John Greyson, what gives? You were supposed to liberate gay cinema, and now you seem imprisoned by its conventions.
Proteus was moving, with slight gestures that seemed borrowed from his previous work, but with less meaning, like the use of anachronism, which I guess meant to remind us that times haven’t changed that much, I mean they’re still chaining gay men together and tossing them off boats for buggering each other, right? Oh, it was fine, I almost cried, but I’m a sap for 18th century sodomites. The love story was given too much importance, I thought, when other more interesting elements were introduced and then not followed through, like the reasons why the prison warden let the affair between the two prisoners continue.
Yesterday we celebrated Reese’s 11th birthday. Bob made a totally over-the-top Baby June (from Gypsy) cake for Reese–upright, doing the splits with hands thrown up in the air, golden locks spilling down over her shoulders. Her skirt was made of puff pastry triangles filled with whipped cream. Her meringue arms were a little too close to the candles, though, so we sang the happy birthday song at quadruple speed as they started to burn. The candles were those trick candles that wouldn’t blow out, so the arms nearly burst into flames as Reese blew and blew in smoke-filled Angie and Megan’s little kitchen, full of coughing kids. Big Chris and Bob got along swimmingly, and he even charmed Megan, a feat not for the timid. Okay, there’s Mrs. Roper again, “Miiii-ni!” Off I go, nighty night…