“Word Is Out”: A Pneerg Documentary of Gay Voic | The New Yorker

Contents:

• A DOCUMENTARIAN WONRS: 'DO I SOUND GAY?'
• FILMMAKER DAVID THORPE DISCS HIS NEW DOCUMENTARY THAT EXPLOR THE ‘GAY VOICE’ PHENOMENON
• IS THERE A “GAY VOICE”?
• A LGUISTIC INVTIGATN OF "THE GAY VOICE"
• THE GAY VOICE
• DO I SOUND GAY?
• “WORD IS OUT”: A PNEERG DOCUMENTARY OF GAY VOIC
• DOCUMENTARIAN ASKS, 'DO I SOUND GAY?'
• Q&A: IS THERE A ‘GAY VOICE’? DIRECTOR DAVID THORPE ON HIS OUTFT DOCUMENTARY
• REVIEW: ‘DO I SOUND GAY?’ EXAM A MANNER OF SPEAKG
• THIS GUY JT WANTS TO KNOW IF HE SOUNDS GAY
• WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’
• ‘WHO SOUNDS GAY?’

A DOCUMENTARIAN WONRS: 'DO I SOUND GAY?'

In the wake of a bad breakup, journalist and gay activist David Thorpe did what many of do: He took tense ventory of his own flaws and securi, then stepped up one of them to a Thg. A good Thg, as turns out, whose end rult is the charmg documentary Do I Sound Gay?, which Thorpe wryly treats his anxieti about his "gay" voice as an exercise self-improvement, and wds up wh a pellg portra of ternalized homophobia and liberatn.

Back South Carola's Bible Belt, where Thorpe grew up, relativ and childhood iends pot out that he didn't sound gay until he me out of the closet llege. Friends wh his tight-kn gay circle are more divid: Some nfs to hatg their lispg, anoidal voic; others own gayspeak wh varyg gre of fiance and jubilatn. The explanatn that pleas him most is that gay speech has s origs ls blogy or nro-chemistry than early female fluence: Men who grow up mostly around women tend to mimic feme speech styl — which, Thorpe argu, would expla why some straight men sound gay, and why gays who grow up wh brothers often velop basso profundos.

Is very good on the way many gay men who were bullied as children have learned to turn the hatred of others ward, which helps expla s of gay hyper-masculy and ternal ostracism of effemate men. Takg his cue om the swellg ranks of gay celebri (among them Gee Takei, Margaret Cho and the effably funny and ndid David Sedaris) who are willg to speak on mera about liberatg themselv om their own fears, Thorpe realiz he's been askg the wrong qutns. While he was by tryg to iron out his gay voice, New York State legalized gay marriage, and the film's release jt weeks after the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage across the natn.

FILMMAKER DAVID THORPE DISCS HIS NEW DOCUMENTARY THAT EXPLOR THE ‘GAY VOICE’ PHENOMENON

Thorpe sets out to change the way he sounds wh the help of a vol ach, who will aid him tamg his gay voice and give him the abily swch to a more mascule tone, or “ swchg.

I spoke wh Thorpe about the his journey to a new voice, what he learned about gay inty, and how almost everyone has an secury about the way they sound. ” They uld really intify wh my own qutns about swchg and why do I sound gay sometim and not other tim, and was I puttg on or was really who I am? As far back as the later 17th century, you had gay men who would mp up, who would sound effemate, sometim drs drag, sometim have mock weddgs.

IS THERE A “GAY VOICE”?

Tabloid culture has bee part of the fabric of London, and the tabloids portray the men as soundg gay and actg gay, soundg effemate, actg like women and soundg like women. My voice was always a symbol of how I felt about myself and pecially about how I felt about beg gay, and, as the urse of makg the film, I’m more nfint for a lot of different reasons. Before Sean Penn played the charismatic, martyred gay polician a dramatized film, we got to see the real Harvey Milk this documentary om director Rob Epste.

A LGUISTIC INVTIGATN OF "THE GAY VOICE"

Director Marlon Riggs chronicled the experienc of Black gay men this 1989 documentary, wrten by Joseph Beam, Essex Hemphill, and Chris Harris. The team of Rob Epste and Jefey Friedman me up wh another important documentary 1996's The Celluloid Closet, based on the classic book by Vo Rso and explorg how Hollywood has portrayed homosexualy.

"Hollywood, that great maker of myths, tght straight people what to thk about gays and gay people what to thk about themselv, " says narrator Lily Toml. He had strong opns on uture but was hard to p down about his sexual inty; he's been scribed as gay, bisexual, or fluid, but he exprsed disda for labels.

THE GAY VOICE

The San Francis Gay Men's Chos went on a journey of renciliatn at a divisive time -- durg the 2016 printial mpaign -- tourg the Deep South, nsired hostile terrory by many LGBTQ+ people.

DO I SOUND GAY?

Not long after Thorpe broke up wh his boyiend, he began thkg about the way he speaks, and the way other gay men speak, and why both sudnly bothered him so much. Gay adolcents, Thorpe pots out, often learn that the “tell” of their sexualy is their voic, even more so than physily—a limp wrist is easier to straighten out than an flectn. Thorpe talks to a straight iend who sounds “gay” (he grew up on an ashram, surround by women), and a gay iend who sounds “straight” (he has jock brothers).

“For many gay men, that’s the last vtige, that’s the last chunk of ternalized homophobia, is this hatred of how they sound, ” Dan Savage tells Thorpe.

As gays and lbians ga cultural pal, helped along by equaly victori like the one jt hand down by the Supreme Court, “gay voice” will surely evolve, too. Films like Portra of Jason and Tongu Untied, for stance, tell ntemporary viewers as much about the dividual stori about gay Black men prented on screen as about the muni (real and imaged) that their rpective filmmakers brought to bear on their fished films. Siarly, aptly-tled works like Before Stonewall: The Makg of a Gay and Lbian Communy and Forbidn Love: The Unashamed Stori of Lbian Liv offer not jt potent history lsons but snapshots of how Amerins were nceivg of their own muny-buildg the years followg the 1969 Stonewall rts.

“WORD IS OUT”: A PNEERG DOCUMENTARY OF GAY VOIC

Crics Consens: Outrage walks a difficult moral and ethil le -- and not always succsfully -- but spe s flaws, 's a fascatg, provotive look at homosexualy Amerin polics.

DOCUMENTARIAN ASKS, 'DO I SOUND GAY?'

Synopsis: Osr-nomated documentarian Kirby Dick directs this shockg and passnate dictment of the clanste hypocrisy of many closeted homosexuals Washgton,...

Q&A: IS THERE A ‘GAY VOICE’? DIRECTOR DAVID THORPE ON HIS OUTFT DOCUMENTARY

Crics Consens: We Were Here reviss the cris facg the gay muny the early 1980s -- and offers a powerful tribute to the spirg rolve shown at a time of turmoil.

(And if you don't know what I mean when I refer to a "gay voice, " watch the trailer for The Birdge and listen to the male voic, particularly Rob Williams, who -swch based on circumstance. After intifyg phoic characteristics that seem to make a man’s voice sound gay, their bt hunch is that some gay men may subnscly adopt certa female speech patterns. More a display for David Thorpe's ternalised homophobia than an actual documentary explorg the so-lled "gay voice", which has ptered almost all of gays at one time or another, Do I Sound Gay?

REVIEW: ‘DO I SOUND GAY?’ EXAM A MANNER OF SPEAKG

Never outstays s wele and featur some tertg tellectual nourishment but s slight nature and rather limed subject matter renrs this stantly fettable, if ed notable for s great terviews wh the lik of Dan Savage (the go-to terviewee every gay documentary ever), Gee Takei and Margaret Cho.

It's not so much about the orig of the "gay voice" (I'm not that satisfied by the "Gay men listen more to women growg up and imate those feme speakg patterns" bee I don't know if that's te and even if is the qutn of how feme vs.

Mascule speakg patterns emerged still remas) but more about ternalized homophobia that often aris om the gay voice which is fe but there's, like, enough projects out there about ternalized homophobia and I want somethg actually, like, amic and….

THIS GUY JT WANTS TO KNOW IF HE SOUNDS GAY

Is an enthiastic documentary that wants to unver the tth behd the stigma and ternal homophobia the stereotyp of gay voic while hypocrilly mak seem personal enough to go through a journey to change his gay voice to a straight one that feels like gog agast what wanted to be, and only follows the end makg like a drama where he gets a remptn arc to realize he is fe wh his gay voice.

A lively, entertag documentary about one man's (producer and director David Thorpe) stggle to unrstand the so-lled "gay voice" and where om, and to also e to terms wh his tratns wh his own voice and his stat as a sgle gay man his 40s. Distilled om approximately two hundred terviews, featur twenty-six people, om llege age to elrly, and om a variety of backgrounds and plac, whose divergent liv nverge around their mon experienc of persecutn and alienatn as a rult of beg gay.

WHAT MEANS TO ‘SOUND GAY’

It is simultaneoly a prentatn to the world at large about the liv of gay people and an affirmatn, to gay people themselv, that there is a muny out there wh which they n intify. The film provis the begngs of such reprentatn—and the self-aware assertn that this reprentatn is self an stment of polil participants share tailed acunts of the terrifyg nsequenc they suffered for beg gay.

‘WHO SOUNDS GAY?’

A woman lled Whey moved to Greenwich Village, where she’d heard that there were many gay people—and, after her father found her there, she was rcerated for four years a New York State mental hospal. A middle-aged man named Gee Mennhall scrib arrivg San Francis the early fifti, as a young man, and fdg a gay bar—one unr tense police scty and prsure—where a performer named Jose got his dienc to sg an anthem together, an act of uny and llective affirmatn that brgs tears to Mennhall’s ey the tellg.