Category Archives: Gay is the Old Black

12.03.11
by

The Help

I had planned to write about Woody Allen this week in light of the terrific PBS documentary that covers his amazing 40-year career.   But I put that off when I began to think of all the brilliantly talented careers of people I knew that were cut short.

Thursday was World AIDS day and I couldn’t help but have this reflection, nor, as I’m aware, was I the only one.   If you think this is headed towards a downer — it’s not.  It’s simply recognition of the fact that not everyone gets to have the creative career they deserve.

Unfortunately I can list several hundred people who were my friends or friends of friends that are gone.  Not to mention many hundreds more who were business acquaintances.  It was devastating and impossible to express fully, even when you’re in the arts and supposedly have the facility for that sort of thing.   Or worse yet, are expected to be able to do it.

But the one truism I know is that none of my friends would want to be remembered for the fact that they died of AIDS, but more for who they were creatively.

As for me — I remember many of them not only for their work but for what they did for me creatively.

Mentoring is a very tricky thing.  If the mentor is looked up to excessively that person wields too much absolute power and influence, and the mentees often suffer by being under the thumb of a person who can easily abuse their position by convincing the innocent that their world view is THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH.  Though it’s tempting and certainly safer to think someone more experienced or in a position of power has the magic answer, I’m here to tell you as both mentor and mentee (and a recovering magical thinker) that ANYONE who is convinced they are right 100% of the time certainly is not right even 50% of the time.  How do I know this?    Well,  I’m slowly creeping above middle-aged and have experienced and observed some really, really, really crappy and some super fantastic, unbelievable, I’ve been lucky to have them, mentors.  And a lot in between.

I’ll leave the extreme ones out.  The college teacher who told me I was a very confusing and not very good writer and the graduate school teacher who told me I wrote like Hemingway.  I also won’t bore you with the film director I once worked for who by day was known as one of THE WORLD’S MOST FAMOUS directors for actors – and by night simultaneously allowed (and sometimes participated with) his inner circle of production people to mock, insult and create little miserable traps for those very actors they loved but decided they didn’t like anymore because they had turned in what they judged to be sub-par performances the day before in dailies.  Or even the producer who nurtured and mentored a now very famous writer and director from one indie movie to the other, only to wind up unceremoniously betrayed by his longtime mentee and kicked off the writer-director’s “big” film once new agents judged this person’s new career didn’t need that particular mentor/producer any longer.

That’s the school of hard knocks, that’s life upon the wicked stage, and that’s show biz, kids.   Everyone has their war stories and somehow the bloodiest ones always seem the most exciting to tell and, yes, the most enticing to hear.  Or are they?

This week I don’t think so.  I’ve had more than a few cool mentors who’ve been gone for as long as 20 years while the lessons they taught me, and continue to teach me in absentia, resonate as if they are still here.  In other words, even though they’re not here, they very much are.  I often hear their voices or feel their presence in my work on various given days or, actually in many other ways, in many most of the things I do.

For instance, I can tell you without reservation that I would not have written any screenplay of any kind; taught any lesson worth listening to; or conceived any blog ever worth reading were it not for my dear friend Brian Lasser.  In fact, it’s not unusual for me to hear (or at least feel) the encouraging sounds of his voice and feedback he’d give to me even now.  A lot of people have talked and written about Brian.  He was a songwriter, pianist, actor, writer and tutor, in the arts and in life.   AND a brilliant mentor.  And to many more people than me.  I am not exaggerating when I tell you that there are Tony Award winning, Emmy Award winning and Grammy Award winning artists who were mentored by him, worked with him and adored him.  I met him as a reporter when I reviewed an act he was doing with someone who also became a dear friend.

Maybe I should be glad I don't have that hair anymore. With Brian, 1991

Yeah, you never know we’re you’ll find mentors or even friends  -– and those people who will encourage you to tap into your creative talent even when you’re too shy, embarrassed or insecure to really pursue it the way you secretly want to.  Someone who will urge you to tell the truth in your work by example, and let you know directly but gently when you’ve gone off course and you’re full of it – and/or full of yourself.  Someone who, as Jodie Foster once mentioned about her mother in an Oscar speech, “makes you feel like every painting you paint” is or could be a Picasso even though it likely isn’t or will not be.  On the other hand, as Brian might counter, how do you know it’s not better?

Indeed.

There was also my friend David Fox.  He was a copy editor at Variety when I was a fledgling reporter and he did have a career as an editor at the L.A. Times.  But he also wrote song lyrics, and had unending classiness and kindness when dealing with people both personally and professionally.  He’d be dumbfounded by this weirdly saintly description but would be positively thrilled and flabbergasted with the Internet of today and all of its power – both good and bad — if he were still here to see it.  David showed me that everyone has a light and a dark side and that it wasn’t necessary to bring it all to the table with everyone you met.  He taught me to be just a little bit bolder in my life and in my work and how to keep the ball rolling and actually venture out to people in a more streamlined way.  He was also one of my first friends in Los Angeles and introduced me to many others I still count as friends (and some mentors and mentees) today.  I also keep expecting David to call, write or at least show up after one of his solo trips somewhere around the world.  Sadly, I’ve never quite mastered the creative art of traveling outside the country alone the way he did (I hate to fly and I’m a chicken – meaning whimp), but now that I’ve mentioned what he taught me publicly perhaps I will.  Or will have to.

WWDG: Where would David go?

Finally, but certainly not only (Note: I don’t think we have room for more than three) there was this guy I knew really, really well for a couple of years named Bob Hattoy.  He was a mentor in, well, a lot of things.  He actually did have a longer career than the others and was quite creative — as a lobbyist, political gadfly and public voice of AIDS in the Clinton administration.  He even gave the first address about AIDS at a political convention in 1992.

Our relationship was some years before that but what I learned from him was – well – to be funnier.  And not take myself so seriously.   Truth is, I was always sort of amusing.  But he was outrageous.  Often, too outrageous.  Though I must admit he often came out with public statements that were witty, cutting and pretty darn smart that said what I and many others were really thinking, albeit somewhat pithier and for public consumption.  Like when Pres. Clinton was mulling the idea of letting gays in the military in the nineties but was considering segregating troops on the basis of sexual orientation.  Bob heard about this and told the NY Times: “If we applied that to civilian life we’d all have to be hairdressers and florists!”  It kinda still makes me laugh now, especially since he had the nerve to say it when —  Oh, did I mention he said all that and more WHILE WORKING for the White House? Uh, yeah.

I guess he taught me in the long run to stick up for myself and let the chips fall where they may.   Of course, that would eventually mean challenging him – an unwilling and sometimes irresponsible mentor that he always was.  But ultimately the best mentors are the ones who you can challenge.  And sometimes the ones you can leave behind.

What I’ve come to know grudgingly is it doesn’t matter whether you or they leave willingly or unwillingly.  It’s all about what you learn.  And what you do with that knowledge.  That’s the cool part of being or having a mentor.  And one of the cool parts of life.

10.21.11
by

The Simple Truth

Less is more.

This is the mantra that my writing mentors taught me and that I try to pass on to those writers I mentor.  It’s tempting to hear these words to mean that working less will mean more.  In fact, it’s exactly the opposite.  It takes a great deal of thought (though not over thinking), digging and artistic courage to explore areas you find scary, embarrassing and frankly, well, private, to come up with what you see as “the truth” (or at least an artistic version of it) in any given dramatic (or comedic) situation. And then to pare it down to less, less and still less in an effort to showcase it in its most relatable and thus, understandable light.  The (not so) simple truth is by then you might be thinking – who needs this torture!  But as one mentor told me some years ago:  “No one forced you to be a writer.”  Indeed.

I was thinking about being “simple” this week when I read that Zachary Quinto — the very talented actor best known to movie audiences as Mr. Spock in the “Star Trek” reboot, to TV audiences as the villainous Sylar in “Heroes,” and to Broadway audiences as Lewis, the neurotic gay intellectual who leaves his HIV infected long-time lover of in the revival of Tony Kushner’s  “Angels in America.” –- acknowledged what many in the entertainment industry have long known but apparently many in the public were still surprised by – that he is G-A-Y.

Having been gay all of my life, what I know for certain is that publicly acknowledging the truth about your sexuality, or about anything else in your personal life, is a personal choice and full of booby traps. Although it could be simple it often isn’t because of endless internal dialogue:

What’s too much… what’s too little; why am I saying anything at all?

But by not saying this am I lying about who I am?

What good will come of this in the age of #Twitter, Facebook (hiding you), tumblr (uh…_), TMZ (bad photo), VERY high unemployment (will I lose my job?).  

The real truthy truth is words can be so easily twisted and damn it, I just want to be understood!

We feel you, ZQ

To this I say – don’t we all?  But it is in that very attempt to do so that we all, including myself stray away from the simple truth in an effort to – what exactly?  Explain what could be covered in a single line, as one screenwriting teacher once told me?  Why not just have your hero take an action, if he has to say something, make it brief because the more he says the more confused you’re making me.

I wonder if to some extent this is what happened to the quite courageous Mr. Quinto, and, I suspect, might have happened to me at 34 years old if I were a major actor and an over thinking artist – both of which I think Mr. Quinto is (and half of which I probably wish I were at some point).  Instead of simply saying: I AM GAY and I want to be honest about it, etc. etc. here is the statement currently posted on his website:

I think he said he was….wait, did he?  Let me read it again.

Good for ZQ (what great initials) for saying something. And who am I to tell him how to say it (obviously this is not stopping me).  But might it have been good, or even more good (I don’t want to say better) for what he was trying to do – which is to make a public statement about his life – to simply, say:

“I am a gay man and I want to help.  And if me living my life openly as a gay man in some tiny way helps a gay kid somewhere who is considering suicide, that’s a small sacrifice on my part.”

Maybe he could add something like, “This is a very personal decision but if all actors, young and old, came out, it would soon become not a big deal and we could get on with our jobs of entertaining people.”

If pressed he could even further elaborate: “Imagine if everyone came out?  Maybe this is not possible for everyone.  But if it slowly were to happen, I can’t help but think, or in fact know, that the bullies would be outnumbered.”

Let me be clear – EVERYONE HAS A RIGHT TO SAY WHAT THEY WANT THE WAY THEY WANT IT.  This is something I tell myself AND my students.  The issue is – what is most effective?  Being Complicated?  Being Simple?  Or something in between?

Certainly, there is nothing wrong with putting all this in the personal and political context of Jamey Rodemeyer’s tragic suicide, the “It’s Get Better Videos,” and civil equality for the LGBT community.  But as they taught us in journalism school and as James L. Brooks taught us by way of Albert Brooks’ character in “Broadcast News,” the one thing you don’t want to do when you’re trying to make a point is: BURY THE LEAD.

Meaning: how great is it when you can say what you want to say simply?  Upfront.  Clearly.  Think the inverted pyramid – who, what, when, where, why, how.  It will ALWAYS work if it’s honest because nothing works more effectively than the simple truth.  It’s the only way to counteract the bullies and the liars and the tellers or stories that deep down we know in our hearts and souls couldn’t possibly be true.

Given our current climate, one could argue simple is not best.  But remember – true simplicity is not just brief but it’s truthful – simple does not necessarily mean TRUTHFUL HONEST.  Which is where the slope gets extremely slippery and where people as smart or even smarter than Mr. Quinto, often get tripped up.  Twenty years ago when an actor I was working with as a writer (one who would soon become hugely famous and powerful) saw my wedding ring and asked if I was married, I brushed him off with a one line joke and didn’t give him the real answer which was that the ring signified the love my GAY partner and I had for each other since we couldn’t marry.  A matter of a year later this actor, who I later found out was hugely liberal and very complimentary of my work, would become nationally known for playing the part of a married man on something he produced and I realized what he was indeed asking me was – if you’re a married guy I think I’d really like to have your perspective in this next project I’m doing.  Which – I will sheepishly admit – became HUGE.

Now, there’s no way to be sure that was the case, but in this instance I think so.  So clarity, honesty, or no matter how you want to define it can cut both ways.  I don’t regret my choice (well, not too much), because it taught me something incredibly valuable.  It might seem like a risk, but more often than not the right answer is the honest and simple one.  Now don’t get me wrong, getting that job certainly would have presented an even greater set of issues and I likely would have quit or got fired because this actor was not necessarily easy.   But neither is simplicity or, at times, honesty.  Though it is always the way to go.  No doubt the latter is something ZQ will be showing us more of in both not so simple and very simple ways in the days to come.

ADDENDUM:  I can report since this writing that ZQ has personally reached out to gay organizations and committees, including one in which I’m a member, offering his help when available.  In this case, his ACTIONS speak louder than his WORDS – and that is truly rare – and something which I greatly admire.  And when it is a choice between words and actions, let’s face it – we’ll take the latter every day of the week. Bravo.