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law has led some administrators to censor any content that is sexual in nature unless it pertains to an academic standard.The Hillsborough County School District determined that many of Shakespeare’s works deal with or allude to sexuality (not to mention those works that contain cross-dressing characters), and should therefore be edited. As a result, some of the Bard’s classics, like Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, and Hamlet, now have been barred from the classroom, with students only reading excerpts of the plays in order to meet basic curriculum standards.The district said that teachers who violate the content restrictions for English classes could be subject to disciplinary action or have a complaint filed against them by a parent who believes the books or plays are “inappropriate” for minors to read.If a student wishes to read the censored plays in their entirety, they’ll have to pursue other ways of obtaining the texts on their own time, such as by seeking them out at a public library or privately-owned bookstore not subject to state regulation.Previously, English classes in the district required students to read at least two novels or plays during the school year.

What’s on Emily Holland’s nightstand?“I always have a few books I’m working through,” says the chair of OutWrite, The DC Center’s literary festival, held annually in August.“I’ve been on a bit of a romance kick lately and am currently reading a queer romance called Love at First Set. It’s a nice kind of bedtime read.

Patterns, London teen Liam (Rufus Gleave) wishes for guidance from the poster boy on his wall, English rugby champion Ben Cohen, and, in the show’s camp comedy fashion, his wish is granted.Stepping directly out of a shirtless poster into Liam’s room, the former pro winger materializes to help the kid build up the confidence to conquer school bullies, and finally come out to his, incidentally, pretty DILF-y dad, Preston (Matthew Simpson).The role came as a natural fit for Cohen, who has long put combating bullying and homophobia at the center of his activism, founding the Ben Cohen StandUp Foundation in 2011. Few world-class professional athletes, who are straight, have worn their LGBTQ allyship as prominently or as proudly as Cohen, who goes so far in Patterns as to dance a dream ballet in a crop tee and cutoff shorts, all for the sake of supporting Liam, and kids like him.“This was a great opportunity to be a role model and to help support [Patterns director-producer] Rex [Glensy] through something that I’ve probably always been curious of, with acting,” Cohen says over a video call from his home in the English countryside.Though Cohen has made several non-sports-related TV appearances, most famously as a contestant on season 13 of BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing, he had “never really acted before, in front of the camera.”He credits Gleave, the episode’s young lead, with supporting him.

What makes a good gay bar? Does it depend on the DJ or dance floor? Is it the strong drinks or the decor? Or maybe it depends on what cute people come in (or who you go home with at the end of the night)? In reality, it’s not one thing. The ability to be considered a “good,” if not the best, gay bar requires an ambiance composed of many things. And in Washington, D.C., there is no shortage of options.

Barbenheimer. In other words, I’m nonbinary.And then Hollywood released Barbie and Oppenheimer on the same day, pitting not just the two films, but Man and Woman, against each other. It’s giving internal conflict!I’ve not yet seen Oppenheimer, but I did see Barbie.

Talk to Me (★★★☆☆) — not unlike co-directors Danny and Michael Philippou, twins from Adelaide, Australia, whose YouTube channel, RackaRacka, has cracked over a billion views with its brand of special effects-assisted comedy videos.Working from a script co-written by Danny Philippou and RackaRacka collaborator Bill Hinzman, the filmmakers invest their feature debut with ample compassion for the movie’s circle of camera-clutching Australian high schoolers, who barely distinguish between danger and content.Led by troubled Mia (played with intensity by Sophie Wilde, also making her feature debut), these friends charge full-speed into the maws of death, but none are treated by the film as expendable, nor as merely grist for grisly humor.In fact, Talk to Me doesn’t rack up a high-volume body count as it weaves grave drama into its taut supernatural tale following Mia, her bestie Jade (Alexandra Jensen), and their friends down a dark rabbit hole of convening with the dead.Mia, grief-stricken over the death of her mother, and probably now a bit too attached to Jade’s family, and definitely feeling some kind of way about Jade dating her ex, Daniel (Otis Dhanji), is already teetering on the edge. So when the group, including Jade’s younger teen brother Riley (Joe Bird), gets introduced to a party game that involves contacting the dead — by grasping a cursed, embalmed hand, and inviting the spirits to “Talk to me” — Mia plunges in eagerly, desperately hoping to make contact.Of course, Mia and friends make contact in ways they hadn’t imagined, summoning spirits who enter gladly but then won’t leave.

Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s epic yet introspective, all-star cast biopic Oppenheimer spawned the summer’s most unlikely double feature.The teams behind both films were smart enough to catch on to the public’s pitting the world’s most famous doll against the man who birthed the Bomb.And the team behind this dual review, having completed the double feature in Barbie–Oppenheimer order, can report that both films are smart enough to recognize, respectively, the stereotypical girlishness that Barbie represents, and the inarguably patriarchal society that J. Robert Oppenheimer both represented and at times resisted.Barbie, co-written by Ladybird and Little Women Oscar nominee Gerwig and her Oscar-nominated husband Noah Baumbach, actually turns examining the toy’s impact on generations of girls and women into its whole raison d’être.

desires like these had to be sublimatedNo Barbies for me! GI Joes. Which I hatedBut used when the neighborhood boys would warBut sometimes I’d swipe Barbies from the girl next doorAnd I’d throw the doll back. Didn’t need her, oh noI just needed the dress that I’d tug onto my Joe(In narrative terms, this is known as “foreshadowing”But I didn’t know that.

Instagram post after being crowned by her predecessor, Ona Moody, at the AFAS Theater in Leusden. “Yes I’m trans and I want to share my story but I’m also Rikkie and that’s what matters to me.

letter — a rambling, unfocused missive that allows the attorneys to vent their spleen at Target for embracing and celebrating LGBTQ consumers — accuses Target of violating laws meant to “protect children from harmful content meant to sexualize them and prohibit gender transitions of children.”“As Attorneys General committed to enforcing our States’ child-protection and parental-rights laws and our States’ economic interests as Target shareholders, we are concerned by recent events involving the company’s ‘Pride’ campaign,” the attorneys general wrote in the letter.“Our concerns entail the company’s promotion and sale of potentially harmful products to minors, related potential interference with parental authority in matters of sex and gender identity, and possible violation of fiduciary duties by the company’s directors and officers,” the letter continues.The letter further alleges that putting up Pride displays in stores may violate child protection laws penalizing the “sale or distribution” of “obscene matter.”The letter accuses LGBTQ activists of using Target to advance their own agenda of “exposing Target’s valuable customer base, which include families with young children across the country, to ‘LGBTQIA+’ concepts and values.”The letter lists a litany of offending merchandise that social conservatives were outraged by, such as Pride- or rainbow-themed T-shirts and clothing for children, a “tuck-friendly” swimsuit sold in adult sizes, and an adult-sized T-shirt with the drag queen Katya on it.Even though the latter two items were not marketed toward children nor sold in children’s sizes, the letter deliberately misstates facts and alleges that such products will encourage kids to become transgender.The attorneys then

law, which was approved by the Republican-dominated legislature and signed by Gov. Bill Lee earlier this year.A federal judge subsequently issued an injunction blocking the state from taking any adverse action against doctors who recommend non-surgical gender-affirming treatments, on the grounds that the plaintiffs in the case were likely to succeed in proving their claim that the law is unconstitutional and should be overturned.The plaintiffs have argued that the Tennessee law runs counter to federal laws prohibiting discrimination in health care and violates both the rights of trans minors and the rights of their parents to make whatever medical decisions they believe to be in their children’s best interests.But in a July 8 decision, the 6th U.S.

The Bear‘s second season places us in a frigid Chicago winter, where our beloved, stressed chef Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and his crew are hard at work turning their now-shuttered sandwich joint “The Beef” into “The Bear,” an upscale dining destination.The second season of Hulu’s surprise hit from Christopher Storer (Eighth Grade, Ramy) proves that without change, even the most timeless meals can go off.

Eldorado: Everything the Nazis Hate, reveals a more complex portrait of queer Berlin during the rise of the Nazis.Cantu, German-Hungarian and raised in Berlin, where he’s currently based, professes that before researching Eldorado, he also held fast to legends of Weimar Berlin’s wild parties and sexual liberation.“But when we dig deeper into it,” he says, “it is much more nuanced and much more controversial, especially because the time in the Weimar era in Germany was politically very, very turbulent, and there was a lot of conflicts within society, but also, on a small scale, for people on the streets. So the tension was quite strong.”The danger was real, for the queer and Jewish artists, performers, and impresarios who were the life of the party at cabarets like the film’s namesake, the Eldorado.As depicted through engrossing archival footage and lush dramatizations (separately directed by Matt Lambert), queer regulars at the Eldorado risked harassment and blackmail, as well as being beaten in the streets by the Brownshirts of the Nazi SA, or jailed in police raids.

The Guardian. “We have decided to make a message towards the U.S. government,” the group posted on the social network Telegram, boasting of the Fort Worth breach.

restrict members of Congress and their staffers from using insider information related to the stock market to boost their personal financial standing. A lawyer by trade, the 36-year-old has served as a CNN commentator since leaving Congress. He is likely to face a contested Democratic field.

homoerotic ad indirectly criticizing the former president’s past statements claiming to support LGBTQ rights.Much of the ad, shared by the “DeSantis War Room” account on Twitter, highlights moments from the 2016 presidential campaign when Trump was either trying to distinguish himself from other Republican candidates or trying to peel away some LGBTQ support from Hillary Clinton after clinching his party’s nomination. Whether DeSantis’s campaign made the ad or simply shared it online is unclear.The ad shows a snippet of Trump’s speech from the 2016 Republican Convention vowing to “do everything in my power to protect our LGBTQ citizens,” a reference to Trump’s willingness to defend LGBTQ people from terrorism in the wake of the Pulse nightclub shooting, in which 49 people were killed.The gunman, who was killed in the shooting, had pledged allegiance to ISIS, reawakening concerns about national security and the threat of Islamic radicals carrying out attacks against Americans.It also shows Trump’s campaign selling LGBTQ-themed merchandise, photos of Trump with Caitlyn Jenner, a clip of Trump affirming that Jenner could use whatever gendered restroom she wanted if she came to visit him at Trump Tower, and a clip of Trump, at the time the owner of the Miss Universe pageant, telling the late Barbara Walters that transgender contestants would be able to compete in Miss Universe.The ad splices those video clips with screenshots of tweets and headlines showing Trump supporting — or at least purporting to support — LGBTQ rights, often while pandering to LGBTQ conservatives.

Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed, the latest in-depth documentary portrait by Sid & Judy director Stephen Kijak.Kijak’s films, both narrative and nonfiction, have delved into cultural icons from Judy Garland to Lynyrd Skynyrd to the Backstreet Boys. For this entertaining bio, he worked closely with author Mark Griffin — whose 2018 All That Heaven Allows: A Biography of Rock Hudson is considered definitive — “to look at all the facets and angles, and the reflections and double meanings and mirror selves” presented by the bright, ex-Navy seaman from Winnetka, Illinois, who became Rock Hudson.“He was in some of the more indelible films of those classic eras,” Kijak says, ticking off Hudson’s famous Douglas Sirk-directed romances Magnificent Obsession and All That Heaven Allows.

LOVE, will grace the event’s Meadow Stage on Saturday afternoon.Rogers joins a lineup of queer artists and allies that also includes the band Lucius, Brandy Clark, Yola, Celisse, local faves Oh He Dead, and one of Rogers’ early artistic heroes, Rufus Wainwright.“Rufus is someone I found in college,” Rogers recalls. “That kind of blew my whole world up as far as this incredibly prolific singer-songwriter, writing these songs as an openly gay person in the late ’90s, early 2000s. That is so important and so inspiring to me.”Rogers, who learned piano while still a kid in Ozark, Missouri, had taken to writing his own songs as a necessary means of self-expression and preservation.

Do I contradict myself?Very well then I contradict myself,(I am large, I contain multitudes.)There is something of another queer American in these lines. His name is Ari Shapiro.

Nutcracker break, or in the summer, when all of the companies shut down and there’s this whole industry’s worth of ballet-trained, high-performing dancers who are just out of work. And everybody has to scatter to the winds to find projects.”Palkens has been dancing with Chamber Dance Project for the past few years.

The Flash (★★★☆☆), look no further than IMDb, which has listed every single (uncredited) appearance on the movie’s full cast list. Some cameos are clever, while others are slightly creepy –- yet another example of CGI eerily resurrecting the dead.

“As much as we’ve seen a progression and needed change, in which more schools have an accepting and affirming climate, where people are able to go to a dance and dance with whomever they choose and dress how they want to, for students who are not out, prom can still be an intimidating experience,” says Amy Cannava.Cannava, a school psychologist who serves as program manager for social activities and social support at Safe Space NOVA, is discussing the motivation behind the LGBTQ youth organization’s annual “Pride Prom.”“We’ve also had situations where young people just don’t feel psychologically — if not physically — safe at their own prom because it’s in a smaller school or a school where there are fewer out LGBTQ youth,” she adds. “And so knowing that you’re going into an environment where everyone is either an ally or queer or trans is instantly supportive and disarming, because people don’t feel the need to hide who they are or worry about people questioning them.”Held annually, the Pride Prom is an event that serves as an LGBTQ alternative to a traditional prom for high school-aged students, from rising ninth graders to recent graduates.

One in Two (★★★★☆) — i.e., the audience at each performance will choose which of the cast’s three actors plays the role of Number One, leaving the roles of Two and Three up to chance — it might behoove a critic to see the show more than one or two times to experience multiple permutations of the production at Mosaic Theater.However, there wasn’t time for that before this review, and, more crucially, I’d say audiences can rest assured director Raymond O. Caldwell’s talented trio will deliver — regardless of who plays which part.

Concerned Citizen (★★★☆☆), a cleverly told story of what it means to be a good neighbor and citizen. One who considers himself both, Ben (Shlomi Bertonov), who lives in neat, orderly, Roomba-assisted comfort with boyfriend Raz (Ariel Wolf), plants that tree in an empty sidewalk plot outside their building.Clearly, he deems his efforts a selfless act intended to beautify his rough-around-the-edges neighborhood, located in the outer limits of Tel Aviv.

Pose, Ryan Jamaal Swain, one of the stars of FX’s Emmy-winning, dearly missed ballroom drama, doesn’t hesitate a moment before responding. “Oh, of course. Season two, episode eight.

The (curious case of the) Watson Intelligence was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2014, is on one of many rolls during our conversation about her craft, her queerness, and her breathtaking and powerful climate change comedy Hurricane Diane, currently getting a divine production at the Avant Bard Theatre in Arlington, Va.“Maybe I’m a little bit more mainstream in this way,” she continues. “But what I really want is for people of any gender and sexual identity to be able to identify with a protagonist who is a nonbinary person — or let’s say a trans-masculine butch person or somebody who has for decades and centuries been seen as niche or weird or different. I want that person to be eligible to be the universal human.

Pose, Ryan Jamaal Swain, one of the stars of FX’s Emmy-winning, dearly missed ballroom drama, doesn’t hesitate a moment before responding. “Oh, of course. Season two, episode eight.

The second weekend of June is when the tentpole events of Capital Pride annually occur. It’s also when the Nation’s Capital, a progressive, inclusive, and diverse city year-round, reaches Pride fever pitch.

The second weekend of June is when the tentpole events of Capital Pride annually occur. It’s also when the Nation’s Capital, a progressive, inclusive, and diverse city year-round, reaches Pride fever pitch.

Cultural Currents Institute, Google searches for questions such as “Am I gay?” “Am I lesbian?” “Am I trans?” and “how to come out,” as well as searches for “nonbinary” have jumped by 1,300 percent since 2004.The analysis suggests that more politically conservative states are the “most closeted,” with Utah, Iowa, Indiana, West Virginia, and New Hampshire leading the list of top states where Google users have searched “Am I gay?” For “Am I lesbian?” the top states were: Utah, Connecticut, Kentucky, Washington, and Colorado.For “Am I trans?” the top states were: Utah, Kentucky, Colorado, Michigan, and Washington.For the term “how to come out,” the states with the most searches were: Oklahoma, West Virginia, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Kentucky.“The regional differences highlighted below are significant, offering a geographical landscape of self-questioning and discovery across America,” Cultural Currents’ analysis reads.“Utah, a state with traditionally conservative social values, surprisingly tops three out of five search term categories.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (★★★☆☆).Diehard fans of Spidey comics, games, cartoons, and movies will have a field day trying to spot every iteration of Spider being, gathered from various storylines and product lines, some dating back decades, who pop up here. But there are far too many for our hero, Miles Morales, the bright Brooklyn teen introduced as the new Spider-Man in the 2018 animated Oscar-winner Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, to fully grasp.Miles (Shameik Moore) is still stuck on Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), a fabulous Spider-Woman from another dimension, who teamed with him and a loosely assembled squad of Spider-friends in the first film to defeat Kingpin and Doctor Octopus, and destroy the villains’ black hole-spawning collider.A masterpiece of style and storytelling, Into the Spider-Verse ended with the sound of Gwen’s voice ringing out from her dimension to contact Miles relaxing in his room.

Judy Blume has a movie out. I’ve not yet seen it, but good for her. Her Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing was the first book to elicit laughter from me.

As the region’s major theaters rebound from the dark nights of the pandemic, it’s nothing short of miraculous that its fringe scene — under-recognized and under-funded at the best of times — has found a way to keep the curtains rising. Operating on a wing and a prayer, these tiny theater troupes may be labors of semi-volunteer love, but they are, without doubt, the crazy, tinkling bells that keep a city’s culture alive, vibrant and just a whole lot more fun to explore.

Jean-Hugues Anglade became an arthouse cinema star of the ’80s and ’90s behind the potent one-two punch of international hits Betty Blue and La Femme Nikita. Playing men who loved hard and recklessly, the actor embodied onscreen a raw, alluring passion that he then upended, to powerful effect, portraying mad King Charles IX in writer-director Patrice Chéreau’s 1994 period epic Queen Margot.But a decade earlier, Anglade made his big-screen breakthrough embodying another raw, reckless lover in Chéreau’s gritty, gay, mean streets drama L’homme blessé, or The Wounded Man (★★★☆☆), earning a Most Promising Newcomer César Award nomination for his intense performance as Henri, a young man who comes of age cruising his local train station.The film — which premiered at Cannes in 1983, and had an extremely limited stateside release in 1985 — actually did win the César for its script, by Chéreau and author-activist Hervé Guibert, inspired by the street-savvy works of Jean Genet.Viewing the film now, as it arrives finally on digital home video via a brilliant, new 4K restoration courtesy of Altered Innocence and Studiocanal, other muses also spring to mind, from the slinky sailors of Rainer Fassbinder’s Querelle, released a year prior, to the pugnacious gay hustler of Wallace Potts’ sublimely sexy 1979 French erotica Le Beau Mec.Somewhere between Le Beau Mec and William Friedkin’s Cruising, we might meet Henri, looking like a sweaty, unstable young Al Pacino, as he prowls his economically depressed, French provincial town.

really starting to polish it,” Thea Kano says.The artistic director of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington was referring to a rehearsal of “My Tennessee Mountain Home,” part of the group’s upcoming tribute to Dolly Parton. “Some of our songs are upbeat and fun and all that,” Kano says.

Thank you!“He then turns directly to the phone’s camera.“Sorry for rudely accepting a coffee right now.”Who could blame him? It’s 8:30 on a sunny April morning, and Kelly is here to talk about The Other Two, the show he executive produces with co-creator Sarah Schneider.The pair met while serving as head writers for Saturday Night Live, and after departing after the 2016-2017 season, decided to forge a comedy series under the production umbrella of SNL‘s legendary creator Lorne Michaels.The Other Two premiered on Comedy Central in 2019 and was a modest hit. It was renewed for a second season, and work had begun on it, but Comedy Central abruptly decided to drop it.