Jeffrey Johnson, seen here as drag character Special Agent Galactica, is organizing Ganymede Art’s first gay and transgender fall arts festival. (Photo courtesy of ganymede arts)
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KATHERINE VOLIN
Friday, October 19, 2007
Although gays and arts go together like George Michael and drug-related scandals, the former gets far less press than the latter.
“I think that there is a good percentage of art that is gay, but very rarely is it presented with that as being the focus,” says Jeffrey Johnson, who is the artistic director of what was formerly known as the Actors’ Theater of Washington. The organization, which was renamed Ganymede Arts this year, seeks to correct that with a direct focus on local gays in the arts.
“To us, the whole thing is about community,” Johnson says. “OK, yes, so this artist has been featured in this art show and this performer has been here and this dancer has danced with this company but now they can come here and say we are all members of this community and here we are, representing ourselves this way.”
As part of the reintroduction of gay artists to the Washington public, Ganymede Arts, named after the gay cupbearer to the Greek gods, will host its first GLBT Fall Arts Festival today through Oct. 28 at the Church Street Theater in the middle of the 17th Street gay district of Dupont Circle. The festival will include every art imaginable, including comedians, actors, poets, musicians and, of course, drag queens.
“We thought the best way to put our money where our mouth is and really show an example of who we now are is to do a festival, [and] start off really supporting everything,” says Johnson, who will even be appearing in the festival in drag as his alter ego, Special Agent Galactica, in a full-scale production on Saturday.
He says he hopes the festival will become an annual event, but adds that funding will dictate what the company will be able to do.
“The [Church Street] Theater seats 120 people. I’d love to see it filled every single night,” he says. This could happen, given the price. With the exception of three full theatrically produced events, including an opening night performance of a one-woman show by actress Karen Black, all performances will be pay-what-you can.
LOCAL GAY ARTISTS seem to be responding favorably to the concept, given the full lineup during the 10-day event.
“I just think it’s fantastic,” says Michelle Burleson, a local lesbian musician who will be performing as part of the Rock and Roll Weekend, Oct. 26-27. “They’re having basically every variety of arts and entertainment in the queer community come out and shake the money maker.”
Formerly part of lesbian band Box, Burleson will be performing as a solo artist for the arts festival. She plans to perform “Lezzies for the Lord,” one of her more controversial pieces.
“Sometimes I’m real selective about which clubs I play that in,” she says. Some of Burleson’s friends, the Cliterati, a group of feminist slam poets from Atlanta, will also be performing in the festival, but as part of the piano and poetry night, which may end up being more exciting than it appears on paper.
“They’re doing something really amazing up here,” Burleson says about the Cliterati.
Local gay musicians Tom Goss, TJ Gaghan and Michael Fitzgerald will round out Saturday’s rock and roll offerings, which are all pay-what-you-can.
THE WEEKEND WILL ALSO include something for those who like their Washington history with a dash of gay spice. “The Loves of Mr. Lincoln” is a play that gay literature professor David Hopes, who teaches at the University of North Carolina, started composing last spring while visiting the Lincoln Memorial.
“It was time to write a play about [Lincoln’s relationships] and this was the way that I could make a play that was not just a history chronicle,” Hopes says. He adds that the “loves” of the title include America, Lincoln’s wife Mary Todd and Josh Speed, with whom Lincoln was close. Although he fleshes out the relationship in the play, Hopes says he doesn’t consider the play controversial and says he’s not trying to allege Speed and Lincoln were lovers.
“People make much of the fact that they shared a bed. Everyone shared beds in the 19th century,” Hopes says. Lincoln also once wrote to Speed that “you are the person I love most in the world,” according to Hopes. “The rhetoric of correspondence was different back then, but it seemed to me that he meant that. He wasn’t guarded.”
Hopes pitched the play to Ford’s Theatre, but they responded by saying that Ganymede might be a better venue for it.
“It perplexes me a little to be included in a gay festival, but that’s cool. If it’s a Martian festival, I’d like to be included in it,” Hopes says. Ganymede has declared its night, Tuesday, a “night of controversy.”
“It’s a little shocking to see it advertised as a night of controversy,” Hopes says.
From Johnson’s perspective, however, the nature of the play naturally engenders some eyebrow-raising.
“If Ford’s can’t do it, than it has to be controversial,” Johnson says. “There’s just some great things [in the play] … we’re just bubbling over.”
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