; Colt’s handsomely heated Lotus; select scenes from Raging Stallion’s GayVN Movie of the Year, Focus; and two scenes from their Swallow Seed. Also, two scenes from Active Duty’s SpeedoBoys – which may be hot-to-trot star Corbett Harper’s only film ever.

Worst Movie: L.A. Zombie. Director Bruce LaBruce is not only not embarrassed by his work, but is calling it an art movie. Oy. Scene of the Year: Nate Karlton and Gage Weston in Colt’s Ripped, directed by John Rutherford. But not just as delivered. Were 25 minutes of incredibly hot sex edited out of the scene only so it would fit standardized length? Fortunately, the shorn footage is included as a Bonus. How many times can Nate edge to the trembling, sweaty brink of orgasm?

Wet in the pool: everybody’s favorite porn star, Adam Killian, in a Rufskin ad.

In the expert hands of Gage Weston, the answer is so many times I thought I’d lose my mind. Loving like this is an art.

Star of the Year: My feeling is unanimous. It’s Adam Killian.

Stars I Wish Would Go Away: I’m really over Francois Sagat and Matthew Rush.

Things I Hate: Spyder gags and similar dental devices. Story lines with bloodshed, murder, rape.

Pet Peeve: I love tattoos, with a few exceptions. Back in the 1970s, our conformity was flannel shirts, jeans with worn crotches, and mustaches. Today, it’s that scythe-like curlicue inking. And what’s with Chinese characters? Why would you want on your body a permanent repThe Falcon Studios promo for INNtrigued featured a range of porn stars. resentation of a country that has oppressed and arbitrarily imprisoned streaming ever offer the resolution of a “Sounds really deep.” its citizens, and invaded and deDVD? Not any time soon.

What I like about the interview is stroyed Tibet? “But,” I’m told, “it’s the Second, Whatever Happened to what he leaves out. He tells how he Chinese character for Courage (or David Taylor? On last week’s episode played sports in college, spent two similar noun).” Well, what’s wrong of As the World Churns, David was a years in the Marines, and was discovwith Courage (or whichever noun it ered by a modeling agent on a beach. gay porn star – well, a gay-for-pay was) in English? Beware cultural It’s no surprise that the first thing he porn star. Then, thoughtimperialism! modeled was his hair, which is indislessly abrupt (just ask Trends: The sacrament of putably glam. The way he relates it, Raging Stallion), he quit.

Oral Cum Shots. Also, Inthough, his subsequent résumé But check this out – cestuous Twins. Thank jumped him from Abercrombie to search his name in the god that’s out of the closactor. Nothing in-between. Strange, Blog section at Jacket. And Pissing – not a that though he’s now legit, Taylor still Manly.com, and you’ll fetish anymore, but uses his nom de porn, and conducts find him interviewed on something the whole the set of his new films, the interview shirtless. Not strange is family can enjoy. And the horror/slasher Lake that he says these are his first films. while I appreciate reisK ARRNAL He seems to have forgotten that those Death (with a trailer so sues, whether collecK NOWLEDGE bad you hope the movie’s selected short subjects he made for tions, classics, or preRaging Stallion – all that penis moda satire), and what’s decondom, why do they eling – were films, too. I’m all for scribed as “a homoerotic vampire cost more than $19.95? Don’t comDavid pursuing a new career. With flick,” Brides of Sodom (with a trailer so panies want their product to sell? his charm and looks he could go pretover-the-top you hope the movie’s a Two Questions: First, will DVDs ty far – although I think he’ll find a satire). It may be homoerotic, but it’s disappear? Raging Stallion is describlack of talent is a hindrance. not hardcore, despite the object of ing their new DVDs as limited ediDid you know my collected reDavid’s affection being Dylan Vox, aka tions. When they sell out, the content views are archived at Brad Benton. David plays a heterosexwill be available only as streaming webwww.KarrnalKnowledge.com? I’m ual vampire, and therein lies the consite video. Falcon, meanwhile, is liquihoping you have a healthy, creative, flict – he falls in love with a male dating their DVD stock. Is the compaand cocky New Year.▼ human. Says the bimbette interviewer, ny going the streaming route? And will

I

Leather + ▼

page 26

husband of 11 years now, Doug, has been my rock. The B.A.R. staff has been great, and patient, with me as well! A big shout-out to Queen Cougar for her unwavering support, help and initial nudge. I also thank my “SoMa Mole,” who’s been my secret eyes and ears and given me some good scoop on what’s going on in our South of Market scene.

None of this would have been possible without the work of my predecessor, the late SF icon Marcus Hernandez. For 38 years, up to 2009, Marcus was the leather columnist among other many titles, accolades,

The Powerhouse, fearing I might get and accomplishments. He blazed the ripped apart by some Jabba-the-Hut trail long before people were willing ogre or worse. Nothing could be furto speak of (let alone print) anything ther from the truth. We instantly leather or kink. He was also a hit it off. So much so that I won, friend, and one of my first supand from then on, Marcus was porters when my husband and I always 100% supportive of all of first moved. In January 2001 my endeavors. After I when I competed to be on competed at IML (where the South of Market Bare he was Judge Emeritus for Chest Calendar, Marcus life) he looked at me, was the emcee. I hadn’t met smiled, rolled his eyes and him yet, and the 2001 guys said, “You’re just too who recruited me also much!” It was his way of coached me, filling my head letting me know that he with all kinds of warnings L EATHER was proud of me. I hope of what to say, what not to he still is. say, how to act, how not to My thanks again to everyone for act. Basically, if Marcus didn’t like making 2010 a good year. Have a you, forget it! I didn’t know what to very happy, and safe, new year!▼ expect when I got up on that stage at

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BAY AREA REPORTER . eBAR.com . 30 December 2010

FILM

Film 2010 ▼

page 17

1 (2). The Social Network This film’s genius-level collaboration mixes director David Fincher’s curdled satire, bordering on nihilistic cynicism, and writer Aaron Sorkin’s fascination with how a party-down generation can rock the world.

A casting trick that allows us to endure the corrosive boorishness of Jesse Eisenberg’s Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is the device of surrounding him with physically more imposing young male co-stars.

Andrew Garfield is sublimely needy as the punching-bag ex-best friend.

He provides an empathetic surrogate for all the victims of computer hedge-fund capitalism.

Oscar bait: Eisenberg nails this era’s most unlikely conquering hero, the paradigm-smashing social nerd.

2. The Kids Are All Right Lisa Cholodenko (with co-writer Stuart Blumberg) concocts an exhilarating same-sex family tale in that sturdiest of American genres, the screwball comedy. The film’s list of hilarious unintended consequences includes a series of unauthorized sleepovers and a bravura drunken dinner party where Annette Bening channels her inner Joni Mitchell. While avoiding the dreaded topic of lesbian bed death, the filmmakers invoke screwball’s motif of the main couple undergoing a kind of symbolic divorce, followed by a magical remarriage.

Oscar bait: ACT alum Bening richly deserves her third stab at Best Actress honors for a new type of screen heroine: the lesbian mom overcoming the odds, and keeping her gal and family.

2. (2) Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work Rivers at 76 demonstrates that queers have no monopoly on campy, kitschy, absurdist, self-referential, self-deprecating, self-flagellating humor. The doc shows why, after multiple nips and tucks, Joan’s still hungry for hefty personal-appearance fees. An aide quips, “No upgrade? Well then, they’ll get $125,000 worth of attitude!”

3. Howl Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman take artistic risks and liberties as they plant us inside the mind of a mad homo poet, the 20year-old Allen Ginsberg, played with saucy élan by quick-change artist James Franco.

Slip-sliding between a mesmerizing recreation of Ginsberg’s first public reading of Howl and the obscenity trial of the poem’s publisher, the filmmakers allow a direct-address turn by Franco to reveal the Beat Movement’s unique queer/straight chemistry.

3. (2) 127 Hours Danny Boyle vividly reinvents the fable of the coyote who, caught in a trap, chews off his leg to escape. The coyote is a redblooded American grown-up kid who throws himself up against nature’s most pitiless scenery and bets that he’ll bounce out of trouble like the cartoon character Wiley E. Coyote. James Franco ditches Ginsberg’s specs to play a reckless, stoned-out fool duking it out with the evolving grownup.

4. The King’s Speech A must-see for fans of The Queen, director Tom Hooper and screenwriter David Seidel’s film is the tale of how Queen Elizabeth’s dad, George VI, overcame a crippling stammer. It’s a moving “two-hander” between a future king (Colin Firth) and a ballsy speech therapist, Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush), whose methods in an earlier age might well have earned him lodging in the Tower of London.

Oscar bait: Colin Firth has all but won the Best Acting honors for a performance that is much showier than his understated, grieving lover in last year’s A Single Man. 4. (2) Tiny Furniture This witty mumblecore social comedy offers a nervy, emotionally subtle portrait of a young woman (director/writer Lena Dunham) testing her social, sexual, and career boundaries while competing in an impossibly hip

Scene from Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right, a same-sex family tale told as a screwball comedy.

Scene from Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Howl, which goes inside the mind of mad homo poet Allen Ginsberg.

Kevin Kline as a crazy old bachelor in The Extra Man, based on Jonathan Ames’ novel of social manners.

world where men are unavailable and women pose prickly problems of a different order. An up-to-theminute peek at overeducated kids who aren’t leaving the nest, at least not until possessing better résumés than sassy YouTube cowboy or dyslexic sex worker.

5. Restrepo This documentary on troops in Afghanistan is pessimistic about ending the war but cautiously optimistic about gay boys playing well with others in the foxholes. Restrepo’s uncensored moments in-

clude a spontaneous disco-dance night at the fort, and the sight of half-naked soldiers wrestling, sunbathing and snoozing. Co-director Tim Hetherington observes, “Only in war does society allow men to show love for each other.”

5. (2) The Inside Job See SF native Charles Ferguson’s brilliant piece of journalism on the financial meltdown the first time to vent your disgust at the system, the second time for the information we’re all going to need after the tsunami of

the midterm elections.

6. I Killed My Mother This chamber piece from Quebec prodigy Xavier Dolan will thrill fans of mom-bashing classics Where’s Poppa? and Mommie Dearest. Dolan finds a painfully funny way to present a series of queer boy/mommy pitched battles that only snap together when Mom is given her primal scream.

6. (2) Beautiful Darling The most poignant and fleeting stab at stardom from the Warhol crowd be-

▼ longs to young James Slattery, fated to grow up with a girlish countenance and an obsession to mime Kim Novak. Riding the Long Island Railroad train taken by NYC cops getting off the Midnight shift, Candy Darling plopped herself down in Manhattan precincts where a man in makeup and a dress risked arrest and worse. Crashing the hot-house world of Warhol’s movie factory with a handful of other starstruck chicks with dicks, Candy was the one boy actress who could match a young Marilyn Monroe.

7. To Die Like a Man The director of O Fantasma, Joao Pedro Rodrigues, achieves his masterwork in this sublimely surreal, tragic yet transcendent melodrama celebrating the final choices of a Lisbon female impersonator.

7. (2) Boxing Gym Documentary master Frederick Wiseman’s portrait of a working-class Texas gym is visual catnip for serious film students.

Wiseman’s camera slices across layers of workouts from women sweating out a new sports bra to blubbery middle-aged men. The spirit of the joint is captured by a hunky white boy giving a tour to a Hispanic new member. “Anybody who comes in here acting tough-ass don’t last very long. It’s like, dude, not that kind of atmosphere.”

8. Strapped Joseph Graham smoothly doubles down on many of his debut film Vanilla ’s haunted boy/horror riffs. In Strapped, we stalk a chameleon-like, boyish hustler (the yummy Ben Bonenfant) through a melancholy rainy night, as he glides through a queer building whose absentee cinema landlord is probably named Polanski.

8. (2) Hereafter As he did so brilliantly with Million Dollar Baby, Clint Eastwood takes a subject that reeks of melodrama and unearned tears, and rinses it of every screen cliché, allowing us to empathize with an ordinary guy (Matt Damon) afflicted with “psychic powers.” The miraculously understated screenplay is by Peter Morgan (The Queen).

9. The Extra Man Based on Jonathan Ames’ novel of social manners. Paul Dano steals the show as a sly and shy hetero crossdresser, fired from a private school for wearing a bra in the faculty lounge, who lands under the roof of a crazy old bachelor (hilarious Kevin Kline) who argues that Henry James’ later novels were flawed because James toasted his testicles on a hot stove. Dano’s character’s desire to come out as a heterosexually-inclined transvestite is met by a cutting assessment from a professional dominatrix. “You’re not really straight, but you’re not really gay.

You’re straightish.” It’s as if Dano were auditioning for the Jack Lemmon role in a remake of Some Like It Hot. 9. (2) The Stranger in Us With the best peek at life in SF’s queer combat zone since Cyrus Amini’s 25 Cent Preview, Scott Boswell finds original and witty ways to assess the price of life on the streets for each generation that hangs out in our little psychotic Disneyland.

10. Winter’s Bone Jennifer Lawrence is this season’s pluckiest heroine as her tenacious teen learns deadly secrets about life in her Southern Missouri corner of Appalachia after the disappearance of her methdealer dad. Debra Granik evokes an oddly beautiful distressed America (from Daniel Woodrell’s novel) filled with guys you don’t mess with.

Oscar bait: Lawrence deserves a nod for her stout-hearted country girl who’s too young for the army, but tough enough to endure horrors that would impress an Iraqi vet.

10. (2) Rabbit Hole John Cameron Mitchell evokes the sad/funny meanings imagined in the title of David Lindsay-Abaire’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, in an enhanced screen version with a pitch-perfect cast.

Oscar bait: Nicole Kidman, for channeling the grief of a mom who seeks solace by stalking the teenage driver of the car that killed her son.▼

▼

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30 December 2010 . eBAR.com . BAY AREA REPORTER

DVD

Spanksgiving

by Ernie Alderete f you enjoy watching firm, snow-white, twink asses being brutalized, Instruments of Persuasion 2 (Sting Pictures) is your instrument of ecstasy. It’s presented as an historical review of spanking and caning methods.

The entire cast is firstrate, all choice, lean, cleancut, fresh-faced, boyish twinks at their peak of youthful beauty. The costumes are superb, the acting excellent, the period sets and staging perfect. There is a voice narration; however, it was so low-volume on my copy that I couldn’t make out what it was saying, except that I realized it was describing the various techniques of corporal punishment across Europe.

The fairest victim suffered the most. Not only did his handsome pale face blush a deep shade of magenta, but his bare blonde buns broke out in a mean set of hives!

He was swatted by nettles, bundled fresh branches with nasty-looking green leaves – perhaps poison oak, because the reaction was instant and extreme. I doubt if the actor knew what was getting into when he agreed to this scene.

All of the actors played the victim to perfection. Nothing appears faked or contrived. The agony on their faces, their moans and groans, and the tears in their eyes are authentic and heartwrenching.

Is spanking sexual? You bet your sweet ass it is. The reaction on the victims’ faces resembles how they would react if they were being fucked. I’ll bet they all wished they were being gangfucked bareback by hardened convicts hell-bent on prison-style serial rape, instead of having their tender behinds so thoroughly whacked.

Most of the as-far-I-could-tell uncut actors got hard-ons while they were being punished. The men administering the punishment were

I

Eric Whitacre ▼

page 21

and a Girl” do have an identifiably different klang on the new recording, but they hardly erase memory of Polyphony’s arresting interpretations.

Of the works making first appearances, the strongly narrative “Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine” and “The Stolen Child” are overwhelming in their impact, the latter redolent of Britten without sounding the least derivative – a charge leveled at the composer’s music that he’s only too quick to welcome, noting that he likes being part of that crowd.”

For all of its patent, heart-on-thesleeve spirituality, Whitacre’s music is almost programmatically non-religious, certainly non-denominational.

That’s an essential aspect of its appeal, and certainly is at the heart of the worship it draws on the Internet from the spiritually hungry everywhere.

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The movie suffers from lousy, comic-book cover type, and an equally crummy if succinct title. The artwork is so amateurish that I dumped the DVD in a drawer and left it there for over a year before ever playing it. A better title would have been Tortured Twinks, because the main theme is bone-skinny, gorgeous young twinks dropping their pants and getting their virginal behinds tanned.▼ Available for immediate download and mail-order purchase. www.stingpictures.tv

So is the music’s, and the composer’s, unmistakable genuineness. The rock star-handsome Whitacre is his own best advocate, and you’ll find out everything you need to know about his music and where it comes from in his short introduction to Light and Gold on YouTube, in which you also get to see him conducting the singers he says have led him to the subtlety of language he has long sought.

With the music pealing around him, he speaks of turning choral composer at the age of 21, seeking to recreate the sounds he came to know as a chorister, the pungent sonorities that “make me want to die in that moment. Those dissonances, those close harmonies – that’s me. I try to make every moment an ecstatic experience, whether small or large.”

If you have to ask yourself whether music that sounds, and feels, this good could actually be that good, you need this music very, very badly.▼

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