FILM LOVE presents QUEER SAN FRANCISCO
1970-1980
In the 1970s, San Francisco became an international vanguard of
the Gay Liberation movement. In campy, anarchic film and theater works and
onscreen explorations of their own sexual experience, gay and lesbian filmmakers
in 1970s San Francisco fused politics, sex, and art, and created a body of work
that is as radical as it is entertaining. As part of the five-day arts festival
Mondo Homo, Film Love
presents two nights of rare films from a legendary time and place in queer
history.
Part two
THE COCKETTES: Midnight at the Palace
Sunday, May 24, 2009, 7:00 pm
at
Eyedrum
part of
Mondo Homo
followed by a rare live performance by the legendary
Diamond Lil
THE COCKETTES is co-sponsored
by the following organizations and departments at Emory University: American Studies, the office of LGBT
Life, Studies in Sexualities, and Women's Studies
Cockettes founder Hibiscus (1971) (photo by
Ingeborg Gerdes)
Pansexual,
psychedelic, and covered in glitter, the fabulous Cockettes were a cross between
hippie commune, radical political theater troupe, and the best secondhand
costume department in the world. Only 1970 San Francisco could have produced
them. Back in the spotlight as the subject of a
celebrated 2002
documentary, the Cockettes' reputation as the anarchic heart of Gay
Liberation (and as a fashion influence!) continues to grow.
This program of extremely rare short films (some courtesy the private collection
of Cockette archivist Rumi) shows San Francisco’s legendary Cockettes in full
anarchic bloom. In Tree, we see the twenty-year-old future Cockettes
founder Hibiscus, along with troupe member Rumi Missabu in a naked, comic dance
at Land’s End. Palace, the only known film made during an actual
Cockettes performance, documents the backstage
and onstage goings-on at the group’s only Halloween show, Les Ghouls.
The hilarious and highly politically incorrectTricia’s Wedding is the Cockettes at their outrageous best. The 1971
White House nuptials of Richard Nixon’s daughter provided perfect satirical
fodder for the group. Characters include Mick Jagger, Indira Gandhi, Mamie
Eisenhower, and Prince Charles. Disco diva Sylvester
portrays both Coretta Scott King and Mahalia
Jackson. Eartha Kitt spikes the White House punch with LSD, and the
resulting group orgy does not disappoint.
Meanwhile, Marxist revolutionaries, along with perverts of various stripes, are
skewered with inspired silliness in the
political/sexual satire Elevator Girls in Bondage. In her greatest role,
Cockette Rumi leads a striking group of hotel workers, "spouting a surreal mix
of folk songs and Marxist maxims."
NOTE: This program contains graphic imagery and radical ideas.
PROGRAM: Tree, Your Sap Beats Gently Against Mine Brittle Jam
(Michael Kalmen, 1969) 19 minutes, super-8mm
screened on video Palace (Syd Dutton and Scott Runyon, 1971)
23 minutes, 16mm screened on video Tricia’s Wedding (Sebastian, 1971) 33
minutes, 16mm Elevator Girls in Bondage (Michael Kalmen,
1972) 56 minutes, 16mm screened on video
Hurtme O. Hurtme (Sebastian) interviews Jackie Onassis (John McGowan)
in Tricia's Wedding (Sebastian, 1971)
