With FIELDWORK, his new exhibition at Jarrow & Goodman, Modlin turns toward colorful forests, rice terraces, tea plantations, canopies, trees, and luscious green worlds. The show is on view at 8825 Beverly Blvd. in Los Angeles, through June 10, 2026. The exhibition catalog includes works such as Green Lung, Rice Terrace, Tea Plantation, and Looking Across Waimea.

For the West Hollywood resident, the exhibition marks a continuation of community-centered practice. In a previous conversation with the Blade, Modlin spoke about the importance of “starting things within our own community.” As an openly queer artist, that means sharing work with members of the community.

“I’m honored to be showing at Jarrow & Goodman, a gallery within this community,” Modlin explains, “Being able to bring these works here first, and to show them to the people I live among, means a great deal to me.”

For Modlin, showing up as an artist is not only about the public moment, such as the gallery opening, the conversations, the wine, or the viewers sharing stories about the places they’ve traveled. It also happens in solitude, in the private space before the work is ever shown. His paintings come from an intense attention to detail, from sitting with a place long enough to feel responsible for how it appears on the canvas.

“For these locations to work, I have to genuinely care about them. I have to feel a responsibility to do them justice and put forward an honest point of view.” 

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The series took more than six months to produce, beginning with the first watercolor study and continuing through the finished canvases. “I couldn’t sustain that kind of attention without a real connection to the places,” Modlin tells the Blade.

That connection is immediately found upon setting eyes upon the vast landscapes within the gallery. The paintings are immersive and dense with color, texture, and motion. The canvas becomes fertile ground for the landscapes Modlin carries back with him.  They do not present nature as a distant view, but as a space the viewer can feel present. 

For Modlin, that immersive quality has changed over the course of his artistic career. “Three years ago, when I first started painting immersive landscapes, they were very much an escape for me,” he tells the Blade. “Now they’ve become something more. This series grew out of watercolors made directly in the field and from photographs; those studies were then composited into larger visual representations of each place.” 

By working from watercolors made directly in the field, Modlin narrows the distance between landscape and image. The paintings do not simply depict nature from afar; they carry the process of being there into the finished work. That is why Modlin describes this series as more “process-driven.” The result is a body of work that feels open and immersive, but never detached from how it was made. 

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For an LGBTQ audience, that process-driven approach carries a particular resonance. Queer community has often been built through chosen spaces: bars, galleries, neighborhoods, homes, and rooms where people can gather, see one another, and feel less alone. Modlin’s paintings offer a version of that refuge on canvas.

At a time when LGBTQ communities continue to face political hostility, Modlin’s commitment to joy feels less like avoidance than insistence.

“We’re living through a genuinely dark moment,” he states. “My work is about joy and beauty, that’s always been its center. I hope people can stand in front of these paintings and simply feel good. That feels more important right now than it ever has.”In FIELDWORK, the gallery becomes its own kind of canvas. The paintings bring the landscapes back, but the community completes them — moving through the room, gathering around them, and finding itself inside the world Modlin has made.

Jarrow & Goodman Present FIELDWORK by Andrew Max Modlin, 8825 Beverly Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90048

Award-winning filmmaker C. Fitz has never been interested in entertaining the stories history books share. With the upcoming re-release of JEWEL’S CATCH ONE, Fitz once again shines a spotlight on the legendary Jewel Thais-Williams, the first out Black lesbian to own a nightclub in Los Angeles and the legendary force behind Catch One, the iconic nightclub that became a sanctuary and cultural hub for generations of Black and LGBTQ+ Angelenos far and wide. Sometimes inaccurately referred to as the “West Coast Studio 54,” Catch One was much more revolutionary than it was trendy. Sure, it was a place to dance and vibe out to. But more importantly, it served the community as a place to organize, to celebrate, to connect with one another, and to belong.

In our deeply moving conversation, Fitz reflects on the six-year journey of making the critically acclaimed documentary, the political urgency of preserving Black queer history, and why spaces like Catch One still matter in an age of social media and cultural turmoil. With wit, honesty, and a palpable admiration for Jewel’s unapologetic drive, Fitz talks not just as a filmmaker but as an usher of a legacy too powerful to fade quietly into the shadows. As Pride Month and Juneteenth converge against an increasingly polarized American backdrop, JEWEL’S CATCH ONE arrives as both a celebration and a much-needed and appropriately timed call to action.

A resounding congratulations on the upcoming re-release of JEWEL’S CATCH ONE! What first drew you to the story of Jewel Thais-Williams and Catch One?

My initial inspiration came when I met Jewel in 2010 while directing a short piece on her community work. The moment I stepped into her world, I realized how much of her story had gone undocumented. As a filmmaker, that immediately felt like something I needed to change.

What stayed with me was not just who she was as a pioneering entrepreneur and activist, but the scale of what she built and how many lives her community touched. There was very little written about her, and I made a conscious decision to commit to capturing that history before it was lost. That led to six years of making the film, followed by two years on the festival circuit, where I focused on building momentum to get the film distributed so this history could reach a much wider audience.

From a storytelling perspective, it was important for me to go beyond a single narrative and trace the broader cultural impact. The film connects Jewel’s story to the evolution of Black and LGBTQ+ life, as well as music, fashion, pop culture, and politics. I wanted to reveal her not just as a local figure, but as a hidden hero whose influence reached far beyond what most people realize.

Catch One has often been called the “West Coast Studio 54,” but your film reveals something much more. How would you describe what the club truly represented for Black LGBTQ+ communities?

I wanted to capture a time when community wasn’t optional, but it was survival. I approached the film with that urgency in mind, to make the audience feel, through visuals, the intimacy, resilience, and joy that existed inside those walls.

Catch One was more than a club. It was a safe haven for Black and LGBTQ+ communities at a time when that kind of space meant the difference between isolation and belonging. It was home to many who had lost theirs. In shaping the film, I focused on blending archival material with a cinematic language captured in the present day that brings those decades and community milestones to life.

Why do you think stories like Jewel’s have historically been overlooked in mainstream LGBTQ+ history?

It has always been a struggle for POC LGBTQ+ stories to be properly recognized and canonized, both now and in Jewel’s time. Jewel was inspired to start the club not only because of the racism her community faced in local neighborhood bars, but also because of the discrimination she and her friends experienced in trendy West Hollywood nightclubs.

When I began making the film in 2010, the industry wasn’t supporting these stories or this history. I had a VERY hard time getting support, including grants from mainstream resources. I had to chip away at it, which also makes this story so powerful, as I filmed for six years while gathering decades of exclusive archival material from the community. I didn’t have the funds to jump into a full production or edit of the movie. I do feel that more resources for films and stories like this emerged over time; however, today it feels like those resources are being stripped back again.

My film is proof that audiences want to see these stories. They shouldn’t be passed over or overlooked. These fabulous pieces of history, stories of how we got to where we are today, should be celebrated and supported by everyone who supports filmmaking: studios, producers, grant organizations, and even cities preserving their own history. So are these stories overlooked, or are they just really hard to make?

And I do want to shine a light on the people who made this possible. I had incredible support from my closest film colleagues who helped me bring this story to life. Without this amazing crew, especially Pat Branch, who was with me since Day 1 as a writer, producer, and all-around crew person; producers Tim Vermeulen and Carmen Quiros; the fabulous DP Abe Martinez (Hunting Wives, The Lincoln Lawyer); and the immensely talented Kelly Boesch, I don’t know if I could have made the film I wanted. It was a labor of love, and I had some great help bringing it to life.

As both Pride Month and Juneteenth approach, this re-release feels especially timely. What conversations do you hope the film ignites in our community today?

Real change comes from within. Like Jewel, one incredible woman ignited her friends, community, and city to help create change. I hope the film sparks conversations around the need to be active in our communities and with our neighbors in order to fight racism and discrimination in all its forms. Jewel’s life and the injustices her community faced still resonate with our current political climate. I hope the tenacity within this storytelling inspires action and helps people work toward a brighter future.

Jewel Thais-Williams was the first out Black lesbian to own a nightclub in Los Angeles, which is a groundbreaking achievement in itself. What struck you most about her courage and leadership?

What struck me most about Jewel was her sheer tenacity in pursuing her goals. Her people needed a safe space, and she kept those doors open. She stood in the doorway when the cops came, even buying time for patrons to flee or hide. She stood up again and again. Somehow, this one woman had the energy of ten, and always with a sense of humor.

The film also captures how nightlife can become not only political but even spiritual. Why are queer gathering spaces so essential, especially during periods of social backlash?

Safe spaces are always essential, especially for the LGBTQ+ community, where family support is often jeopardized. The space becomes home, a place to be whoever you are in peace and to find love and support. Often like church, but usually open to everyone.

During the AIDS crisis, Catch One became a hub for activism, fundraising, and care. What did you learn about community resilience while researching this chapter of the story?

In the face of patrons, friends, and loved ones dying all around her, Jewel and the community came together. Instead of saving what little she had and closing the club, she turned the parking lot into a soup kitchen for sick patrons and worked even harder to help them. Against all odds, with minimal financial and political support, Jewel and the community poured more love and hard work into helping those who needed it most. That’s what real community is and does. This story shows audiences the true meaning of community.

Do younger generations fully comprehend what spaces like Catch One meant before social media and mainstream acceptance?

No, and how could they, when so many have never had the opportunity to experience spaces like these? Some haven’t needed a safe space, and in this social media age, they don’t crave one in the same way. Online spaces can feel “safe,” in a sense. I hope a film like Jewel’s Catch One encourages people to step outside those digital walls, feel the music, experience the people dancing, and discover a “Catch One” in their own backyard. There’s nothing like it, and they’re missing out if they never experience it.

With the film also capturing the music and fashion of the era, how important was it for you to preserve not just the politics of the era, but its joy and glamour as well?

HUGE! The world of Catch One and spaces like it is where fashion is born and thrives. I wish I had a mini-series so I could show everything I witnessed in the photos and ball culture footage from our archival collection. It was incredible, and incredibly important, to celebrate the fabulous fashions of the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s, and early 2000s. It was a blast, and I only wish I’d had more time to show the world even more of the incredible trend-setting imagery.

What surprised you most while exploring the history of Catch One and the communities built around it?

The desperation to meet love. The community protects each other and fights so hard together. These were times when one wrong move could cost you everything, your job, family, or home. People were fearless, and Jewel was a leader in that fight.

The film arrives at a moment when LGBTQ+ rights and Black history are increasingly politicized in the United States. Did revisiting this story feel different now than it did during the original release?

I’m so thrilled to be partnering with Freestyle for the re-release. The original release was about celebrating the story and preserving this history on film forever. I never imagined we’d need to be shining a light on it again just a few years later because of today’s polarized climate.

This is one of the biggest reasons I made the film. I wanted Jewel’s inspirational story to encourage people to become heroes in their own communities. I didn’t know at the time that all of America would one day feel like a single backyard in need of inspiration, but here we are.

How did Jewel herself respond to seeing her life and legacy reflected back through the documentary?

When I first approached Jewel on the day we met, I told her how incredibly impressed I was by everything she had created and was doing: running the club, running the nonprofit health clinic, and, at the time, also running a vegan restaurant, an entire chapter I filmed and interviewed people about that ultimately had to be cut. I told her we needed to make a full documentary about her. She humbly shrugged and said, “Sure.”

Years later, when we were attending film festivals, and I would bring her onstage, she would receive standing ovations. For Jewel to receive her flowers not only at Los Angeles film festivals, where so many patrons and club workers had lived, but from audiences all over the world, was incredibly moving. It deeply touched her. And I felt very blessed to witness it and help shine a light on a true hero in our community.

As a filmmaker, how do you balance documenting trauma and discrimination while still honoring celebration and joy?

It was a challenge, and my first rough cut was over 10 hours long! I think you have to understand the purpose of showing trauma and discrimination in order to fully tell the story of how Jewel and her community overcame it, rose above it, and created real change. That’s where the inspiration lives.

There were moments, I’m not going to lie, when I struggled with letting go of certain stories. But the goal was to inspire change through the film’s storytelling, just as Jewel’s life inspired change. That balancing act was painful at times, but it felt worth it when audiences told us the film made them want to look at their own communities and ask what they could do to help make a difference. That made all the time and sweat that my editors and I poured into it worthwhile.

July 2026 will mark one year since Jewel Thais-Williams’ passing. How has her absence changed the emotional meaning of this re-release for you?

I’m very sad that Jewel isn’t here to witness the documentary’s next chapter and new audiences discovering her work, tenacity, and legacy. We traveled the world with this film, and, as I mentioned, seeing audiences everywhere discover her work and celebrate her was the best part of making it.

In today’s climate, I know she would be happy to contribute to the resilience needed to reclaim what we’ve lost and continue fighting for equality, just as she did through Catch One and her foundation.

If Jewel were here today watching the current cultural and political climate surrounding LGBTQ+ rights, what do you think she would want communities to remember about resilience and resistance?

Jewel was a doer. She didn’t wait for someone else to open the door, rather, she opened it herself and then held it open for everyone behind her. I think she would want communities to remember that real change doesn’t come from watching it happen; it comes from showing up again and again, even when the odds are against you.

She did it with minimal resources, in a climate that was often hostile, and she never stopped. I think she would say: look at what we built, look at what we survived, and know that we can do it again.

Her life is proof that one person with enough tenacity and love can change everything. That is ultimately why this re-release matters so much to me. Jewel’s story is not just history. It is a roadmap.

The film will be re-released on June 16, 2026, across major streaming platforms throughout North America, including Apple TV, Amazon, Kanopy, cable VOD, and additional digital outlets. Check out the pre-order link on AppleTV.

Ben Fisher’s BALL BOY begins with a familiar tension: loving something that did not always love you back. For Fisher, that something is sports – the dominant language of his childhood, his family, and his relationship to masculinity. He was surrounded by team spirit, even as he found himself ‘playing for the other team.’

The comedy show, which comes to the Los Angeles LGBT Center as part of the Hollywood Fringe Festival, uses baseball to explore what LGBTQ+ people inherit from sports culture and what they have to reimagine for themselves. It will run for five performances throughout June at the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Davidson/Valentini Theatre, 1125 North McCadden Place, Los Angeles, CA 90038.

“I’d say the show is at its heart a comedic excavation,” Fisher tells the Blade. “It’s my attempt to understand and unpack parts of my experience as a gay person growing up in a culture and family dominated by men, and learning or adjusting to how I can fit in, survive, [and] find my place.” Given his proximity to sports, Fisher explains that sports serve as the perfect metaphor for understanding his situation today, especially after having lost his father, and unpacking the complicated feelings with their relationship.

For Fisher, sports were not just on the television in the background. They were family infrastructure. His parents were varsity athletes, his siblings and cousins played, and his father coached, umpired, refereed, and sat on local sports boards. “It was just a ton of balls in the air,” Fisher humorously tells the Blade, “and there I was, a little gay kid amidst all of this sport just trying to find my way.” Though he sought to find enjoyment in sports, he mainly found enjoyment in other activities: “I loved being in plays and musicals, and pretending I was a mermaid, and gardening.”

This show resonates with many, as it carries with it the theme of queer acceptance. “I did a lot of grueling and bargaining with myself growing up,” Fisher explains, “and a lot of trying to appease these men around me, to try to make them comfortable by shrinking myself or trying to be something I thought they wanted me to be.” 

These feelings become further complicated when dealing with a parent. The show carries the weight of Fisher’s father, who passed away. “Sports were so his world, and I’m looking for ways to stay connected and honor him while also holding myself and healing from the unintentional damage that he perpetuated onto me,” Fisher says. Fisher is not claiming that every man in his family is toxic, by any means, nor is he blaming his father. Rather, he is giving shape to something many LGBTQ+ people know intimately: the feeling of being measured against a standard one was never able to meet.

Still, BALL BOY is comedy first. And it is this contrast that gives BALL BOY much of its comic charge. Fisher is not rejecting sports so much as reclaiming the field, and in doing so, he uses the arena as a place where childhood discomfort, family grief, and humorous storylines fill each base. Fisher describes humor as the way he processes pain and grief. “It’s always been the way I process things,” he says, “through humor, finding the levity in hard situations … it’s always gotten me through, or helped me make sense.”

He also brings music into the work, including a song called “Little Gay Boy,” written with Camille Harris. Fisher calls it “a reparenting love letter” to his “little gay child self” that has allowed him to heal through humor. Fisher’s show brings together grief, healing, humor, and, somehow, a guitar – and it works.

Bringing the show to the LGBT Center during Pride Month feels especially meaningful. “I’m just grateful for the opportunity,” Fisher says. For this show, he plans to put everything on the stage. And if he is “swinging and missing,” he hopes it is “at least a base hit.”

After an hour of jokes, grief, sports, and self-reclamation, Fisher hopes audiences leave laughing – but also feeling less alone. “I hope people will feel laughter and joy and feel connected and empowered to step up to their own plate and take a swing.” The result is less a rejection of the game than a rewriting of the entire playbook.

Get your tickets here.

Where: Los Angeles LGBT Center – Davidson/Valentini Theatre – 1125 North McCadden Place, Los Angeles, CA 90038When: 5 performances throughout June (Tuesday, June 9th at 5pm; Friday, June 12 at 9:15pm; Sunday, June 14th at 11:45am; Tuesday, June 23 at 9:15pm; Saturday June 27th at 3:15pm)

NEW YORK — Cyndi Lauper on Monday said LGBTQ+ Americans and their allies cannot give up in the fight for equality.

“We need to band together. We need to stand together, and we need to speak out, and we need to help each other,” she told the Los Angeles Blade during an interview after she arrived at Outright International’s Celebration of Courage gala that took place at Pier 60 in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood. “Otherwise, we’re dead.”

Outright International honored the singer and long-time ally at the gala that raised nearly $1.5 million for the global LGBTQ+ and intersex advocacy group. Levi Strauss and VoteLGBT, a group that seeks to increase LGBTQ+ representation in Brazilian politics, also received awards at the event that Laverne Cox emceed.

“These people have courage — you have the courage to stand up,” said Lauper in her acceptance speech, specifically referring to VoteLGBT and its work in Brazil.

‘I just saw a lot of things that weren’t right’

Lauper’s LGBTQ+ advocacy spans decades.

She co-founded True Colors United, which seeks to end homelessness among LGBTQ+ youth, in 2008. Gregory Lewis, who co-founded True Colors United alongside Lauper, introduced her at the Outright International gala.

Lauper in 2010 created the “Give a Damn” campaign through True Colors United that specifically encouraged straight people to support LGBTQ+ rights. She raised funds for True Colors United and the Stonewall Community Foundation when she was a contestant on President Donald Trump’s “The Celebrity Apprentice” the same year.

Lauper headlined the WorldPride 2019 opening ceremony in New York. She received the first U.N. High Note Global Prize for her LGBTQ+ rights advocacy later that year.

Lauper in 2022 performed at the White House ceremony during at which then-President Joe Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act, which codified marriage rights for same-sex couples into federal law. Lauper last year was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Lauper in her Outright International speech talked about her decision to support LGBTQ+ rights.

“I just saw a lot of things that weren’t right,” she said.

“Because I’m friend and family, I thought it would be important to show up here and be with you guys,” added Lauper.

She told gala attendees and honorees that they inspire her.

“Tonight was a big inspiration for me because I was feeling kind of down about how things are going,” said Lauper. “I know that we need to stand together in any civil rights movement — and that’s what it fucking is!”

Lauper reiterated that message when she spoke with the Blade. She also criticized those who “weaponize religion” in their opposition to LGBTQ+ rights in the U.S. and around the world.

“That’s very sad,” said Lauper. “Religion is supposed to be about humanity and love and understanding each other.”

Lauper urged gala attendees to vote and to encourage their families and friends to do the same. She also told them not to “give up.”

“We can never give up,” said Lauper. “Even though it might look like we’re not going anywhere, you guys made me see that we are.”

“That inspires people,” she added. “You make ripples and you change right before your eyes. It don’t look like much, but it is and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger.”

For Noadiah Eckman, the problem begins with a line that is both comic and devastating: “My mom voted for Trump.”

That sentence opens Jesus, Trump & The Little Mermaid Walk into a Bar: The True Story of A Man Called Mommy, a 40-minute one-man show written and performed by Noadiah and coming to the Hollywood Fringe Festival in June. The show, performed at the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Davidson/Valentini Theater, tells the story of Eckman’s transition, his relationship with his Fox News-watching mother, and the difficult praxis of loving family members whose politics can feel hostile to one’s own existence.

“It is personal,” Eckman told the Blade. “It’s about my family.”

But A Man Called Mommy is not simply a trauma narrative. Eckman describes the show as a fast-paced, comedic, and transformative story about pushing past binaries: red vs. blue, straight vs. gay, us vs. them. The show asks what it means to love someone without pretending the conflict does not exist.

“It’s secretly queer and spiritual,” he explained. “The bait [of the show] is how to love your enemy.”

Eckman transitioned later in life, shortly after the 2016 election. At the time, his children were 10 and 8. When he told them he was taking testosterone, their reaction was almost casual.

“They looked up from their Harry Potter books, and they were like, ‘Okay,’” he told the Blade. Eckman added that his children told him, “But we’re not calling you dad.”

The title A Man Called Mommy came from that moment. His girlfriend at the time responded, “I love that I’m dating a man called Mommy.” What began as a joke became a way to hold the complexity of his identity, his parenting, and his family.

At its center, the show explores the complicated relationship between a parent and child. “My transition was into manhood, and her transition was from life to death,” he said. “They’re going together.” The emotional material is heavy, but Eckman insists the show is fun. 

He does not want the audience to feel trapped inside an open wound – a wound that many individuals in the LGBTQ+ community feel deeply. Instead, he wants the community to feel guided through something difficult and return to joy.

“I think the key for good art is that it comes from a healed place,” Eckman told the Blade. “I like to feel like I’m taking the audience somewhere.”

For Eckman, that “somewhere” is not a political agreement. In one scene, he watches Fox News with his mother. The point is not that she switches political parties. Rather, the point is that Eckman and his mother find peace within the noise.

“I love her out of it,” he said to the Blade. “It doesn’t mean she has to change her vote. But we get to a place of love and connection that’s very deep.”

As a Gen X person, Eckman sees his work as part of a longer lineage of survival, humor, and resistance. He points to the AIDS crisis, ACT UP, Reagan-era silence, marriage equality, and the younger generations now facing their own set of problems.

“I definitely think Gen Z’s gonna save us,” he said optimistically. “They’ve got the smarts to do it. They just need a little insight from Gen X.”

His show reaches beyond his own transition. Eckman is a trans man, his son is gay, and his children are Black. For him, the story is about the intersections of all identity categories – but without turning anyone into a main enemy.

“Everybody’s a little good and a little bad,” he explained. “There are no villains. There are no heroes. Everybody’s both.”

Performed with just Eckman and two chairs, A Man Called Mommy is intimate but also part of a larger body of solo performance work. Eckman said the show is a newer piece in a cohort of works he has been developing since 2018 from different sections of his memoir, A Man Called Mommy. Those include It’s Cat O’Clock Somewhere, about how he ended up with 30 cats; Home Wrecker Inc., about trying to break the habit of dating married women; and Home for the Holidays, about healing the past, future, and present at once. He also credits solo performance teachers Ann Randolph, Josh Townshend, and Martha Rynberg with helping shape the work.

For audiences, Eckman hopes the show offers more than 40 minutes of joy. He wants people to leave feeling that another way of living with one another is still possible.

“They’re going to have fun,” he said. “They’re going to see their life in a new way. They’re going to feel a sense of joy at the possibilities of truly loving everyone, and also truly loving ourselves.”Jesus, Trump & The Little Mermaid Walk into a Bar: The True Story of A Man Called Mommy runs June 7 at 7:30 p.m., June 13 at 11:35 a.m., and June 21 at 5 p.m. at the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Davidson/Valentini Theater, 1125 N. McCadden Place.

If you ask an LGBTQ+ person what Michelle Visage is known for, you’re likely to get a few similar answers. Most people will say that they know her as the co-judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race, with the woman serving looks (and scathing critiques) for more than a decade on this seminal program. Others may bring up her time aweing audiences on the West End, or her initial star turn in the hit girl group Seduction. There are a few answers you may get when asking about Michelle Visage, but there’s one part of the performer’s career that not enough people bring up today: her advocacy. 

Before the record deals and hit TV shows, Michelle Visage was a tough teenager from New Jersey. A girl who knew she was meant for fame but was still figuring out how to get there. Eventually, the search for stardom brought her to 1980s New York, a thriving home of queer nightlife that taught Visage how her voice could be used to fight against hatred. And while she flexes that skill every day as a fierce advocate, she’s excited to be louder than ever through ViiV Healthcare’s new ‘PrEP Wisdom Campaign.’ 

Michelle Visage sat down with the Los Angeles Blade to discuss this campaign and how it feels to speak up about this important issue. But before we could get to the present, she stressed that if people wanted to know about her current work, they first had to understand how it all began.

Visage detailed her youth in New Jersey, her no-nonsense parents, and the many times she snuck into nightclubs hoping to be ‘discovered.’ It was in these clubs that she found the thriving ballroom scene of 1980s New York, saying, “I felt like Dorothy [from the Wizard of Oz] when she clicked her heels! [Except] Dorothy clicked her heels three times, and she ended up in Kansas — I ended up on Christopher Street with 30 or 40 of the weirdest, craziest looking misfits I’d ever seen in my life.” Michelle smiled widely as she remembered those early moments. “I was like, ‘Oh my god…I think I found my people.”

“I met Willie Ninja and Caesar Ninja Valentino, and they took me in as one of their own and started teaching me how to vogue. And that’s how life began for me in the ballroom!” She began to walk as a member of the House of Valentino — specifically Face, Body, and Femme Vogue — and found a second home amidst this thriving subculture of marginalized artists. “When I didn’t have anybody or a group or a clique to speak of, the queer scene in New York City took me in as one of theirs — and I became ‘Michelle Magnifique.’”

Through this community, Visage got to see the birth of our modern LGBTQ+ rights movement — as well as just how much the AIDS crisis would come to terrorize these people she’d begun to call her family. 

“Because I was so deep in this scene, I was affected greatly by the AIDS crisis and the lack of any kind of support from anything around us,“ said Michelle, speaking candidly about her many days spent at the bedsides of those suffering from this disease, acting as a source of comfort for folks whose blood family had abandoned them long ago. “I was standing by their side and holding their hand and being with them…I didn’t know what I was doing. But I knew that I needed to show up, and I knew that I needed to be there.”

Even when her career took Michelle from New York, she always carried those memories of standing by community members when nobody else would. This, when paired with her massive singing and acting talents, is what made her one of pop culture’s staunchest advocates for LGBTQ+ rights in the 90s and early 2000s. This earned her a massive queer following, and today, it’s what makes her the perfect partner for ViiV’s new PrEP Wisdom Campaign. 

“Viiv Healthcare is the only pharmaceutical company solely focused on preventing, treating, and ultimately curing HIV,” Michelle explained. “Their goal is to help end the HIV epidemic for all — and that, to me, is music to my ears.” 

It’s a goal that’s only become more important since the company was founded back in 2009. The only large-scale pharmaceutical company focused on ending the HIV epidemic, ViiV, not only fights cultural stigma but also saves thousands of lives daily by connecting folks to the treatment and prevention resources they need. Especially as we’re seeing numerous states — including California — begin to slash HIV funding, their work through campaigns like this one is becoming more important than ever.

“The PrEP Wisdom Campaign, first and foremost, is intended to encourage conversations between people who could benefit from PrEP, and [why they should] talk to their doctors to help determine which injectable PrEP might be right for them,” said Visage. She discussed how the campaign is information-oriented, with ViiV developing easy-to-understand pathways for folks to become more aware of injectable PrEP services as well as general HIV/AIDS-related resources. 

“More than 2 million Americans could benefit from PrEP to help prevent HIV [according to the] CDC — yet only 25% of them are currently using it!” She understands that there were many things holding people back from getting PrEP, ranging from cultural stigma to discriminatory doctors to a lack of awareness that these resources even exist. But she emphasizes that people cannot let social judgment hold them back from their health and safety! “If you’re not clicking with your health care provider, please find a new one. You don’t have to settle…there are plenty of people to choose from. Plenty of healthcare providers, plenty of doctors who want to work with you, who want to give you the information about PrEP, who want you to be on PrEP so you are protected.”

“Listen, we have come a long way since I started [back in] 1986], and we’ve got so much further to go,” Visage said, reflecting on her lifelong role as an HIV advocate, first as a teenager, and now as an acclaimed performer. But while she may have grown since then, she still carries the commitment to fighting against injustice that the queer community of 80s New York instilled in her. “I will fight forever on this platform. [Discrimination hasn’t] changed, so I don’t plan on changing.”

Michelle Visage knows that change doesn’t happen by being silent — it happens by staying informed and keeping yourself healthy so that you can speak out for what you know is right. In honor of the many lives she fought for in 1980s New York, Visage wants to help as many people as she can today get the PrEP resources they need. And through her new PrEP Wisdom campaign with ViiV, she’s excited to do exactly that.

Check out www.getprepwisdom.com for more information

Music has always been a key part of every civil rights movement. 

No matter the cause or the community, the songs of the oppressed have always underscored the fight against their oppressors, with these pieces embodying the passions of a movement — and in Saunder Choi’s newest song, the resilience of Los Angeles’ LGBTQ+ community. 

The renowned composer sat down with the Los Angeles Blade to discuss “Credo,” his newest song that he’s putting together for Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles (GMCLA). Debuting at the group’s upcoming Declarations of Independence show, Choi’s goal was to not only create a beautiful piece of music but a literal creed for the many identities this chorus represents. In the man’s own words, “[This song] serves as a way to memorialize, to uplift those stories, and to reflect the resilience and strength of our community.”

“Music has always been used as a tool for advocacy,” Choi explained. “Music has always been used to reflect one’s beliefs, one’s values, and one’s principles…I choose to use my [music] as a platform for that advocacy.” It’s a sentiment the composer has always embodied; after receiving a Master’s Degree in composition from USC, Choi traveled the world singing in professional choirs, sharing his skills through teaching, and writing pieces for numerous LGBTQ+ choirs. He’d dedicated too uplifting communities through music, and he decided to channel that dedication when the GMCLA reached out and requested a new song for a very important concert.  

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The Declarations of Independence show commemorates America’s 250th birthday, with the GMCLA celebrating our country’s queer legacy by performing the many songs that helped build the LGBTQ+ rights movement. Whether it be Broadway classics or universal hits, each of these songs will reflect the queer community’s long history within this country, with Saunders’ new piece “Credo” serving as the show’s defining number. 

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When tasked with composing for such a symbolic event, Choi knew that the GMCLA wasn’t looking for just any song: they needed a creed. “I wanted to build upon that tradition of creeds being set to music, being sung by a community that believes in them…[I want us] to ask ourselves, ‘What is our creed as the LGBTQ+ community? What do we believe in?”

To do this, Choi collaborated with Brian Sonia-Wallace, Poet Laureate of Los Angeles, to devise lyrics that encapsulate the current moment LGBTQ+ Americans are living in. “With all the attacks that’ve been happening in the LGBTQ+ community, what does our community need at this moment? In these times, how can we, as singers, use our songs to protect our community [and] fight for our values?” It was on this point specifically that Choi drew inspiration from, with the artist guiding his creative process by asking himself, “What would it mean for a gay men’s chorus to sing and declare [their] beliefs out loud?”

With all of this in mind, Choi went to work, writing tirelessly to craft a song that embodies the fierce sense of Pride he knows fills this city. It wasn’t always easy — the composer detailed his composing process, a complex combination of musicality and precision that can easily boggle the mind of a non-musician (and many actual musicians). Yet when he was finished, Choi believed that he had created the perfect song for GMCLA’s Declarations of Independence. A true “Credo,” one that could serve as not only an enjoyable piece of music but an anthem for what queer people all across Los Angeles are experiencing right now. 

 “I hope that [with ‘Credo,’] folks hear a powerful anthem that they can use as a weapon to protect themselves in an era where you know our lives, our stories, our communities are being actively threatened and erased,” Choi described. “Sometimes the lyrics get a little raw, a little specific, but as James Joyce said, ‘In the particular is contained the universal.’ These are things that I think a lot of the queer community can believe in…this is our anthem — this is our creed.”

Saunder Choi’s latest piece, “Credo,” is a reminder to whoever is listening — whether they’re in Los Angeles or not — that they are not alone. He captures a true chorus of resistance through lyrics that uplift the voices of those community members who are too often silenced. It’s the perfect song for the Gay Men’s Chorus of LA’s Declarations of Independence show, and it may just be exactly what so many people need to hear right now.

Join GMCLA for Declarations of Independence, a bold celebration of Pride and Protest, happening Saturday, June 27, at 7 pm and Sunday, June 28, at 3:30 pm at the Saban Theatre.

You’re all geared up.

You’ve got your best parade-walking shoes, your coolest tee, your most-comfortable shorts, and a rainbow flag to carry. You’re set for Pride, but before you go, try one of these great new books about LGBTQ life and history.

After the parade, where will you end up? A place to talk your experience over, to re-hash things for the next parade? Then you may need “The Lesbian Bar Chronicles: The Living History and Hopeful Future of America’s Dyke Dives and Sapphic Spaces” by Rachel Karp (Beacon Press, $29.95).

Lesbian bars, says Karp, are more than just places to drink. They’re also places to find community, and to organize. For many, she says, they are “sanctuaries,” as they have been for at least a century, and this book introduces you to some of the people who run the establishments, the things they do to support their patrons, and the 100-year-plus bravery that it took to own, run, and enter a lesbian bar.

If you had to name a gay icon, there are probably quite a few who come to mind. So read “Without Prejudice: My Life as a Gay Judge” by Harvey Brownstone (ECW Press, $21.95) and add another name to your list.

This memoir, written by Canada’s first openly gay judge, takes readers from Brownstone’s childhood to his life as a lawyer, then to his work within the justice system in Ontario, and beyond, to his current career. This is a surprising, informative book that gives you an idea what gay life is like, north of our uppermost borders, then and now.

Pride is a celebration, an event, but it also demands a peek backwards, and in “The LGBTQ Almanac: 500 Years of Queer Culture in American History” by Deborah G. Felder (Visible Ink Press, $39.95), you’ll get a wide look at the pioneers, allies, policy, and gay life over the course of the last five centuries. Want to know more about religion in the gay community? It’s in here, along with celebrities, presidents, science, business, and more. This is the kind of book that settles bets. It’s one you want to have in any room of your home because it’s comprehensive and perfectly browse-able for all of its 600-plus pages.

And finally, here’s a book to read and think about: “No Fats No Fems: A Guide to Queer Empathy and Unpacking Prejudice” by Max Hovey (HarperOne, $19.99). How do you eliminate hateful, hurtful words, aimed at gay people – by gay people? What kind of stereotypes do we carry, unintentionally? This book takes those things out into the daylight by talking honestly and thoughtfully about them, as well as other issues. It’s a book to have when doubts creep in, when you need a new way of thinking or a different direction, or when you just want something different to read.

And if these great books aren’t enough, head to your favorite bookstore or library and ask for books that you can read before Pride or after. And happy Pride!

If you’re at Mattie’s (né Rocco’s), you might spot this cutie at the bar. On Hunter Cassidy’s Instagram, he says he’s a bartender, gym potato, and gay. His resume and dating profile say, “Known for driving repeat business by delivering exceptional guest experience through fast, friendly, high-quality service.” But jokes aside, he’s a sweet smartypants who fills his social media with sarcastic stories from his side of the bar. 

Originally from Garden City, Kansas, he has an innocent vibe and a bone-dry sense of humor. He says he moved to “escape a small town that smells like cow shit because there’s more cows than people.” A legacy hire, he worked at Rocco’s in Westwood, then transferred to West Hollywood and stayed on as it transitioned to Mattie’s. He took some time to share his thoughts on nightlife and Los Angeles culture. 

How did you get into bartending?

I lied! No place wants to hire a bartender with no experience. So, many years ago, I made a resume and said I worked at a place that had recently closed, knowing there was no way to verify it. 

I applied to hundreds of places and took the first job that hired me. Then, I relentlessly networked with people at all the places I actually wanted to work. Once I got my foot in the door at a good spot, I leveraged the two jobs against each other until I had the premium shifts at the better spot.

How long have you been in nightlife?

I’ve been in nightlife for about 10 years.

What do you do besides bartending?

I’m trying to get into the fitness industry, starting as a personal trainer, but I’d like to own a business someday. I also make content on social media as a hobby, usually just talking about whatever is on my mind.

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What do you love about bartending and the nightlife scene in LA?

My favorite thing about bartending is that I get to be part of everyone’s fun experience. Some people only go out once a week, maybe even once a month. I get to see people on their birthdays, during celebrations, on date nights, or maybe even just having fun after a long day. And I get to be part of that.

What do you think has changed about LA nightlife?

I think the entire landscape changed drastically post-COVID, especially on Santa Monica Blvd. So many bars on this strip alone either closed or quietly changed ownership or management.

What do you love about Los Angeles?

I love the opportunity, the chaos, and the absurdity. I like looking to my left and seeing someone with a word salad job title, then looking to my right and seeing an ambitious artist who pours everything into their work, and we’re all just at yoga at 2 p.m. on a Tuesday.

What brought you to LA?

I’m from a small town in Kansas, and I always wanted to live in a big city. So I packed two bags and got on a train.

What is your passion?

I really like math. I just don’t have enough time to pursue it. If I won the lottery, I’d probably go back to school and spend the rest of my life staring at a whiteboard.

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

Every person you meet is someone’s child, someone’s friend. Have your boundaries, but lead with kindness.

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Favorite spot in Los Angeles?

Hi Tops is definitely my go-to bar. And I’d like to thank them for still allowing me on the premises even after all the absolutely stupid things I’ve done there.

How has Los Angeles changed you?

It made me stop caring so much about how I’m perceived and start living authentically. You begin to realize that you’re just one of many people, and most people are thinking about themselves anyway.

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

Stop worrying. You’ve figured it out every single time.

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

Trisha Paytas for mayor?

What do you want for the queer community?

I will always want gay spaces for gay people. But someday, I hope that all across the world, a child can come up to their parents and say, “Hey, I think I’m gay,” and it sounds no different than, “Hey, I think my favorite color is green.”

What do you look for in a person?

I want someone who also puts effort into building: building their mind, their health, their financial future, and their relationships with others. Because that’s the goal, to build a life together… that, or big biceps, you know, whichever.

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Celebrity crush?

I’m convinced that TikTok comedian Natalia Alyssandra and I are meant to be in a lavender marriage.

What is your favorite thing to do in your downtime?

I like doing mental puzzles, karaoke, and hanging out with friends.

What are your goals for the future?

I’d like to start a fitness business, find a guy, and someday be that old gay couple with a life full of amazing stories.

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When Albert Camus published “L’etranger” (“The Stranger”) in 1942, he was living in Nazi-occupied France, so it’s no surprise that it became one of the most celebrated “existential” novels of all time. A fascist regime is great for inspiring thoughts of an indifferent and meaningless universe.

It wasn’t his first experience with authoritarianism. Born to a working-class white European family in then-French Algeria, he grew up observing the harsh treatment of the native North Africans by the colonists who governed them. It was this personal history, amplified by the spread of European fascism, that found its voice in “The Stranger.” Short, terse, and shrouded in a cloak of ennui, it was his first novel – novella, really – but its impact was seismic.

Naturally, its influence has run through the world of cinema, and, it has been translated to the screen three times — most recently by French filmmaker François Ozon, whose screen version won acclaim at last year’s Venice Film Festival, and is now available for on-demand streaming in the U.S.

Ozon’s vision is captured in gleaming black-and-white, blending the luster of modern-day faux-vintage fashion photography with the nostalgic flavor of classic era “arthouse” and European cinema, and it maintains a largely faithful connection to Camus’s novel, at least in terms of plot. It’s the story of Meursault (Benjamin Voisin), a French settler living in the capital city of Algiers, who receives word that his mother has died. He takes time off from work, traveling to the nursing home – where he had sent her three years before – in order to attend her funeral, but remains seemingly emotionless throughout, prompting members of the staff and other residents to mark his apparent lack of customary grief.

When he returns to Algiers, he encounters Marie (Rebecca Marder), a former co-worker, and after spending the day together, the two become romantically involved. Their relationship continues over the next few weeks, while they also associate with Meursault’s neighbor Raymond (Pierre Lottin) – a suspected pimp who, after beating his Arab mistress, is being followed and harassed by her brother (Abderrahmane Dehkani) and his friends. After a skirmish with the Arabs, Meursault encounters the brother alone during a walk on the beach, and shoots the young man dead with a pistol given to him for protection by Raymond. On trial for murder, he offers no defense and expresses no remorse. He is convicted and sentenced to death, facing it all with emotional detachment, and seeming to find liberation from the recognition that none of it matters, anyway.

Though it’s a tale that includes romance, murder, and courtroom drama, it feels like a story in which nothing really happens – which is, of course, the perfect effect to emphasize the point of Camus’s philosophical viewpoint; but while that might satisfy the kind of viewers who might be drawn to any film of a Camus novel, Ozon’s movie probably won’t hold much appeal for audiences seeking action, suspense, feel-good sentiment, or easy answers to the moral dilemmas that come hand-in-hand with being alive. Camus was interested in the opposite effect, a confrontation with existence which leaves no room for comfortable denials, and Ozon’s inflection on the original’s themes makes no effort to soften the blow. 

What it does, however, is introduce – without having to adjust the narrative provided by Camus – an element of queerness that lends the whole story a new layer of subtext through what can only be described as the “gay male gaze” that anchors the film’s visual aesthetic.

It’s in the way the camera – aimed by Ozon and cinematographer Manu Dacosse – remains fixated on its star, the exquisitely beautiful Voisin, lingering on his face, his frame, or his body in swim trunks. There’s a sensuality in the way the director shows us female beauty, too, but it’s never framed as the “object” of desire; and in the narrative’s key scene – the killing by the sea – there’s an inescapable element of repressed homoeroticism, born perhaps by associations with mid-20th-century queer aesthetic of writers like Jean Genet or artists like George Quaintance, or pretentiously artsy commercials for high-end men’s cologne, or just from real-life memories of cruising on the beach. On the surface, Meursault gives no sign of queerness; but the emphasis that Ozon brings to the story – almost purely through visual suggestion – lends the character, already an outsider to the world of “normal” human experience in the first place, an even deeper sense of “otherness.”

As to that, Voisin’s performance is effective for reasons beyond his model-esque physical perfection; there’s a vast inner life happening under that pretty face, and the actor conveys it with a “less-is-more” approach that aligns perfectly with the character’s dissociation from conventional humanity. He’s compelling enough to engage us, and intelligent enough in his expression of Camus’ ideas to help us grasp them even as he makes us feel them – and frankly, that’s saying a lot.

The rest of the cast is effective, as well, though most of them serve primarily as a foil to reflect Voisin and his character. Marder brings a relatably savvy-yet-romantic presence as Marie, and Lottin gives Raymond a kind of louche charisma that evokes a certain brand of appealing-but-toxic masculinity. Swann Arlaud also stands out as the prison priest who attempts to convert Meursault on the eve of his execution, bearing the full brunt of Camus’ existentialist arguments in a scene that somehow taps into transgressive homoerotic fantasies even as its characters discuss impending death.

Camus, for his part, did not see himself as an existentialist; instead, he embraced and promoted a viewpoint in which human life is defined by its relationship with what he called “The Absurd” – the gap between reality and our assumed expectations about it, where our circumstances and behavior become obviously ridiculous – and believed that, in a meaningless universe, we are free to find our own meaning. An essay he published around the same time (“The Myth of Sisyphus”) posited that finding happiness in the struggle was perhaps the most logical response to facing an unfeeling world, and the Absurdist movement he helped to define used humor – albeit often the dark and sardonic variety – as a means to expose the madness of trying to impose sense on a nonsensical world. In the end, his writings reveal him as a deeply humanistic thinker, whose acceptance of objective reality served only to deepen his dedication to the ideal of a better mankind.

Whether or not any of that comes across in Ozon’s artful film, which emphasizes the immediacy of experience – the beach, the sea, the sun, the visceral responses we get from sex or violence – over the intellectual arguments that Camus would elucidate throughout his life, probably depends on one’s own grasp of Existentialist thinking and its offshoots. In any case, while Ozon’s “The Stranger” might fall short in the challenge to convey its philosophical arguments, it more than succeeds as a stylish piece of international art cinema, and it just might – hopefully – inspire audiences to go on a deeper dive into the mind of Albert Camus.

And even if it doesn’t, it’s still pretty to look at.