faewraithsworld reblogged
Lost in the Pages
Between Two Tomes
faewraithsworld reblogged
faewraithsworld reblogged
To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar (1995)
Dir. Beeban Kidron
This was such a formative movie
This shit was revolutionary for the mid-90s. Among other things it helped me understand that transgender and cross-dressing were completely separate things.
To this day, I am in awe of the fact that Patrick Swayze not only campaigned hard to get the audition, not only auditioned in dress and makeup, but spent most of the day leading up to the audition walking around LA in dress and makeup.
This was a man who could sing, dance, act, ride a horse, fight, and walk in heels, he had nothing to prove to anyone, and he is MISSED.
Okay, I’m not done feeling about this.
If you’re younger, you may not know Patrick Swayze; he was Taken From Us in 2009. But Patrick Swayze was an icon of masculinity. Men were willing to watch romantic movies because Patrick Swayze was in them.
Patrick Swayze was fucking beefcake.
And this man didn’t just agree to do a movie where the only time he’s not actually in drag is the first three minutes, which involve stepping out of the shower, doing make up, and getting Dressed. He has ONE LINE that is delivered in a man’s voice, and it’s not during those three minutes.
And if you watch those three minutes, you see a stark difference between his portrayal of Miss Vida Bohéme and Wesley Snipes as Noxeema Jackson. (I am not criticizing Snipes’ performance. They were different roles.) Noxeema was a comedy character. Chi-Chi was a comedy character. But Miss Vida Bohéme was a dramatic role, played by a dramatic powerhouse.
When Vida sits down in front of the mirror, she sees a man. And she doesn’t like it.
Then she puts her hair up, and her face lights up.
“Ready or not,” she says. “Here comes Mama.”
And while Noxeema is having fun with her transformation (at one point breaking into a giggling fit after putting on pantyhose), Vida is simply taking pleasure in bringing out her true self. And when she’s done, she sees this:
And you can FEEL her pride.
All of this from an actor who, up to this point, walked on to the screen and dripped testosterone.
impossiblemonsters
the fact that some of you history-ignorant children in the notes are trying to shit on groundbreaking historical queer cinema because it doesn’t meet 2021 standards is infuriating. sit down, shut the fuck up, and listen to the elders in the room for fucking once
darkshrimpemotions
This. If you have never lived in a world where queerness was universally pathologized and criminalized to the point that even IMAGINING a world where it wasn’t constituted a radical and potentially dangerous act, you don’t have any business judging those of us who have for how we survived it and how we found (or still find) comfort in the few imperfect representations we got.
You don’t have to like it. You probably aren’t capable of “getting” it. And to be honest, I don’t want you to! I am glad that young queer people will never know exactly what it was like “back then.” But what you also will not do is refuse to learn your own history and then shit on everything that came before you, because like it or not what came before you is the reason you will never have to get what it was like back then.
On Wesley Snipes’s role Noxeema and John Leguizamo as Chi-Chi Rodriguez.
“I grew up in the ‘70s and even within the street culture, there was a lot of flamboyancy,” Snipes told TODAY of his perception of drag before filming. “Pimps wore the same furs as theprostitutes wore.
“Some of the great musicians of the world, like Parliament-Funkadelic, were very androgynous. So it wasn’t really new for me to see men dressed as women or men dressed as drag queens.”
Snipes attended the famed LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts and then State University of New York at Purchase. He wasn’t a dance major, but most of his friends were. “That exposed me to the world of glam, vogue, drag, transgender and gay people, LGBTQ… but it wasn’t in fashion those days. But it existed and I was around it.”
Not only did “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert” pave the way for “To Wong Foo,” so did films like the 1968 documentary “The Queen” and “Paris Is Burning,” the 1990 doc that chronicled ball culture of New York and the various Black and queer communities involved in it.
Even though he was known for his action roles, Snipes’ portrayal of Noxeema wasn’t the first time he played a drag queen. In 1986, he made his Broadway debut in the play “Execution of Justice,” playing Sister Boom Boom, a real-life AIDS activist and drag nun who acted as the show’s voice of conscience. Snipes pointed out, “Sister Boom Boom did not have Noxeema’s makeup kit.”
On whether he got any pushback for stepping into Noxeema’s pumps, he said, “Not so much professionally but the streets weren’t feeling it, and there were certain community circles. The martial arts community… they were not feeling it at all.”
“In fact, when the movie came out and they would come down the street, I would see them in Brooklyn sometimes, they started listing all my movies. I noticed they would always skip that one. I would correct them, ‘Now you don’t got the full count!’”
Lesser-known than his co-stars at the time, Lequizamo didn’t really anticipate becoming a transgender icon, but he did know that they were working on something special when they started filming.
“Drag didn’t really exist in movies,” Lequizamo, who was nominated for a Golden Globe for his portrayal, told TODAY. “There were straight men pretending to be women to get out of trouble or into trouble but this was not that. I was trying to make Chi-Chi a real life trans character and Patty and Wesley were trying to be real drag queens.” Never fully articulated in the film, Chi-Chi Rodriguez has always been perceived as transgender, something that ending up making an indelible mark on LGBTQ people in the late ‘90s as trans representation in media was limited.
“Chi-Chi was a trans icon, but she also showed us that gay men and trans women can both perform and work in drag side by side, and that those relationships are symbiotic,” Cayne explained.
“It was a powerful thing. I get lots of fan mail from LGBTQ teens telling me how my character helped them come out to their parents,” Leguizamo said. “They didn’t feel like they were seen, so that was a beautiful gift from the movie.”
Lequizamo also articulates that if “To Wong Foo” were cast today, a trans actor should be cast in his role. (And that just may happen, since Beane is developing a musical for Broadway.) “Anybody can play anything, but the playing field is not fair that way,” he said. “Not everybody is allowed to play everything. So until we get to that place, it is important for trans actors to get a chance to act which they don’t. In the project I’m doing, I’m making sure that the person playing trans is a trans person so we can make it legit, make it real. That just needs to be done right now.”
a monumental film in the library of queer history.
it was formative for modern society, too.
there are a lot of action fans out there who learned from their idols that respect doesn’t cost a damn thing to give. i know plenty of people who aren’t queer saw trans women and drag queens presented as people to them for the first time in wong fu. suddenly, strange and foreign queer identities that had only been presented to them as jokes if they’d even heard of them, seemed a little more relatable, and very human.
we’re all just people.
snipes, swayze, and leguizamo were willing to play people a lot of their fans didn’t respect yet or didn’t even know how to respect and demand they figure it the fuck out.
It’s also worth noting Leguizamo has gone on the record to say he brought his own experiences to the role; Chichi is wearing makeup too light for her natural skin tone through most of the movie, and swearing to stop doing so is part of her growth. Leguizamo based this on observation of his own female family members growing up.
“It was all about accepting my ethnicity in it. I had my face done really light all the time. I have family members who have issues with self-hate and race and so their skin will be five times lighter than the color of their neck, and that always tripped me out, so I wanted to put a little bit of that into it,” he said. “At the end of the movie, my neck and my face matched. My face is much darker. So that was the arc. Chi Chi becomes polished but accepting of herself, mature, romantically grows. Instead of a taker, she becomes a giver.”
sleepwithgiggli
Important tags:
Dec 16, 2023
I stumbled across this movie on TV one day years ago and was fascinated by it. By the sincerity of it to the love within it to the story itself, every part if it was imbedded in my brain. I’m cisgender, but I think this was the first time I’d seen a drag or a trans character in any media where 1) they were the main characters, and 2) they weren’t there to set up some sort of ‘oh my god, you actually dated a man!’ punchline/reveal. And that alone is something that stuck with me.
I haven’t seen the movie since that one time, but it’s one I’ve always wanted to revisit and I recently bought it on DVD and can’t wait to watch it again.
That’s exactly it. This was a mainstream movie, released nationwide, and it was the first time most people– queer or not– got to see that. Straight people (even most queer people hadn’t heard the term “cisgendger” yet, as it had been coined on a usenet newsgroup only a year before– and if you need me to explain what a usenet newsgroup is, no you don’t, because that’s my point) went to the see this movie because it was a comedy starring Patrick Fucking Swayze and Wesley Goddamn Snipes (John Leguizamo was great, but he wasn’t a draw yet), and came out with a little perspective that they’d never been exposed to before.
faewraithsworld reblogged
Nobody tagged me but I love showing up where I'm not wanted so here's me
those are all the friends I have
i also enjoy being where i'm not meant to be, chaotic evil and all that
Thanks for tagging me!!!
@baecakie :3
Was my picrew design looking a bit like Fiyero from Wicked intentional? Nope!
Do I love it even more for that exact reason however? Yes!!!
Tagging @itsyagurlchip @kittykittyanon @smol-rabbit-ghost @m1sf0rtune-gb @literatureisdying @mothbagel @ziipzeepzop-eez @bassguitarinablackt-shirt @imslowlydisintegrating @scrunchiesandsquips @real-artemis @real-odark @realjoehours @sydneyofalltrades @kanyewestshipsmileven @mochapop223 @skrapa-doodlzz @sleepyheadd0 @fluffyr0cky @crystalsandbubbletea @deadboywalking227 and anyone else interested! :D
not what i was expecting but okay-
AAAAA TYSM FOR THE TAG @thephoenixstar ♥️♥️♥️
i am neutral good but close to lawful good!!!!! :]
tags!!!
@milyki @bigfatbimbo @chaoticcrazynerd @crysatoru @peachdues @flametrashira @freebluefrog @animated-moon @phoenixthethief @theamazingellie @self-spaghettification
and anyone else who wants to join/i forgot to tag!!!!
Neutral good, but close to middle of good/evil
Normally I don’t do these things but the piccrew looked cute. Yes I’m a blue eyed blonde 😶
Tags?
Woooo
Tagging: @mikuyuuss @octoooo @kuwajima @haruharuna @shycroissanti and anyone who wants to join! ^•^
Finally I have time to join this, thanks again scirmbly! 💕
tagging @tanjir0se @loosesodamarble and anyone else whos interested!
Oh thank you for the tag, Unni~!
Ahaha... I kind expected to be Lawful Neutral but to the degree is a lot smaller than I thought. Was also hoping to be more good than lawful but then again, I'm very afraid of being a criminal even in a petty way so I shouldn't be surprised.
this was super cute!!! I am...not surprised in the slightest about my alignment, to be honest!
tagging @cece-lives-here @hybridanafrost and of course, whoever else wishes to take part!!
faewraithsworld reblogged
How about Lumiere x Nero? And Oscar x Nero?
Makes sense, compels me!
I really did love the bond Lumiere and Secre shared. They had a tender connection that was gone too soon. I just adored that aside from all the research they did, Lumiere still had plenty of time to make her a pretty dress! While I personally may not get a romantic vibe from them, their circumstances can be read like a romantic tragedy. To be separated for centuries is just heartwrenching. So I understand why people ship them. I see Lumiere having a fondness for her like he would for Tetia. Maybe Secre's the little sister he wished he had since they had more in common while Tetia was occupied with Licht.
As for her relationship with Oscar, that definitely compels me! They're two nerds in love, and it's adorable! Oscar definitely has his similarities to Lumiere, which makes Nero feel comfortable around him. Poor Oscar is just so awkward since he's so inexperienced when it comes to wooing women. But Oscar is passionate about his work, and Nero is a devoted helper. They make a great team and would be good to each other. I can't get over the idea of Sally and Millie gossiping about them in the research lab together. It just feeds into my love of workplace romantic comedies.
Lumiere wanted a nerd buddy because his sister was too busy banging an elf 🤣
I do think Nero sees Oscar as her second chance in life. Once again being the assistant of a genius magic engineer in present time, but Oscar sees her more than just a coworker.
faewraithsworld reblogged
faewraithsworld reblogged
The Atelier Couture 'Luminous Reverie' Fall 2024 Haute Couture Collection
faewraithsworld reblogged
Rain for My Parade 🌧️🌱🌿🌹🌷🌼
part of my cloud petticoat series~
faewraithsworld reblogged
don't destroy his self-esteem 🐦😆
faewraithsworld reblogged
jason: what do you mean i’m too old for the easter bunny??
bruce: jason, and i cannot stress this enough, you’re a 22 year old crime lord who murders people on the regular
jason: okay? where are my colorful fucking eggs?
faewraithsworld reblogged
nightwing being hurt in the field, and over comms he can’t get out what was wrong, nearly in shock, and jason puts on his best batman™️ voice and says “robin, report.”
and it snaps dick out of it enough to say concussion, possible broken ribs, and a gash in his side.
no one talks about it, and then a year later, damian does the same thing to tim
This is... somewhat canon. But with Dick using "Robin" to stop Jason from doing more damage.
Nightwing 2021 Annual
faewraithsworld reblogged
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faewraithsworld reblogged
patrol is fun :DD
faewraithsworld reblogged
C/ommissions for @hybridanafrost !
C/ommissions are open! Please DM me if interested! ♥
faewraithsworld reblogged
faewraithsworld reblogged