Justin Bond

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New York is Burning:
Xtravaganza Ball @ The Box

November 13, 2009 in Nightlife, Performance by hadjalexiou | 4 comments

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Before Tuesday night, I had only dared to dream about attending a New York City underground ball.

But at the Lower East Side burlesque hall and trendy lounge the Box, I lived out my fantasy. And oh, was it beyond amazing. Fingers were wagging, screams of work bitch! filled my ears. There were shows, there was drama and real life danger. And most of all, there were looks, honey.

Derived from the celebrated “Paris is Burning” (a viewing of this 1990 documentary is obligatory for understanding the magnitude of this event) the apt-named “New York is Burning,” was hosted by the House of Xtravaganza, one of the most popular and collectively talented groups on the ball circuit. It was, most simply, a high-fashion, do-it-yourself runway competition where scores of folks dressed in ways that purposefully defy written description. To use the vernacular of this queendom, before you say anything, you would want to get into the look.

O Brother, thou art kind;
Robert Smiths’ queer reading series

September 24, 2009 in Literature, Nightlife by hadjalexiou | 2 comments

“WE EAT OUR OWN,” said writer Robert Smith, at the first installment of his new queer reading series, Brother, My Lover at the Hose.

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Photo: Joseph Alexiou

“The name ‘Brother, My Lover’,” Smith explained later, “is to promote love and mutual respect in this community.”

The gay cannibalism Smith referred to was our tendency towards extensive cruelty to our fellow feys, dykes, and trannies. Smith wanted to create a communal project where everyone is  “welcome and as loved as I have always wanted and expect from the queer community,”—big surprise, he hasn’t found it yet in NYC.

The “PRO SEX, PRO BODY, PRO WEIRDO, PRO NON-WEIRDO PRO whatever U R, and having people SHUT THE FUCK UP and listen to what it is you got to say,” gathering recalled the Reading for Filth, a dirty queer reading series founded by the late Dean Johnson in the now-defunct Rapture Cafe.

Glenn Marla, one of Wednesday night’s readers, agreed.

“They have same kind of energy,” said writer and performance artist Glenn Marla, referring to Reading for Filth. Brother, My Lover, while not necessarily sex-oriented, encourages participants to “just be.”

Marla’s reading, delivered in his signature bubbly style, discussed his feelings on fertilization (at one point calling it the “world’s deepest fuck”) and how the idea of impregnating his girlfriend, although physically impossible, gets him off.

Spotted in the audience were several scene players, including a bespectacled Justin Bond (the performer, whose recent Sunday show at Joe’s Pub was very well received, politely declined a photograph), Earl Dax, and VGL boy Cole Escola (of LOGO’s Jeffery and Cole Casserole).