In “Swan Song,” the acclaimed German actor plays a character whose gay history mirrors his own ntributns to queerg the movi
Contents:
- INTERVIEW: UDO KIER ON SWAN SONG, EMBODYG MR. PAT, AND BEG A GAY IN
- 'SWAN SONG' IS A 'LOVE LETTER' TO DISAPPEARG GAY CULTURE, DIRECTOR SAYS
INTERVIEW: UDO KIER ON SWAN SONG, EMBODYG MR. PAT, AND BEG A GAY IN
* is udo kier gay *
People have told me about gog to to a gay bar, [and] they had to [stand] ont of the door and look right and left to make sure nobody saw them gog . Pat mak p stops at the se where his hoe once stood, the salon n by his former employee-turned-rival (Jennifer Coolidge), and even the gay bar he ed to stt through like a kg (or drag queen, rather).
Pat and an old iend are remiscg when he remarks, “I don’t even know how to be gay anymore. It’s a lovely acknowledgment of the bt today’s LGBTQ2S+ people owe to earlier generatns of gay men, particularly nelly queens like Pat, known to most as Mr.
The acknowledgment of queer legaci the film is particularly ronant given that s star is an out, gay actor who’s ma approximately 200 films over more than half a century. While studyg England, the young, extraordarily handsome Kier was spotted by gay mil entreprenr Robert Stigwood. A meetg wh gay director Van Sant at the Berl Film Ftival led to My Own Private Idaho 1991, his first U.
'SWAN SONG' IS A 'LOVE LETTER' TO DISAPPEARG GAY CULTURE, DIRECTOR SAYS
Film in Udo Kier has received some of the bt reviews of his reer for playg a retired gay hairdrser 'Swan Song.' * is udo kier gay *
When he ma Mark of the Devil 1970, gay director Michael Armstrong had to cut queer implitns om the script. Over 20 years later, 1991, Kier was fally able to play a gay character von Trier’s Europa, though the character’s queerns is only mentned passg after his murr.
That film generated some plats om gay dienc when Reev’ character Stt Favor rpond to Phoenix’s Mike Waters’ prottatns of love by remdg Waters that he only slept wh men for money. By 2009’s Hoe of Boys, however, the oppose happened: The ostensibly straight Jake (Benn Northover), who strips and turns tricks a gay baret n by a drag queen played by Kier, ends up the arms of a gay -worker after his girliend steals om him. His newt film, Swan Song, giv Kier the chance to work wh gay wrer-director Todd Stephens, who has been celebratg his queerns on-screen sce he wrote the g-out story Edge of Seventeen 1998.
That film started what Stephens lls his “Sandky Trilogy”: Three films—cludg Edge of Seventeen, 2001’s Gypsy 83 and, now, Swan Song—about gay life the small town where he grew up.