The Ugly Truth about why The Kids ARE All Right

A guest post by Jasbir Puar (JKP) and Karen Tongson (KT).
SPOILER ALERT: important plot points to The Kids are All Right are revealed in this post. 

On opposite coasts, KT and JKP diligently turned their attention from World Cup fever to an important mission: sussing all the hoo-haa about the latest “lesbian film,” Lisa Cholodenko’s highly-anticipated The Kids Are All Right.  KT saw TKAAR on a Friday night at the Arclight in Los Angeles, a well-appointed Hollywood multiplex with assigned seating and other bourgie accoutrements like Italian mineral water, chicken sausage baguettes, and a full-service bar and restaurant in the lobby. To put the setting in perspective, Nic and Jules--the lesbian couple played by Annette Benning and Julianne Moore in the film--would probably go to the Arclight to see something like TKAAR for a “date night.” (Admittedly, KT was there for that same purpose).

Lesbeaux pairs were neatly dispersed across the stadium-style seats, and a collective clutching of hands could be felt as the movie started, as if everyone was steeling themselves for yet another “dick intervenes” narrative about dyke couples. Despite what KT only half-jokingly refers to as her lesbian fundamentalism, she actually didn’t leave the theater hating the film, but felt provoked in ways both reparative and hostile.
 
On the East coast, in the heart of Chelsea’s gay male homo-ville, JKP went to see The Kids are All Right the weekend it opened, a few hours after a tepid, snooze-fest World Cup finale between Spain and the Netherlands.  She too was on “date night,” and her beaux, being thoroughly nonplussed by the merits of watching football at the local BBQ joint while downing greasy pork ribs and cheap cuba libres, was more than happy to have something interesting to mull over.  While JKP left the theater feeling more than a little uneasy with the liberal depiction of gay family, A.O. Scott's ringing endorsement finally making sense, the movie was a relief: entertaining, fury-rousing, thought-provoking and head-scratching.

We can see why the film has been pretty much reviled by many of our friends and colleagues. We felt compelled to nod vigorously along when reading Jack Halberstam's and Claire Potter's lively critiques of TKAAR. We’ve also been wowed by Daisy Hernandez’s bravado dissection of the film’s race politics in Colorlines. We definitely laughed out loud and hard upon reading Lisa Duggan's proclamation--undoubtedly true--that TKAAR has the worst lesbian sex scene in the history of cinema (Claire of the Moon be damned).

Within the reception spaces of these reviews, however, the film had gone from questionable to bad. Really bad. In fact, consensus has seemed to build among queer academics in particular that TKAAR is the worst movie of this summer, if not this year, if not EVER. How is this so? How is it that TKAAR can be trashed for not transcending the racial, sexual and gender stereotypes that dominate all of Hollywood filmmaking? Neither of us can remember the last time we saw a mainstream release that didn't have shitty race politics, gender politics, sexual politics, class politics or all of the above.

Maybe we’ve approached TKAAR with too much earnestness and not enough salt. What if everything that’s wrong with the movie is actually what's right about the movie?

Blacklisted: Racism at Essence magazine?

I thank Thought Catalog for permission to republish this piece. 

You know we’re not in a “post-racial” society when a controversy of epic proportions explodes over the appointment of a white person as the next Fashion Director of a black magazine. Angela Burt-Murray, Editor-in-Chief of Essence magazine, recently hired Ellianna Placas as its next Fashion Director. Before anybody decides whether the move is racist, post racial or somewhere in between, we need to think about the larger history of black people in fashion. 

KOTW: Lighten Up, It's Just Drag

Last Monday, RuPaul’s long-awaited Drag U. , the latest brainchild from her blond highlighteness, premiered on the LOGO Network. Drag U. is basically a spin-off of Drag Race, that super successful reality competition series that’s searching for America’s Next Drag Superstar. Shantay you stay. Before I saw the first episode of Drag U., I didn’t really know what to expect. Whatever it was, I knew that Ru would serve the kids something fierce. And honey, there’s nothing I like more than a 7-foot tall drag queen in my television screen. Worrrrrk.

Drag U. is a makeover show, but one like you’ve never seen. Here’s the premise: a carefully selected group of queens from previous seasons of Drag Race basically descend from Sephora and WeaveTopia to unleash their wisdom and dragspertise, making the world a better place. One fake eyelash at a time. You might remember Nina Flowers (hey, girl), Raven (I can’t STAND this trollop), and Jujubee (yesss!), plus Ongina, Pandora Boxx and other favorites are in the house, too.



Each episode, one of the queens gets assigned a plebeian hot mess to make over into a more fabulous drqg queen version of themselves. The show just kicked off, so it’s hard to tell who the lucky group will be each week. But last time,  the queens made over women who had seemingly lost touch with their femininity. Cue the house music! The queens sashay to the rescue and teach these women everything they need to know about hair, make up, and walking in high heels. There was something very Butlerian about the whole ordeal (and I’m not going to take it there) with the boys in drag teaching the women how to be more like women. Right?

The heart of the show is its big heart: you know, self-empowerment, inner beauty, self-confidence-it’s-what’s-on-the-inside-that-counts. And these ladies do come from diverse backgrounds: some were lesbians, but others were straight and married with children, with the husband and kids in the audience! How’s that for a progressive family dynamic?

But I don’t see how the show will survive week after week without changing the group who gets made over. People want to be surprised - that's TV for you. The gender doesn’t matter as much as how unfabulous their background is. I mean, the whole premise of the show is basically saying, Okay, so you’re really fabulous on the inside and that’s fine and everything, good for you, but let’s just go ahead and make that boring outside pop just a touch more.  

I’m excited to see what becomes of Drag U. It’s an inventive, new kind of makeover show. Everybody remembers the Ricki Lake makeovers or the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy makeovers, but leave it to RuPaul to create the first Drag Over. Lord knows I’m dying to live in a world where everybody’s fabulous and rolling around in sequins and 42 inch weaves. 

Apologies and Re-branding, Oh! My

Look what Patty found... Mac apologizes for its collaboration with Rodarte on the Juárez collection and then decides to re-brand the whole line. Check out the full piece Here.

Lest you start feeling all warm and cuddly about the energies wielded by blogosphere outrage, please note that the Mac-Rodarte collaboration still looks to be intact. Mac - now enlightened - will donate $100K to help Juárez. Stay tuned for definitions of "re-branding." 

Sex, Soju, and a Memo to Academics: Interview with Scarlet Chan, Cast Member of the First K-town Reality Show

 Cast, L-R: Young Lee, Jennifer Field, Joe Cha, Scarlet Chan, Violet Kim, Peter Le, Steve Kim and Jasmine Chang

I think it’s safe to say we should all be bracing ourselves and honing our “krage” (or Korean rage) for the ching-chong-chang, racist humor coming our way with the arrival of the highly anticipated K-town reality show. Though I’m a little disappointed that there isn’t a “sinful PK or Pastor’s Kid” (or is there??), a “chola/ggangpae girl” with eyebrows drawn in with a black sharpie, or a “was captain of the high-school volleyball team, closeted dyke from New Jersey,” I’m still super excited at the potential hot-mess looks of the first ever K-town reality show crew . If you’ve been sleeping, the K-town pilot was shot last weekend and the cast was finally revealed earlier this week. Which K-town am I speaking of? The ever-gentrifying, noraebang lit, densely populated, driving buzzed is A-OK-- Koreatown of Los Angeles that we all heart or will learn to heart.

Another reason I will be tuning in to K-town is because my good friend Scarlet Chan is one of the eight cast members.  Trust that she's going to shake shit up!  Here is our cute Sunday morning conversation for you all, which reveals a little on who she is, why she's in it, what she thinks of it all so far: 

Gay Boi: The Hottest Accessory In Summer 2010

Don’t cha wish your boyfriend was gay like me? Don’t cha wish your boyfriend was fierce like me? Don’t cha?

According to July’s Teen Vogue, gay dudes are this season’s Must Have Accessory. Hurry – everybody put down your ‘It’ bags and go get u a gay before we’re all sold out. 

KOTW – A few poems for Oscar Grant

Here at Oh!, one of the many things that binds us is our love of pop culture. We love it for its abundance and excess, for its whimsy and shine, its detours and swerves, but mostly, for the possibility it harbors between its opaque folds. We follow it eagerly through fantastical scapes and spaces that rhythm with promise.

Often, that sleepy wonder is cruelly shaken and those moments require a different set of energies. Last week, when juries took liberties and played with words and meanings and named murder “involuntary” was one of those moments. So, if you will allow, this Kick of the Week will be a digression from pop culture proper, in the hopes that moving askew can sometimes lead to productive encounters.

Maquiladoras are In for Fall

For those who religiously follow fashion's every catwalk and wade through designers' reported inspirations, this is unlikely to register as newness. But I'll offer it up anyway because it has less to do with fashion and more with geographic citation as practice.

A little while back, deep in the determinedly cosmopolitan exploits of Vogue's André Leon Talley (most recently, he shops with Michiko Kakutani and Maureen Dowd), I came across a note about Rodarte's Fall 2010 ready-to-wear collection and the source of its creative energies – maquiladoras in Mexico's Ciudad Juárez. Yes, maquiladoras. The same maquiladoras that serve as the site for violence, exploitation and femicide, all neatly brokered by global corporate capitalism. The same ones featured in Vicky Funari and Sergio De La Torre's documentary Maquilapolis. According to a Style.com piece, for Rodarte, the image of women making their way to factories in the middle of the night translated into an aesthetic of dreams and sleepwalking, complete with candlesticks for heels. As if to authenticate their interpretation, Kate and Laura Mulleavy – the sister design duo behind Rodarte – are quick to cite their Mexican roots and of course, the metaphoric journey through heritage that magically turned violence into floral patchwork, pastels, and embroidered leggings (they drove through Texas; El Paso to Marfa). Check out selections below and the full collection here. For me, questions of witness, creative translation and gnawing traditions of inspire-mutilate-and-move-on abound.
(inna)

 

 

Model Of The Moment: Joan Smalls

A couple weeks ago I was at a party hosted by V magazine in honor of Iman, who was just awarded the CFDA Image Award. Iman is largely considered the first non-American black model to break out in the modeling industry. Her rise to fame in the 70s and 80s was met with hot resistance - Marcia Gillespie, then Editor-In-Cheif of Essence, said that Iman was only famous because she looked like a "white woman dipped in chocolate."

Since Iman retired from the industry decades ago, she's made it her mission to bring attention to the lack of people of color in fashion. She has written books about make up for women of color, and is committed to bringing diversity to the catwalks.

It's really depressing to me how few black models there are on the catwalks during Fashion Week, and in the fashion industry at large. Some designers, though, such as Diane von Furstenberg, are committed to showing models of color on their catwalks. But the debate about girls of color is certainly nothing new. Back in 2008, Italian VOGUE dropped a special "All Black" issue, and it quickly became the best selling number of all time. That issue featured four different covers, each one featuring a different black model.

To date, the hottest working black models dominating the catwalks are Jourdan Dunn, Chanel Iman and Sessilee Lopez. But move over, gals! Joan Smalls is the new black model in town.

At just 22 years old, Joan has walked for Antonio Berardi, Christopher Kane, Burberry, Givenchy, Yves Saint Laurent, Aquascutum, Julian McDonald, Anna Sui, Michael Kors, Rodarte, Marc Jacobs, Altuzarra and Alexander Wang - all the hottest tickets on the block.





What I love about J.Smalls is that she's so naturally beautiful that she almost doesn't need make up, and if you look at the images of her on the runway, her face is always very fresh, clean, with little to no make up.

The sad reality of the fashion industry is that your race is really a commodity like any other. Why do you think that for such a long time, most models had that Eastern European Death Glare (Sasha, Natasha, etc.) A particular ethnicity flows in and out of fashion to the point of almost fetishizing the race. But that's the way of fashion. I'll leave that to the critical race theorists to parse out. In the meanwhile, I'm just so glad to have more black models in fashion, so that little girls like my sisters and cousins have a beauty icon to look up to.

KOTW: Brown Eyed Girls' "Abracadabra"

This kick is coming to you a li'l late in the week, I'll admit, but you know how these U.S. national holidays can send your temporality, diets, and drinking/smoking moratoriums into a tailspin what with the all-too-early dwindling news of oil spills and an endless array of fourth of July debt relief ads streaming through KDAY [FML].

But, to turn our attention to other news, the World Cup nears the end of its one-month colonization of my and many of your sleep schedules, writing and work regimens, and social connections with those friends and family members who could give two fucks about all the shirt-swapping, hair-flipping, body-flopping, homo-hugging, and tear-wiping histrionics of what the rest of the world calls football.  With South Korea being one among a number of my favorite teams knocked out of the running-- the tournament will now most definitely conclude in an all European final-- I decided to dedicate this week's KoTW to a Korean girl group who has occupied a special place in my heart for the last half year.

The connection between S. Korean World Cup soccer and a S. Korean pop girl group might seem thin (save for those who would myopically find their shared national origins an exceptional detail).  But, the morning that Korea played their final game in the tournament, my heart was moved by a group of young-ish girls who got on stage before the 7:30AM PST kick-off to perform the dance routine from Brown Eyed Girls' (BEG) scintillating music video for their 2009 single "Abracadabra."