Together Together hits Sundance with Patti Harrison and Tig Notaro
Together Together, a new comedy making its debut at the 2021 very online Sundance Film Festival, is another push forward for trans actors. The movie’s co-star, comedian Patti Harrison (Shrill), is a transgender comedian who’s already got a reputation for turning perceptions about comedy upside down. In TT, she plays opposite Ed Helms as a young loner who goes to work for him, and their growing relationship forms the basis of the story. No word on whether her character is trans or what the on-screen relationship entails, but what’s exciting here is that a trans actor is co-headlining a feature. With the exception of Laverne Cox in the remake of The Rocky Horror Picture Show that’s still a rare enough occurrence to be exciting news. Nikole Beckwith (Stockholm, Pennsylvania) wrote and directed the film, which co-stars Nora Dunn, Tig Notaro and Los Espookys creator Julio Torres. Now all it has to be is funny.
Little Richard really was Everything
When Little Richard died in early 2020 at age 87, the world lost the great queer inventor of rock and roll. In the 1950s he brazenly took on musical norms, white racism and anti-queer cultural norms, defiantly making music that terrified parents and turned on young people. And though his religious beliefs led him to a lifetime of conflict with his own queerness, he maintained his position as a voice for liberation until his death. Now a documentary is in the works, one that will try to capture a small part of the musician’s world-changing legacy. Little Richard: I Am Everything – produced by queer filmmaker Dee Rees (Mudbound) in collaboration with Rolling Stone, and directed by Lisa Cortes (All In: The Fight for Democracy) – will focus on the man’s influence and musical innovation, as well as his fearless (and often contradictory) public discussions about sexuality. Expect lots of famous musicians, queer and otherwise, to lend their testimonies to this one. And a 2022 release is also a safe bet.
Zachary Quinto and the Secret Court
Podcasts are everywhere, and now Zachary Quinto’s got one. No, he’s not sitting at his dining room table talking about Star Trek. He’s producing and starring in a scripted podcast series, called Secret Court, based on a 100-year-old tragedy that took place at Harvard University. It was then that a young Harvard sophomore named Cyril Wilcox, a member of the class of 1920, killed himself. He had been part of a small group of gay male friends on campus, and his suicide led the school to secretly purge the other students from the university. Nobody had done anything wrong except be homosexual, but they found themselves branded as offenders and removed from school, their official records – as well as the record of the purge – erased. Secret Court will feature Quinto in a voice role (no other is known at this point) and is being written by Abdi Nazemian (The Artist’s Wife), produced in partnership with Quinto’s production company. We’re also guessing that its potential success might lead to a film or TV version of the story, one that deserves to be brought to light.
A Samantha-less Sex and the City?
You heard that correctly. HBO is in talks with Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon and Kristin Davis for a possible Sex and the City reboot. Kim Cattrall is not part of that conversation. We all know why. And it doesn’t matter if you’re Team Cattrall or Team Everybody Else in this fractured friend-scape. What matters is the fact that a Sex and the City reboot is a great idea that we all need. This is a dire historical moment of people not having frivolous sex with total strangers and not being able to afford very large Manhattan apartments or Manolo Blahnik shoes or even a fancy brunch. This culture needs frothy, shallow glamour-based entertainment and Sex and the City is a brand you can trust. Solution: A new character who is extremely horny, young and queer, one who runs circles around the other three women and treats them like the scolding aunties they’ve all turned into, a chaotic Gen Z sex demon who’ll shake things up and make Parker’s outfits look tame. Maybe Zendaya. The script can figure out why she’d be hanging out with the rest of them. Maybe she’s someone’s niece. It doesn’t matter. It could work.