News, Reviews & Commentary on Gay and Bisexual Men in Entertainment and the Media

Savage Grace

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The men of SATC, Mario Lopez on Broadway, gay TV kisses everywhere, and more.
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What's gay in summer movies, Kevin Bacon's gay moment, and Moonlight's homoerotic moment.

AfterElton Briefs: A fancy new "Savage Grace" trailer, a gay hip-hop tell-all, and more!


In a continued effort to bring you all that is important in the world of gay entertainment and ensure that you are being spoon-fed images of gorgeous, commoditized manflesh, we present the newly-minted AfterElton Briefs. Following the usual assortment of carefully-selected news items, interested readers can find a refreshing pic of a hot man in underwear after the jump. Yes, we're serious.

  • The theatrical trailer for gay director Tom Kalin's Savage Grace, which stars Julianne Moore as murdered Bakelite heiress Barbara Daly Baekeland, is now online. Looks pretty good, as does the shmancy new poster, above.
  • A new tell-all from former MTV exec Terrence Dean promises to blow the closet doors off the hip hop music industry.
Carson Kressley

  • Gay glitterati of all stripes (including Carson Kressley, Heather Matarazzo and girlfriend Caroline Kennedy, Christine Vachon, and film exec Andrew Saffir) turned out last night at the premiere of Helen Hunt's directorial debut, Then She Found Me. Why? I have absolutely no idea.
  • Another posthumous outing of a closeted and by all accounts fairly bittersweet Hollywood success story: Raymond Burr. I think it was pretty well-known already, but a new biography dots the i's and crosses the t's.

And today's Briefs are brought to you by...

Sundance Gay Film Dispatch 1: Reichen, The Queer Lounge, Eating Out 3, and more

Riechen Lehmkuhl at the Queer Lounge
Riechen Lehmkuhl at the Queer Lounge 

After a mellow opening Thursday night at the Sundance Film Festival – with opening film In Bruges – and rowdy shindig at concurrent festival Slamdance, things have sparked to life here in Park City, Utah. Celebs are appearing, much to the delight of paparazzi stalking Main Street – I walked alongside Alan Rickman, who attracted a handful of shutterbugs. Allegedly, Ang Lee was spotted drinking a Gatorade in Albertsons' supermarket. Colin Farell is all over the place. And I ran into High School Musical 2 co-star Kaycee Stroh in the Reaction swag lounge admiring Unstoppable brand "F*ck You" hats. Not that she can wear them just yet. "When I'm no longer with Disney, totally!"

Ah, swag, another "S" word that entails part of the Sundance hubbub. Being that today wasn't a heavy movie day for me – the queer films start bowing on Saturday (including Amy Redford's The Guitar, Isaac Julien's Derek, and Bruce LaBruce's Otto, or Up With Dead People) – I spent time investigating the numerous Main Street swag enclaves.

At the Revaleskin Rejuvenation Lounge I was treated to an EarTherapy consultation, during which my ears were inspected and massaged; Her Native Roots survival kits; cool organic Eco Gear, and of course Revaleskin products, which utilize uber-antioxidant-loaded coffee bean berries. At The Reaction Hospitality Lounge & In Touch Café at STEREO had some primo stuff including Triple Five Soul jackets and new Kenneth Cole scents (sales of which benefit Hope USA and Habitat for Humanity).

Meanwhile, The Queer Lounge opened its doors. And the evening ended with the Outfest Filmmaker Party at the Heineken Lounge, where Eating Out producer Michael J. Shoel told me an Eating Out 3 is in the works, to be co-written by Q. Allan Brocka and EO2 director Philip Bartell … Yes, things have just started and it only gets gayer from here!

Saturday morning kicked off with the press and industry screening of Amy Redford’s The Guitar, in which out actress Saffron Burroughs portrays a milquetoast New Yorker who, after discovering she has terminal cancer, goes credit card happy and has hot lesbian (and bisexual three-way!) sex. I found it entertaining, which seems to be the minority opinion asofar. “I thought it was dishonest,” scoffed a colleague. Well, sure. It’s fiction.

And off to the Queer Lounge for the PlanetOut Short Film Awards shindig. In fact there was a lot of lounging going on over the weekend. The Donnas performed a juicy set on Saturday night as part of the party for Isaac Julien’s Derek, a fantastic documentary/retrospective of the late Derek Jarman’s queer landmark work.

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Sundance is gayer, Law & Order makes homophobes cry, and more!

Sundance gets a little gayer

Sundance announced another slew of films on its 2008 slate yesterday (these are the out-of-competition offerings), and it's as depressingly gay-anemic as the list of films in competition, it does at least feature a few legitimitely intriguing gay-related movies.

First and most exciting to me is Tom Kalin's Savage Grace, starring Julianne Moore and Eddie Redmayne. The exciting bit is the fact that this is Kalin's first feature film since Swoon, the groundbreaking meditation on the Leopold/Loeb murder case that helped kickstart the queer indie film movement here in the States back in 1992.

Kalin is back in true crime mode, this time tackling the horrific Barbara Daly Baekeland murder in London, 1972. Baekland (Moore), a wealthy socialite, was murdered by her gay only son, Anthony (Redmayne), after seducing him into an incestuous relationship in an attempt to "cure" him of his homosexuality. Sensational subject matter and a fascinating true story, and one that I'm very interested to see tackled by this impressive bunch.

Birds of America, a dysfunctional family comedy directed by prolific gay playwright Craig Lucas (Longtime Companion, The Dying Gaul), has potential for some gay elements, but who knows.

Also rather delicious-sounding is Otto: or, Up With Dead People, the new film by gay cineterrorist Bruce LaBruce (Hustler White, Super 8 1/2). This one follows a "lonely gay zombie searching for love and meaning in contempo Berlin." Okay, I'm so there. Check out the website for some more intriguing (and gruesome) pics.

Gay Six Feet Under mastermind Alan Ball's Towelhead (formerly titled Nothing is Private), which has received mostly scathing reviews, is playing the fest as well.

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