Prominent local trans advocate and actor Jazzmun Crayton’s poetry, presence, and performances have shifted the county’s queer landscape, joyously reanimating spaces with the magic of her liberating words. “Love is a religion, so let your performances be your ministry, your lip synching be the anointing / and stay baptized and fully immersed in all the glitter, rhinestones and feathers you can glue / onto your costumes,” reads the verses of her poem, “Drag Queen.” 

Crayton’s voice and vision, which center the lived experiences and stories of transgender, gender-expansive, and intersex (TGI) people, have drawn the attention of several community members and collaborators, including director David Hays Gaddas. Together, they created “Lovely Bouquet of Flowers: An Exploration of Non-Traditional Gender Voices”: a full-length play packed with musical numbers, monologues, and scenes drawn from real-life interviews with trans community members. 

First performed in 2013 at the LA LGBT Center’s Renberg Theatre, the play returns for a special, curated edition on Tuesday, Mar. 31, at West Hollywood’s City Council Chambers for International Transgender Day of Visibility. Tomorrow’s performance focuses on pieces and scenes from the original play that are most resonant with today’s social climate, but retains its nearly 15-year-long message: the trans community is a varied and resilient bouquet that continues to blossom even under the wilting conditions of its environment. It will always renew. 

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This affirmation remains timely and urgent, as anti-trans rhetoric makes its way into legislation and pours from the platforms of vocal, powerful figures both socially and politically. “There is a rise in misinformation and targeted rhetoric at the federal level toward the trans community,” Crayton and Gaddas wrote to the Blade. “And our response is to meet that injustice with truth, visibility, and love.”

Tomorrow’s show will open with a reading of a poem titled “Baby’s breath,” performed by TGI activist and host, ChiChi Navarro, who told the Blade that they had no prior acting experience before being invited to be a cast member. This is another aspect that holds strong from Lovely’ Bouquet’s earliest days: many of the original cast members were not established actors. Some were not yet out as trans either.

The play became more than a ground to experiment with performance: it was a portal to step into courage, to draw from their own lives, and to experience collective and individual empowerment by gathering in community. 

“At its core, this is about more than a performance,” Crayton and Gaddas wrote to the Blade. “It is about creating a space where we can show up for one another, where we can celebrate not only TGI2+ lives but humanity as a whole, and where we can strive to be our best selves. It is an invitation to stand up for what is right, to lead with love, and to be part of something that is rooted in truth and justice.” 

The play calls on its cast, creators and audience members to share in the joy and strength of their unity and resistance against attempts to shut TGI people out — attempts to render them invisible and pliable. Navarro has felt the impact of this in their personal life, of the transformative power of being heard and seen, and of witnessing your community flourishing against adversity. “I find myself getting lost in the stories that they’re telling, and it’s beautiful,” Navarro told the Blade. “I hope that people who attend and watch these performances are able to feel that feeling.” 

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The Lovely Bouquet Foundation is also raising funds for their latest Anthesis Tour, of which tomorrow’s performance is part of. To support and find more information, learn more here.

Kristie Song is a California Local News Fellow placed with the Los Angeles Blade. The California Local News Fellowship is a state-funded initiative to support and strengthen local news reporting. Learn more about it at fellowships.journalism.berkeley.edu/cafellows

Now that Oscar season is officially over, most movie lovers are ready to move on and start looking ahead to the upcoming crop of films for the standouts that might be contenders for the 2026 awards race.

Even so, 2025 was a year with a particularly excellent slate of releases: Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners” and Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another,” which became rivals for the Best Picture slot as well as for total number of wins for the year, along with acclaimed odds-on favorites like “Hamnet,” with its showcase performance by Best Actress winner Jessie Buckley, and “Weapons,” with its instantly iconic turn by Best Supporting Actress Amy Madigan.

But while these high-profile titles may have garnered the most attention (and viewership), there were plenty of lesser-seen contenders that, for many audiences, might have slipped under the radar. So while we wait for the arrival of this summer’s hopeful blockbusters and the “prestige” cinema that tends to come in the last quarter of the year, it’s worth taking a look back at some of the movies that may have come up short in the quest for Oscar gold, but that nevertheless deserve a place on any film buff’s “must-see” list; one of the most essential among them is “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You,” which earned a Best Actress Oscar nod for Rose Byrne. A festival hit that premiered at Sundance and went on to win international honors – for both Byrne and filmmaker Jane Bronstein – from other film festivals and critics’ organizations (including the Dorian Awards, presented by GALECA, the queer critics association), it only received a brief theatrical release in October of last year, so it’s one of those Academy Award contenders that most people who weren’t voters on the “FYC” screener list for the Oscars had limited opportunity to see. Now, it’s streaming on HBO Max.

Written and directed by Bronstein, it’s not the kind of film that will ever be a “popular” success. Surreal, tense, disorienting, and loaded with trigger-point subject matter that evokes the divisive emotional biases inherent in its premise, it’s an unsettling experience at best, and more likely to be an alienating one for any viewer who comes to it unprepared. 

Byrne stars as Linda, a psychotherapist who juggles a busy practice with the demands of being mother to a child with severe health issues; her daughter (Delaney Quinn) suffers from a pediatric feeding disorder and must take her nutrition through a tube, requiring constant supervision and ongoing medical therapy – and she’s not polite about it, either. Seemingly using her condition as an excuse to be coddled, the child is uncooperative with her treatment plan and makes excessive demands on her mother’s attention, and the girl’s father (Christian Slater) – who spends weeks away as captain of a cruise ship – expects Linda to manage the situation on the home front while offering little more than criticism and recriminations over the phone.

Things are made even more stressful when the ceiling collapses in their apartment, requiring mother and child to move to a seedy beachside motel. Understandably overwhelmed, Linda turns increasingly toward escape, mostly through avoidance and alcohol; she finds her own inner conflicts reflected by her clients – particularly a new mother (Danielle Macdonald) struggling with extreme postpartum anxiety – and her therapy sessions with a colleague (Conan O’Brien, in a brilliantly effective piece of against-type casting) threaten to cross ethical and professional boundaries. Growing ever more isolated, she eventually finds a thread of potential connection in the motel’s sympathetic superintendent (A$AP Rocky) – but with her own mental state growing ever more muddled and her daughter’s health challenges on the verge of becoming a lifelong burden, she finds herself drawn toward an unthinkable solution to her dilemma.

With its cryptic title – which sounds like the punchline to a macabre joke and evokes expectations of “body horror” creepiness – and its dreamlike, disjointed approach, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You” feels like a dark comedic thriller from the outset, but few viewers are likely to get many laughs from it. Too raw to be campy and too cold to invite our compassion, it’s a film that dwells in an uncomfortable zone where we are too mortified to be moved and too appalled to look away. Though it’s technically a drama, Bronstein presents it as a horror story, of sorts, driven by psychological rather than supernatural forces, and builds it on an uneasy structure that teases us with expectations of “body horror” grotesquerie while forcing us to identify with a character whose lack of (presumably) universal parental instinct feels transgressive in a way that is somehow even more disquieting than the gore and mutilation we imagine might be coming at any moment of the film.

And we do imagine it, even expect it to come, which is as much to do with the near-oppressive claustrophobia that results from Bronstein’s use of near-constant close-ups as it does with the hint of impending violence that pervades the psychological tension. It’s not just that our frame of vision is kept tight and limited; her tactic keeps us uncertain of what’s going on outside the edges, creating a near-constant sense of something unseen lurking just beyond our view. Yet it also helps to put us into Linda’s state of mind; for almost the entire film, we never see the face of her daughter – nor do we ever know the child’s name – and her husband is just a strident voice on the other end of a phone call, and the effect places us squarely into her dissociated, depressed, and desperate existence.

Anchoring it all, of course, is Byrne’s remarkable performance. Vivid, vulnerable, and painfully real, it’s the centerpiece of the film, the part that emerges as greater than the whole; and while Oscar may have passed her over, she delivers a star turn for the ages and gives profound voice to a dark side of feminine experience that is rarely allowed to be aired.

That, of course, is the key to Bronstein’s seeming purpose; inspired by her own struggles with postpartum depression, her film feels like both a confession and an exorcism, a parable in which the expectations of unconditional motherly love fall into question, and the burden placed on a woman to subjugate her own existence in service of a child – and a seemingly ungrateful one, at that – becomes a powerful exploration of feminist themes. It’s an exploration that might go too far, for some, but it expresses a truth that those of us who are not mothers (and many of us who are) might be loath to acknowledge.

Uncomfortable though it may be, Bronstein’s movie draws us in and persuades our emotional investment despite its difficult and unlikable characters, thanks to her star player and her layered, puzzle-like screenplay, which captures Linda’s scattered psyche and warped perceptions with an approach that creates structure through fragments, clues and suggestions; and while it may not land quite as squarely, in the end, as we might hope, its bold and transgressive style – coupled with the career-topping performance at its center – are more than enough reason to catch this Oscar “also-ran” before putting this year’s award season behind you once and for all.

We have all been impacted by at least one film. Whether it’s a hilarious comedy, a jaw-dropping horror, or a plot so sorrowful that just the thought of it brings viewers to tears, movies have long offered LGBTQ+ audiences the truths they’re too often denied in reality. They also have the potential to shape these folks’ lives on a macro scale; studies show a direct correlation between positive representation of queerness in film and wider acceptance of these communities in the real world. During a time when LGBTQ+ people are being constantly attacked, it’s more important than ever for these folks to find movies that uplift and respect them. But with the endless stream of hateful rhetoric groups are currently facing, it can be hard to find films like these — luckily for us all, the Los Angeles Trans and NB Film Festival exists today.

The only LA-based festival focused on spotlighting movies made by transgender and nonbinary creatives, in only two years, this festival has quickly become one of this city’s most celebrated nights of film. It’s become a true haven for queer creators and fans alike, and none of it would be possible without the festival’s host and director, Joey Haley. 

A filmmaker himself, Haley knows how difficult it is to get your average movie made and distributed — and how exponentially harder it is to do that while being openly queer. During his conversation with the LA Blade, he spoke of his many years trying to ‘make it’ in Los Angeles and how vital it was to find other queer creatives, saying, “It’s like building any type of network that supports you, it takes a lot of time and a lot of trust.” It’s a network of other directors that, in 2025, decided that even if studios were denying their movies distribution, that didn’t mean these projects didn’t deserve to be seen. Joey spearheaded a ‘movie night’ made up of all of their films, with his search for a small venue to host the event eventually growing into the established festival he now hosts today. He recalled the moment of stepping back and looking at all his work, at the hundreds of people now clamoring to attend a night originally made just for his friends, and thinking, “[Well], I guess I’m running a trans film festival!”

“The LA Trans and Non-Binary Film Festival is a community-oriented space [meant] to uplift not just trans filmmakers around the world, but trans organizations, vendors, and people,” he explained. “[It’s a] very specific platform to showcase these alternative, embodied perspectives.” Spawning from the accidental event in 2025, 2026 saw the festival grow in both size and impact; it completely packed the well-known Silverlake club Akbar and sold out of tickets within days of release. 

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In just two years, the event has already inspired so many, which is even more impressive when supporters learn that it was conceived during this presidential administration’s first round of anti-trans attacks. 

Haley remembered the visceral bigotry that this festival was born around, detailing, “It was [when] the first anti-trans scapegoating articles were coming out, and so I was reaching out to sponsors, being like, ‘Oh, you’re absolutely going to retract as soon as you get this email’…it was getting to a point where I was like, no, [maybe this can’t happen].” But he luckily found support from businesses all around the city, with these organizations putting their faith in this completely new project because they recognized how badly LGBTQ+ Angelinos needed it. “I ended up talking to one of the Akbar owners, and I was like, ‘Yeah, this is something I’m trying to work on. We don’t have a theater. There’s no budget, there’s no backing, there’s no sponsors, there’s no brands, there’s no audience other than me and my friends.’ And [despite that] he was like, ‘No, come do this event here. We need this.’”

It was this support that made Joey realize that the festival couldn’t just be one night of movie watching. It had to contribute to this industry as a whole, helping to make sure that outside of this event, trans and nonbinary filmmakers could still access the resources they need to have their stories told. “The doors are way faster to close in your face,” he recalled, discussing the struggles of being a queer filmmaker today. “Being able to find a contact in this industry, [to get] streaming and distribution across the board…it’s the hardest thing!” 

Knowing these struggles firsthand and armed with the popularity of its first showing, this year’s LA Trans and NB Film Festival saw Joey partner with Red Coral Universe and Big Lettuce Entertainment to not only amplify the event but give its participants vital connections within this industry. These are important relationships for any burgeoning filmmaker to have, and Joey hopes that they will make other distributors realize just how valuable queer content is today. On granting this group of creatives these tools, Haley said, “Being able to provide that for filmmakers…it’s truly incredible.”

Joey was tight-lipped about what he had planned for the 2027 version of the LA Trans and NB Film Festival — but he did promise that there would absolutely be one for future audiences to look forward to. “Definitely we’ll be bringing in a lot more like community organizations and trans vendors…and a couple [of other big] things I’m going to keep under wraps,” the director teased. “There are a lot of things I’m excited for, and [all I’ll say is]: we’re going to need a bigger boat.”

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Throughout the discussion, Haley spoke with the same jubilant enthusiasm that has come to define the LA Trans and NB Film Festival. While too often the only trans stories we see are either deceitful hate speech or discrimination-driven anguish, the director’s festival reminds attendees that this community is still finding success. They are still creating and finding joy with one another, and making it clear that no amount of flawed hatred should ever stop a queer artist from putting out their narrative for others to see. 

The festival balances this triumph with the vital work of making the film industry more accessible to trans and nonbinary filmmakers worldwide. Its mission is encapsulated best in Joey’s own words, as the filmmaker reminded supporters of why the LA Trans and NB Film Festival needs to exist: “This festival…it makes it easier to find trans folks in film. It’s a tiny community — but oh, is it mighty.”

This week marks the Los Angeles Blade’s 9th Annual Best of LA Award Show, honoring leading members from the community as voted on by readers of the Blade. Presented in part by MISTR and Visit West Hollywood, the community gathered on Thursday, March 26th, at The Abbey, to celebrate the winners: 

Best Drag Performer 

Cake Moss

Kyra Jete, Runner-up

Best Drag Show

Rocc-ettes at Mattie’s

Hamburger Mary’s Weho. Runner-up

Local Influencer of the Year

Rose Montoya

Lucas Dell, Runner-up

Best LGBTQ Bar

Gym Bar

The Abbey, Runner-up

Best Happy Hour

Motherlode

Hi-Tops, Runner-up

Go-Go of the Year

Steven Dehler

Prince Joshua, Runner-up

Best Restaurant

Bottega Louie

WeHo Bistro, Runner-up

Best Radio or TV Station

REVRY

KTLA, Runner-up

Best Cannabis Retailer/Lounge

Green Qween

Artist Tree Lounge, Runner-up

Best LGBTQ Owned Business        

MISTR

Green Qween, Runner-up

Best LGBTQ Social Group

Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles

Dark Circle Film Society, Runner-up

Best House of Worship  

Hollywood United Methodist

Congregation Kol Ami, Runner-up

Activist of the Year

Maebe A. Girl

Rose Montoya, Runner-up

Public Official of the Year

John Erickson

Lindsey Horvath, Runner-up 

Best Local Pro Sports Team, co-presented by Pride House LA/West Hollywood

LA Dodgers

LA Lakers, Runner-up

Local Ally of the Year   

Kevin De Nicolo

Jessica Steinman, Runner-up

Best Doctor/Medical Provider

AIDS Healthcare Foundation

LA LGBT Center, Runner-up

Most LGBTQ-Friendly Workplace

Los Angeles LGBT Center

City of West Hollywood, Runner-up

Non-Profit of the Year

Los Angeles LGBT Center

Trans Lifeline, Runner-up

Best Local Actor

Annie Reznik

Matthew Scott Montgomery, Runner-up

Best Local Theatre

Celebration Theatre

Pasadena Playhouse, Runner-up

Local Musical Artist of the Year

Prince Joshua

Ross Alan, Runner-up

Best LGBTQ Event

Outloud Music Festival at Weho Pride

GLAAD Awards, Runner-up

Best Regional Pride    

WeHo Pride

Long Beach Pride, Runner-up

Best Promoter of the Year

Beau Byron

Paul Nicholls, Runner-up

LGBTQ Professional of the Year

Erik Braverman

Michael Ferrera, Runner-up

Best Bartender

Danny Hernandez

Michael Susi, Runner-up

Best DJ

Boy Apocalypse

DJ Les Ortiz, Runner-up

Best Local LGBTQ Podcast

BabyGay

On The Rocks, Runner-up

Best Salon/Spa

Shorty’s Barber Shop

The Massage Company WEHO, Runner-up

Best Music Venue

The Hollywood Bowl

The Troubadour, Runner-up

Best Fitness/Workout Spot

LA Fitness, Hollywood

Barry’s WEHO, Runner-up

Best Hotel

Hotel Ziggy

SoHo House, Runner-up

This year’s Local Hero Award goes to Genevieve Morrill in honor of her role as an ally, serving as president and CEO of the West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce. 

Gus Kenworthy received the first-ever Los Angeles Blade Athlete Legacy Award, co-presented by Pride House LA/West Hollywood. 

Los Angeles Blade publisher Alexander Rodriguez shared, “In light of the year we’ve had to contend with as the queer community, it is imperative that we take moments to share the accomplishments and resilience of our local family of activists, leaders, and allies. Honoring our nominees and winners this year is proof of the power of queer joy. Until next year!” 

The International Olympic Committee on Thursday announced it will not allow transgender women from competing in female events at the Olympics.

“For all disciplines on the Sports Program of an IOC event, including individual and team sports, eligibility for any Female Category is limited to biological females,” reads the new policy.

The policy states “eligibility for the Female Category is to be determined in the first instance by SRY Gene screening to detect the absence or presence of the SRY Gene.”

“On the basis of the scientific evidence, the IOC considers that the SRY (sex-determining Region Y) Gene is fixed throughout life and represents highly accurate evidence that an athlete has experienced or will experience male sex development,” it reads. “Furthermore, the IOC considers that SRY Gene screening via saliva, cheek swab or blood sample is unintrusive compared to other possible methods. Athletes who screen negative for the SRY gene permanently satisfy this policy’s eligibility criteria for competition in the Female Category.”

The policy states the test “will be a once-in-a-lifetime test” unless “there is reason to believe a negative reading is in error.”

The new regulation will be in place for the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

“I understand that this a very sensitive topic,” said IOC President Kirsty Coventry on Thursday in a video. “As a former athlete, I passionately believe in the rights of all Olympians to take part in fair competition.”

“The policy that we have announced is based on science and it has been led by medical experts with the best interests of athletes at its heart. The scientific evidence is very clear: male chromosomes give performance advances in sport that rely on strength, power, or endurance,” she added. “At the Olympic Games, even the smallest margins can be the difference between victory and defeat. So, it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category. In addition, in some sports it would simply not be safe.”

(Video courtesy of the IOC)

Laurel Hubbard, a weightlifter from New Zealand, in 2021 became the first trans woman to compete at the Olympics.

Imane Khelif, an Algerian boxer, won a gold medal at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. Khelif later sued JK Rowling and Elon Musk for cyberstalking after they questioned her gender identity.

Ellis Lundholm, a mogul skier from Sweden, this year became the first openly trans athlete to compete in any Winter Olympics when he participated in Milan Cortina Winter Olympics in Italy.

President Donald Trump in February 2025 issued an executive order that bans trans women and girls from female sports teams in the U.S.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee last July banned trans women from competing in female sporting events. Republican lawmakers have demanded the IOC ban trans athletes from women’s athletic competitions.

“I’m grateful the Olympics finally embraced the common sense policy that women’s sports are for women, not for men,” said U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) on X.

An IOC spokesperson on Thursday referred the Washington Blade to the press release that announced the new policy.

There was a time, according to queer lore, when gay men referred to themselves as a “Friend of Dorothy” as a coded way of communicating their sexual orientation to each other without fear of “the straights” catching on. The reference, of course, is a winking nod to the love and affinity felt by the community toward the main character of L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” – especially as personified by Judy Garland in the classic 1939 big screen musical version from MGM.

It may be that the origins of this phrase have been mythologized, exaggerated and/or retro-fitted to convey the underground nature of the queer community – as, indeed, is suggested in “It’s Dorothy!” (the new documentary from filmmaker Jeffrey McHale, now streaming on Peacock), which concerns itself with the enduring cultural legacy of this quintessentially American fictional heroine. But regardless of whether it truly served as a sort of “secret password,” it has come to be embraced as a part of the LGBTQ lexicon. As “campy” as the reference may be, being a “Friend of Dorothy” is now a proudly held communal watchword not just for gay men, but for an entire rainbow community – and McHale’s fizzy-yet-reverential exploration taps into all the reasons how and why this fictional Kansas farm girl has come to be a touchstone for so many by tracking her journey across popular culture over the 125 years since she first sprung to life in the pages of Baum’s timeless literary fantasy.

Calling on the commentary of cultural figures – writers, performers, and other artists whose paths have been, by fate or by personal design, have become associated with Dorothy’s legacy across pop culture, as well as the observations of scholars and historians that provide insight on the appeal that has made her into a sort of avatar for anyone who feels marginalized in a wild and self-contradictory world – and enriched by a plentiful trove of clips from the myriad incarnations through which she has become embedded into the American pop culture imagination, it’s a documentary that leans heavily into the notion that Baum’s timeless heroine remains relevant through her relatability. Given a minimum of descriptors by the author who created her and portrayed in the public imagination through a widely divergent array of social viewpoints, she represents a kind of “blank page” on which we can imprint ourselves; but at the same time, there is something about her – her nebulous status as presumed orphan, raised by an aunt and uncle who don’t quite understand her and thrust without warning into a world of contradictory rules and unfair expectations – that speaks directly to those who feel like outsiders, or who dream of freedom, acceptance, and personal agency beyond the proverbial rainbow.

Naturally, McHale imprints on Dorothy’s most iconic incarnation off the pages of Baum’s books; the cultural legacy of Dorothy cannot be separated from that of her most iconic representative – Garland, of course – and his documentary easily makes the case that, through her association with the character, this beloved actress who was constantly judged and frequently stigmatized throughout a career that took her through the heights of public success to the depths of personal heartbreak, all while living under the constant scrutiny of Hollywood’s publicity-and-propaganda machine. As a result, she somehow merged identities with her most famous role: Judy was Dorothy, but Dorothy was Judy, too. “It’s Dorothy” takes advantage of this almost mystical transfiguration to reflect on the qualities that make this pairing of actress and character so deeply complementary, while also using it to illuminate why the empathy which binds her with the queer community is so tightly connected to the qualities she shared with the non-descript but unforgettable character that would make her into an undisputed icon.

As famous as Garland’s Dorothy is, however, it’s not the end-and-be-all of Baum’s beloved heroine, and much of McHale’s movie turns its attention to the numerous other performers who have taken on the role throughout the decades, in various incarnations of the “Wizard of Oz” mythos – particularly through “The Wiz,” the 1974 Broadway musical that reframes and remolds the story (and Dorothy) through the lens of Black culture and experience, and other iterations that have emerged throughout pop culture as a testament to her enduring appeal. Indeed, the movie brings illumination to the way that Dorothy – and the “Oz” mythos in general – has become a touchstone within Black community culture as well, and how artists (like musician Rufus Wainwright, gay counterculture icon John Waters, comedian/actor Margaret Cho, comedian/writer/director Lena Waithe, and “Wicked” author Gregory Maguire, all of whom participate in the film’s conversation) have found inspiration in the character and her story, which has helped to shape their own creative lives.

Thoughtful and scholarly while also delivering a celebratory tribute to the character (and the outsider qualities which make her beloved by so many who can relate to her sense of longing and the call she feels to journey “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”), “It’s Dorothy” provides a respectful yet candid examination of the lasting impact of Baum’s iconic character and the world he created around her in our popular imagination, not just as queer people but as a larger American community. It’s an entertaining journey into cultural history, which connects the dots to give us insight on why Dorothy and her adventures continue to speak to us with such profound resonance. It’s also entertaining in a way that feels like a “guilty pleasure” but is validated by the reverence it exudes for its subject, and loaded with memorably evocative clips from movies, shows, and performances from across the decades; and while it may begin to feel a bit repetitive, at points, as it examines the various actresses who have played Dorothy over the years (and the meaning they have found in her that connects her to their own lives), it nevertheless maintains a sincerity of feeling that keeps us invested.

And just in case you might feel like the times are too somber for a nostalgic stroll down the “yellow brick road” of cultural memories, be aware that McHale also explores the ominous presence of the Wizard himself in these tales, a phony who pretends at power while hiding behind a benevolent mask to maintain it.

As if the “Wicked” movies didn’t make the point clearly enough, we’re in a world that’s a lot more Oz-like than we would like to imagine, and it’s hard not to wish we had the ability to go “home” simply by tapping our heels together in fabulous footwear. “It’s Dorothy!” conveys that longing in a way that feels light-hearted and joyful, and reminds us why being a “friend of Dorothy” has been and continues to be a resonant way of identifying ourselves in a world full of wizards, witches, and “twisters” that can carry us far away from home.

And if you want to follow it up with an impromptu rewatch of the 1939 classic, we wouldn’t blame you. It’s a movie that feels, to so many of us, like home – and there’s no place like it.

Bartenders are a unique blend of therapist, den mother, and bouncer. In gay bars, their role is even more important as they administer to the queer community and keep our remaining few safe spaces queer-friendly and well lubricated. Meet Michael Vega. 

You may remember him from his tenure at Micky’s or you can currently catch him at Mattie’s (formerly Rocco’s). If you lived in New York City you may have seen him at The Monster in the West Village. If you lived in San Francisco you may remember him from the popular night spot The Powerhouse. He took some time to share some insights from behind the bar. 

How did you get into bartending?

When I was between college years, I spent a summer in Philly, where a friend got me a job as a waiter in a fancy pants restaurant called The Moshulu. I had no experience, but was a quick study. 

They had me as a cocktail waiter in the lounge, serving drinks that I wasn’t old enough to drink. I watched the bartender and asked a lot of questions. So, when a year or so later the opportunity to work in a nightclub called “The Cartwheel” in New Hope, PA, came up, I was able to fudge my experience behind a bar and say, “Sure, I can do this.” Then it snowballed from there. It helped that I got a theatre degree, so needing a side gig was necessary. No one tells you that a 3-picture deal doesn’t come with the degree. 

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How long have you been bartending?

Longer than I care to admit.

What do you love about bartending?

Over the years so many of the dearest people in my life have come from being behind a bar.

What do you love about Los Angeles/West Hollywood?

Diversity & opportunity. 

What brought you to LA?

I’m an actor first and foremost, so after several years in San Francisco, where I was a working actor in theatre & some film, I’d grown less interested in the acting opportunities there. So moving to LA was the next logical step for my career. I go back several times a year to visit, though.

What is your passion?

My passion is being an actor. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do since I was a kid. I’m very grateful that I’ve been able to continuously do it for all these years.

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What’s a weird thing you learned about life from bartending?

One thing I learned about life through bartending is that everyone has a very primal need to be seen, heard, and acknowledged. Simply remembering someone’s name can make all the difference in their day. 

Favorite spot in Los Angeles?

My place. Outside of that I love Scum and Villainy, a sci-fi geek bar in Hollywood.

How has Los Angeles changed you?

Not sure if it qualifies as a change, but I’ve never been one to alter who I am to fit in. If anything, LA made me more steadfast in that. 

What piece of advice would you give to your younger self?

Stay out of tanning beds & wear sunscreen.

If you could make one wish for Los Angeles what would it be?

Less traffic

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What do you want for the queer community? 

To be kinder to each other. Mean Girls was a fun film…not something to aspire to. 

What do you look for in a person?

I gravitate to those with a love for, involvement in, or at the very least a curiosity for the arts.

Celebrity crush?

Jonathon Bailey… because he’s so fucking charming. I feel like I’m under his spell and not in control of my carnal wits. 

What is your favorite thing to do in your down time?

Not Speak. I value having time to just be alone with my thoughts. It helps me to focus and  figure stuff out.

When the idea was tossed around to try to bring the original 1976 Charlie’s Angels cast back together for a reunion event, PaleyFest LA’s vice president of public programming and festivals, Rene Reyes, admits he “never” thought it would happen logistically.

But on April 6, the festival’s headlining event will feature Kate Jackson, Jaclyn Smith, and Cheryl Ladd for a one-of-a-kind 50th anniversary celebration. The show spanned five seasons, found a dedicated legion of queer fans, and evolved through multiple reboots, including the 2019 film starring Kristen Stewart, Elizabeth Banks, Naomi Scott, and Ella Balinska.

“You think about how there really weren’t female-driven narratives at the center of a TV investigative drama. That just wasn’t happening with great frequency [in the ‘70s], and they did it,” Reyes says of the original show. “They haven’t been together on stage in 34 years, so it’s a miracle that it all came together because schedules are all over the place. When it happens, we always seize the opportunity.”

Running April 4-12 at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, CA, PaleyFest LA’s 43rd edition will once again feature screenings and panels celebrating some of the best shows of the past year; Pluribus, The Pitt, Shrinking, Scrubs, Emily in Paris, Nobody Wants This, and Your Friends & Neighbors are among the lineup. Stars expected to attend include Noah Wyle, Karolina Wydra, Jason Segel, Lily Collins, Kristen Bell, and Adam Brody.

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“Across my 26 years with the festival, I’ve been able to see so many changes in media and so many changes in the way we consume media,” Reyes says. “But what’s interesting is what remains the same — the connection to the shows we love and the stars we love. That really powers what happens at the festival.”

LGBTQ+ storytelling is a cornerstone of the shows represented in this year’s line-up. In Pluribus, the lead character Carol (played by Golden Globe winner Rhea Seehorn) is queer and talks about her experience with conversion therapy in a standout episode. In The Pitt, many of the patients and doctors are queer. And in Shrinking, Michael Urie and Devin Kawaoka play a married couple navigating their relationship.

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Reyes, who identifies as queer, sees these stories as an essential part of the festival in today’s climate: “It always becomes a facet of the conversation just because, thankfully, a fair amount of shows on television right now have queer storylines. We always want more, but that kind of representation just makes everything better and makes the conversations that happen at the festival more insightful. It always comes up and is a factor when we’re planning the festival to ensure we’re celebrating series that have representation across the spectrum.”

After the red carpets and star-studded panels end, though, the work has only just begun. The Paley Center for Media, the non-profit organization behind the festival, continues their work year-around, focusing on preservation and educational efforts. Over 160,000 TV and radio programs are featured in the collection, including an archive specifically dedicated to queer shows like That Certain Summer, Pose, and Glee.

“We shoot all of the PaleyFest events and all the events that we host at the Paley Center in New York for the archive, so it’s like a living history,” Reyes says. “You can hear what the writers of Pose were actually doing, what their thoughts were, what their creative process was. You can always look back on that. I think it’s so important to preserve our history, to make it accessible to people — especially queer history, which in so many cases is largely untold. That drives me.”

Head to PaleyCenter.org for more info

Watching a good musical can be transcendental. 

As the more theater-inclined members of the queer community can attest, watching a musical that makes you feel something is a legitimately unforgettable experience. These are productions that feature not only amazing music but resonant themes, drawing on core aspects of the human experience to make viewers feel connected with the artistry taking place onstage. Modern audiences are lucky to have many inventive musicals that they can connect with — but few are as unfortunately relevant as David Byrne’s Here Lies Love. 

First premiering off-Broadway in 2013, Here Lies Love documents the glamorously haunting rise of Imelda Marcos, who, with her husband, served as the Philippines’ dictator for decades in the late 1900s. The story uses pop music to document her steady descent into fascism, with its dazzling images reflecting how Marcos used her trademark style as a cover for mistreating millions of citizens she was meant to serve.

In recent years, as the Philippines and the U.S. struggle with fascism, viewers have recognized the production’s political importance, with its themes of fighting oppression becoming more important than ever before. It’s why so many fans were thrilled when it was announced Here Lies Love was coming to LA in what was promised to be the queerest version of the show yet — meaning it was perfect for RuPaul’s Drag Race alumna, Aura Mayari. 

“What really caught my attention was the Filipino-ness of this story,” said Mayari, as she sat down with the LA Blade to discuss her role in the show. “In my drag, I really love to intertwine my culture into what I do. And so when I was told that it’s a Filipino story and it’s going to be an all-Filipino cast, I was all in!” 

It’s an aspect of the performer’s art that fans know well; Aura first made waves on RuPaul’s Drag Race season 15 as one of that cast’s best dancers (and self-titled ‘trade’ of the season). While on the series, she proudly discussed her experience as a queer Filipino, with the years since seeing Mayari bring her intersectional drag to countless clubs across the country. It made her a perfect fit for a show that merges Filipino culture with visually stunning effects, with the LA iteration creating a new role just for the queen: Imeldific, a drag version of Imelda Marcos who narrates the story to a group of club goers. 

Aura spoke about what a personal honor it was to originate this role, explaining, “I moved to the United States [from the Philippines] when I was 11…and I wanted to be American so bad. I didn’t want to stand out, and I wanted to avoid being bullied. I didn’t want to be seen as someone who was an immigrant until after college, when I met a lot of my Filipino friends that I’m still  friends with today.” It’s a pride that she was honored to bring into Here Lies Love, and it only grew once she encountered a cast who understood and loved the intersectional identities she showed through her drag. “They embraced my queerness and what I could bring to the table. And I think a lot of what I’ve learned through my Drag Race experience, I was able to use and [help] inspire my cast members to make something as magical as this show is.”

The performer stressed how being a part of this ensemble truly felt like being at home. “We get to eat a lot of Filipino food — people bring in a lot of Filipino snacks, and a lot of Filipino egg rolls!” Aura laughed, describing her experience on set. “Every day, being in the show…it’s so special to me. I’ve never, ever thought to be a part of a project that celebrates Filipino culture and that dives into the history that a lot of people don’t know about. I have learned so much about my own history from this show.” 

It’s a history that, unfortunately, we are seeing repeated across the world today. 

Since the 2024 election, U.S. citizens have seen numerous attempts by this administration to strip away the freedoms of marginalized communities. And in the Philippines, for many months in 2025, thousands of citizens fought against widespread government corruption through protests extremely similar to the ones that toppled the Marcos regime. It’s a deeply disheartening experience to watch Here Lies Love and realize that not only have the issues portrayed in the show not gone away, in some cases, they’ve also worsened. Aura recognized this fact, but she reminded everyone watching: Here Lies Love’s story doesn’t end with corruption. 

“History repeats itself. And it’s really important to know and understand that history — and to fight the erasure of our stories.” 

She emphasized how Imelda Marcos is not the only character in this show, that the audience gets to meet many of the real advocates who never stopped fighting against their country’s authoritarianism and eventually toppled their gorgeous dictator. “[Here Lies Love] really reminds us how quickly power can shift and how propaganda can influence people…[it shows] that people have fought things like this in the past, and [their fighting] has worked.” On what these stories are meant to teach the audience, Mayari continued, “I think [the lesson] is: if you do believe in something, anything can change. You just really have got to be aware, and you have to teach yourself [to fight back].” It’s an inspiring message that so many need to hear right now, and that Aura Mayari is delighted to share through her performance as Imeldific eight times a week. 

As the interview came to a close, Aura realized that in the span of thirty minutes she’d discussed Here Lies Love’s queerness, innovative storytelling, and political pertinence — and she’d barely scratched the surface of all that this production contains! Recognizing that she would need many hours to speak about everything she’s experienced during her time with the show, Aura summed up her feelings by saying, “It’s so special to me. I’ve never, ever thought to be a part of a project that celebrates Filipino culture and that dives into the history that a lot of people don’t know about. And I have learned so much about [myself and] my history from this show.”

It’s a truly deserved experience for an artist who’s dedicated her career to uplifting her communities. And, for the many people who get to watch Aura perform in Here Lies Love at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, the show is a good reminder that, yes, the issues we’re facing today have all happened before. But those people fought back, and they won. 

So that means we can too.  

Here Lies Love is playing at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles from February 11 to April 5, 2026.

Pride House LA/West Hollywood, an organization that creates safe spaces for out athletes and allies, announced yesterday that it will partner with Angel City Football Club (FC), L.A.’s National Women’s Soccer League team. 

Formed in 2020, Angel City FC has made its stance on queer rights clear. They collaborate with Girls Play Los Angeles, a countywide program that creates low-cost soccer programming for young girls and gender expansive youth. Accessibility and LGBTQ+ representation are not afterthoughts, and they will continue to advocate for queer representation in sports as a sponsor of Pride House LA/West Hollywood.

This new partnership merges the growing power of these two organizations’ work in highlighting queer athletes and their stories. Angel City FC will provide financial backing for Pride House LA/West Hollywood’s upcoming 2026 World Cup Weekend in June, which will include a Women in Sports Day to shine a light on women and their continued leadership in queer movements. 

“We are so excited to partner with Angel City Football Club, an organization that furthers our mission of increasing visibility and inclusion for Out Athletes and LGBTQ+ fans as part of their DNA,” wrote Pride House LA/West Hollywood CEO Michael Ferrera to the Blade. “With female athletes leading the way out of the closet, this is a perfect partnership for us.” 

The organizations will uplift queer joy, representation, and unity in upcoming joint community engagement efforts, which include the aforementioned World Cup Weekend as well as Angel City’s Pride-themed match night on July 26. 

The partnership marks progress for vocal allyship and defining action when it comes to protecting queer safety in sports. There is still time before Pride House LA/West Hollywood’s ambitious and historic takeover of West Hollywood Park for the 2028 Summer Olympic Games. Who else will join in and explicitly declare their support for queer athletes?

For more information, visit the social pages of Pride House LA/West Hollywood and Angel City Football Club.

Kristie Song is a California Local News Fellow placed with the Los Angeles Blade. The California Local News Fellowship is a state-funded initiative to support and strengthen local news reporting. Learn more about it at fellowships.journalism.berkeley.edu/cafellows.