THEGAYUK

Category: Entertainment

  • FILM REVIEW | Big Gay Love

    ★ | Big Gay Love

    Ringo Le’s comic drama admirably tackles the concept that even in our physique obsessed culture, gay men who are socially inept and more than pleasantly plump can still get their chance at a big romance.

    The lonely soul in this instance is Bob, who is a chubby successful party caterer in LA who has made enough money to buy his first house but desperately sad as he has no-one to share it with. For some reason (insecurity?) his only friends are a couple of vapid vain gym rats who are as self-centered as his mother who was once a famous Pin Up Girl.

    When at one of his own parties, he meets Andy a handsome beefy accomplished chef & restaurant owner, and budding writer to boot, who actually fancies him, Bob’s low-self esteem kicks in big time. The trouble is for Bob… and for us too… that once Le sets up the scenario the initially promising story disintegrates through a series of convoluted and somewhat ridiculous plot twists and the whole mishmash becomes one annoying big pity party for Bob.

    The cast includes the talented Jonathan Lisecki (the writer/director/actor of ‘Gayby’) and handsome Nicholas Brendon (from ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’) but with zero chemistry between them and a very stilted script, both of them looked as uncomfortable as we felt by the time the final credits rolled. They would be lucky to find a small gay love at best!

    Big Gay Love = Big Gay Yawn.

  • FILM REVIEW | Hollywood To Dollywood

    ★★★★ | Hollywood To Dollywood

    One of the very first things you learn from this enchanting wee documentary is that when you are growing up gay in a Southern Baptist family in a small North Carolina town you worship both God and Dolly Parton in equal measure.

    Handsome identical twins Gary and Larry Lane, now in their mid 30’s, got as far away as they could from their childhood homes when their family struggled to come to terms with the fact that they are both gay. Now they are living the lives they always wanted in West Hollywood, these inseparable brothers are desperate to fulfil their long-held dream. They want to present Dolly Parton with a movie script they have written for her based on her life story, and they also want their families to finally accept them for who they are.

    This film then is of their road trip in an RV christened ‘Joleen’ right across the country to Pigeon Forge Tennessee where Dolly is scheduled to appear in person at her famous theme park and where they are planning to get the script into her hands. They also hope that once their family see the finished documentary it will help them appreciate the fullness of the rather wonderful lives they have shaped for themselves.

    Before the start of the journey they persuade a few of their LA celebrity friends to read through the script and give them advice and any tips. They include Oscar Winning Scriptwriter Dustin Lance Black, and actors Leslie Jordan, Chad Allen & Beth Grant. None of them is immune to the boy’s infectious charm and boundless good humour.

    On the road with Gary’s boyfriend Mike doing most of the driving, the twins spend a lot of time verbalising about how childhood and in particular the rejection by their mother when at aged 25 they finally came out to her. She would not believe them and tried to make them swear on the Bible that they were not gay, and when they refused, she fell apart. Even now none of the rest of the family or their neighbours knows. Such treatment would have devastated most people but not these good-natured resilient twins who are still determined to be accepted regardless how long it takes them.

    The rest of the trip seems to be spending time with other people who also worship at the shrine of ‘Saint’ Dolly and who are so excited to give testimony with such fervour on camera as to how she has enriched all their lives. And when the boys arrive at their destination actually manage to get a brief meeting with Dolly herself, she is so welcoming and graciously accepts the script, they feel like they have died and gone heaven.

    Whether the script was any good, and whether Dolly liked it at all is really irrelevant. What makes this film so endearing is the twins unshakable faith in themselves and the people they love. And Miss Dolly Parton, who I would chose over God any day.

  • Andrea Faustini To Give Full Diva With Whitney Houston Classic

    Okay, who is looking forward to Andrea Faustini’s rendition of a Whitney classic.

    Andrea Faustini is bound to wow a national audience tonight live on the XFACTOR as he takes on the classic Whitney track, I Have Nothing.

    Speaking about performing at the live shows, Andrea said, ‘I just want to sing my heart out, show everyone who I really am, and give everything I have. I think this is the greatest chance I’ve ever had in my life. I still can’t believe it right now.’

    Andrea, who is the bookies’ favourite to win this year’s XFACTOR said in an interview that he felt overwhelmed when it was announced that he would be taking part in next year’s XFACTOR Tour. The tour features the finalists of the show.

    Here’s what the other contestants are singing:

    Girls
    Lauren Platt – How Will I Know?

    Groups
    Only The Young – Something About The Way You Look Tonight

    Stereo Kicks – Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me

    Overs
    Ben Haenow – I Will Always Love You

    Fleur East – I’m Every Woman

    Stevi Ritchie – I’m Still Standing

    Tonight’s show is the Whitney Vs. Elton John, you can watch it on ITV1 from 8:00PM

  • THEATRE REVIEW | Accolade, St James Theatre

    ★★★★★ | Accolade, St James Theatre

    London, 1950: Private and public worlds collide when on New Year’s Day author Will Trenting’s knighthood attracts the glare of the British press. Happily married novelist, Will, has been leading a double life. Drawn to the seedier side of life, he’s been mixing with London’s ‘low-life’ and indulging in debauched sex parties and drunken debauchery. Will is forced to battle against the exposure of his secret life, its effect on his family and friends and the double standards of a society bent on destroying him.

    Rising star Director Blanche McIntyre (Best Director 2013, UK Theatre Awards) directs Emlyn Williams’ tale of sex, scandal and blackmail. As relevant now as when it first shocked audiences in 1950, this gripping thriller was awarded Time Out’s Best Off West End Production and three Off West End awards including Best Production when it was presented at the Finborough Theatre in 2011.

    Playwright Emlyn Williams was openly bisexual, balancing his marriage and family life with a series of flings. Coming out as bisexual ahead of most of his contemporaries, Williams’ play echoes his own private life. Surprisingly, the play passed the strict censorship rules of the early 1950s and still retains a freshness and salacious yet sympathetically drawn power to shock in 2014. This is a superior play and a worthy revival of a piece that was sadly neglected and mostly forgotten for many years. Shades of Coward and Rattigan exist but this play has a daring boldness that wasn’t always evident in works of the era.

    The staging and cast are pitch perfect with no weak links in the powerful nine-person line-up. The versatile set invokes the feel of the early 1950s and manages to echo the play as the walls slowly close in along with the world Trenting inhabits.

    I’d heartily recommend catching this rare gem at the St James Theatre.

    Accolade runs until the 13th of December 2014

    Buy tickets here: http://www.stjamestheatre.co.uk/theatre/accolade/

    by Chris Bridges

  • As New HIV Infections Soar, Hollyoaks Plans To Tackle With Postive Storyline

    One of the UK’s most cutting edge TV soaps, Hollyoaks, is to tackle the rising numbers of gay men who are newly infected by HIV.

    Keiron Richardson is set to make history when his character, Ste Hay, on Hollyoaks becomes the first HIV positive gay man in a British soap, in an attempt by the production company to tackle sexual health issues in gay men.

    On Monday new figures from PHE (Public Health England) revealed that new HIV infections amongst MSM (men who have sex with men) continue to buck the downward infection trend.

    Shockingly nine gay or bisexual men are infected with HIV everyday in the United Kingdom.

    Will Harris, Head of Media at Terrence Higgins Trust, said, ‘We always say that a well-researched, well-told storyline in a national soap is worth any number of health campaigns, especially for a stigmatised condition like HIV. It’s important because currently whole generations of young gay men are entering adulthood without the confidence they need to negotiate healthy sex and relationships.’

    Executive producer Bryan Kirkwood said, ‘We have wanted to tell this story for a long time and while HIV can affect anyone, infection rates in young gay men remain too high and to ignore that is to do the gay audience a disservice. Hollyoaks is in a unique position to be able to talk directly to millions of young viewers and if the safe-sex message is not coming through education we can help with that both on screen and through multi-platform support.

    ‘2015 is Hollyoaks’ 20th year and to make that our “year of safe sex” felt right for a show built upon telling rites of passage stories. With Ste’s HIV and other stories for our teenage characters we will explore the many implications of unprotected sex and hope to encourage thoughtful debate amongst our audience.’

    This isn’t the first time that Hollyoaks have reached out to gay audiences with hard hitting storylines. In January the programme in its 19th year wrote about male rape in a crueling storyline which saw John Paul McQueen assaulted by Finn O’Connor.

  • Jake Quickenden to enter The Jungle

    Jake Quickenden, who’s appeared on the X Factor show twice now, will be entering the Australian outback tonight in I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!

    The surprise entrance will be made with ex-conservative MP Edwina Currie, joining the host of celebrities at base camp who’ve already battled with nature for the last four days. So will the jungle prove scarier than facing Simon Cowell?

    Jake and Edwina will no doubt help to boost the numbers of the camp after Gemma Collins, TOWIE, walked on Wednesday after struggling with camp life and today Craig Charles has decided to leave camp following news of his brother’s death, reported in the Mirror.

    You can catch the arrival of Jake and Edwina tonight on ITV.

  • Here It Is: The Johnny Carter And Ben Mitchell Kiss

    After weeks of will they? won’t they?, is he?, isn’t he?, Ben Mitchell and Johnny Carter finally share a smooch.

    CREDIT: (C) BBC - Photographer: Kieron McCarron
    CREDIT: (C) BBC – Photographer: Kieron McCarron

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  • FILM REVIEW | Life Itself, Totally Unmissable

    ★★★★★ There are very rare occasions when the somewhat jaded and skeptical Press and Movie Industry audience at the Sundance Film Festival are ever moved to tears.

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  • FILM REVIEW | Campaign Of Hate: Russia And Gay Propaganda

    ★★★★ | Campaign Of Hate: Russia And Gay Propaganda

    Uber gay porn king Michael Lucas has kept his clothes on in front of the camera for a second time with his new documentary about the plight of gay men and women in Russia. It is a vast improvement on his first attempt at getting serious with his ‘Undressing Israel’ movie where life for the stream of hot gay hunks he interviewed couldn’t have been any rosier. Here Russian-born Lucas (born Andrei Lvovich Treivas) was back in Moscow his birth city to discuss that being a homosexual during Putin’s regime can be a serious danger to your health.

    It’s hard to get past a culture where the first time young gay kids learn anything about their sexuality is when they open their Soviet Encyclopedia and turn to the letter H. There for homosexuality they read just three facts. 1: it’s a sickness, and 2: a harmful influence of the West, and 3: it;s a crime for which you can go to prison for. And it doesn’t get much better for when the boy turns into a young man he will not just be mocked and humiliated by society but gay bashed several times and quite severely.

    The personal accounts of the gay Russians trying to lead normal lives, albeit almost all of them in the closet, were grim and depressing. Given the fact that they have to deal with so much sheer undisguised hatred every working day, it is no wonder that all of them without exception would choose to leave and move anywhere else in the world to live if they could.

    One of the commentators that Lucas interviewed made several good observations about in this present tough economic climate in Russia, Putin needs to distract people’s attention from his main problems and focus them on other media grabbing agendas. The harassment of gay people is one such target especially as they are considered a soft option and will not fight back. It has eerie overtones of the old Bush campaign that stirred up the US conservative wing about gay marriage in such a way that they would be sure to turn out to vote on Polling Day and at the same time re-elect him. Coincidentally our economy was in ruins then, but somehow that was hidden from us at the time.

    The rhetoric spouting by one of the vehemently anti-gay legislators as he justified his unequivocal hatred of the LGBT community was barbaric and heinous and he refused to accept either reason or factual information. When Lucas informed him that there was data that showed that the largest single group of people who committed suicide in Russia where young gay teenagers, I thought the man would explode with rage.

    Some of the gay and lesbians that Lucas interviewed tried to put a brave spin on the situation saying that things were definitely improving and that LGBT was now becoming accepted as part of the general protest. The majority of the others, however, thought it was just getting worse.

    Lucas’s interesting film probably didn’t say anything new, and it avoided drawing its own conclusion as to what lie ahead for the gay community there. It does however quite rightly serve as a wake-up call for those of us that live in the relative freedom of the West, lest we should ever think that gay rights are the rights for everyone.

  • Is this the song that will destroy Christmas?

    Television X has announced the launch of the festive single by TVXbabes in a bid to hit the No.1 in the UK music charts this Christmas.

    The original song called ‘Coming For Christmas’ is described as a ‘high-energy, fun and poptastic Christmas contender’ for the coverted number one slot for Christmas day.

    The single, will be officially launched on 1st December with the unveiling of the full video on 27th November on the TVXbabes You Tube channel.

    Artists that currently have their sights set on gaining an elusive Christmas Number 1 slot include: Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas, John Lewis’s Real Love, the X Factor winner and Iron Maiden.

    Sneak a peak at the teaser video here

  • FILM REVIEW | In Their Room: London / Berlin / San Francisco

    US Filmmaker Travis Mathews is a professional voyeur.

    His documentary movies all focus on gay men and their intimacy and are very raw and explicit. His most successful project to date is ‘Interior Leather Bar’ where he, and a somewhat obsessed James Franco, pieced together what they thought maybe the content of the chunk of William Friedkin’s 1980 gay classic ‘Cruising’ that the Censors insisted on being deleted. Before this however, Mathews embarked on series of videos, that have now been released under the banner of ‘In Their Room’.

    The first ‘episode’, a 20 minute short, was filmed in Mathews hometown of San Francisco where armed with just a simple video camera he visits 8 men alone in their bedrooms. Some are clothed, some naked, some are silent or reticent to share, whilst others are happy to expose every intimate detail of their thoughts about love and sex. Although it is always mainly the latter.
    The second film, shot in 2011, continues to voyeuristically document what goes on in the minds and bedrooms of urban gays. Now in Berlin, Mathews lingers on the tension and circular nature between intimacy and loneliness by documenting a handful of gay men as they troll the web looking for hook-ups or love. It is the only film in which he actually features a coupled pair, and is probably the most explicit of the three films.

    The third and final film made last year focuses on 8 gay men in London. I’m not sure if it was deliberate on Mathew’s part, but the bed-sitting rooms of his subjects this time around look decidedly squalid. Again he manages to draw out the men’s most private thoughts and aspirations as they talk aimlessly as he films them doing the banalest daily tasks. It is also the one episode when the vulnerability and loneliness of urban gay men really starts to seep through.

    The work is an interesting experiment, which although shares nothing new with us, at least gives us a moment to reflect on parts of our lives that many gay men have difficulty discussing. The series is definitely not for everyone, but at least you don’t have to have a Masters Degree in Counselling Psychology (like Mathews has) to appreciate it.

    Out December 2015