Firebird's Out Star Tom Prr on the Cold War Gay Romance's Relevance

Contents:

• RSIAN GAY DU
• RSIA TO GAYS: SHUT UP AND DISAPPEAR
• FIREBIRD'S OUT STAR TOM PRR ON THE COLD WAR GAY ROMANCE'S ONGOG RELEVANCE
• THE FILM PUT DON’T WANT THE WORLD TO SEE: FIREBIRD, A GAY LOVE STORY ABOUT FIGHTER PILOTS

RSIAN GAY DU

Cast & crew20141h 16mBoris Brokerov, ex-Soviet hockey star, is asked by the Brish News Network to make a film about the state of ee speech Rsia and to learn a ltle on what 's like to be gay Mos... Read allBoris Brokerov, ex-Soviet hockey star, is asked by the Brish News Network to make a film about the state of ee speech Rsia and to learn a ltle on what 's like to be gay Mosw. He unrgo a powerful transformatn as a rult of makg this Brokerov, ex-Soviet hockey star, is asked by the Brish News Network to make a film about the state of ee speech Rsia and to learn a ltle on what 's like to be gay Mosw.

RSIA TO GAYS: SHUT UP AND DISAPPEAR

As Rsia ntu to flounr Ukrae, wh attempts to pture the small town of Bakhmut turng to a grisly reenactment of the Battle of Verdun, and Kreml propagandists lurchg back and forth between hysteril swagger and the five stag of grief, the Rsian polil tablishment has cid to tackle what’s really important: a natnal “Don’t Say Gay” law.

A bill that outlaws “LGBT propaganda”—fed so broadly as to ver not only gay or transgenr rights advocy but potentially all public exprsns of “nontradnal” sexualy or genr inty—passed the State Duma on November 24 and was approved by the upper hoe of Rsia’s fake legislature, the Council of Feratns, last Wednday. ” (Thk of as the Really Don’t Say Gay Law.

) But do rell Soviet-era censorship unr which any mentn of Tchaikovsky’s homosexualy was scbbed om books and films about the great poser’s life, while bgraphil prefac to Soviet edns of Osr Wil cloaked the reason for his imprisonment such phemisms as “transgrsns agast moraly. ” Ocsnally, foreign books wh gay characters, such as Iris Murdoch’s 1973 novel The Black Prce, slipped past the censor’s vigilant eye. But there uld have been no qutn, for stance, of publishg Jam Baldw’s gay-themed masterpiece Gvanni’s Room, even though Baldw was acclaimed the official Soviet media as a fighter agast Amerin racism; the novel had to wa until 2007 for s first Rsian edn.

FIREBIRD'S OUT STAR TOM PRR ON THE COLD WAR GAY ROMANCE'S ONGOG RELEVANCE

This is not the first time Put-era Rsian legislatn has gone after “gay propaganda”: A more limed 2013 law add “propaganda of non-tradnal sexual relatns” to a broar law that banned the distributn of “harmful” material to mors. The Duma voted down an amendment that would have exempted “universally regnized cultural products” such as lerature and art om the ban; theory, this means, for example, that Rsian translatns of Vladimir Nabokov’s novel Pale Fire, whose prcipal narrator Charl Kbote is nspicuoly gay, uld fall unr the ax.

Jt last month, the premiere of a play lled The Prcs and the Ogre at a children’s theater Novosibirsk was nceled—or at least layed, sce will apparently open this month after vettg by the Mistry of Culture—bee of an anonymo plat om someone who found too gay. Many Rsian mentators, such as journalist and activist Renat Davletgilyev, believe the new law is a transparent attempt by the Put regime to shore up flaggg support among the Rsian public by appealg to homophobia, stg gays as the menacg “other, ” and monizg not only the Wt but Rsian antiwar liberals as “sexual viants.

A report by journalist Sasha Belaya on the Khodorkovsky Live YouTube channel noted that the Duma’s discsn and passage of the legislatn had been acpanied by an anti-gay mpaign the Rsian state media that explicly targeted liberals and dissints. Fellow TV host Vladimir Solovyov livered his mentary on “this filth, this abomatn, this foulns, and nasts” a bizarre sgsong apparently tend to mimic “gay” mannerisms.

THE FILM PUT DON’T WANT THE WORLD TO SEE: FIREBIRD, A GAY LOVE STORY ABOUT FIGHTER PILOTS

In a particularly ironic twist, some propagandists such as Olga Skabeyeva exprsed ncern that the ban on “LGBT propaganda” uld accintally brg the hammer down on homophobic propaganda, bee was unclear what kd of pictns of “nontradnal sexual relatns” were prohibed: Could her own show be slapped wh a fe for showg the Zygar/Shcherbak kiss, albe “wh undisguised revulsn, ” as an exposé of “the liberal public” and of “the Wt and s valu”?

The gay-bashg for domtic nsumptn uld achieve at least some sire effect a untry where nearly 70 percent of the populatn believ that nsensual same-sex relatns between adults should be illegal and half say they feel personal hostily toward LGBT people. But is que likely that the current Rsian anti-gay mpaign, cludg the anti–“LGBT propaganda” law, is tend at least part for a Wtern dience—a specific part of , that is.