GAY DIRECTORS, GAY FILMS?
EMANUEL LEVY
GAY DIRECTORS GAY FILMS?
Pedro Almodvar, Terence Davies, Todd Haynes, Gus Van Sant, John Waters
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
NEW YORK
Columbia University Press
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E-ISBN 978-0-231-52653-1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Levy, Emanuel, 1947
Gay directors, gay films? : Pedro Almodvar, Terence Davies, Todd Haynes, Gus Van Sant, John Waters / Emanuel Levy.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-231-15276-1 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-231-15277-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-231-52653-1 (ebook)
1. Homosexuality in motion pictures. 2. Gay motion picture producers and directorsUnited States. 3. Gay motion picture producers and directorsEurope. I. Title.
PN1995.9.H55L48 2015
791.43'653dc23
2015006484
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In Memory of Rob Remley
Love of My Life
CONTENTS
T HOUGH ITS my ninth book, Gay Directors, Gay Films? is my first truly personal workfor a number of reasons. First and foremost, its written in honor of my late companion, Rob Remley, who passed away on September 27, 2011. A former Merce Cunningham dancer and a top executive in the film industry (Sony, New Line, Time/Warner), Rob was an extraordinary man in many different ways. Having spent thirty-one years of happiness and fulfillment together, I cannot think of another individual who has influenced my career and shaped my life more significantly than Rob. My loss and grief are indescribable, and rather than engaging in therapy (as most of my friends recommended), I decided to channel my sorrow into writing a tribute book for Rob that would reflect in spirit and in essence the kinds of informal and spontaneous discussions that we used to have after seeing films, dances, and other art forms. Incidentally, we seldom disagreed about the quality or impact of a film; it was always a matter of the extent or degree to which we liked or responded to a particular film.
Second, the book is personal due to its subject matter. I have written comprehensive biographies of two major Hollywood directors: George Cukor: Master of Elegance (1993) examines George Cukor (18991983), who was openly gay (sort of living an open secret life), and Vincente Minnelli: Hollywoods Dark Dreamer (2009) considers Vincente Minnelli (19031986), who was a latent homosexual, opting for heterosexual marriage and children (he was married four times and had two daughters). One goal of these books was to elevate the stature of two extremely gifted filmmakers whose critical standing and reputation had suffered, albeit in different ways, due to their sexual orientation.
Third, Gay Directors, Gay Films? is the first book in which I subject myself to self-criticism, paying attention to how my sexual orientation and social background as a white, gay, upper-middle-class male influences, directly and indirectly, consciously and subconsciously, the ways I read films made by openly gay directors. In this, I follow the lead of gay theories, which no longer limit themselves to the analysis of overtly homosexual images but embrace other aspects and images of film that may be gayer or queerer in meaning than the explicitly gay ones.
In the early 1970s, while spending a summer in Paris, my relatives enrolled me in a course offered by one of the colleges of the Sorbonne. The charismatic teacher of that course, which was devoted to French literature, exposed me to a perspective called explication du texte, in which she analyzed according to different yardsticks classic novels by Flaubert, Zola, and others. I have always wanted to apply tenets of this approach to my scholarship and decided to do it in writing Gay Directors, Gay Films?
Finally, more than any of my previous books, Gay Directors, Gay Films? has benefited from my dual academic background in social sciences as well as cultural and film studies. The books key organizational principle is career, which is more of a sociological than a uniquely filmic concept. And though I apply the notions of worldview and sensibility to the realm of film, the concepts themselves are broad, deriving from philosophy, history, and other fields. The following text also integrates the duality of my career as a full-time professor and a full-time film critic (Variety, Screen International), a career inspired by my great Columbia teacher and mentor, Andrew Sarris.
T HIS BOOK, as noted in the preface, owes its entire existence to my late companion, Rob Remley. My vivid memories of the lively and lovely experience of seeing these movies with him have nourished and sustained me in some tough and hard times.
I have enjoyed tremendously attending the world premieres of many of the movies, and interviewing the five directors who made them, at various press conferences and events at the Cannes, Sundance, and Toronto Film Festivals, or in more intimate forums, such as the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
To the best of my knowledge, there have been three or four books in English about Almodvar (many more in Spanish and French). I especially learned from the expertise of Paul Julian Smith and Mark Allinson, who published their volumes over a decade ago, thus covering only half of Almodvars output. Robert James Parish is the first and sole biographer of Gus Van Sant; his informative volume was printed over 15 years ago. John Waters has written several personal books, and I benefited from the 1992 volume that John G. Ives wrote based on lengthy interviews with the director. There are no biographies or comprehensive books about Terence Davies or Todd Haynes, but several scholars have done exemplary analyses of some of their films, particularly Michael Koresko and Leonard Quart in Daviess case, and Justin Wyatt in Hayness.
Many colleagues and friends have contributed to the research and writing of the various drafts. I would like to thank in particular Thomas Doherty, Pamela Griffin, Molly Haskell, Fred Katz, Bill Shepard, Ed Sikov, Edward Turk, David Van Leer, all distinguished critics and scholars. Though I did not set out to write an auteurist volume about gay directors, during the process it became clear that my book could not have existed without Andrew Sarriss seminal criticism and pioneering book of 1968.
Over the past three decades, I have shown many gay-themed features in various film classes at Wellesley College, Columbia, New School for Social Research, ASU, UCLA, and NYU. The students of these schools have helped immeasurably in shaping my ideas and focusing my views with their bright comments and challenging criticism.
Much gratitude goes to three of my loyal research and media assistants, Jeff Farr, Beth A. Mooney, Lisa Plinski, and especially Ariel Adler. Valerie Todesco, who was born in Spain, helped me with translations of Spanish dialogue (and slang) in Almodvars films. My friend and HFPA colleague Jorge Camara, who hails from Mexico, improved the quality and accuracy of the language.
