Memoir

All posts in the Memoir category

Who Ya Gonna Call – 2

Published November 10, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

Days later, after I stop by Lou’s to chug a root beer & grab some licorice at the mid-point of a Saturday afternoon jog, he tells me that he told off his sister Luann earlier in the week. Both Lou’s sisters are nuns and the three of them seemingly share some weird sort of ecumenical magic. “I don’t think I told you she was here last Friday.”

“No.”

“Well, I don’t know what the hell she left behind, but I finally had to call her on Sunday and tell her to cut it out! I mean, my phone’s whizzed and popped for awhile after one of her visits. But that? The bumping and scratching & weirdness?”

“I know.”

” Especially after that disappointing Eastwood flick!! Not a bare chest in sight! So, I couldn’t take it! I called her and screamed BITCH! She just laughed and hung up and… minutes later, it finally stopped.”

Catching his breath, the switch, as it so often does, clicks in him and he now eyes me, flirtatiously. “& to think, I thought you were making things up,” he fake-pouts, his voice oozing with Baby Jane cuteness, “just to get a little comfort from me!” He reaches out his arms, like a clumsy Toys R Us baby doll in need of perpetual attention, and I, reluctantly, let him hug me, damply, for a bit and then, after faking a coughing fit, I move to the kitchen table and sit.

Indeed, when Lou and Sherry had first returned that evening they had, dubiously, listened to my ghostly tale. The boys, who I had (somewhat) properly sent to bed, began calling for her, almost immediately. 

“They were really scared” She grunts, noncommittedly. “They might try to come down if you don’t go up!” 

Indeed, their whimpers of “Mom, mom,” sonically, seem to move ever closer as speak. “You stay right there! & In that bedroom – not the hallway!” she commandingly screams up to them as she shakes her head at me and, disapproving, climbs the stairs to the guest room where they are nervously pacing.    

Earlier, we three, unsurprisingly, had found nothing upon exploring. Post incident, both Lou’s bedroom and the room that the boys were set up in were minus any deities – menacingly corporal or otherwise. Despite that seemingly calming discovery, their nervous energy squiggled about in uncontrollable bursts throughout the rest of the evening. I had hoped the continued lack of spiritual congress would eventually put them at ease. But as their prescribed bedtime rolled ever nearer, they grew increasingly nervous, begging to stay downstairs with me. 

Naturally, I was desperate to avoid any kind of maternal disapproval. Sherry did not strike me as someone to mess with. So, I ordered them back up the stairs when their bedtime arrived. My caveat being that I would go with them as a form of mild, foolhardy protection. So, I sat by them for an hour, chatting as the lay, still too mortified to sleep. At the sound of shooting gravel in the rectory parking lot, they shot up, immediately, whipping off lightly draped blankets. But before their feet could hit the ground, I corralled them into remaining still for the moment. “Do you want to be the one who explains to your mom why you’re not in bed at 11 pm?” They both shake their heads. “Smart. Stay & I’ll send her up right away.” 

Now Sherry emerges from the upper level, not a child peeping behind her, just as my parents, merrily, arrive. The five of them settle in the kitchen while I take coverage in the living room. My mom and dad seem less than convinced of our paranormal adventure, as well, and I sink into the recliner in the furthest corner, wanting to be at a far remove from the disbelieving adults. Time passes and I am just beginning to contemplate dozing off. My mom and dad tend to settle in for these gatherings and hours will pass by before the thought of leaving begins to even tickle at their consciousnesses. Keeping with the established flow of the evening, though, there have been consistent whispers on the floorboards and minor moans of wind against the windowpanes since this particular stop-by has begun. But the mature element has written them off as mere weather induced tragedies. Thus, I have not uttered a peep of awareness. But suddenly it seems as if these minor aural presences amplify – the creaks feel deeper, as if they are rocking the heart of this doggedly noble structure from within it’s oaky marrow. The conversation in the other room stops for a moment. I rouse from my slumber-aimed stupor…and listen to them listen. The chatter eventually begins again…but throughout the rest of this prolonged encounter, there are significant pauses in the flow of their words. The noises eventually, as if mocking them, begin to take on the shape of speech. They have the feeling of mini-monologues about them, as if some former inhabitants and their long ago guests, are trying to communicate their past stories through the shifting bumps and bark-stained titters. What secrets are they sharing? Lou’s voice rises even higher now, a quivering tone of strained combativeness entering his exchanges. He is trying to outgun the unknown’s invisible, sensory alarm. 

Finally, Sherry rises, mentioning a need for sleep if she wants to be at early mass in the morning. The group ascends into the room, drawing nearer, almost as one, embarrassed smiles creasing their features. They believe us now, I can tell. And I, who will spend decades doubting myself even in the most affirmative circumstances, am strangely confident here. I never second guessed for a moment what we’d seen. It felt as real, as part of this atmosphere as all the unwanted gestures, the lingering caresses of a man possessed by some other affliction than charitable duty and public service. 

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Part One of this Remembrance is located at:

Who Ya’ Gonna Call?

Thanks for reading &…Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan

First Time I Ever Saw Your (True) Face

Published June 1, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

From the moment that Father Lou asked me, at one of our post-Sunday mass family get-togethers, to do some odd jobs around the parish, I knew exactly how I was going to spend the money I would earn. For weeks I’d been excitedly eyeing an 8-track player at the family run True Value hardware store near the expressway…and now, Dana Kimmell willing, it would be mine. Dana Kimmell, for all those who are unusually uninspired, is the heroine of Friday the 13th Part 3. I look to her as a savior of some sorts. If Chris, her resilient yet emotionally awkward heroine, could survive the strain of judgmental friendships & the onslaught of an unstoppable killer, then I can endure the realities of existing in such an unglamorous, excitement-less town as East Randolph, NY.

To Illustrate – our town has no stoplights or movie theaters. There is no work out facility or any name brand department store, as well. But in seeming deference to the farmers and factory workers that comprise the bulk of its population, there are two hardware stores. McNally’s Hardware in the heart of town has been the local favorite for decades – its friendly, rumpled owner always present there in a pair of faded gray bib overalls. He wanders among the never changing, dusky open-ended bins of nuts and bolts and practical tools, beaming whenever his assistance is requested. Famously always costumed in his downbeat attire of choice, he pays cash for everything – keeping a wad of green tucked inside the front pocket of his never altering outfit. My dad loves to tell the story of how a shiny brute of a salesperson almost turned McNally away from purchasing a new vehicle – until he noticed the indentation of cash and realized the unaccomplished gent in front of him was actually going to pay in full…and not with a check. The shinier True Value was a newer addition to our manure strewn burg – appealing to younger families and the truckers who veered off the highway for food and supplies. And while McNally would have never dreamed of carrying frivolous accessories, rows of comic and colorful lawn ornaments greeted you when entered the bright confines of this rivaled counterpart. And there, on a table towards the front, sat the greatly reduced item of my fascination. No surprise there. It is 1983 and the era of the cassette Walkman. Bins of sale priced 8-track tapes reside in hidden corners of any department store that you wander into. While most of my contemporaries would have properly scoffed at this totally uncool, completely uninvestigated bounty, to me it seems like a cornucopia of undiscovered music that I can commander on the cheap – if only I had the necessary equipment. I long to dive into the riches of the titles that I had already purchased for seeming pennies – Cher and Greg Allman’s Two the Hard Way, the critically reviled recorded culmination of this famous duo’s short and combustible cohabitation, Joan Armatrading’s Show Some Emotion and the film soundtrack recordings to Grease and Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band – a perfect stew of funky, pre-teen sonic bedevilment. And now the time was at hand.

We don’t have many muggy days in our miniature municipality. Surrounded by shaded hills and rolling meadows, we are in the heart of ski country-and a good hour or two away from the moist atmospheres brought on by Lake Erie. But as I set out to clean out Lou’s garage and straighten out the parish lawn, it is bursting with warm heat. I walk down Main Street, the primary boulevard, past the Children’s Home, the town’s modest gas station, the high school and McNally’s Hardware. The winding strip also contains the rectory and St. Patrick’s Church, buildings that reside shoulder to shoulder, at one of its’ furthest tips. I arrive sweaty and Lou forces water on me. Like any 14-year-old, I would much prefer a glass of soda…even something of the generic variety. But that seems out of the question at this venture, especially considering his visibly parental concern over my well-being. So, I settle for the H20 and try to ingratiate myself to its restorative effects. When he is finally convinced that he has helped me avoid the degenerative onslaught of heat stroke, Lou gives me a cursory description of what he would like done. He then excuses himself for a nap, telling me to come wake him when I am through. He will drive me home. He decisively informs me, mama lion style, that am not walking back in this heat!

Labor-wise, it seems like I am through with the bulk of the chores before a half hour has even passed. Worrying that Lou will think I have rushed through things or that I perhaps have skipped over some important detail of the proceedings, I linger, moistly, over some minor activities – washing the windows of the garage, collecting the garbage strewn about the parking lot – I want it to appear that I have thoroughly committed myself to the tasks at hand.

Finally, it feels as if I can dawdle no longer and I enter the rectory through the kitchen door, making my way through the dimly lit living room and up the stairs to the bedroom. As I advance up the steps, it dawns on me how unusual this scenario is and a slow bead of fright starts to drip slowly into my consciousness. I am entering the bedroom of a man who has swiftly become like an uncle to me, a revered agent of god. In our simple familial theology there is not much difference between our local clergy and the president of the united states and something feels off about this. Perhaps, this is merely reality bursting forth, the oddness of his chosen vocation finally seeping through the walls of my budding sub consciousness. That spring I was shepherded together with a bunch of other teens to listen to a group of nuns talk about their lives, in the ever-springing hope that some of us would examine ourselves and perhaps, one day, join them in their calling. This career day for the sacramental arts seemed to misfire for all of us attending, though. We itched uncomfortably in our seats, mentally begging to be released from the unrelentingly suggested assault of such a life denying profession. For days afterward, I feared that, as they suggested, some spirit of devotion would overcome me and I would be compelled to join them on their religious journeys. Therefore, thoroughly embracing the muse of counter-activeness, I fearfully found myself masturbating every spare second that I could, sure that such willfully enforced horniness would turn sour any benevolent urges to pursue priesthood that suddenly might consume me. The fear of such entrapment still lingered with me that day – along with a tiny distrust, a worry for the strange path that could lead anyone, including our family’s beloved Father Lou, toward such a strict and solitary vocation. How sexless they must be.

Still, I enter his bedroom, rosy hued with the dimming afternoon sun. He lays crumpled on his right side, breathing heavily. Sheets and blankets are swirled around his heavy form, moving up and down to the sluggish atomic force of his jagged breathing.

“Father Lou,” I called out, hesitantly.

He stirs…wakes. Slowly rising and facing me, like a vine less Dick Durock emerging from the Swamp Thing‘s cinematic quagmire, he remains laying on his side – his torso arched towards me while his legs are still curled into the depths of his queen size mattress. He breaths deeply for a moment and takes me in, frozen in the doorway, unable to step further into what now feels like dangerous territory. He laughs lightly as he genre-hops, stylistically. Pouting his lips out now, like a heavily made-up nightclub chanteuse, he stretches out his lower leg, a rotund Marlene Dietrich lounging his body across some imaginary piano top. “Have you come to ravage me in my bed?” he sings out, girlishly.

The room shifts and I feel my body leave itself. It’s as if mother Mary herself has smacked me in the face. If anything, I was expecting him to brusquely rush me from his quarters…even thought I may have misunderstood his instructions and that he would scold me for invading his privacy…but not this. Seeing my shock, he rolls onto his back and wraps the blankets that have fallen away tightly around him. He laughs, dismissively, and tells me to meet him down in the kitchen. I should grab some licorice from the jar and a can of root beer from the fridge. Minutes later, he emerges into the bright light of the pantry – a check for me in one hand and his keys dangling from the fingers of the other.

He chatters, brightly, as he drives. I know that I will walk back this way later this afternoon. I will not be able to stop myself from collecting my bounty – I have 8 tracks to listen to, after all. I try to think of all the fun I will have tucked away in my room, my new toy spinning out sounds that I have waited months to hear. It is easier to concentrate on that hopeful future than to focus on what has just happened. It was a joke I tell myself, ignoring the salacious intent…the truth of perversion I had seen glinting in his eyes. It will, I assure myself, never happen again…

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Always Something There to Remind Me

Published April 10, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

I am the B-movie loving, punk rock savior of Chicago theatre. Well, not really…but please let me try to (over-confidently) claim that title for at least a moment. This change in ruling status has been confirmed by a review in The Chicago Reader…well…almost…and overall, this has been a pretty glorious time.  

It all began months ago, when I forced my grizzled, unshaven roommate James to watch a backwoods revenge opus called Blood Games with me. A cigarette never far from his yellowed fingertips and a rocks glass, forever spilling over with Diet Coke and whiskey, he looked on at me, from his favored black leather recliner, with an almost tender, parental disbelief. Although his face was ringed with sort of kindness, he was definitely not sharing my enthusiasm for the cinematic retread of I Spit on Your Grave that was spooling out before us – a low budget opus about a traveling female baseball team who, after winning a birthday game against a group of chauvinistic small-town males, soon find themselves being physically assaulted and murdered off by the chagrined losers. Of course, Babe, played with committed athleticism by Laura Albert, and her fellow players, including the spunky Shelley Abblett, who stood out to me as the undefeated, kick ass Donna, triumphed by the final credits – obliterating all obstinate assholes and meek male passers-by. As always, struck by how an exploitation piece could have such obvious social constructs – so many women I knew did deal with harassment and subjugation on a daily basis and triumphantly made it through – I sat down and a wrote a show using the well-worn plot points of my favored exploitation gems mixed with all the feministic thought pieces that I had been compiling from riot grrl albums and periodicals for the past several years. I cast a series of fresh young actresses, many new to the city and some totally new to the acting scene itself – one or two marking the project as their first professional theatrical excursion – and we began a series of rehearsals in various living rooms across the city. 

Not only were these women acting out my words – a distinct and precious thrill – but they served as my built in movie buddies, as well. As part of the process, I shared a variety of revenge flicks with them – starting with that (previously mentioned) grimiest Mother of Invention- I Spit on Your Grave. Granted, I skipped over all the drawn out rape sequences, cutting straight to Camille Keaton’s beautiful revenge arc. The southern gothic The Beguiled (about a group of Southern school girls poisoning Clint Eastwood’s charming Northern philanderer also served well… although the rape of Mae Mercer’s Hallie, a plot point that I had forgotten about, caused an uncomfortable moment or two.  The fact that Farrah Fawcett actually stops her attack as well as turns the tables on her unshaven transgressor also made Extremities a necessary tool for the celluloid viewing pile…although by that point in time, we all had grown restless with the aggressive pyrotechnics on display and rounded things out by watching John Waters’ Female Trouble, a suggestion from one of the cast members, and a surprisingly appropriate offering considering (title character and perhaps Divine’s great moment) Dawn Davenport’s aggressive no holds barred criminal badassery. 

One night, during rehearsal, I even found a reason to throw in Barbi Benton’s Hospital Massacre AKA X-Ray. The show was written in a poetic idiom and there were 3 MacBethian witch style characters in X-Ray that I thought might help illustrate the rhythms that I was looking for in one of the dialogue selections of the show. But admittedly, by then my favored ladies seemed weary of my exploitation loving instructions, so I cooled it with my all too enthusiastic celluloid explorations. Thus our tight knit balance of personalities was restored and anything seemed possible once again.

We even beat the odds, structurally. The owner of Too Far West Cafe, the establishment where we were performing the show, decided he was going to put up a full length mirror in the performance space days before we were to begin rehearsing there. If his plans had gone through, the audience, in essence, would have been watching themselves watch the show. Thankfully, Daniel, the cute bespectacled barista who eventually became the show’s adorably muppet-like mascot, dropped the unwieldy piece of glass just before its installation and it shattered on the ground…allowing us to retain a certain sense of suspension of disbelief. 

We weren’t so lucky with the first reviewer, a long feared indie paper mainstay named Jack Helbig, who compared what I thought was Lydia Lunch style outrage to a badly written, overly hysterical after school special.  Hoping to mitigate the damage, I waited, squirming with anticipatory anxiety, for The Reader to come out today. As 5pm finally neared, I rushed from the office I work at on 640 N LaSalle to the paper’s headquarters on 11 E. Ohio, skirling through the broad, 4 sectioned contents with both hope and dread. I practically jumped with joy when I finished reading. While not without its criticisms, the author here actually got what we were aiming for and provided me with enough positive verbiage to market the rest of the run with some proper rave statements. 

Feeling the triumphant relief expressed in my opening paragraph here, I am proudly strutting across the bridge on LaSalle to Wacker Drive. I’m definitely taking the train home from the Lake station, downtown, off of the illustrious State Street. It is a bit out of the way but I want to be in the middle of a mass population glow, to be throwing out my joy among the thronging urban crowds. I want to fuel my already propulsive energy with the forceful stamp of my fellow city lovers, to feel as if we are all one big creative body, streaming together en mass. I believe I am finally on my way to achieving a consciousness filled with a swaggering essence of peace. I, stupidly, did not click on the self-confidence box when the goddesses of microbiology were creating my make-up at birth and I have stumbled every since, trying to ease my round sense of uneasy wondering into some square, stable peg. 

But just as these notions of security begin to take purchase in my essence, I glance into the swirling population storming around me …and I think I spot Lou sweeping past me in the crowd heading in the opposite direction and I gasp. All those motivational building blocks I have just carefully stacked up within me, crash down, shattering like James’ empty whisky glasses around me, cutting a quick and unexpected path to fear & turmoil in the face of this literal ghost.

Lou has been dead for over two years…and it’s been much longer than that since I’ve seen him, face to face. Granted, it has dawned on me, multiple times, as I’ve bludgeoned my way into my early 20s, that despite our familial friendliness, our relationship was far from a kosher one. I’m well aware what happened between us was abusive, but until now I have always sensed a love for him of some sort within me, as well. The mere suggestion of him has never frightened me before.

So, this reaction, this chilled to the bone- heroine in a gothic Henry James story response stuns me. I have no idea where it’s coming from. Could this possibly be the trauma that my therapist Gail has often talked about? She mentioned these feelings might sneak up on me when I was least expecting them. True to that form, I am standing here, stock still, contemplatively considering this — when I realize people are beginning to have to move around me, stalled in mid traffic as I am. So, I recover quickly, give a quick glance behind me and determine, decidedly, that the stranger I have just passed – as I have known all along – was not Lou. I shake it off and head home, eager to call my favorite cast members with the good news. We have a tag line for the show. “Searing…inescapable.” Two words, I suddenly realize, that describe not only our show, but the circumstances of my past, as well.

 

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Suddenly Last Summer

Published March 22, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

My father is hanging from the ladder off the side of the house, a common sight. He tinkers constantly, blind hope filling in where carpentry skills fail, with our 200-year old residence, trying, hopelessly, to navigate the creaks and pains that come with its accelerated aging.

“Hi, Brian. How was rehearsal?” His fingertips hooked around a rotting rain gutter, this question is eagerly, almost hopefully, asked- even before the woman who is directing the small community production that I have joined as a time killer this summer has the chance to pull out of the driveway. 

“Fine,” I reply.

“Good.” Then before I have a chance to expound any further about the process, to snootily remark that I will be happy to be back among the future professionals at the famous theater school that I have been attending in the fall, he gallops as if atop a through-bred, to a newly reconfigured finish. “Before you go inside, I just wanted to let you know that I’ve rented a house in Alfred for the coming year and…I’ve filed for a temporary separation from your mother. I think it’s for the best.”

Almost working in accomplice with his forced ease, I take this news with breezy relief, as if this new juncture was a long foreseen conclusion. And it has been. My parents’ marriage has been teetering towards oblivion since the day I was conceived. This feels like the first smart move that my father has made towards that increasingly acidic partnership in a while.

“I think that’s a wise move, dad.” He almost blushes with relief. Then. as if the dissolution of an almost 20-year old marriage is everyday news, I quickly ask “Can I borrow the car?” 

“Sure, Brian, sure,” he happily sputters. “And thanks!”

Touched by his childlike alleviation, I expand a bit. “The commute has been rough on you and the kids. & a break will do you and mom good. Things have only gotten worse lately.”

Comrades now… equals, he solemnly nods his head in agreement with me. “I knew that you kids could feel that. I decided to do this for everyone. Not just your mom and me.”

I nod and he swings back to his patchwork repairing – a whistled tune soon escaping from his recently loosened lips.

Later, after I have returned from the store with my frozen pizzas and 2 liter bottles of pineapple soda, my mother approaches me, teary eyed. 

“Did your father talk to you?”

“Yes.”

“I – I just can’t believe it!” Tears begin to pour forth from eyes as her body hiccups with the intensity of her sobs. 

I am shocked. Her every waking moment has been colored with derision towards my father since my late teens. How could this not come as some sort of relief to her? I look on at her as she weeps… bewildered and judgmental, a photocopy of the whispered glances that I am sure she is consumed with worry that are soon to come – frowns from family members and the well wrapped parishioners of St. Patrick’s Church, scowls filled with disapproving inferences. She is a failure. She could not make it work. 

Thus, the summer unfolds in degrees. Lou and I watch Alice, Sweet Alice and Blood Sucking Freaks during late night get-togethers. He has been counseling both of my parents and the extremity of being twisted between two sides weighs on us both. Inducted, fully, into the creative activities of a big city life, I desperately clutch at any culture I can imbue myself with. My parents take turns accompanying me to events. The concerts I attend with my mom are a mixed bag of practices – Marie Osmond at Chautauqua Institute contrasted with a huge homecoming bash at JCC for hometown heroes 10,000 Maniacs. I excitedly procure Natalie Merchant’s autograph on a flyer before she skittles quickly, skirt flowingly away. Ever in competition, my mother decides that my father has fared better with me – shows with Judy Collins and Emmylou Harris (who I also get to meet) seem much more relevant to her. More disturbingly in her spreadsheet of wins to losses, while out with my father at the Little Valley County Fair, I am called up onto stage to perform with Louise Mandrell – an event that is captured by one of my mother’s co-workers on camera. This provides hard photographic proof that my paternal regiment is there for the significant artistic occurrences in my life – a fact that provokes wearying conversations – especially as my brother and sister disappear more completely into their new lives several townships away. 

So these movie nights provide relief – for both Lou and myself. Almost ineptly pornographic, I can’t quite decipher what Bloodsucking Freaks is, cinematically.  It’s the only film that I watch with Lou that makes me feel a bit awkward. With its brain milkshakes, head vice tortures and elements of WIP slavery, however ineptly rendered, it’s not exactly a film you watch with the equivalent of a family member. (Years later, I would have the same reaction when watching the opening moments of Leaving Las Vegas with my father’s second wife, Judy. “Why, he should be arrested,” she sputtered during Nicholas Cage’s first drunken diatribe as I, cringingly, held my breath until she, soon thereafter, joined my father in their bedroom, a whole thankful flight of sound proofed stairs away from the TV room, where I continued to watch.) Still, it feels like a film, much like The Toolbox Murders and Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, that as a well-rounded horror aficionado that I should have in my viewer’s canon. Ever looking for connective tissue between my celluloid obsessions, I am also thrilled to find that the film features former soap opera actor Niles McMasters as the avenging, crime solving hero. While almost silly here, McMasters gives a much more well-rounded portrayal in Alice, Sweet Alice, a film that I adoringly play on repeat throughout the summer. Not only do I watch it first by myself, but I also share it with the older group of kids that I watch over at the local children’s home, my summer job. I excitedly purchased it – my first VHS tape – with my inaugural paycheck – picking it out from other desired offerings such as Sleepaway Camp and Empire of the Ants in the budget K-Mart movie bin – although the $10 price tag does not seem like much of a bargain to me, to be truthful. I had first read about the film in a scholastic style biography of Brooke Shields which described, in judgmentally lurid detail, her character’s violent murder at a first communion ceremony in the film. While the author’s intent was to seemingly make the readers avoid the movie – it had the opposite effect for me and I had been, dreamily, searching for it ever since. Slightly influenced by that writer’s assessment, I was not expecting the rich atmosphere, twisted dramatics and stylized violence that, markedly, colors the film. The exact opposite of the cheap horror outing that I was expecting, I adored it and wanted everyone to revel in its hysterical beauty along with me.

Lou was surprisingly silent about these offerings, though. Blood Sucking Freaks was understandably hard to, conversationally, qualify. Although, I, at least, expected him to comment on McMaster’s handsomeness. But I fully expected to discuss the wonders of Alice, Sweet Alice with him. I could, instinctively, hint at the things that the film was trying to say about power and those devoted to it. It seemed emblematic of the world around me. It seemed there, as in real life, no official could be trusted.

But perhaps it hit too close to home. “You watched this with, Lou?” my mother asks me, looking up from the magazine that she has been half- heartedly picking through, during one of my repeat watches. Now that my father and siblings are in absentia, she often spends her evening hours cuddled near me as I view my favorite programs. “Yeah.” Her eyes flicker with a questioning note. “What?” “This just feels a bit…anti-Catholic. I’d be offended, maybe, if I was a priest or a nun.”  For a moment, I also consider the character of Mr. Alphonso, the corpulent landlord in the film. This character defiantly accosts the film’s pre-teen lead at one point early in the plot’s gestation. I realize I have seen myself in all the awkward final girls that I have grown to love – from Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz to Laurie in Halloween to Chris in Friday the 13th, Part 3. I connect fully with their otherworldly apartness. Perhaps Lou saw himself in the well portioned vastly skinned Alphonso and he did not like what he saw. 

\

I do not dwell on this thought for long, though. My mother’s birthday is fast approaching and I want to ease some of her sense of loss by throwing her a party. Lou agrees to offer up the rectory as the gathering place if I provide all the necessary drinks and food stuffs. I begin inviting folks and buy packs of cold cuts and bags of potato chips and pretzels from the Quality Market. Lou assesses what I have purchased and suggests I buy more. 

The night of the event I am in heaven, greeting the invitees as they arrive and playing DJ. I think my mother even realizes she is wrong about the events I’ve attended with my father being the more significant. I happily show off the Marie Osmond album (with its silky atmosphere and leggy pose) I’ve been playing to Marsha Hinman, one of the soft spoken elegant church ladies I’ve invited. My mother overhears me rhapsodically speaking about Osmond’s act with her and beams. We’ve needed this. Just the week before, I spent the weekend with my father. My brother who had been attending a movie with a friend got in a small car accident and was taken to the hospital. When I call my mother to let her know from the payphone in the visitor’s lobby, she has a fevered breakdown on me. She screams, inconsolably, blaming me somehow for her physical and emotional distance from her other son during this minor tragedy. Unable to reason with her, I finally hang up the phone. After he is fitted with one or two stitches on his forehead, I convince my brother to call her – and though no apologies leak forth when she asks to speak to me again, I can tell just hearing his voice and his assurances that he would have called her immediately himself if he had been able to, has calmed her. 

Tonight, all has been forgiven, though. And it even seems, that days away from my return to college, all is as it once was. She clasps my waist and happily squeezes me moments before Lou gooses my backside proudly. “You did a good job,” he tells me, a paternal note of proudness leaking into his voice. But I can see. due to the winking brightness behind his bifocals, that he longs to go further, to stroke my buttocks softly, as well.

But reveling, for once, in the deterrent of my mother’s closeness, I quickly remove myself from his over grasping attempts at affection and begin the clean-up that gatherings such as this always justify.

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Why Can’t I Be You?

Published March 8, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

“William likes horror films, too,” Lou informs me, one Sunday afternoon in August after mass.

“Really?”

“Yeah!”

“Nice! We should hang out!”

William, who has the soft, handsome looks of some teen sex comedy hero, is visiting Lou for a few days before beginning college at SUNY Buffalo. In fact, he is just one of many attractive young men who have visited Lou, ever the youth loving pied piper, over the years since he has arrived at St Patrick’s. I never question this virile form of loyalty, though. More than anything, I feel a familial sense of pride. Lou, who is so popular, is like our family uncle & he, seemingly, loves us more than any of these affection hungry intruders from parishes long past. So, I always provide the guys who arrive for quick intervals of time with a bit of brotherly compassion. A benediction, as it were, from the one who is truly favored.

Almost by accident, we pick the perfect evening to gather. Fright Night, which I saw in theaters the summer before, is debuting on HBO and I am eager to revisit it. William hasn’t seen it, so I happily recount to him, while drinking our pre-movie fest sodas in the rectory kitchen, about watching it with a small group of kids from a theater troupe I had joined the year previously. Every time Jonathan Stark’s Billy, the vampire-villain’s slavishly devoted sidekick appeared, we would gleefully shout out “Gay! Gay!” at the screen! Since that evening, though, I have secretly wondered about the authenticity of those outbursts. What if the Billy character wasn’t gay? He could have just been extremely devoted to his master. I had seen the slavish way the nuns had reacted around priests all my life…some almost trembling with devotion when they walked into room…and there was surely nothing sexual there…or so I hoped. The thought of a shaven headed, wrinkle skinned ghoul flagellating herself over love for an unreachable colleague a la Vanessa Redgrave in The Devils, one bizarre cult film that my father actually heartily encouraged me to watch (in Lou’s living room, nonetheless, as it came on during one of their late night talk-a-thons) due to its literary and historical references, was simply too much for me to imagine.

Besides, if there was going to be homosexuality portrayed on the screen, why couldn’t it be straightforward? The Billy-Jerry relationship was cloistered in secrecy and innuendo and sadistic power plays – another coupling, if that was even what it was, that made something secret and shameful out of being gay. I would have actually much preferred Charley, the tentative, moonstruck hero, and Ed, his socially awkward best buddy, being the leading couple as opposed to Charley and Amy, the no bullshit lass who, ultimately, became the object of desire for both central male characters. As if to make up for this affront, Ricky, a member of the acting group, and I parked in the alley behind that movie theater, post-viewing, and passionately made out. Once or twice, we had to duck below the swinging orb-like glow of police lights – an adventurous thrill. My grandfather was the postmaster of Dunkirk, the small town where we would gather to rehearse and often perform for civic groups, and the thought of his reputation taking a hit due to the discovery of my deviant midnight lip locking seemed both horrifying and recklessly thrilling all at once. The fact that the handsome, raven haired Ricky, a confirmed bisexual who was already the father of two-year-old twin boys, exuded a devil-may-care, new wave James Dean vibe only heightened the power of those moments. 

But that all seemed very long ago and despite my outward enthusiasms, I pulsed with the nervous energy that accompanies one leaving home for the very first time. College was just days away and I was distracted, seemingly filing that long ago sexual energy away for some true love that I knew was just waiting around the corner in Chicago. I could picture him now – some rippling, dexterous athlete running down the corridors of my dorm, tossing a football, thoughtlessly, in the air…our eyes would latch…and… Or maybe we would even meet cute like Frannie and Kirk on As The World Turns, an accidental collision turning from a rude and caustic energy to an undeniable connection. 

Back in the present, though, I am curious about William’s decision to commute to college from home. “Don’t you want to escape from your parents a bit?” I ask as Jerry whirls the dazed Amy around the dance floor, attempting to seduce her away from the frenzied, (wrongfully) love struck Charlie. 

“Maybe by my junior year. This is more convenient now…and with my job and school, it seems like I’ll barely see my parents.”

This reasoning baffles me. My every aching, straining move since middle school has been to escape my present circumstances. I have been keen to cut through the strangling vines of my familial cords with a vibrant incisiveness and establish myself someplace, far away, in a world of freedom and creativity. The lure of this imagined plane has been so compelling that even the thought of failing my Regents Exams – which would have put a definitive damper on my aspirations – couldn’t interrupt my dreamy, cobble stoned wanderings. Even when studying in those last days of high school, I could barely concentrate, preferring to listen to the haunting strains of Suzanne Vega’s debut album…imagining the lyrical processes that went into writing a song like Marlene on the Wall. Which of Ms. Dietrich’s films had inspired Vega, I wondered.

Maybe William was questioning his choices, as well, and that was the reason he has come to visit Lou…to get advice and support. I can’t comprehend why anyone would really want to remain at home when the whole world glistened with adventure, with opportunities almost too precious to behold.

The credits roll and the next movie is announced. Ninja 3: The Domination. I am a little disappointed. I have no interest in some chop ‘em, sock ‘em Bruce Lee rip-off.

“Oh, wow. This one is really awesome. Have you seen it?”

“No. Have you?”

“Yeah. It’s this crazy demonic possession horror flick meets action-karate mish-mash. It’s wild. You’re going to love it!”

I have a feeling I will. I am also slightly jealous. It bothers me that I have never even heard of this movie while William has had full knowledge of its sure to be never fading awesomeness. Lucinda Dickey, who I’ve also never heard of for some reason – another sorrowful occurrence, plays a telephone line woman-aerobics instructor, bringing all the wonders of the multi-hyphenate to life in one role. She, indeed, is also possessed by the evil spirit of a ninja warrior – leading to floating, wind machine influenced, Linda Blair circa Exorcist 2 light shows. As the mayhem enfolds, William and I settle back into the comfortable space of two acquaintances connected by one powerful force. It’s as if the rhythm of Lou’s slumber-built breathing, coming from somewhere up in the rafters of the second floor, binds us. We will, surely, never see each other again, but both on the cusp of new beginnings and bound by the patronage of such an unusual force, we seem united and a brotherly contentment washes over us. We hug, with hearty back slaps, after the credits roll and I drive home, dreamily imagining, that in mere weeks I will no longer be this shimmering, barely formed mortal gliding, dreamily, down country roads. I will no longer be this person who merely passes the time away with a stranger, waiting for the revolution to begin. It will have already started —- in Chicago!

Impulsively, I drive back to the rectory the next morning. I want to drop off a couple magazines featuring coverage on Fright Night for William. I am possession hungry, but feeling the weight of my upcoming departure, I decided, after settling into bed last night, that I would shed some of the fat of my media works in commemoration of one of my final evenings in my hometown. It’s a hit and run moment. I pass the magazines quickly off to William, wish him well and start to head for the door. As I turn to go, though, I sense the flicker of Lou’s hand moving under the table… and I see a tension enter William’s frame as he flips through an article in a year-old issue of Fangoria. I am stunned into immobility for a moment. In a reverse sense of egoism, I had always assumed that I was the only one that Lou fondled in such a manner. For the first time, I consider that might not be the case. It’s a haunting thought. 

But I am on a forward rushing trajectory, ultimately. I have no time to ruminate on the unknown, on relationships other than my own. I have college boyfriends to obtain and future stardom to initiate. The door to the rectory, with that oasis of wonder gleaming far beyond it, is looming before me. I regain my momentum. Without a glance back, I move on. 

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Peek-A-Boo

Published March 1, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

I had made up my mind that it was never going to happen.

But Channel 59 was playing a Saturday October afternoon marathon of neutered horror flicks – Halloween 2, A Nightmare on Elm Street and Carrie – all interrupted, periodically, with brightly announced ads for local car dealerships along with speaker exploding reminders about the playtimes of long cancelled network shows and newly produced syndicated sitcoms. “See Mama’s Family every Saturday night at 7:30!” and – “Go back to a simpler time every afternoon from 3 to 4 with the Ingalls Family and Little House on the Prairie! Unsurprisingly, that Little House time slot was a favorite at Eden Heights, the old folk’s home that I volunteered at every Wednesday afternoon with several other eager, socially minded classmates. One of the beleaguered yet incredibly feisty residents – she once spat at a visiting Bishop and threw the rosary that he offered her back into his mighty, quickly reddening face – was a particular fan of the show. Every time that I entered the home with my fellow ambassadors of conscientiousness, I could hear her bellowing from her bed, “1,2,3, 4! The kids are here! The kids are here! I’m gonna kiss ‘em then I’m going kill ‘em. I’m gonna kiss ‘em then I’m gonna kill ‘em. Then, 1-2-3-4, I am gonna make ‘em sit ‘n watch Little House on the Prair-r-r-ie!” She, quite simply, was my heroine. 

Her outrageousness seemed on the same Zen-like plane as Patti Smith, a squawky voiced punk priestess whose LPs I had begun discovering in cut out bins, after school, at mid-range department stores like Fisher’s Big Wheel. Most recently, I had found her 1976 recording Radio Ethiopia shoved into a tightly packed, impulse buy side rack at a grocery store checkout lane in Salamanca, New York.  I loved the incongruity of finding an LP that featured a song called Pissing in a River, which I was surprised to discover was a fairly mournful ballad about the fading embers of youth, in a supermarket that catered to grade school moms and the hopeful, soon to be tenured teachers at the nearby academy of higher learning. 

That afternoon, unsurprisingly, Lou also had his own ideas about further education- in this case, my own. Gathered together in his living room to watch the previously described, mostly bloodless terror-thon, he nestled against me, leaning his head on my shoulder, breathing words of hysterically inept seduction. 

“You can take me like Rod takes Tina, stud,” he whispered in my ear, referencing A Nightmare on Elm Street’s doomed couple.

I chuckle nervously.

“That didn’t end so well, Lou.”

“True.” Beat.  “You’re no fun,” he purrs with a cattish pout. He’s a round, bald bastardization of Ann Margret in Bye, Bye Birdie, a film that my brother and sister and I have recently watched in this very room while my parents were visiting, gossiping about church business into the long hours of a small town Saturday night. Now, on a kittenish roll, he begins rubbing at my crotch in long, incredibly cloying circles. I shift away from him, decidedly uncomfortable, a fact that he just as decidedly ignores. 

“Take me now, Brian, and I’ll buy you a flower and bring you to the prom like Tommy did with Carrie.” His eyes twinkle, a comic counterpoint to a statement that is not only desperately silly, but almost unknowingly cruel. It hits too closely upon desires that I have long harbored in secret. I would love for some handsome young athlete to proudly escort me to a school dance. Often I have longingly stared at schoolmates driving off from Homecoming mixers in cars with their college age sweethearts. How, I wonder each time, did they pull off such a seeming impossible, totally desirable coup? Even my dreams at night are filled with images of me on dinner dates with ripped n ready soap opera studs…and the fact that Lou so assuredly crowns himself as being superior to them in desirability pushes at me with a fiery force. 

“Fine,” I say. “Let’s do it!!”

“What?”

“Show me what you got!”

For the first time ever, I grab at his pants. Leering my fingers at his belt, I jerk at it with awkward revulsion…pawing at him, almost claw-like, the way my mother must do with certain objects. I have watched her make the motions I am now making 1000s of times. Her right hand withered by a childhood bout with polio, I have had to help her open cans, latch the buttons of her girdle, reach for out of place objects since the early days of my childhood. Now, I am, momentarily, afflicted like her, the physical cause of my distress not some relentless virus, but the seemingly unstoppable sexual overtures of Lou. 

For the first time, Lou seems a bit nervous, if agreeable.

“Let me do it,” he squeaks. Then, in what is probably mere seconds, but feels like a film-roll eternity, his black tweed pants are down and bunched at his thighs. I almost laugh at what their unbuttoning reveals. Lou’s underwear is luminously grandfatherly – large, white cotton briefs with majestic give. Standing there, momentarily knock-kneed, he hardly represents the “underflair” highlighted in actor-model Jack Scalia’s highly provocative ads for Eminence briefs. 

Still, pent up annoyance rallying me forth, I reach for their elastic band below Lou’s smooth, rounded gut. Maybe he has an amazing cock? It almost might make this worth it, but…

No.

It is stubby and short – a thin 4 and a half inches. But I’ve started this and, as with the other awkward encounters I’ve had with older summer stock actors, I believe I’ve begun this, so I have to see it through. I don’t want to suck it, though, so I cup my palm around it – squeeze it once, twice, three times. Lou gasps as tiny drools of ejaculate start to leak from the tip.

Suddenly, a car door slams and the sound of crunching gravel echoes closer and closer to the back entrance of the rectory. It is my father coming to pick me up. 

Lou’s eyes flare with mortified adrenaline. He hikes forward, dragging his pants up his nearly hairless legs, hitching his fingers into his underwear and pulling them towards his belly almost simultaneously. Boisterously calling out “Hello,” my father enters through the kitchen, as Lou scatters up the stairs to change. 

I wipe my thankfully clean hands down the sides of my jeans as I turn towards the television. Jamie Lee Curtis, clad only in a hospital nightgown & what I can only assume is a very bad wig, hobbles down a long & winding corridor – a dankly lit path that does not seem to end. I sigh, as my father swings his head into the room and waves at me. I nod, my thoughts elsewhere. I am concentrating on Jamie and the path she jaggedly weaves down. I think that if she can make it out alive, maybe so can I.

Note: (My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.)

Lou…and the Night…and the Music

Published February 15, 2023 by biggayhorrorfan

My first horror movie buddy was a priest named Lou Hendricks. Several years ago, Hendricks was named by the Western New York Catholic diocese as one of their most unrepentant predators in the ’70s and ’80s. Thus, I grew up watching monster movies with a monster – a man who was like an uncle to our family. Over the next few months, I will be sharing some of my stories from that period of time.

My father is away for the weekend and my mother and I are fighting again.

 This should come as no surprise, though. 

A tar dark country night swirls above us, an inky stain that seems to revel in feats of unprecedented madness. This atmospheric wonderland is made for home invasions, furious insults from the maternal line, domestic batteries. On a weekend much like this, many years ago, a distant neighbor ripped the growing baby out of his wife’s straining belly. The mother & child both survived, living on while the town whispered their sordid story behind cupped fingers for the many months that followed. The galaxies must have swirled, chaotically, that evening, peeling the stars, usually so fragrant above our fields, down to tiny pricks of light. Tonight, as it must have been then, I can only count one or two soft glowing spots far above us. Both dim orbs are culling the fervor from within our familial souls. Perhaps, though, this is only a magical exaggeration, and our violent arguing is, as my mother claims, truly the fault of my moony negligence. 

Admittedly, I live in my head…always making up stories, imagining the plot lines of the movies and plays that I will star in once I have escaped into my real life. 18 and a city nurtured existence can’t come soon enough for me. Until those deliriously blessed days arrive, I restlessly spend my weekend hours, wandering from room to room, moodily deciding where I might fit in, character wise, in my favorite soap operas. I even devise passionate and committed off screen love affairs between myself and the handsomest cast members. My head whirls, constantly, with these romantic notions…and this dreamy path only has room for one – any other participants would surely destroy the allure. A stranger, even a family member…let’s be honest, probably most especially a family member, would singly obliterate these illusions, would point out, emphatically, that this is all fantasy…all in my head. So, I fervently channel these possibilities alone…and my mother broods, cut off from my deepest thoughts, picking, critically, around my flight activated edges. Out of hurt, she points out my many faults, weighs out my unmanly preoccupations, arms outstretched as if they were the scales of justice, sentencing me to inferiority like some dirt stained, school yard bully.  

Frankly, I am not immune to jealous notions myself. When she isn’t preoccupied with anchoring down my un-abided affection, my mother murmurs consistently about the wayside kids at the home that she works at, the fever of social work warming her daily blood. Dinners are often focused around the trials & tribulations of these youths, many sent to this country facility, far away from their unfortunate families, with that hopes that our quaint, natural surroundings will protect them from the drug and gang addled lives that they have been subjected to. It seems to me that she is as obsessed with these crime stained wards as she is with me – sometimes even more so – and while I bristle at her clutching attentions, I defiantly do not want them focused elsewhere. It hurts that she so passionately worries about their grades and their meds and the faltering attentions of their own parents. More than that, their histories scare me…much more than the horror films that my family now, due to Lou’s quietly supportive intervention, have reluctantly conceded to be a major part of my life. 

Recently, my mother brought me a letter she received from Dolly, a former student. Dolly and another girl from the village sized reformatory that my mother spends her working hours at visited us once. Slaquered with make-up,  naturally curly hair teased high, her already womanly buttocks stretched tightly into stone washed jeans, Dolly commandeered my stereo that day – sorting through my records like a sassy Ronnie Spector-wired DJ. She and her friend danced throughout our living room, side stepping our curiously nonplussed dogs, discussing (as their arms swung rhythmically, hips clocking to the beat) which boys at the home were the best dancers. Their brash confidence scared me – I don’t think I could ever be that fluidly sure of myself. I was also annoyed at their dissection and momentarily yet propriety claim over my possessions, their dismissal of the artists that they deemed unworthy for some personally identified prime, grooving flow. Those were my albums – I had purchased that stereo with the last of the money saved from a paper route & it was my prized possession. I was able to dance just fine to Liza Minnelli AND John Cougar Mellencamp – no matter what they said. Of course, then I didn’t understand about the quivering insecurity that could flow like swirling streams beneath overt bravado. Soon after her visit, Dolly was reunited with her mother. She was thrilled to be returning to the home that she had been taken away from due to neglect and a supreme lack of supervision. That trend continued unabated upon her reintroduction to that environment— her mother’s boyfriend soon turned his attentions from her mother to Dolly, herself. She became, unsurprisingly, as the world seems to turn on the axis of a gothic beast’s shoulders, pregnant by him. Mere months after the child’s birth, he unleashed his unbounded fury upon her and murdered her in her crib because she wouldn’t stop crying one night. In the letter’s girlishly scrawled missive, Dolly wailed “He killed my baby, ma!!” – a chilling blue inked cry that haunted me beyond measure.

Now, though, the light from one of those solitary stars suddenly beats through the windows of our kitchen. It entrances my mother and, in the middle of her ongoing list of my ingratitudes, she calms, almost bewitched by the power of its flashy sentiment. She stands there, moments passing, watching so quietly that I am worried that she is having one of the mild seizures that overtake her on occasion. Finally, she stirs, utters a deep sigh and, as if forgetting our quarrel entirely, asks, “Would you like lasagna for dinner tonight?” She knows this is my favorite, the meal that she makes with ingenuity and zest. 

“Sure,” I, cautiously, utter.

Transformed, she beams. 

“How many fingers?” she suddenly asks. In our happier times, this is one of her favorite games, a silly testament to my devotion. Normally, I would hold up both hands, proudly, and wiggle my bony digits throughout the air, a physical representation of the 10 fingers that I supposedly have her wrapped around. But I feel too old for this game right now. I can’t let my anger go as completely as she has. I turn away from her and notice part of the letter from Dolly is still scattered across the tiled island in the center of the room – even though it was shown to me weeks ago. Our passions as a family seem to overflow into our sense of order, as well. Things are often cluttered, unattended here – books are battered, left coverless. My parents old Rolling Stones & Brenda Lee albums, all originals, are left out of their sleeves. Correspondence that I should have never been allowed to see is left about, important pages torn & missing.

So, instead of the expected boyish gesture,  I swivel towards her, flipping up the middle fingers on both hands, a defiant double bird. My mother reacts like a bride whose flowing trail has been stamped on, choking her, stopping her short.

She gasps, “I’m calling Lou. He’ll talk some sense into you.”

There is a part of me that wants to object. I have plays to write…my Lisa Hartman album awaits me in my bedroom – Nothing makes me happier than pretending I am her male counterpart – I dance around my private spaces, singing along with Letterock, pretending I am a rock star adored by millions with secret celebrity boyfriends lining the walls of my dressing room. But I know my mother will not be appeased until her orders have been met – until someone in the world, in this case Lou, bears witness to what a rotten child that I am. 

One summer, several years ago, my parents spent a long weekend away. As the oldest, I was sent to stay with my mom’s rigid, often emotionless parents. This was a much less desirable destination than the home of my affectionate, loving paternal grandparents (where my brother and sister were ensconced). Adding further grit to the fuzzy, life-sized lollipop that had been wedged into my mouth, I was instructed to tell my grandparents that I had to go to confession on Saturday, penance for talking back to my mother one too many times. My mother left it up to me to tell them – a nerve jangling experience as I was fully convinced that I would receive further punishment from my disapproving kin. Thankfully, my grandfather just laughed and dropped me off at the church that afternoon while he ran errands. 

Lou, the activated civil servant, reacts in mainly the same way after he quickly arrives. He makes pleasantries with my mother and then asks, “Do you want to go for a ride, Brian?” He winks at me, secretly. “We can talk about treating your mother with more kindness in private.”

 My mother looks at me with an insulting superiority in her eyes, as if I have been suitably chastised. My teenaged attitude executioner has arrived. 

“Sure”, I say.  I am cautious about being alone with him after that flirtatious gesture, but anything seems preferable to the blazing self righteous fury contained now in my mother’s eyes. 

In the vehicle, we roll on in silence for a moment. Lou quietly shifts onto Hoxie Hill Road. Even though I cannot see it through the gloom, I know farmland ripples all around us – pastures, hills, acres of woods that bloom with crisp, orchestral colors in the fall. Everything is round, lush, breathing widely before us, the seeming antithesis of the tightly wound, graffiti graced cities that I desperately long for. Always aware of cultural significance, I note that we are traveling on a byway named after the family of a former schoolmate of mine. Having a curving farm woods lane named after you in this area seems the equivalent of being born into royalty and I wonder what it must be like to feel like you are part of a dynasty – even if it is a backwoods one, unpasteurized milk staining the lips of every descendant – the family cows moaning in fields, a very vocal ancestral crest. I respect every kind of celebrityhood it seems…even the ones that I deem less than desirable. 

“My mother was loved by everyone, too,” Lou finally ventures. “And she loved everyone back. She truly cared about people – which can be hard. As the child, you want to come first. You don’t want to share.” 

I sigh. There is so much more to it. So many complicated strains of emotions bleed through my familial interactions, often on a daily basis. Everything about this life seems way too complicated to decipher in a simple evening’s jaunt. 

Slowly, I gather my thoughts. “I understand,” I begin, “that I have more than anyone at the Home does. & I love mom’s passion for helping them…”

“But…”

“It hurts.”

Lou nods. He rubs my leg with compassion, lingering there for a moment…and then stops, returning his hand to the steering wheel of the car. I tense, ready for some twist – he always finds a way to turn simple affection into something erotic. But moments pass and I realize, for once, he has read this situation compassionately and won’t try to negate it with humor or a winking offer of sexual relief.

And on this kind of night, a night where bloodshed and horror and death would not feel out of place, on this night where a parent’s love feels outlined with a dangerously poisonous intent, I take this respite as a true blessing and, for the first time in many hours, my breathing slows to a normal pace and I feel some kind of hope, no matter how distant, surround me at last.

Perks of the Trade – Phaedra

Published June 28, 2022 by biggayhorrorfan

Perks of the Trade looks at the varied filmography of Anthony Perkins, the queer performer forever associated with Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest onscreen killer, Norman Bates.

I was 19 years old and Marty was way too old for me, his manly body already going soft around the ages. He also never finished college and worked at a grocery store during a time when I thought being a conservatory trained soap opera actor was the only occupation to aim for. Still, I wanted him much more than I wanted the handsome, curly haired carpenter who ran his own construction business and the muscular, blonde pre-med student who adored me and followed me around the dance floor of Christopher Street, the then Mecca of Chicago gay bars, with an unmitigated devotion. Attraction is mysteriously undefinable, a strange beast.

These unpredictable notions of romance often ran through my head when viewing 1962’s Phaedra, the lushly histrionic soap opera that finds Melina Mercouri’s maturely exotic title character rejecting Raf Vallone’s viral and passionate shipping magnet for his strait-laced son, played by a skinny, nervously intense Anthony Perkins. At the time of its release, the majority of critics rejected this grand operation outright – claiming that Mercouri’s amply charmed lass couldn’t seriously have found a moment’s fascination with Perkin’s anxious playboy. But the actor’s fresh-faced desirability does show through here on occasion, pointedly proving why his lighter contrasts might have appealed to Mercouri’s magnificently aging creature.

Thus, one wonders if director Jules Dassin had directed the seduction scenes with less tragic melodrama and more angular kink that the whole enterprise might have played differently. Perkins’ powers reside in his eccentricity and despite finding the quiet strength within himself to go toe-to-toe with Vallone during some climatic sequences, he truly comes alive here during the hysterical sequence when he drives himself to a madly howling death in a European sports car. Delightfully, this entire sequence is included as a track on the movie’s soundtrack album, with Perkin’s strangulated yowls making for one of the most unusual audio experiences ever committed to vinyl – a blazingly creative achievement in and of itself.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Ghosts: Watching Over

Published October 17, 2021 by biggayhorrorfan

My dad would have been 75 last week. In some sort of coincidental converging of significant dates, we are also inching towards the 20th anniversary of his passing. His death in 2002 was totally unexpected….there was no early term cancer or other major health issues – just one final popping of his heart, one warm, late summer afternoon . That endlessly surprising week, my sister and brother & I camped out in the living room of his house in the far stretches of Western New York, pouring through boxes of photos & family mementos, writing his obituary. I would wake in the morning on the floor of that well worn area, my body curved towards my sister’s on the couch, almost like a human cocoon. It was like I was trying to protect her, unconsciously in the night – to cradle her from any further, completely unexpected blows. My niece Gabby arrived later in the week, descending breathlessly upon the funeral home with her father & younger brother. There was no one my father and I adored more in the world…each of us fighting to spend as much time with her as possible on those all too rare get togethers between our far flung family members. That evening, I walked with her into the waiting area where we, quietly, looked at all the memorabilia pertaining to my dad’s life – his existence laid out on cork boards and carefully scattered photo albums. There, upon seeing a photo of herself and my father, my dear, dear niece’s chin began to quietly tremble. As her adorably plump cheeks quivered, one single, fat, perfectly formed tear eventually leaked from her left eye. “Grandpa is dead,” she gasped, “and – I – will – never – ever – see – him – again!”

And I, being the kind of uncle who sang her Husker Du songs as lullabies when she was a toddler and tried to engage her in feminist chants during my infrequent stints as a babysitter , said, “Oh no, you’ll see him again, honey! He’ll appear to you when you need him the most. Your great grandmother, dad’s mom, has shown up to talk to me…even on the day of her funeral. So, maybe you’ll even see grandpa this week. But even if you don’t, he’ll be watching over you, always.” Perhaps, thankfully, it didn’t register in her 5 year old mind that her agnostic, punk rock loving uncle was talking to her about ghosts as the dawn leaked away from the sky that twilight gloaming – but I was….& perhaps rightfully so. My niece has grown up to be strong and sure and independent- the product not only of her own fierce will & a strong familial hand… but perhaps also due to the presence of a man who loved her very much and who has been watching over her from some misty, far off plane.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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