QSaltLake Magazine | Issue 354 | December 2023

DECEMBER, VOL. • ISSUE QSALTLAKE.COM

UTAH PRIDE CENTER’S NEW LEADER, NEW BOARD, PLAN FOR MOVING FORWARD UTAH LOG CABIN REPUBLICANS STRIPPED OF CHARTER • TEAM HARDWOOD

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Drag Queen Storytime Gone Wild!

Sunday, December 3, 2023 @ 6pm

The Rose — Jeanne Wagner Theater 138 W Broadway

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designer Christian Allred sales Michael Aaron, 801-997-9763 x1 sales@qsaltlake.com Meda Thompson, 208-576-1444 meda@qsaltlake.com Rivendell Media, 908-232-2021 ext 200 sales@rivendellmedia.com NATIONAL NEWS editor Craig Ogan contributors Joshua Adamson Pickett, Diane Anderson-Minshall, Chris Azzopardi, Paul Berge, Jeff Berry, Paul Campbell, Laurie BennettCook, Roger Cox, Stephen Dark, Jennifer Dobner, Jack Fertig, Greg Fox, Oriol Gutierrez Jr., Tony Hobday, Blake Howell, Ashley Hoyle, Joshua Jones, Christopher Katis, Alpha Mercury, Sam Kelly-Mills, Craig Ogan, Peter Reynolds, Mikey Rox, Terri Schlichenmeyer, Gregg Shapiro, Petunia Pap Smear, Steven Petrow, Ed Sikov, JoSelle Vanderhooft, Ben ­Williams, D’Anne ­Witkowski

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news The top national and world news since last issue you should know

by Craig Ogan

George Santos, not gone, will not return The U. S. House of Representatives released its Ethics Committee Report on Republican New York Representative George Santo. Santos claims to be gay, though no one believes it, and had hoped this status might protect him from trouble. Do not look for his expulsion this Congress yet. Santos is part of a four-seat Republican majority, which gives them the speakership and committee chairs. After the report’s release, he announced he wouldn’t run for reelection, but who can believe a word out of his mouth? The ethics committee made a referral to the U. S. Department of Justice for actions the committee identified as criminal, including using campaign funds for personal purposes and filing false campaign reports. The committee found “a complex web of unlawful activity involving personal and business finances. Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit.”

Qsaltlake.com |

New U. S. House Speaker The new Speaker of the U. S. House of Representatives is being criticized for what is considered “anti-2SLGBTAIA activity” before his election to Congress. The Human Rights Campaign denounced the Speaker and those who voted for him. “The MAGA House majority has selected the most anti-equality Speaker in U.S. history by elevating Mike Johnson — this is a choice that will be a stain on the record of everyone who voted for him.” As an attorney for “pro-family groups,” he wrote editorials opposing eliminating legal restrictions on sodomy, were against marriage equality, and opined that “the homosexual lifestyle” was destructive to individuals, families, and society. In the Louisiana legislature, he introduced a “religious freedom” bill that was thought could legalize discrimination against married same-sex couples.

In Congress, he introduced a version of the Florida law critics call “Don’t Say Gay.” In news interviews, he says marriage equality and non-discrimination are now the law of the land, and he has other priorities as House Speaker.

Time wounds all heels The former Florida lawmaker who sponsored the controversial law critics call “Don’t Say Gay” has been sent to prison for six months for wire fraud, money laundering, and making false statements in connection with COVID-19 relief fund misuse. He got $150,000 from the Small Business Administration’s Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program by making false statements and then using the

money for personal expenses.

School book fairs The Scholastic Book Fair’s good intentions to create a separate category for books with LGBTQ+ themes and information met opposition, but not from “book banners.”

Scholastic provides educational material for public schools and runs book fairs where students may browse the offerings in person or online.

The problem? PEN America, a free speech group and partner of Scholastic, believes the separate catalog accommodates the “nefarious laws and local pressures” and makes them “an accessory to government censorship.” More than 30 states have legislation aiming to restrict certain books in schools, specifically ones that include LGBTQ+ topics and racial diversity.

Red Wine & Blue, a political group of “liberal moms,” also started a petition against the separate book selection.

Florida drag restriction law blocked A U.S. Supreme Court and the Circuit Court of Appeals have upheld a decision that Florida cannot enforce the law barring businesses from allowing children to view live entertainment deemed inappropriate for young eyes. circuit court judge ruled the law “creates an unnecessary risk of chilling free speech.”

Florida wanted to enforce the law while they appealed the ruling, and the court said, “No.” The Supreme Court ruled that there was no “reasonable probability” that the Court would eventually grant certiorari on the case. Orlando’s Hamburger Mary’s, which runs a “Drag Brunch” that allows children to attend with parents or

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guardians, challenged the law’s constitutionality.

Queers for Palestine, no tit for tat “Queers for Palestine” decry Israeli army activity in Gaza after the massacre

by Hamas and the call for ‘decolonization” of Palestine. What do Palestinians think of the Queer support?

Palestine ranks #190 out of 197 countries, according to HRC’s “LGBTQ+ Equality Index.” Homosexuality is punishable by death in Palestinian-controlled areas.

Many gay Palestinians flee to Israel, which has quite liberal laws for a place, like Utah, established by adherents of a socially conservative religion.

Islamic scholar Mohammed Saleem Ali said in a sermon at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem that the Palestinian people will not allow a single homosexual to openly declare “his abomination,” and that they will not “allow a single homosexual on the land of Jerusalem and Palestine.”

Japan’s baby steps on gender change Japan’s top court found that some of a law governing gender marker changes was unconstitutional. That portion required a person changing gender markers to be sterilized. This brings Japan into line with the European Court of Human Rights and the United Nations. The Court sent a second provision of the law requiring the genitals of the person wanting to change the marker to correspond to the sex they claim back to a lower court for deliberation.

No changes in the genitalia requirement will leave Japan in line with Iran and some other Mid-East, Eastern European, and African countries’ laws.

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Barry’s out, who knew Barry Manilow came out in 2017 in People Magazine. To reiterate that which everyone always knew, he chose another low visibility media vehicle, “Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace?” which streams on Max. He told the former Fox News anchor, “The public was not ready for anybody to come out” as gay in the 1970s. “Back in the 70s, it would have killed a career.” With Wallace, he discusses his long-time partner, manager, and now spouse, Garry Kief. The couple met in 1978 and married quietly in 2014. Barry and Garry, how gay is that? Manilow was in

an opposite-sex marriage until 1966. He started his musical career creating music for TV commercials (State Farm Insurance-“Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there;” Band-Aid, “I am stuck on Band-Aid, ’cause Band-Aid’s stuck on me”; and McDonald’s “you deserve a break today”). He then started writing popular music and performing with Bette Midler at NYC’s Continental Baths.

His hits include “Mandy,” “Looks Like We Made It,” “Copacabana,” and 51 other Top 40 Popular Songs. He has recently returned to Las Vegas to perform and has written the music for the recent Broadway show, “Harmony.”

Bud Light goes toxic So, the last time Bud Light was heard from, the brand had hired Tik-Tok transgender tyro Dylan Mulvaney to broaden the beer’s customer base. After a big drop in sales and stock value for the brand’s parent, Anheuser-Busch, and threats of suits from distributors, the marketing department was nuked. The new marketing department thinks it is going in a different direction to reestablish Bud’s identification with infantile men. Naturally, they have made a big sponsorship deal with toxic masculinity in the form of the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

UFC is a company that stages gladiatorial performances by chemically altered men and women dressed provocatively and involved in extremely close body contact. From 30,000 feet, it appears not a lot

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S. Korea Military, No gay stuff South Korea’s constitutional court, citing a possible risk to the military’s combat readiness, upheld a law banning same-sex relations within the country’s armed forces. Military members can face up to two years in jail for getting out of line, sexually, with another member of the military of the same sex. It is unclear if members of the military face sanctions for fiddling with a non-military member in the general population. South Korea has one of the world’s largest active armies, with all able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 28 required to keep their hands to themselves for 18 and 21 months. Q

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Incoming executive director Ryan Newcomb holds a press conference announcing changes.

COURTESY PHOTO

Utah Pride Center announces new leadership, new path forward Utah Pride Center leaders announced a new executive director, a new board, and a new path forward at a press conference November 15. They also announced the continuation of the Utah Pride Festival and Parade.

The Utah Pride Center announced in August that it laid off seven of its 19 staff members, and later furloughed the rest of the staff, citing the “instability of our organization.” Leaders temporarily closed the doors of the Center, partially reopening them in October.

producer ERICA GABRIEL is now vice chair. HR professional DYLAN ­WALKER is the board secretary, and CPA KIRK BRAGDON is the board treasurer.

Commercial banker NATHAN CRYER remains on the board. J­ USTIN ANFINSEN, a director at Valley Behavioral Health, and social workers STACEY FRANCONE and KENNY LEVINE are new to the board.

Three out of the eight board members are women and there is lesbian, bi, gay, and transgender representation on the board.

New Board

New Executive Director

Eight people now make up the board of directors for the organization — all of whom joined in 2023.

Family law attorney and Just Law LLC cofounder JESSICA COUSER took over as board chair earlier this year. Event

RYAN M. NEWCOMB, who has a 16-year resume as a nonprofit executive and fundraising professional, will take the helm as executive director of the troubled Center. Newcomb told QSaltLake in an interview that his past experience

BY MICHAEL AARON

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of working in nonprofit development and change management, raising over $29 million in those years, are a perfect fit for the Center’s current needs.

“People have asked me why I would take this on,” Newcomb said. “I felt like someone who knew what they were doing — someone who had the experience from a nonprofit management point — needed to correct things. Someone to build the right systems, to listen and collaborate and work with anyone and everyone who was calling for change, and to get the organization back on track.”

Newcomb spoke in June at the Utah chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals biennial conference about important elements of nonprofit leadership.

“I made a presentation about pivot-point leadership and taking organizations to the next level. It was not only about fundraising but about board leadership, branding, and organizational narrative with the public and the media,” he said. “I enjoy that. I enjoy the challenges of that. That’s why I decided to do this.”

In a press conference Wednesday, Newcomb said his top priority in this role is “to be transparent, restore trust, and build an inclusive center that our queer community deserves.”

“The new board leadership and I join public calls for full accountability and take full responsibility for correcting the mistakes of the past. We are charting a new, clearer path with a relaunched organization that will ensure this never happens again,” said Newcomb. “We are pursuing and putting into action aggressive plans that are both timely, quick and fully rectify these debts over the coming months.”

WHO IS NEWCOMB? Newcomb was born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas “Before I came out, I got my start on the ‘wrong side of politics,’” he said. “I was a product of where I grew up, and I was closeted. I was projecting the wrong things and trying to conform to the ‘toxic masculinity,’ as that was what I was supposed to do to come across as straight. I think it was a different time.”

“But I learned from that; I grew from

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that. Since then, I have been involved in different progressive nonprofit organizations ever since, and I’m very proud of what I’ve done and where I’ve been able to do it,” he continued.

After his beginnings as an intern at the Executive Office of the President for George W. Bush, then moving on to Department of Homeland Services, Newcomb became the regional executive director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in Washington, D.C. There, he began his experience in change management, board development, and strategic growth planning.

He was also managing director and director of development of the Gallatin River Task Force, an environmental organization focused on clean water and sustainable water management in Montana. He then came to Utah as the chief development officer of The People’s Health Clinic in Park City. PHC is a volunteer-driven clinic providing no-cost healthcare to those with no health insurance.

Newcomb says he fully recognizes his privilege, as a gay white cisgender man, while taking on this role.

“Since I was young, I was taught to understand that by my parents. I was raised in a heavily Latino and African-American community. I tried to be aware of those things, and I was taught to be aware of those things,” he said. “Intersectionality and the civil rights of everyone, especially those of diverse racial experiences that are not mine, are tremendously important and deserve to be heard. Those in positions of power should elevate their voices. I think we need to be aware of that and continue to do that. It is particularly important to me to meet with the QTBIPOC organizations and their leaders to listen and understand their past experiences, and the needs that they have, and the demands that they would like to see happen to chart a better path forward for everyone.”

Community Newcomb recognizes that the greatest challenges facing the Center are rebuilding and regaining trust from the community it serves and ad-

dressing its financial challenges.

“Our biggest challenge is rebuilding trust and relationships with people where they’ve been broken,” he said. “I also think that we have a heavy lift financially but that it’s completely doable at the same time.”

Newcomb said he will be embarking on a series of roundtables and meetings with diverse groups and members of the community to address and listen to their feedback on how UPC can be a stronger organization well into the future.

“As much as people are willing to sit down, I am willing to do so… We recognize and value the complex and multifaceted needs and experiences of the many diverse groups in our LGBTQIA+ movement. We aim to listen more than we have in the past, while being a unifying force for progress in a time when hate crimes and scapegoating of marginalized communities are at all-time highs,” Newcomb continued. “We look forward to working with all members of our LGBTQIA+ community as we seek a new, more sustainable, and focused path forward that celebrates and empowers all queer people with transparency and trust.”

As part of that, Newcomb said the Center will stop duplicative programming that competes with other LGBTQ+ organizations, including political advocacy, mental health services, and senior programming that are successfully being provided by other groups.

“We aim to be an alliance organization that uplifts and promotes allied partners in similar work for the greater good of our community,” he said. “We will not be doing direct programs for seniors or direct mental health services going forward, but plan to continue providing youth and trans programming that are exclusive to our organization.”

What will continue, he said, are those things that the Center has been the exclusive provider in the past, including peer support groups. With a grant from Select Health, a not-for-profit subsidiary of Intermountain Health, UPC will restart limited youth and transgender programming. Annual events like the Youth Summit, TRANScendence, and Queer Prom are planned to be continued.

Newcomb hopes that, in the fu-

ture, the Center can be a building that could offer a place where successful programming being done by other organizations can be housed.

Financially, Newcomb says that he has been able to quickly correct the course of the Center’s finances by reducing the operational budget, at least temporarily, by 95 percent.

Looking forward, Newcomb hopes to establish an endowment “so that we never find ourselves again in this position.”

“I also want to continue to develop and expand upon a limited and focused programming model that is responsive to community needs, while increasing the direct impact to every diverse portion of the queer community,” he said. “I don’t see us rebuilding it into a 25-person team again. I think that having a $1 million-plus overhead for staff is not a sustainable model.”

“While I would hope to rebuild the staff in time, I think we have to be smart in how we do it,” he said.

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Utah Pride Center —CONTINUED 2024 Utah Pride Parade and Festival “The biggest program we currently have is the Utah Pride Parade and Festival, and it has been for a long time,” Newcomb said. “That is the shared queer experience.

No matter where you come from, Pride is a place of visibility, celebration, and empowerment. I know it was for me at my first Pride in 2011 — the experience of support and love and affirmation.”

“Pride is more important than ever with the rise in hate crimes and extremist threats and hateful rhetoric,” he said. “That remains our top program.”

At the press conference, Newcomb said Center leaders are working to “ensure a successful 2024 Utah Pride Festival in June with a new organizational strategic plan being readied for rollout.”

“We plan to charge ahead with the 2024 Utah Pride Parade and Festival — the program that is the crown jewel of our work and that brings together hundreds

Qsaltlake.com |

of thousands of Utahns each June to celebrate and take pride in our diverse queer community.” Newcomb said, “We aim for 2024 Pride to be much more inclusive, welcoming, and affordable than in 2023 — and we will do all we can to address the concerns some members of our community have had around policing, inclusion, diversity, and more.”

This year’s festival drew complaints from LGBTQ+ organizational leaders and small business owners that they were priced out of participating. Others felt that the Festival lost sight of Utah’s LGBTQ+ community, focusing more on national talent.

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Looking at how the Center got to where it is today, Newcomb said that they have an independent team of auditors, lawyers, and others digging into the finances of the 2024 Pride Festival and other financial decisions made through the year.

“The new board leadership and I join public calls for full accountability and

take full responsibility for correcting the mistakes of the past,” Newcomb said. “We are charting a new, clearer path with a relaunched organization that will ensure this never happens again. We are pursuing and putting into action aggressive plans that are both timely, quick, and fully rectify these debts over the coming months.”

Newcomb promised that the results of the review will be made public once it is complete.

Moving forward, leaders are “aggressively working to establish and put new financial and ethical guardrails into practice.” They pledge to be “open and transparent about Pride and our finances going forward.”

“We promise not only to deliver the basics of what is required of a nonprofit but to go even further than required in providing transparency of our finances in the future,” Newcomb said, adding that the community can expect “regular, quarterly updates to the public on UPC’s efforts.” Q

2010 at the Marmalade neighborhood location of the Utah Pride Center, when the word “FAGS” was sprayed over the sign of their coffeeshop.

A neighborhood on Washington Street near Harvey Milk Boulevard has had several incidents of Pride flags being cut down from porches and ripped up and even burned.

In October, Chief Mike Brown joined community members and released a public service announcement as being a partner against hate.

In Utah, a hate crime is a criminal offense committed against a person or

property that is motivated by the offender’s bias or prejudice against the victim.

“The Salt Lake City Police Department recognizes our responsibility to investigate hate crimes thoroughly and impartially to hold offenders accountable and ensure justice for victims. The Salt Lake City Police Department educates its officers and works with the community to recognize and condemn hate crimes and works to prevent them from occurring in the future,” SLCPD said in a statement. “The effects of a hate crime can be devastating and long-lasting for both the individual victim and the larger community.” Q

The Past, Transparency in the Future

Salt Lake police seek info after Utah Pride Center sign tagged with hate speech The Salt Lake City Police Department is asking for community tips to help with an investigation into vandalism at the Utah Pride Center.

This investigation started at 4 p.m. on Tuesday, November 14, when a Pride Center volunteer noticed hate speech spray painted on the main sign of the center, located at 1380 S. Main Street.

Staff members have since removed the word “faggots” from the sign.

At a press conference announcing the Center’s future leadership and direction, Incoming executive director Ryan Newcomb said it was important to emphasize community safety for marginalized individuals following such incidents.

“You will not deter us in the fight for love and equality and celebration of who we are as human beings,” Newcomb said.

The Salt Lake City Police Department is asking anyone with information to call 801-799-3000.

A similar incident happened in

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Kinsey Sicks bringing ‘Drag Queen Storytime Gone Wild’ for Safe Zone Take four extremely talented male singer/actors — a conceited counter-tenor, a booming bass-baritone-second tenor, a lyric baritone, and a show tunes tenor — paint their faces with gorgeous make-up, don them in dresses, and top them with wigs and you have the makings of America‘s Favorite Dragapella — The Kinsey Sicks.

The troupe returns to Salt Lake City with their hit new show “Drag Queen Storytime Gone Wild!” featuring their hit new single “Poof the Magic Drag Queen,” no Disney tune, nursery rhyme, or TV theme song is safe from their signature Dragapella treatment of outrageous parodies in delicious four-part harmony. With over a dozen new songs, paired with scathing satire and Kinsey Sicks classics from over 30 years of appalling audiences, this brandnew musical from America’s Favorite Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet has been rated

“PG” for “Patently Ghastly.”

The show does come with a trigger warning: This children’s show is unsuitable for children and may provoke strong reactions among people named DeSantis or Taylor Greene Audiences love their bawdy humor, sharptongued wit, over-the-top drag, and smart dialogue.

Started in 1993 when five professionals — lawyers and professional activists — went to a Bette Midler concert dressed as the Andrews Sisters. They were approached that night by a woman who asked them to perform at her upcoming 50th birthday party, to which they said, “We don’t sing.” They then figured out all of them had previous musical experience.

From their first public concert on the street corner of San Francisco’s Castro and Market to performing arts centers, music venues, and comedy festivals around

the world, an Off-Broadway play, a film, a documentary, and an extended run in Vegas, they have gathered a devoted following.

And their schtick has staying power.

“Only one a cappella group has remained steadfastly lewd, crude, and rapturously reviewed,” wrote the Huffington Post. “Legendary for their succulence, sarcasm, and style, the Kinsey Sicks can easily shock and awe unsuspecting audiences …

Rollicking … [They] never fail to bring down the house.”

During a show they called “Oy Vey in a Manger,” a reviewer gushed: “The Kinsey Sicks don’t suck.”

Alright, he continued with how, as acapella singers and drag divas, “They are faaabulous. Think of the best of “Ballet Trockadero,” or “The Cockettes,” or “Tranny Shack” or any other of the most celebrated and gaymous (gay famous) performing troupes you can recall. None have produced better work than

this “dragapella” ensemble.

Oh but wait, it gets better.

“And the material? Their arrangement and performance of Schubert’s “Ave Maria” could not be improved upon by members of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. But I doubt that the Mormons would have adapted the lyrics as ‘I Ate Maria,’” wrote Theatrestorm reviewer Charles Kruger.

SAFE ZONE UTAH Kinsey Sicks is coming to Salt Lake to raise funds for Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce’s Safe Zone.

Safe Zone Utah provides training and resources for small businesses and non-profits free of charge. Training is offered on LGBTQ and gender 101, anti-bullying and allyship, and suicide and domestic violence awareness.

Information is available at safezoneutah.org. Q The show is Sunday, December 3 at 6 p.m. at the The Rose – Jeanne Wagner Theatre, 138 West Broadway. Tickets are $45 if purchased before the show and $55 at the door. Purchase tickets at saltlakecountyarts.org or utahlgbtq+chamber.org.

Under the Umbrella opens cafe Under the Umbrella Bookstore is ecstatic celebrating its second anniversary and announced the opening of their new Umbrella Cafe.

“After months of dust, construction, and anticipation, our in-store Umbrella Cafe is open to customers looking for a queer space to sit and sip,” owners wrote in a statement. “Just like in the store, Umbrella Cafe prioritizes queer-owned businesses to source its cafe offerings.

The cafe invites you to come give food and drink a try.”

Umbrella Cafe serves LGBTQ-owned local products, including Sweet Hazel & Co., Hans Kombucha, and SLC Underground Sweets.

Other queer sources include

Queer Wave Coffee, Apostate Coffee, PARU Matcha, Sis Got Tea, Pink House Alchemy syrups and Bee Wild honey.

Currently, the menu includes coffee, espresso, lattes, cappuccino, tea-based drinks, muffins, vegan English muffin sandwiches, a vegan breakfast burrito, and an assortment of pastries, cookies, brownies and breakfast bars.

Items can be ordered at the cafe or online for pickup at undertheumbrellabookstore.com/umbrella-cafe.

The bookstore and cafe are located at 511 W 200 South, Suite 120, in Salt Lake City.

If the bookstore is not open, use the back door, accessible from Eccles Ave. off 500 West

12 | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | NEWS

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National Log Cabin Republicans dissolves Utah Chapter The national Log Cabin Republicans political organization dissolved its Utah chapter. The chapter had been active since at least 1993.

Citing “a series of serious violations of the terms of our Chapter Qualification Agreement,” Charles T. Moran, president of the national Log Cabin Republicans, sent a letter to the Utah Chapter saying they were out of compliance.

“As a 501(c)(4) organization, Log Cabin Republicans relies on the strength and integrity of our brand to advance our mission of promoting equality and inclusion within the Republican Party.

To maintain this integrity, we require that all of our chapters adhere to a set of guidelines and standards for the use of our branding, name, and logo,” the letter stated. “However, after a thorough review of your chapter’s activities, we have found that at least one of your Executive Board members has repeatedly violated these guidelines. Specifically, you have used the Log Cabin Republicans branding, name, and logo in ways that are inconsistent with our values.

This includes promoting discord within the greater LCR community, as well as within the Utah Republican Party.”

“After numerous attempts to mitigate and remediate this situation, our only option is to dissolve the Log Cabin Republicans of Utah chapter effective

immediately,” the letter stated. “We regret that it has come to this, and we understand that this decision will be difficult for you and your members.

However, we must prioritize the integrity and reputation of our organization.”

In a press release, Goud Maragani, who was the president of the Utah Chapter, announced, “Effective immediately, the Utah Log Cabin Republicans Charter is dissolved and replaced with the UTAH GAY-STRAIGHT COALITION.” Maragani called the new organization the “go-to organization of citizens working together to ensure transparent and fact-based policymaking in Utah.”

“This development follows a period of substantial growth and political engagement previously facilitated by the ULCR under the guidance of Goud Maragani,” the release stated. “During its tenure, the ULCR worked hand in hand with elected officials to protect Utah’s children from the draconian and outrageous trans movement targeting our children.”

“Unfortunately, some ‘Republicans’ in Utah do not like our practice of transparent, common sense, and fact-based policymaking. We are told they contacted the national Log Cabin Republicans, pressuring the National office to shut down the Utah chapter,” Maragani said. “It seems that behind the scenes, some prominent ‘Republicans’ support a

Goud Maragani

left-wing agenda that is anti-family and promotes the trans-ing of Utah’s children.”

“UGSC will continue its laser focus on issues that matter to Utahns, like keeping biological males out of women’s locker rooms; banning teaching about gender identity in our schools; getting pornographic books out of schools and the children’s sections in our libraries; addressing wildfire danger, especially in the Cottonwood Canyons; protecting Utah’s homeowners from predatory HOAs and management companies; and much more,” the release continued.

The new group will be on social media at x.com/UtahGSC, fb.me/ utahgayconservatives, and instagram. com/utahgaystraightcoalition. Q

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December, 2023 |

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SL Hardwood basketball team brings home bronze from Gay Games XI in Guadalajara Salt Lake’s LGBTQ basketball team, Team Hardwood, competed at Gay Games XI in Guadalajara.

When it became evident that Hong

Kong would be a challenge to host the Gay Games, the Federation of Gay Games leadership faced a daunting challenge. The clock was ticking, and

the FGG was looking for an alternative venue. In stepped Guadalajara, a city known for its rich cultural heritage and warm hospitality.

The basketball event was organized by the USA National Gay Basketball Association, led by Mark Chambers and Jason Jaramillo. Teams from around the world showcased not only their athletic prowess but also the spirit of unity that the Gay Games embodied.

Team Hardwood was made up of core players Stewart Ralphs, Jared Warnock, and Jonathan Juretich, who were joined by long-time National Gay Basketball Association friends 6’7” Rob Smitherman and guard Byron Thompson and new players/friends Memo, Jose, Andrew, and Diana.

The team played in the C Division against teams from an independent team, Los Angeles, and Jalisco and ended up with a Bronze medal.

This was Stewarts’ fifth Gay Games and he looks forward to XII València Gay Games 2026 in Valencia, Spain. Q

Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber unveils plans for LGBTQ+ visitors center in downtown SLC In a move aimed at boosting LGBTQ+ tourism revenue and showcasing the vibrant local queer and allied business scene, the Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce announced an ambitious project to establish an LGBTQ+ visitors center in the heart of downtown Salt Lake City. The anticipated launch is set for May 2026.

Taking inspiration from the successful San Diego LGBTQ+ Visitors Center, the Salt Lake City Center will serve as a hub for visitors to connect with local businesses, discover exciting events, and access essential resources for LGBTQ+ individuals looking to relocate to Utah or start and expand their businesses in the state. The visitors center will also feature queer arts and historical exhibitions, host Chamber and SafeZone Utah events, and provide cost-effective retail space for local Utah artists and creators.

With LGBTQ+ travel expenditures accounting for a substantial seven to ten percent of the total U.S. tourism

revenue, the Chamber is embarking on this venture to connect LGBTQ+ travelers with the rich tapestry of experiences that Utah and its communities have to offer, thus contributing to the strengthening of the local economy.

Small business owner Ed Turner, the Chamber Board Secretary, who himself relocated to Utah in 2017, expressed his delight with the state’s livability and the vibrancy of the local queer community.

“Utah’s LGBTQ+ community has played a major role in the economic growth and development of our state, with Salt Lake City consistently listed as having one of the largest queer communities in the US,” Turner said. “The Chamber celebrates the state’s major tourism draws, regardless of the season, and our local queer and allied business impact. The visitor center will only add to the uniqueness of Utah while supporting the state’s world-class visitor attractions and unique cultural history.

The Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber wants everyone to visit the country’s best-kept secret.”

Over the first half of 2024, Chamber leaders, in conjunction with a community-based advisory committee, will meticulously evaluate the feasibility of the project and finalize the timeline.

Fundraising and planning activities will span through the end of 2025, with the ultimate goal of inaugurating the Visitors Center in May 2026.

Those interested in learning more about the project or becoming part of the Chamber’s LGBTQ+ Tourism Committee are encouraged to reach out to Liz Pitts, president and CEO of the Chamber.

The Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce, devoted to fostering enduring partnerships between key organizations and businesses, is committed to promoting growth and visibility for LGBTQ+ communities and their allies throughout Utah. Q For more information, visit: utahlgbtqchamber.org or connect with the Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn at @utahlgbtqchamber.

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views

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quotes “LGBTQ young people are regularly victimized at the expense of their mental health, and X’s removal of certain moderation functions makes it more difficult for us to create a welcoming space for them on this platform ... we’ve concluded that suspending our account is the right thing to do” —The Trevor Project, now at TrevorSpace.org

“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but hate on social media morphs into real life violence...

Thankfully, the antiLGBTQ atmosphere of X is not in alignment with the basic values of most Americans.”

—GLAAD

“You know you’ve hit a sore spot in a weak mind when their only argument is ‘she’s ugly!’ ‘She’s fat!’ ‘She’s irrelevant.’ Read banned books! Go to @penamerica to learn how you can stop the bans and the nonsense.

—Pink

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| Qsaltlake.com

creep of the month

Let’s just talk about Pete Buttigieg instead D’ANNE WITKOWSKI

Once upon

a time, there was a very, very, very boring day in a very, very, very boring world full of very, very, very boring people. And it was absolutely the best day ever.

I am old enough to remember when people actually used the term “slow news day,” as in, “Oh, look at this seemingly inconsequential news story on the front page of the paper. Must be a slow news day.”

Granted, back then, the news came once a day in the form of a paper brick hurled at your front door and twice a day in the form of TV news broadcasts on the major networks.

Shit would happen, and you wouldn’t hear about it for hours, sometimes even a full day. Wild times, man. Wild times.

Now, of course, the news is on 24/7. And so much of what is called “news” is actually people talking about their opinions about the news.

No wonder we’re all so tired all of the time.

I got to thinking about all of this when I went to put something scheduled in January on my calendar and was faced with the four most terrifying numbers I could possibly conceive of: 2024.

I’ll admit. I’ve been dreading it. Hell, I am still dreading it. Has anyone fully recovered from the political nightmare that was 2016? How about 2020?

And yet here it is, folks, right around the corner. Another presidential election with, it seems increasingly likely, another head-to-head between President Joe Biden and disgraced former President Donald Trump.

I’m sure it’ll be a very civilized, very normal affair. Boring, even!

Oh, how I wish.

I considered writing this column about Trump this week because he’s sure in the news a lot lately for all (checks notes) really bad reasons! But I suspect that Trump will get enough coverage in the coming year.

So, instead, did I ever tell you about the time I met Pete Buttigieg? It was 2022, and I was working on a state senate campaign in Michigan. Buttigieg came to a campaign event at a park to meet a bunch of candidates for statewide office and their supporters. He spoke briefly, encouraged everyone to keep working hard, and

shortly afterward, I left to go knock on doors.

I shook his hand and was introduced to him, but there is no way he would remember me if we bumped into one another again (an unlikely prospect). What I remember was that he was handsome, kind, and well-spoken. He was also shorter than I had expected. Anyway, it was a cool moment. Though I think his run for the presidency was premature, I actually do think there could well be a President Buttigieg someday.

During a recent appearance on “The Late Show” on CBS, host Stephen Colbert said to Secretary Buttigieg, “When we last talked, Mike Johnson was not Speaker of the House. Now, Mike Johnson is Speaker of the House. His record on LGBTQ+ issues is, what’s the word? Awful. So, how do you work with a guy who argued that same-sex relations are ‘the dark harbinger of chaos and sexual anarchy that could doom even the strongest Republic?’”

Colbert was referring to a 2004 op-ed that Johnson wrote while in the role of spokesperson and lawyer for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a group with a long history of defining freedom as “life where everyone is heterosexual and Christian.”

“Look, I’ll work with anybody who can help us get good transportation available to the American people, but I don’t know. Maybe we’ll just have him over, ’cause our little house is not far from the Capitol,” Buttigieg responded to Colbert.

Now would Johnson actually ever set foot in the home of a gay member of the Deep State (at least, I think Buttigieg is a member of the Deep State?

Aren’t all Democrats? Or at least all men named Pete? It’s so hard to keep track of since the whole Deep State thing is such utter right-wing bullshit)?

“If you can see what it’s like when I come home from work, Chasten’s bringing the kids home from daycare or vice-versa, and one of us is getting the kids ready,” Buttigieg continued. “And the other one’s microwaving those little freezer meatballs that are a great cheat code if you’ve got toddlers and you’ve got to feed them quickly, and they won’t take their shoes off, and one of them needs a diaper change.”

I do not know what Buttigieg is talking about re: microwave freezer meatballs, but I do know that toddlers are A LOT, and so if this is a form of self-care for the Buttigiegs then I’m all for it.

“Everything about that is chaos,” Buttigieg said, “but nothing about that is dark.”

Indeed, it isn’t. Having kids is hella hard, but raising them with a loving partner is pretty awesome. So, anyway, may Buttigieg’s depiction of domestic bliss remind us that not everything is bad.

Most things, mind you. But not all. Q D’Anne Witkowski is a writer living with her wife and son. She has been writing about LGBTQ+ politics for nearly two decades. Follow her on Twitter.

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December, 2023

who’s your daddy

Click, click Christmas

BY CHRISTOPHER KATIS

Whenever

my mom says she can’t find a certain item in any store, Kelly always says, “click, click, click.” It’s his way of trying to persuade my nonagenarian mother that the internet is for shopping.

And he is the king of online shopping.

This holiday season, why face the crowds and the chaos of shopping for gifts for your favorite LGBTQ+ families in stores when you can find the perfect presents online? There are myriad online sellers with some really great merchandise for the gay dad or lesbian mom in your life.

Etsy, which specializes in handmade and vintage items, has quite a large selection of cute stocking stuffers and unique gifts.

AMONG MY FAVORITES FOR THE GUYS: Picture frames inscribed with “Double the Dads, Double the Love” (it also comes as a onesie) or “Some Babies Have One Daddy but the Luckiest Ones Have Two” A rustic sign announcing “Life

is Better with Two Dads” Coffee cups declaring “Gay Dads Are the Best Dads” or “Ask Your Other Dad” A cute tee-shirt for toddlers proclaiming the wearer is a member of the “Two Dad Club” Redbubble, another e-commerce site focused on “print on demand” products, offers a ton of clothing and other gift ideas.

AMONG MY FAVORITES FOR THE MOMS: Tee shirts for the mothers reading “Two Mom Crew” or “Mom Power X2” Some clever onesies stating, “Loved

by Two Moms” or “Smart Like Mommy, Strong Like Mama” (I love that one!)

A fun throw blanket announcing, “I Am Loved by My Two Mommies” A variety of decals and pins, including those featuring two moms with a rainbow umbrella to protect their kids from the rain Chewy, the online retailer of pet food and other associated products, has a nice selection of pride-related items.

Among some of my favorites are:

FOR THE DOGS: Plush squeaky toys emblazoned with “Love is Love” or the heartshaped “My Dads Love Me” “Pride” tug-of-war ropes

FOR THE KITTIES: Pride mice-shaped toys filled with catnip A “Love Wins” cardboard cat house

LOCAL BRICK & MORTAR Of course, there are some terrific brickand-mortar stores right here in Salt Lake City where you can get awesome presents for that special gay dad or lesbian mom in your life. Cahoots and Cabin Fever are chock full of fun gift ideas. And The King’s English is simply the best bookstore anywhere.

GIVING Perhaps you’d rather give a more meaningful gift. Going online makes

donating to worthy causes incredibly easy. And there are a plethora of them out there that are focused on helping the LGBTQ+ community. Just a few are: Family Equality, which has spent over 40 years ensuring that everyone has the right to “find, form and sustain their family.” (familyequality.org) Rainbow Families, a volunteer organization dedicated to helping and supporting LGBTQ+ families, parents, and prospective parents. (rainbowfamilies.org) The Trevor Project that is literally saving queer youth through suicide prevention and crisis intervention. (thetrevorproject.org) The Human Rights Campaign, which fights for equality of gay people everywhere. (thehrcfoundation.org) If you’d rather focus on making a local difference, there are several organizations doing some amazing work, including: Encircle, offering “mental health services and resources for LGBTQ+ youth, young adults and families.” (encircletogether.org) Equality Utah, dedicated to fighting for the rights of all Utah’s queer community (equalityutah.org) The Salt Lake Men’s Choir, which keeps Michael Aaron from singing in the shower (saltlakemenschoir.org) Look, there’s absolutely no way my mom is ever going to shop online.

But don’t worry, Kelly’s fingers are already click, click, clicking away!

Happy Holidays, everyone! Q

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Qsaltlake.com

HELPFUL SIDE-BAR FOR STORIES

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WARNING SIGNS OF SUICIDE • Talking about wanting to die • Looking for a way to kill oneself • Talking about feeling hopeless or having no purpose • Talking about feeling trapped or in unbearable pain • Talking about being a burden to others • Increasing the use of alcohol or drugs • Acting anxious, agitated or recklessly • Sleeping too little or too much • Withdrawing or feeling isolated • Showing rage or talking about seeking revenge • Displaying extreme mood swings The more of these signs a person shows, the greater the risk. Warning signs are associated with suicide but may not be what causes a suicide.

WHAT TO DO If someone you know exhibits warning signs of suicide: • Do not leave the person alone • Remove any firearms, alcohol, drugs or sharp objects that could be used in a suicide attempt • Call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 9-8-8 or 800-273-8255 • Take the person to an emergency room or seek help from a medical or mental health professional

THE NATIONAL SUICIDE PREVENTION LIFELINE

9-8-8

A free, 24/7 service that can provide suicidal persons or those around them with support, information and local resources.

Online at qpages.com and at over 350 locations across the Wasatch Front

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December, 2023

Salt Lake Men’s Choir will sing its Christmas concert, for the 40th time

BY MICHAEL AARON

Salt Lake

Men’s Choir will be performing its holiday concert in December in celebration of 40 years as “Utah’s Other Choir.”

On October 18, 1983, 16 men assembled in the living room of Ron Richardson with the dream of creating a men’s chorus. Forty years later, the fruits of that first meeting are now the state’s longest-running member-supported arts organization.

“Rehearsals began at St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral under the baton of Mr. Bruce Bayles,” choir historian R. Adrian Ruiz tells QSaltLake. “Our first Christmas concert was held at the cathedral in December of 1983 and, from then to now, 40 years later, our Christmas/ holiday concert tradition continues with ‘Sing we a Merry Christmas for the 40th Time’ at the First Baptist Church.”

“Like all organizations, there have been ups and downs, but its continuity has been its members and choir councils who have come and gone, and each season has secured the validity of this male chorus,” Ruiz continued.

Ruiz has also been singing with the choir for 36 years and, at one time, was choir president. He has been the costume maven for many, many years and steps in as chore-

ographer at times. He notes several highlights over the choir’s 40 years.

“Our 10th annual Christmas concert was held at Abravanel Hall in downtown Salt Lake City,” Ruiz said.

“The choir also represented the state of Utah, singing in the Washington National Cathedral in celebration of its quadrennial Utah Day in 2005.”

“The choir traveled all the way to Sydney, Australia, in 2002 to represent Utah at Gay Games VI, singing in many of the city’s larger venues and in the Sydney Opera House. At the opening and closing ceremonies, we sang backup to a barefoot k.d. lang. It was her birthday, so of course we had to sing happy birthday to this lovely crooner,” Ruiz said.

Another milestone was in 2005 when the choir performed, with permission from Andrew Lloyd Webber, an all-male production of ‘Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.’”

The choir has done many fundraisers, and sang at churches, the prison, funerals, and the YWCA. They’ve sung at many Utah Pride festivals and at a town event in Helper, Utah. It was tradition for many years to travel to St. George and perform in the St. George Opera House, followed by a singing party that went late into the night at “The Ranch,” owned by the parents of a choir member.

“One year, while on stage at the Utah

State Fair, horrendous wind gusts almost literally blew the house down, and the performance came to a screeching halt,” Ruiz remembers fondly.

Dennis McCracken has been waving his baton as artistic director for 18 years.

“When I was hired, the choir was kind of on a downhill grade,” McCracken said. “We were down to 21 members at my first rehearsal. So we had to rebuild.”

McCracken initiated an “invite a friend night,” and went to bars hosting karaoke.

“I invited more people than you can imagine. We also contacted past members to ask them to come back,” he said. “And slowly, we started picking up members. We started with music that was singable by small ensembles and built from there.”

He has added around 150 new songs to the choir’s repertoire.

“We have worked very hard on musicianship and the sound of the choir, and it just continues to get better and better every concert,” he said. “The bar gets set a little higher with every concert, and the members of the choir never fail to reach where we’re headed.”

“The choir is my family; it is the one thing that keeps me going when times are rough,” McCracken said. “I love my choirboys, and I can’t imagine my life without the choir. I talk constantPHOTOS BY BRAD MONTGOMERY

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ly about us being a big family, and that is the most important thing in this organization. If we act like a big family, our audience will know that we love each other and know that we love what we’re doing. I have also made some of my best friends by being part of the choir. My life is so rich and full because of the Salt Lake Men Choir.”

The current president of the choir is Mike Winget, who moved to Salt Lake in 2020 during the Covid pandemic.

“I have been involved in choruses for most of my life, and for me, it’s a social outlet as well as an artistic outlet,” Winget said. “I had a couple of friends who had been part of SLMC for a few years, and they encouraged me to join when the chorus reopened in the Summer of 2021. The chorus has been a great way for me to become a part of the community and find new friends here.”

Winget has hopes and dreams

for the choir’s growth.

“My hopes for the choir are to become one of the best-known ensembles in the Salt Lake area,” he said. “Now that we are 40 years old, I’d like to everybody in Salt Lake to know who we are and for our concerts to become a hot-ticket commodity. We are only limited by our vision and by our members’ involvement and support.”

McCracken’s vision for the choir is to get bigger and better.

“I’ve always wanted to have the choir on the risers with 100 people. We’ve gotten close a couple of times, but just once, before I retire, I would love to see that happen” he said. He implores those who identify as male to join.

“You should come sing with us,” he said. “We don’t have auditions, just come sit in a section and see if you enjoy it. It is great fun, you’ll love the guys, and you really should come try it.

Ruiz says the future of the choir is bright.

“Forty years is a milestone,” he said. “And the choir is ready for its next decade of singing.” Q “Sing We a Merry Christmas for the 40th Time” will be at First Baptist Church, 777 S. 1300 East, on Friday and Saturday, December 8 and 9 at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, December 10 at 4 p.m. Tickets are available from choir members, saltlakemenschoir.org, and at the door.

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live!

Danielle Brooks and Corey Hawkins in “The Color Purple” (2023). Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

The gay man who spearheaded the 1963 March on Washington, Celie and Shug’s romance fully revealed

BY BLAIR HOWELL

BIG-TO-LITTLE SCREEN The 1963 March on Washington — revered for Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” — likely wouldn’t have hap-

pened without the work of a master strategist: Bayard Rustin, a gay Black socialist and pacifist-activist.

I left the theater in tears after watching “Rustin” before it began streaming,

at The Broadway, Salt Lake’s paramount home of independent film, and a home for we who disfavor formulaic corporate-created catastrophes.

Always unapologetic and confident in his identity, Rustin proclaims, “On the day that I was born Black, I was also born a homosexual.” The film also explores romantic attachments, including an affair with a married preacher and a relationship with a younger activist Rustin is reluctant to embrace fully.

“Rustin” is one of the most important and illuminating movies of the year, a thrilling film celebrating an ignored gay civil rights activist. On Netflix now.

BIG SCREEN Is there a more universally embraced gay-inclusive book-to-movie than “The Color Purple”? What appears to be a lovely film adaption of the musical stage version has been produced.

With the song “What About Love?” the eventual flowering of Celie and Shug’s relationship won’t be nearly obscured

December, 2023 | ISSUE 354

as in the “Spielberg-ification” picture-postcard film. Wide movie-theater release, beginning Dec. 25.

TOUR THEATER “Here you go again / My, my, how much I’ve missed you.” If you’ve missed the 1975 song, Broadway Across America brings back ABBA’s catalog-filled “Mamma Mia” to Salt Lake, allowing us to compare the nonunion production to Pioneer Theater Company’s excellent Actors’ Equity union-sanctioned 2008 staging. Eccles Theater, Dec. 19–24.

revised storyline. After recent productions with queer lead characters, including “La Cage aux Folles” and “The Prom,” can we (please!) enjoy “Angels in America” or “The Boy from Oz”? Or “Love! Valor! Compassion!” or “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert ”? Or… I’ve a long list. Pioneer Theatre Company, Dec. 1-16.

COMEDY TOUR The mischievous, charming musical comedian brings his electrifying extravaganza “Randy Rainbow for President” tour to Salt Lake.

Randy was launched into the stratosphere with help from the “Mary Poppins” patter song, rewritten as “Super Callous Fragile Egocentric Braggadocious.” Sondheim called his lyrics “brilliant.” Kingsbury Hall, Feb. 24, 2024, tickets now available, including $398 VIP seats, with a may-sell-out advisory.

LOCAL DIRECTORY If you’re unfamiliar with its posts, the independently run Gay Utah is an informative guide to the city’s drag, nightclub, and other events specifically for us. On Facebook as Gay Utah and Gay.Utah on Instagram.

In his youth, Blair was routinely chastised for being overly obsessed with pop culture.

The attachment has grown significantly.

I can’t help myself. Here are a few favorite Trump-skewering ditties:

THEATER Pioneer opens a new musical staging of “Christmas in Connecticut.” The movie famously featured Barbara Stanwyck as an unmarried city-living magazine columnist pretending to be a farm housewife and mother. Word is there are two gay characters in the PHOTO: BW PRODUCTIONS

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“If Donald Got Fired,” from “Gypsy”; “Don’t Arraign on His Parade,” “Funny Girl”; “Donald in the John with Boxes,” the Beatles hit; “Ya Got Trump Trouble,” “The Music Man”; “Border Lies,” Madonna; “Tweets, Tweets and Nothing But Tweets,” “Into the Woods”; “You’re Making Things Up Again, Donald,” “Book of Mormon” (the musical, not the unhistorical doorstopper opus); “A Spoonful of Clorox,” “Mary Poppins”; “Sedition!,” “Fiddler on the Roof,” ad infinitum, with infinitive possibilities.

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live!

Beyoncé, Madonna, Mariah, Cher, Whitney, Celine, Britney?

No, the GOAT is Audra

BY BLAIR HOWELL

She’s just

an O away from EGOT, with record-breaking Ts, and she’s a fervent queer advocate.

The Celestial Choir is in envious awe of Audra McDonald.

Every gay man has a female vocalist he admires/celebrates/worships. Our first icon was, of course, Judy.

Audra most definitely has the accolades to warrant my veneration.

As a Broadway luminary, she has six Tony statues on her fireplace mantel, more performance wins than any other actor and the only person to win in all four acting categories: musical, drama, leading role, and supporting role. It remains to be seen if this record-shattering achievement will ever be surpassed. Oh, and two Grammys and one Emmy.

She also has had plum screen roles: currently in “The Gilded Age” and “Rustin” (a must-see, stirring Netflix biopic of Bayard Rustin, a little-known queer activist who was a major March on Washington organizer alongside Martin Luther King, Jr.).

Audra has long been among the loudest entertainment-industry champions of LGBT rights, prominently honored by PFLAG and the Human Rights Campaign — and awarded the National Medal of Arts. When she joined Twitter, her handle was @AudraEqualityMc. With seven solo CDs released, she maintains an active concert career, most recently with the Utah Symphony at Abravanel Hall. Finally, to the topic of this review. But I was compelled to acquaint her with the less-enlightened.

While Abravanel has 2,811 seats, she made the venue feel intimate with her innate charm and personal introductions to her repertoire of musical theater, jazz, and popular songs.

“I’m not going to sing country western,” she playfully announced.

This warm congeniality is a hallmark of her concerts, but also attributable in part to her feeling that she was in her “second home.” Her husband is Tony nominee Will Swenson, a Utah native, and his family operates the paramount Hale Center Theater Orem (where they have together performed a charity benefit. Fans eagerly anticipate another McDonald/Swenson benefit with the opening of the company’s long-awaited new theater in Pleasant Grove).

Beginning the evening was a vibrant orchestral “Carousel Waltz,” a nod to her first Tony win as Carrie Pipperidge. Under the nimble baton of her “work husband,” long-time music director/collaborator Andy Einhorn, the symphony was particularly majestic, with its brass section strong and buoyant.

With Audra’s first song, “I Am What I Am,” from Jerry Herman’s “La Cage aux Folles,” she celebrated living truly who we are and enjoying an authentic life. (Lyrics: It’s time to open up your closet / Life’s not worth a damn ’til you shout / Hey world, I am what I am.)

PHOTO BY IAN MOWER

When her eldest daughter Zoe was an infant, she told Audra her “singing made her ears cry,” and while tinkling on the piano, her youngest daughter at five months, Sally, slammed shut the keyboard lid, as soon as Audra joined her in a short verse of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.” With this tongue-in-cheek explanation, Audra was pleased to include lullabies, beginning with “Pure Imagination,” which premiered in “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory” (the film version, not the recent weak stage adaptation). Followed by a smart linking of two songs sung as lullabies — Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught” and Sondheim’s “Children Will Listen” — into a comment about prejudice. Commenting, “Don’t we need that love and acceptance more than ever right now?”

She turned herself into a lovesick chatterbox with the hilarious “Can’t Stop Talking About Him,” the Frank Loesser patter ditty from “Let’s Dance.” And accelerated the tempo of “I Could Have Danced All Night,” the bubbly number from “My Fair Lady.” The Frederick Loewe-Alan Jay Lerner standard McDonald acknowledged is the kind of popular song she has tended to avoid.

“But I earned my Soprano card by performing it.” We were encouraged to sing along.

As a champion of less-familiar fare, she included Jule Styne’s “Cornet Man,” a sexy faux-blues cut from the film version of “Funny Girl.”

Each song was sumptuously sung, and she has said she can’t include a composition that she didn’t have a personal connection to, surprisingly excluding any song from any of her Tony-winning roles. No “Ragtime.” No “Lady Day.” No “110 in the Shade.” The only exception is “Summertime” from her role in “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess,” powerfully sung sans-microphone, yet her vocals filled the hall.

An Audra concert is an experience approaching the divine. There isn’t a critic who doesn’t proclaim her artistry’s unparalleled breadth and versatility. Q

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the bookworm sez REVIEW BY TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER

‘Blood Sisters’

BY VANESSA LILLIE, 2023, BERKLEY, $27, 384 PAGES

It’s the truth. Scout’s honor.

Pinky swear. Spit on your palms, or prick your fingers, and shake hands. As a child, you had many ways to show that you intended to keep a promise when you made it, and your word was your bond, but you’ve grown up. Today, you cross your heart but, as in the new novel “Blood Sisters” by Vanessa Lillie, you hope no one has to die.

She wasn’t looking for skeletal remains.

For Bureau of Indian Affairs archaeologist Syd Walker, such a find was very unusual but not unknown. Odd things happen during geological surveys on tribal lands everywhere. Still, the gruesome recovery in Rhode Island wasn’t top on Syd’s mind.

She’d gotten a call that her sister, Emma Lou, was missing in Oklahoma.

Again.

Fifteen years before, as Syd, Emma Lou, and Luna, who they’d considered a sister, were chilling in Luna’s family’s trailer, a group of men broke in. Wearing masks, the “devils” killed Luna and her parents, and the small town of Picher, was never the same.

Neither were Emma Lou or Syd. As a member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, Syd was well aware of the problems near her hometown, the issues

q scopes DECEMBER

BY SAM KELLEY-MILLS

ARIES March 20—April 19 It’s time to reconnect with those who have fallen to the sidelines lately. There is certainly time for parties and festivities, but the best gift is that of connection and getting to know the past again. Nostalgia, it would seem, is supreme.

TAURUS Apr 20—May 20 While it has been a calmer season than most, lower expectations tend to lead to more rewards in the long run. Keep looking at simplifying your plans, and don’t give in to desires without ensuring the payoff first. Less is more!

GEMINI May 21—June 20 Your intentions are always pure, but that could lead to overconfidence. There’s certainly no harm in seeing the best in yourself, but don’t let your heart and head in-

Native Americans had there with the BIA, and her own ancestors’ efforts to survive on land that was given and then snatched back. She also knew the fact that she had a wife at home in Rhode Island set her apart since she’d left. And drugs – too many people on tribal allotments were getting drugs too easily.

But someone wanted Syd to come home: a female skull was found in the crook of a tree with her old work badge in its mouth. Despite knowing that Syd had fled Oklahoma on purpose, her new boss at the BIA pulled strings to arrange the trip and assigned her the case.

Years ago, Syd had promised to protect Luna and Emma Lou. One of them was already dead. The other was missing.

Was the skull a threat – or a warning?

Here is the best advice you’re going to get when you grab “Blood Sisters”: pay close attention to the minutiae. Without being a spoiler, little things mean a lot.

Unless you watch carefully, you’ll be cruising along at 200 miles an hour in a screaming run through pages and pages of barely-bearable excitement when suddenly, your brain will make that scratchy sound like a stopped record album. It’s there where author Vanessa Lillie drops three tons of TNT, right towards the almost-end of her story, and whoa, Nelly. If you’re not paying attention, you may have to read the chapter multiple times to cut your “What the….?” down to a manageable level.

Yeah, this is that kind of book, the kind that’s written with authenticity, an insider’s feel, and heightened tension that’ll keep you awake. The kind that you think you know how it’ll end, and you’re wrong. For mystery lovers or thriller fans, “Blood Sisters” is the kind of book you should scout out. Q

flate like a balloon. Keep your plans from popping, and take it easy.

can do. It’s better to give than receive, especially this season.

CANCER June 21—July 22 For some reason, there seem to be more invites than you have time or energy for.

Choose wisely and base decisions on quality over quantity.

Your friends are likely to put pressure on you, so be honest and go with those who care.

LIBRA Sept 23—October 22 Friends want more of you, which is a surprise since you feel you’ve given all you can.

But feeling needed feels good right now. You could find there is more joy to pass out than you thought. Don’t hold anything back.

CAPRICORN Dec 21—Jan 19 Dive into work that satisfies your heart and soul.

There is no need for monetary gain when the heart is feeling warm and fuzzy. The only thing you need to consider is the legacy you are hoping to leave behind.

The joy comes from expression.

SCORPIO Oct 23—Nov 21 A surprise mutual attraction could lead to some good times. It’s always in your best interest to follow the path to pleasure, especially with those you can trust. Show caution when dealing with someone who has prior commitments.

AQUARIUS Jan 20—Feb 18 Trying nothing is always better than doing something you don’t feel good about.

It might be prudent to let the good times come to you and have faith that what you need isn’t far off. The passive way feels good for a while, so rest up.

SAGITTARIUS Nov 22—December 20 Where the road is going, no one can say. But since it’s taking you in the generally correct direction, there’s no reason to make a major course change. Focus more on obstacles from those with selfish needs, but don’t overcorrect either.

PISCES Feb 19—Mar 19 The world seems to be more united in your mind than it really is. It’s a reflection of what you have in your mind.

The calm you feel originates from understanding what hope feels like, and there’s no reason why you can’t spread it to others.

LEO July 23—August 22 Have you ever felt as though confusion is more common than clarity? Is every thought formed in your mind as a question? Looking to end the cycle? The answer is simple – accept that some things are simply as they are. Stop overthinking.

VIRGO August 23—Sep 2 Family and friends are probably your main focus at the moment, and there is nothing that can stop that. But you might find a call for help, and answering it will be the best thing you

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Fall into a Book LGBTQ+ books you’ll want to add to your shelf this season

BY SARAH BRICKER HUNT AND CHRIS AZZOPARDI

It’s always the perfect time to cozy up with a book, especially ones that celebrate queer stories, queer icons and queer authors. Those still pushing for bans on LGBTQ-inclusive books may say otherwise, so consider supporting a local bookstore or your local library this fall — they need your love and support more than ever.

Fiction ‘A Nearby Country Called Love,’ Salar Abdoh Publishers Weekly describes Iranian author Salar Abdoh’s latest novel, a study of gender and sexuality in modern-day Iran, as “an artful rendering of hope amid despair.” In the book, we meet Issa, who witnesses a woman who has just lit herself on fire — a desperate act of defiance. Violence and protest ensues. Now, Issa must confront an uncomfortable family history that involves his late brother, Hashem, a prominent queer artist, who defied their father for his oppressive cultural views on traditional masculinity. This sets Issa on a journey, discovering more people like his brother who are living on the margins.

Destruction abounds, but in these hope-filled pages, so do small but powerful acts of love and kindness. Out Nov. 7. – CA

‘Blackouts,’ Justin Torres A book within a book, author Justin Torres’s follow-up to “We

the Animals” — a beautiful story in its own right, with themes of Latino queerness, masculinity and self-discovery — explores the erasure of queer history.

“Blackouts,” a fact-meets-fiction intergenerational epic, uses real text from the 1941 book “Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns,” a doctor’s collection of the psychological, physiological and social aspects of sexuality, particularly homosexuality. Torres was drawn to the historical book for being “ahead of its time” when it came to how “frank and straightforward” it was in sex-related subject matter published during the 1940s,” he told The New York Times.

The resulting novel, through its use of testimony, illustration and photographs, is ambitious in scope and riveting in content, asking an important question — are missing historical details about queer life lost forever? Already among this year’s finalists for the National Book Award, “Blackouts” was described to the Times by gay author Alexander Chee as “the literary equivalent of a PJ Harvey album.” Out now.

– CA

‘Something About Her,’ Clementine Taylor A rich, intimate queer comingof-age story, “Something About Her” zeroes in on the transformative power of first love set in Ireland, Scotland and London.

Taylor’s sensitive storytelling focuses on Aisling and Maya, who have an unexpected connection as university students. As the two fall in love and experience an undeniable sexual awakening at the impressionable, often challenging period of young adulthood, Taylor weaves in an emotionally intelligent storyline

familiar to anyone who has experienced the often painful road toward self-discovery and young love. Out Nov. 7. – SH

‘Day,’ Michael Cunningham Ohio native Michael Cunningham is best known for giving contemporary life to Virginia Woolf through “The Hours,” his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel-turned-film about three intergenerational women whose lives intersect on themes of love, hope and despair. Cunningham’s new book, “Day,” is his first in almost a decade. Written during the pandemic, the novel takes place as the threat of coronavirus upends life as we know it, but it is intimate, focusing on a New York family who was already facing challenges. The book is presented in three acts over several years, during the worst of the pandemic, with the familiar themes of abrupt change, grief and loss permeating its pages. “I do have to give credit to Virginia Woolf for helping me understand that a novel can have real scope without being physically large and without spanning a great deal of time,” Cunningham recently told The New York Times. “That there’s meaning at the cosmos, but there’s also meaning at the subatomic level.” Out Nov. 14.

– CA

‘We Belong,’ edited

by William O. Tyler and Viktor Kerney “We Belong” is a crowdfunded anthology created to fill a significant gap in the sci-fi/fantasy genre: the Black queer perspective. Every story is written by a Black, queer author and features queer characters and plots. As

co-editors Viktor Kerney and William O. Tyler write in press materials, the stories “showcase the fact that, despite what the landscape of popular fiction says, Black queer people have existed and do exist everywhere, in every time and space. Whether we’re fighting monsters or becoming superheroes, we belong.

From intergalactic adventures to interdimensional exploration, we belong. As wizards, as mermaids, as witches, fully as ourselves, we belong.” Out soon. – SH

Gay Icons ‘Madonna: A Rebel Life,’ Mary Gabriel When I first thumbed through what must be the most comprehensive book on Madonna — it is over 800 pages, about two-thirds the size of an average Bible — I couldn’t believe some of these chapter names: Chapter 1: Pontiac (19581963), Chapter 2: Pontiac (19641966), Chapter 3: Pontiac (19671969), and then three chapters on Rochester Hills and one on Ann Arbor.

That’s just the first 51 pages of biographer and former Reuters journalist Mary Gabriel’s very heavy book on Madonna, who almost died recently but, like the seemingly indestructible pop warrior she is, recovered and slapped on some knee pads and wrist splints to finally kick off her Celebration Tour. Whether Madonna was bravely parlaying religion and sex into pop music when it was not popular to do so, defending the queer community when few other famous

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allies did or setting the pop-music stage for the Beyoncés and Taylors of the world, Gabriel’s book is a meticulous history of an extraordinary trailblazer, a reappraisal that reminds current and future generations who didn’t experience Madonna in real time why we should always celebrate her. In the book, her life and influential career is examined within the context of historical markers that shaped her own personal and professional narrative, from Stonewall to the pill, the Equal Rights Amendment, Roe vs. Wade and the AIDS crisis. “A Rebel Life” is Madonna’s history as much as it is our own. Out now. – CA

‘The Woman In Me,’ Britney Spears Britney Spears’ much-anticipated tell-all was even too revelation-heavy for the author herself, who couldn’t read the audio version and enlisted actress Michelle Williams to do so in her place.

“It is finally time for me to raise my voice and speak out, and my fans deserve to hear it directly from me,” Spears told People magazine. “No more conspiracy, no more lies — just me owning my past, present and future.”

The book traces Spears’s life from her childhood-star roots on “The Mickey Mouse Club” at age 11 through stardom-catapulting moments in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when she released her first two iconic records, “…Baby One More Time” and “Oops!...I Did It Again.” Of course, behind the scenes, her life was tumultuous and tightly

governed — she was a constant paparazzi target, she was placed under psychiatric holds and, infamously, in a court-ordered conservatorship. Her father and a lawyer were, until 2021, granted complete control over her financial and personal affairs for 13 years. The put-upon pop icon gets real about all that, including how her family “robbed me of my freedom,” as Spears writes.

Her story is finally hers to tell.

Out Oct. 24. – CA

‘My Name Is Barbra,’ Barbra Streisand If page count is any indication, few stones will go unturned in Barbra Streisand’s first memoir, which clocks in at a whopping 1,040 pages. At 81, Babs has done and seen more than most gay icons, with a spectacular six-decade career that spans film, music, TV and the stage. She even has her very own shopping mall right in her house, which, if you ask me, is an accomplishment right up there with her Kennedy Center Honors, EGOT status and 46 Grammy nominations. What I’m saying is, in addition to promising recounts of her early struggles to becoming an actress and her political advocacy, this book is big enough to give us at least a few chapters on what we also hope to find out: what she thought of Lea Michele in “Funny Girl,” being an LGBTQ+ ally mom to gay son Jason Gould and every last detail on eating “frozen yoghurt” with Lady Gaga and Ryan Murphy after casually showing them her “Funny Girl” gowns at her inhome mall. Out Nov. 7. – CA

Memoir ‘The Old Gays Guide to the Good Life: Lessons Learned About Love and Death, Sex and Sin, and Saving the Best for Last,’ the Old Gays of TikTok When you’ve lived long enough to be called “old,” surviving AIDS and the plight of queer people during the 1960s gay liberation rights movement, maybe it’s time to wear that “old” title just as proudly as the gay one. Enter Mick Peterson, Jessay Martin, Robert Reeves and Bill Lyons, who call themselves the “Old Gays,” and their book “The Old Gays Guide to the Good Life.”

The foursome, who consider themselves the real-life Golden Girls of the social media era, or “grandfluencers,” did just that, amassing 11 million followers on TikTok (by comparison, Beyoncé has 5 million, while Taylor Swift has 21.9 million; the guys know how to work the short-form video format is all I’m saying). In the book’s good-humored preface, they draw on their long, enduring histories, “from Hula-Hoops to hot hookups, through protests and parties, witnessing the chaos of the ’60s to the current culture wars.” As current LGBTQ+ generations live through another wave of clamorous anti-queer hate, it’s never a bad idea to check in with the elders who know more than a thing or two about surviving and thriving during the worst of it. Out Nov. 28. – CA

‘How to Live Free in a Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoir,’ Shayla Lawson Nonbinary author Shayla Lawson’s upcoming memoir, “How to Live Free in a Dangerous World,” is a lyrical voyage through a world of self-discovery, empowerment and unapologetic queerness that bestselling author Imani Perry called “phenomenal” and “luminously intimate.” The memoir embraces the significance of queer community and self-love, emphasizing that “free spirits are never binary.” Lawson reminds us that individuals are more than their gender, offering the mantra: “Trans people do not owe you their gender performance. Nonbinary people don’t owe you their androgyny.” A powerful revelation unfolds when Lawson is diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and shares a strikingly honest perspective on Black queer intimacy in disability. Out Feb. 6. – SH

‘TransElectric: My Life as a Cosmic Rock Star,’ Cidny Bullens Two-time Grammy nominee Cidny Bullens has spent 45 years performing alongside the biggest names in the music industry, from Elton John and Bob Dylan to singing on the “Grease” soundtrack. Now, the singer is charting new ground as a trans man, releasing his first solo album (“Little Pieces”) this month and a candid memoir, “TransElectric: My Life as a Cosmic Rock Star” about his

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storied music career and his long road to feeling whole. The book features a foreword by his long-time friend, Elton, and has the support of musical giants like Lucinda Williams and Beth Nielson Chapman. Elton writes in the forward, “I would never have known that Cidny was so troubled with who he wanted to be, his identity. That night he told me that he wanted to transition to a man, I just cried and cried and cried. I finally kind of understood.” Out now. – SH

‘Breaking Free,’ Cory Allen Cory Allen’s “Breaking Free” is a vulnerable and empowering memoir detailing an often-difficult childhood spent in Pennsylvania and rising through the ranks of a career in law enforcement as a gay man.

Allen doesn’t hold back when it comes to detailing his sexual and romantic exploits, including a marriage that ended in divorce and a winding path toward true self-acceptance and the kind of love he’s deserved all along.

Highlights include exclusive anecdotes about working as a secret service agent for the Obama family. Out now. – SH

Nonfiction ‘Prequel,’ Rachel Maddow Our favorite bespectacled queer investigative journalist is back in

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the stacks with “Prequel,” a deep dive into a WWII-era narrative about a little-reported propaganda campaign waged by the far-right that was thwarted by everyday citizens and committed public servants. Maddow draws parallels between the movement and the modern-day right-wing strategy to undermine democratic institutions, promote antisemitism and destroy public confidence in duly elected leaders. Maddow details how both movements have aimed at overthrowing the government in favor of authoritarian rule. Out now. – SH

‘Gender Is Really Strange,’ Teddy G. Goetz “Gender” might just be the buzzword of the decade, but precious little space is dedicated to exploring what it actually means to be trans, nonbinary, gender expansive, or any other label under the ever-expanding umbrella of identity. “Gender Is Really Strange” tackles these big-picture questions in the form of a non-fiction graphic novel geared toward anyone who wants to understand more about their own gender identity.

Here, Goetz considers the nature vs. nurture debate and the inherent messiness of gender alongside intriguing, fact-based information from the fields of biology, neuroscience, behavioral and mental health, balancing

scientific fact with the impact of social norms shaped by religion, culture and other influences.

Out now. – SH

‘Eyeliner: A Cultured History,’ Zahra Hankir What can we learn from a little eye makeup? More than you think. Just ask ancient royals and RuPaul.

In Zahra Hankir’s exploration of eyeliner, we learn about the intersections of beauty and power around the globe, a history seen through a beauty mainstay. Through reporting and conversations with a wide variety of people who have lined their eyes throughout history — from geishas in Japan, dancers in India and drag queens in New York — Hankir, a Lebanese-British journalist who reports on the Middle East and editor of “Our Women on the Ground,” investigates humanity with the unifying thread of eye contouring. She looks at eyeliner as a signal for religious devotion, a practical tool for shielding the eyes from the sun and a transformative way of turning a face into a fantasy. Out Nov. 14. – CA

Young Adult ‘The Borrow a Boyfriend Club,’ Page Powars This young adult rom-com delivers the heaping dose of trans joy we could all use right about now. The story follows 16-year-old Noah as he enters a new school and works up a plan

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aimed at getting his classmates to see him as his true gender. Can Noah convince the “Borrow a Boyfriend Club” president that he can pose as the perfect sham boyfriend?

Or is something else happening here? The perfect page-turner for a queer teen. Out now. - SH

‘Ryan and Avery,’ David Levithan “Ryan and Avery” is quintessential high school fare for the modern era. Blue-haired Ryan and pink-haired Avery meet at a queer prom, go on 10 dates and experience the sometimes tumultuous, always dramatic experiences of high school love in this breezy read by New York Times bestselling author David Levithan. Out now. - SH

‘Eli Over Easy,’ Phil Stamper “Small Town Pride” author Phil Stamper’s latest middle-grade book focused on a queer lead, “Eli Over Easy,” is a sensitively penned story about Eli, who has recently moved to New York City from small-town Minnesota.

Eli’s mom dies unexpectedly, and his dad can’t seem to communicate about her at all, leaving Eli feeling utterly alone. When he finds a collection of instructional cooking videos created by his mother, he decides to follow the recipes — by recreating the dishes, maybe he can keep her with him always. Still, there are only so many videos and he’s not sure what happens when they run out. Eli opens up about his feelings and his sexuality with next door neighbor and kindred spirit Mat. Out now. - SH

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Amy Schneider, In Her Own Words The ‘Jeopardy!’ Amy Schneider champ on fame, activism and book bans

BY CHRIS AZZOPARDI PHOTO: SEAN BLACK

has made

at least one thing clear: she is the person you want on your trivia team.

The Ohio native ruled the “Jeopardy!” stage this year like a queen in her castle — the only question she couldn’t seem to answer was whether her winning streak would ever end.

Viewers, who she won over with every win (an incredible 40 by the end), sure hoped it wouldn’t. What we, or she for

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that matter, couldn’t guess is just how big her win would be. It was history-making big, as she became the most successful woman ever to compete on the ultimate quiz competition show. Schneider left “Jeopardy!” $1.3 million richer, and she left the world at large with something even more valuable — an invitation, for all of the families watching, to understand her life as a trans person.

“So when did I know I was trans?

Always. Never. In 1986, or 1993, or 1996, or 2011, or 2016, or 2017, or any and all years in between,” she writes in her debut memoir, “In the Form of a Question: The Joys and Rewards of a Curious Life.” “I’ve come to realize that I don’t much care when I knew I was trans, or even if I know it now. All I care about is that you know. And now you do.”

In the book, Schneider, 44, reflects on becoming a nationally recognized and beloved trans celebrity, but these turning points are just part of her overall story. She shares other aspects of her life with unflinching candor and inviting repartee in her multifaceted memoir, which is deliberately less wholesome than her “Jeopardy!” image. By gaining a richer understanding of her life, you can’t help but become a fan of the person she is, not just the awe-inspiring quiz-show contestant she was.

Now that Schneider has the world’s attention, she’s using her platform to open up about the intimate parts of what a trans life can look like. It may be eye-opening for some outside the queer community and, even for those within it, surprising and affirming: her newfound fame (and zealousness for the free touchscreen toaster fame afforded her), having ADD, being pro-polyamory (not so popular in the Midwest, she admits), her touching experience with a prostitute and how doing theater was critical in helping her understand who she is. I spoke with Schneider at the end of September, the same week her book hit shelves.

Congratulations on the book. What is going through your mind right now as you promote it? Oh, I mean, it’s

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just been a blur. I’ve been in New York for four days, and I did “CBS Mornings” and “The View” today and I just barely have time to stop and think about it. But yesterday I did go to a Barnes & Noble a couple blocks away, and indeed there it was. It’s really real, so it’s pretty exciting.

What was it like seeing your book at Barnes & Noble for the first time? Pretty great. The real moment was when I got my author’s copies; that really hit me. I just remember looking at it being like, “It’s got an ISBN number. It’s official. It’s part of the record now.”

You’ve got an ISBN number and a toaster. I mean, what more could you really ask for?

Indeed. I mean, this was quite a toaster, I have to say.

If ever there was a time for a trans activist, especially one such as yourself with a universal, beloved platform, it’s now. But what’s so unique about your platform is the audience you attracted just by being a “Jeopardy!” contestant. How do you think being on “Jeopardy!” helped you reach an audience who may not understand trans people or are just blatantly anti-trans? I certainly knew going in that it’s an older demographic that watches “Jeopardy!” And so those are people that are less likely to know trans people or to be supportive of trans rights, so I was definitely bracing myself for a lot of negative feedback from the “Jeopardy!” audience.

The fact is that that was really minimal. Instead, what I heard from so many different people was usually talking about their parents or people in their family who had seen me and were like, “You’re the first trans person that I ever heard them gender correctly and use the right pronouns [for]. It really changed the way I think about trans people’s place in our society.”

I think that there is a loud minority of people that are motivated by hatred and othering and hierarchies. But I think most of the people that they get their votes from that end up supporting these policies aren’t doing it out of that motivation. They’re doing it because they were raised in an America that taught that trans people were frightening and scary and weird and laughable, as I was.

I was raised with all those same messages, and if you have never encountered an actual trans person, you’re just not going to question what you’ve always been told.

And so for all those people, it was just once they saw me — and I just obviously am not any of those ridiculous things — then that was all that needed to happen for them to change their mind, which I was not expecting.

With this book, instead of writing just about your “Jeopardy!” experiences, you’ve decided to present an in-depth look at your full life as a trans person. At the time I was pitching the book, I just spent a few months doing nothing but talking about “Jeopardy!” I just was tired of it, so that was part of why I didn’t want to just make it about that. But then there were two things I was thinking of. One was those people who had gotten to know me. They had seen my most presentable, likable, normal self. While that wasn’t inauthentic, it’s a big

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simplification of who I am and what my life has been. So if those same people were to encounter trans people in real life and not just on TV and see the complexities and not necessarily as relatable things that have happened to them, then maybe they’re just like, “Oh, why can’t they just be like that Amy from TV?” It was something I felt a responsibility to do — to show my full self in that sense, so that you could see that those things about me aren’t incompatible with being successful and being nice and smart. And so that I shouldn’t be written off for them, and neither should other people.

Then the other audience I was thinking of was just other trans people specifically like me, the younger version of me. What are the things that I wish I had known a lot sooner about what it really means to be trans and what that internal experience is like? And the simplified version that I understood and that some trans people have lived up to?

I’ve known trans people in childhood who were fighting with their parents over what clothes to wear from age 4. That was my understanding of what counted as a real trans person, and [I thought] since that didn’t apply to me, I couldn’t be a real trans person. I can only tell my own story, but it is a story that I sure would’ve liked to have heard when I was younger.

In the beginning of the book, though, you do say that this is not a book for kids. Was it difficult for you to decide between writing a book that could reach a younger LGBTQ+ demographic given how a book by you could influence them, but ultimately opting to write a book that is more adult-oriented? Well, actually, the good news is that I didn’t really have to choose because in the deal that I signed, the agent that originally reached out to me mostly does children’s literature. She was just going to make sure that any deal I signed had an option for a children’s version of it as a middle-grade version.

And so that is something that we’re in the early stages of.

I’m going to be working with somebody who’s written for middle grade before. Because it’s a different skill set and obviously it is going to not include every part of this book, but the parts that are appropriate, we’ll be pulling those out.

That said, like I say, that wasn’t exactly my idea in the beginning. That was just something my agent wanted. I’d been all ages on “Jeopardy!” and there were parts of my life that aren’t appropriate for kids, but still felt very important to share.

The thing about trans people and queer people is, because we did not fit into the moral systems that we grew up in, we are going to be more experimental around things like drugs and sex and violate rules that way because the rules that we were raised with were so wrong. That is part of what frightens people about queer people. So, that was also part of why I wanted to show, at least as best I could, why I wound up doing those societally less-acceptable things.

I love that there’s a chapter about polyamory. Again, I feel like it will be one in which people may read your book because they loved you on “Jeopardy!” and they’ll get to that chapter and their

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mind might be blown. Why did you decide to express that side of yourself in the book? It’s something that I feel strongly about, and here’s this platform. I get the chance to write a book, and it’s something that I think is so misunderstood. I feel like in retrospect, I could have gotten this point across slightly more clearly. But to me, it’s more about sexual monogamy being the one and only definition of a relationship. I find [it] baffling, to be honest. I think that it partly comes from patriarchal types of ownership. I think that certainly I know that when I was living as a man in a polyamorous relationship, it was other men who were extremely hostile to me for it. Really, it made them angry that “I would allow my wife to have sex with other people.” So it is just something that I feel strongly about, and I also know that I’m in the extreme minority with that viewpoint. Trans rights have a decent following, but polyamory is still pretty niche. It is going to surprise people, and just let people know that there are rational people out there who believe in that.

You flew home to your home state of Ohio on the day you were attending the Out100 Gala to testify against a bill that would restrict gender-affirming medical care for minors. That bill is still in committee. What do we do if and when it potentially passes? Keep fighting is all that you can do. I think that the thing that I would say is, first of all, when it comes to medical care, there is some reason for hope in the course that these things won’t be enforceable. That’s no guarantee either, of course. The other thing is to comfort ourselves with the fact that time is on our side on this. Every day somebody sees a trans person on TV or something happens where they get it, and they realize that trans people are just people who deserve the same dignity as everyone else. When somebody does that, that’s a one-way street. They don’t end up going back on that.

So the people that are targeting us right now, it’s this backlash because they see themselves losing, and they will. It doesn’t mean that there’s not a lot of hardship and suffering being caused by them now, and that’s awful, and we should resist as much as we can, but there is a legitimate reason not to despair.

What would you tell a kid that makes them not feel like the “deviant subhuman” that some consider trans people to be? This is what’s so crazy to me about people who say negative and hateful things to me, saying, “Oh, you’re really a man.” I am legitimately the world’s expert on my own mind and my brain and what’s going on inside of it. How can anyone else even think that they know better than me and what my own internal truth is? That’s something that anyone can remind themselves of. You may not be a “Jeopardy!” champion, you may not be these other things, but the one thing you are truly an expert in is yourself. You can rely on that and know that other people, if they disagree, they’re just definitively wrong because how could they know?

It’s an interesting time to release a book as a trans person, given that books with queer content are under attack. It is possible your book could be banned from libraries. What do you say to the

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people who want to get rid of our literature and our books and potentially your book? I would say that people that believe in banning books are unlikely to become “Jeopardy!” champions.

I love that shady comment. Yeah, and it’s true. I think that the mindset that people need to be shielded from information and protected from it, it harms yourself. When you shield yourself from information, you make yourself less knowledgeable, and ultimately you’re going to be less powerful if you know less.

Young people will find that knowledge no matter what you take away from them. They have other ways to be connected. There is TikTok. There is YouTube. Yeah. I mean, even before the internet that was always the case. Certainly, I was raised in a family and community that did their darndest to keep me from learning anything about sex, but I figured it out.

Since your fame happened and wasn’t something you were expecting, was there ever a moment where you had to wrestle with being the major trans activist that you have become?

Yeah, it certainly is. I mean, it is an ongoing thing that I continue to wrestle with. Since I testified in Ohio, I haven’t really done anything like that again since. There’s a part of me that feels somewhat guilty about that. Not overwhelmingly, but I wish I had continued more of that specific type of activism. It’s also, I’ve got this book to write and I’ve got to balance my own mental wellbeing, and how much I’m willing to take on and all of those things.

This platform is extremely lucky but lucky doesn’t mean undeserved. I’m fortunate to have this opportunity, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have the right to take advantage of it and to use the platform that I have. That’s something that took me a while to start to accept.

Do you have a barometer for understanding how you have changed social attitudes about trans people? Even activists, I imagine, need that kind of validation to keep going. Well, it used to be Twitter DMs and now that site is sinking into the ground.

I would get a lot of stories from people about how it meant something in their family. Then also, I’m recognized out in public pretty regularly, and most of the time it’s, “Oh, loved you on ‘Jeopardy!’ I watched every episode.” Things like that, which are a delight to hear and I love that.

But just today, one of the crew on one of the shows I did during this press run pulled me aside to say that they had a trans daughter that had just come out, and that was very meaningful to her to have seen me. I do hear those stories, and it’s the best thing ever to hear a story like that. Because I feel so passionately about the trans kids out there and what they’re up against, and it makes me so sad at times. To hear that I’m helping some of them is just the very best feeling. Q Chris Azzopardi is the editorial director of Pride Source Media Group and Q Syndicate.. He has interviewed a multitude of superstars, including Cher, Meryl Streep, Mariah Carey and Beyoncé. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, GQ and Billboard. Reach him via Twitter @chrisazzopardi. This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

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HO, HO, HO-ING HIS WAY TO THE TOP How Matt Rogers’ joke about making a Christmas album evolved into the holiday gift we didn’t know we needed

BY CHRIS AZZOPARDI

Come get

cozy around the fire with your chestnuts and hear the soon-to-be classic tale of how Santa got all the toys into his big bag. That tale, as written by actor-musician-podcaster Matt Rogers, involves what else but Gun Oil. Rogers sings about the lubricant on “Lube for the Sleigh,” the second song on his first album that is like a Lonely Island release, just gayer and by someone who is actually gay.

This is “not your grandma’s Christmas album,” Rogers says.

“I kind of hacked the system with this one,” he goes on, just days before promoting the album on “The Kelly Clarkson Show.”

“I’m on ‘Kelly Clarkson’ and selling this album to a bunch of people that are watching at home, who are going to be a little shook when they find out what this really is, and I kind of love that.”

It’s true that you won’t hear Queen of Christmas Mariah Carey singing about one of the horniest times of the year on “Have You Heard of Christmas?”; leave that to Rogers. The album’s sexy (can you even say that about a Christmas song?) lead single is a club banger about banging. Called “Also It’s Christmas,” the song is real life for a lot of queer men — you go home to visit the parents and also get a fresh grid of Grindr torsos. Merry Christmas one and all, but especially to you! And to Rogers, PHOTO: JEN ROSENSTEIN

whose childhood dream was always to record a comedy album.

Best known for his supporting roles on the Showtime comedy “I Love That For You” and in the Hulu film “Fire Island,” the 35-year-old aspiring Christmas prince is also the co-host of the podcast Las Culturistas, alongside friend Bowen Yang.

In December 2022, Rogers hosted his own Showtime musical-comedy special, also called “Have You Heard of Christmas?”

Now that the album has slipped out of Santa’s slippery bag and into our hands, I caught up with Rogers to chat about why it made sense for his first album to be Christmas-themed (#capitalism), finding success when he decided to lean into who he is and why he thinks it might be “dumb” to release this album.

How are you feeling about the album coming out? It’s pretty surreal. I think that the most exciting thing will be when I get to hold my vinyl in my hands. A couple of my friends have reached out and… oh my god, I get emotional. I think sometimes I get a little in my head and insecure about the fact that I haven’t seen anything like this. It’s a comedy album that’s also a Christmas album, that’s also a full pop record.

But I just say to myself, “You know what, so I did something

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new.” So I’m just trying my best to have a sense of humor about it because it’s so fucking funny that this is happening.

Here you are laughing and nearly crying. It’s a weird mix of emotions. It’s my music, but also it’s my comedy. So it’s this odd fork in the road I find myself at where I’m being vulnerable in sharing and asking people to listen to me, in terms of what I create musically, but also as a comedian, my self-awareness is what arms me. So it’s this very bizarre hybrid product I have right now, and I’m having a very weird hybrid experience with it: One, I worked really hard and it’s vulnerable, and two, LOL, this is so dumb!

Both of those things can be true. I guess that’s like Christmas. Yay, we’re celebrating; also, it’s pretty stupid. Like, “Look at this. What is this, tinsel?” What does it have to do with anything? I just hope people get it, and if they don’t, I hope they have a good time not getting it.

You mentioned that this is pop and Christmas, but it’s also unabashedly queer. I didn’t try to make a gay album. I don’t think of this as a gay Christmas album or a gay comedy album. It’s my album. I never once thought, “We need more gay shit or less gay shit on this,” or, “We already have a gay song, so we can’t do another gay song.” I’m pretty fucking gay. It’s a pretty intrinsic part of my personality, and therefore my comedy. So I don’t think of it as I’m a representative of the queer community, even though I obviously am. I’m representing myself. This is what I think is funny. The same way when Dane Cook didn’t think, “I’m making an incredible straight comedy album right now.”

Do you recognize that the Christmas genre has been dominated by a heterosexual narrative and that you get to do something really special and different just because you are queer? Yeah, I think that because I’m queer, I get to say some truths about the whole Christmas thing, and one of the truths is that no one does this because they love Christmas. No artist is making a Christmas album because they’re super excited about making a Christmas album. They’re super excited about participating in the capitalist moment that is the Christmas season and that’s funny. There’s a lot of comedy in that. And so that is why I titled my album, “Have You Heard of Christmas?” Because obviously everyone has, but then when you listen to my song, “Have You Heard of Christmas?”, it’s really coming from the point of view of this person that knows that Christmas is this unifier and this thing that’s so dominant in the culture, but also at the same time has no idea where it’s come from, has no idea why we celebrate it, has no idea that it even has anything to do with religion.

So I think that there’s something really funny about our disconnect between why Christmas exists in the first place and why we celebrate Christmas. And so I think if I’m looking at this through a queer lens, one of those things is I’m taking the piss out of it because it’s funny and it’s actually way more obvious than we all think.

It’s literally screaming at us: spend money, spend money, spend money. And yet we code it in this thing, which is gift giving. It’s beautiful. It’s about celebrating and being together. It’s about family. It’s about the stories we tell. And all of it is attached to money.

You also get to say things about Christmas that Mariah and Cher can’t, like acknowledging hookup culture during the

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holidays. This album coming through a queer lens, yeah, part of it is that Christmas is one of the horniest times of the year for gays on the apps. We’re back at home. There’s no one around. I actually have several years in a row over the Christmas holiday realized that someone I was into was into me too, because they also were at home, horny and on their phone, and we started sending nudes back and forth. I’ve hooked up with those people, and it’s because there is such a heightened sense of horniness when you’re isolated on Christmas with just your family and you’re just going stir-crazy. So that’s kind of where “Also It’s Christmas” was born.

Also, just to be totally honest, I just wanted a banger as the lead single, and I thought, “What’s an environment I could place this in?” Obviously the club, and also, it’s just so funny to me to think about the holiday and the cold and the family of it all surrounding what is a horny atmosphere.

How much did Mariah’s own influence on Christmas become your inspiration for your music launch with a Christmas album? Pretty much a hundred percent. It was 2017, and I was looking for a new show to put up, and I really was just trying to figure out what the angle was going to be for my next one-man show back when I was just doing comedy in New York, and I thought I had seen an interview with Mariah Carey and the interviewer was complimenting her on, basically, her owning Christmas.

I thought to myself, “Oh, maybe that’s a funny angle for a comedy show: I’m releasing a Christmas album.” So it all started as a bit like, “Please come to The Duplex and see me perform my Christmas album, which is definitely real for sure. Absolutely one-hundred definitely coming out for the very first time.”

And it was a hit just amongst my friends and family that came to the show, and then every year it grew and grew and grew till now, in 2023, I literally have a Christmas album coming out on Capitol Records, so I’m happy, one, as a person who always wanted to release an album as a kid; that was always my dream. And, two, as a comedian, because I stuck the bit.

Best of both worlds coming together for you. I mean, obviously, neither are an easy pursuit, and somehow you have made them both come together at the same time. You just have to fake it.

You have to fake it till you make it. And you made it. I guess.

I keep faking it. So many things have gone so amazingly well in my career, but it never feels like it’s enough sometimes. There’s always that next thing. So the other day I found myself in a situation where I was just like, hold on, just stop for a second and pull yourself out of this and tell your little 12-year-old self that you’re releasing an album. I can buy a vinyl with my face on it. That’s insane.

I don’t even want to ask you what’s next. Let’s not even talk about it. OK, good. Don’t ask because I literally don’t know. As the industry collapses all around us, what a horrifying question too. “What’s next?” Literally, every single person in the entertainment industry is so horrified by that question nowadays.

I want to unpack something that you said about overachieving. The best little boy in the world.

It sounds like there’s a big part of your drive that is still that kid. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. For me, it changed when I was in my 20s. To me, success meant that I was just solid as

34 | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | NEWS

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a rock and that I looked like everyone else and did what everyone else was doing. Individuality was not prized when I was growing up or just in the culture at that time. Suddenly I moved to New York to go to college, and it became really clear to me that that was not true anymore. We were moving into a new era. I don’t know whether it was the Obama election or just people catching on about gay rights throughout the country, or just diversity even becoming a topic. Suddenly it was like, no, in order to be successful, you have to have a strong point of view. You have to get your individuality across, you have to stand out.

Even when I started doing comedy. I did the acceptable kind of comedy, which was sketch and improv comedy. I could connect that to “Saturday Night Live” and so therefore, everyone at home would understand why I was doing it, because “SNL” was cool. When I came out of the closet, I started to finally turn more into myself. And I think it really crystallized when Bowen and I started doing the podcast and we literally thought no one else was going to listen or that it was going to be a thing. And so we really just talked to each other as ourselves in a vacuum, and without any thought about whether or not people would like it or want to keep listening to it or think it was cool.

Things really changed for me once I leaned into myself and leaned into the things that make me different.

What’s the story behind your collaboration with Bowen on “Rockafellacenta”? So I wrote “Rockafellacenta” years ago because I basically... OK, to be totally honest, I had auditioned for “Saturday Night Live” and didn’t get it, and I was thinking a lot about that part of town. I was in that part of town a bunch; it’s just so commercial. And again, it’s the tree. I had grown up going to the tree, and it was this place that was so larger than life, but also so sort of everything that this project satirizes. It is just this big, busy collection of people from all over the world who come and stand and stare at a tree. It’s essentially run by a media company, NBC Universal, and it made me laugh to think about going there on a date. It made me laugh to think about, do you really want to get gussied up and be romantic and you choose Rockefeller Center?

A basic bitch Christmas tale. Bit of a tale of a basic bitch, yeah. And so, I wrote this song years ago, and now years later, Bowen still works in Rockefeller Center, and I just thought it would be so funny, because it was a short song, to beef it up with this “Vogue”-inspired breakdown that talked about all the legends that had worked in Rockefeller Center. And so I sent it to him.

It really just elevates the song, and to me, makes it so funny that he is speaking for all of Rockefeller Center.

And the way it ends with him saying his own name, I guess he’s really cemented his legend with this song. Q Chris Azzopardi is the editorial director of Pride Source Media Group and Q Syndicate. He has interviewed a multitude of superstars, including Cher, Meryl Streep, Mariah Carey and Beyoncé. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, GQ and Billboard. Reach him via Twitter @chrisazzopardi.

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Pop singer Chappell Roan celebrated her own queerness and everyone else’s, too

BY CHRIS AZZOPARDI

Ahead of

bringing easily one of the queerest pop shows to a sold-out crowd in Detroit, rising performer Chappell Roan made a request to Michigan fans on her Instagram — wear something rainbow.

At the October St. Andrews Hall show, Roan explained that she wanted to give everyone a chance to go full-on gay; openly queer herself, she acknowledged an understanding that things aren’t great for LGBTQ+ people right now, and so to her queer fans, she conveyed a heart-filled message: “You are safe here.”

That night, there were so many rainbows that you would be spotted for not sporting one. Pride colors were bedazzled on shirts, printed on socks and painted on glitter-speckled faces. October felt like June as Roan turned the Detroit venue into an average day on the streets of West Hollywood. (She’ll hit the road next year too, playing to arena crowds when she opens for pop megastar Olivia Rodrigo.)

Both through her defiant music and her less assured stage banter, which emphasized her completely uncaged pop persona, Roan made affirming statements that a mostly Gen Z crowd ate up. Some of it was about her own journey to self-discovery, some about kissing whoever you want to kiss. The song “Kaleidoscope” was dedicated directly to the queer community. “This is your song,” she said about the achingly beautiful slow piece, on which she describes love as multidimensional — “never just a shape alone.”

Watching Roan perform for the first time in a small club, I was reminded of Lady Gaga’s debut show in Michigan at the Royal Oak Music Theatre in 2009 during The Fame Ball tour. Gaga, at the time, was just a couple more singles away from meat-dress-wearing pop stardom, and her show then was also a love letter to the queer community. Roan and Gaga share space in a parallel pop universe, and based on how Roan perfectly covered “Bad Romance” at her recent show, Gaga’s sandbox is one Roan is happy to play in. But the Gaganess of Roan’s own pop music — the theatrics, the camp, the unserious messiness of it all — can be heard throughout her promising debut album, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess.”

Like so many queer pop artists who set their eyes on shinier sights, Roan, whose real name is Kayleigh Rose, outgrew her Midwest roots. Her own small-town queer experience will resonate with anyone who grew up without the kind of visibility that makes it easier to be who you are. But Roan, who has known she was queer since seventh grade and is now

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being called the “queer pop moment” by Vogue, didn’t know any queer girls in Willard, Missouri, where “gay boys in my school who were out got terrorized, slurred, threatened.”

“It was horrible,” she tells me during a Zoom call before her Detroit stop. “I saw what would happen if you came out, and I knew that it was a sin at the time, and I think that to grow into the queer girl that I am today, I obviously had to stop dating men who were not it. I had to stop settling for losers and start dating women and getting rid of that shame. I have a girlfriend now, and I just struggle with it still, but it’s taken baby steps to get to the confident drag queen version of myself.”

At 18, she left the Midwest and moved to West Hollywood, where she turned the volume up on all things queer. It was there she experienced drag queens, the outwardly queer kind, for the first time, even though the Disney princesses she met as a kid at Disney World was her first “drag” inspiration. It’s her earliest memory of being in “such awe of the makeup, the hair, the outfits, the dancing, the songs.”

“I think what this project is honoring is that inner child of mine and proving to her that she deserves to be that version and that she does exist.”

With drag performance as an entry-point into queerdom, “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess,” then, was destined to be proudly rooted in the art form. Roan describes the album as “super obnoxious and very tongue in cheek, and I think that’s exactly what drag queens do.”

One song, “Casual,” features a “mermaid drag girly” in the video; in another, for “My Kink Is Karma,” Roan appears as “literally a drag clown devil situation.” For the video, she learned how to do drag brows by watching makeup tutorials on YouTube by beauty expert Patrick Starrr, who appeared as a guest judge on “Drag Race Philippines.”

“I think the songs themselves have drag elements,” she says, “but more so in the visual aspects of how I do my makeup. All the songs are very camp, and I think if you’re taking it seriously, you see it as tasteless, but the reality is that’s just drag; it’s supposed to be tacky.”

Go back even earlier to her biggest single to date, “Pink Pony Club,” released in 2020 but still finding new audiences even now, and you’ll hear Roan envisioning how her mother might react to seeing her dress entirely different. Roan can picture what her mom — melodramatically shocked — would say while she’s dancing at a strip club: “God, what have you done?”

The song, which references a club just outside of Willard, was inspired by Roan’s obviously transformative visit to the gay bar The Abbey in West Hollywood. “I can’t ignore the crazy visions of me in L.A.,” she sings, “and I heard there’s a special place where boys and girls can be queens every single day.”

In the video, she prances around on stage in a rhinestone encrusted cowboy hat at a biker bar — you can imagine some of those grizzled guys batting an eyelash at what’s about to come — and then, suddenly, Roan lets loose with drag queens Porkchop and Meatball and a posse of harness-clad leather daddies. Midwest princess reborn!

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“I think what this project is honoring is that inner child of mine and proving to her that she deserves to be that version and that she does exist,” Roan says.

Outside of immersing herself in the freewheeling L.A. life, it was opening up for U.K. pop-rock artist Declan McKenna, whose spectrum of queer sexuality is ever-changing, in 2018.

“I was so jealous of them, because they had glitter on their face every night, and they threw balloons in the audiences and they were jumping off amps and speakers and everyone was screaming,” she says. “There’s no reason to be doing this job if it doesn’t feel like that.”

“I love seeing other queer artists, of course, and I love talking to them,” she adds. “I feel like there’s a little alliance with all the queer girlies. I was literally talking to Reneé Rapp this morning, and then Hayley Kiyoko and I are friends.”

In regards to her own musical journey, Roan attributes attending summer camp at Interlochen in Michigan, a place that “literally changed my life,” to a pivotal professional breakthrough.

“I’ve never met creative kids before that camp, and it changed my trajectory forever,” she says. “I’d never been with other songwriters before in my life that were my age. Everyone was a fucking hippie, and I’m from Trump country. I’m from a heavily church background, and this is not that. There were

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kids from all over the world there. It was just so inspiring.”

The song she wrote at Interlochen, “Die Young,” ended up being the most significant in her professional career as a recording artist, when “a few months later, I was sought out by record labels and six months later got signed for five years.” She was only 17 and already picked up by a major label (after Atlantic Records dropped her, she released her full-length debut on Island Records).

“Die Young” was released as the first single from her 2017 EP, “School Nights,” an era in her career that she describes as “dark alt-pop girl vibe.”

“That was really just not fun. Gay clubs are much more fun than straight clubs,” she says.

The stage isn’t just her playground, though. Even now at 25, just a few years into her career, Roan knows the power of her platform, and she knows how to use it as a queer artist.

“I know for my project, I am very adamant about giving back to the queer community,” she says, “and I think that is what I encourage to other artists, whether they’re queer or not, just giving back to the community that supports them so much, whether that be by lowering ticket prices to what they can, or lowering merch prices to what they can, or donating a portion of every ticket or doing charity events. I think that’s the most important part, because no one’s going to stand up for queer people. It’s got to be us. We have to support each other.

We have to do mutual aid funding and mutual safe spaces.”

Proceeds from every ticket sold on her tour are going to For The Gworls, a Black- and trans-led charity based in New York.

As for her openers, she’s sharing the stage with those who have inspired her — drag queens. Three Detroit queens, ANTI, Perry Dox and Aphrodite, opened for her at St. Andrews. At the show, Roan pointed people to their Venmos so they could tip them.

Whether that’s the drag queens onstage or queer pop peers like Kiyoko and Fletcher, Roan is one with the “little pop girlies” now — a phrase it’s hard to imagine her even thinking about using when “Die Young” came out.

But in Detroit, freer to be herself in all her aspirational queer glory, a different artist emerged. It was clear that night Roan hadn’t just accomplished what she was inspired by McKenna to do — “I feel like I was put on this earth to throw fun parties” — but she made that party seem like a homecoming for anyone who also knows the feeling of wanting to break free.

“I feel really at peace, which is something that I didn’t really know I would feel,” Roan says. “But I just feel gratitude and peace. I’m proud that I kept going through all of the parttime jobs, through being dropped by a label, through all the breakups, through all the times my bank account was nearly empty. I think as long as I’m literally putting on shows that make people happy, or playing music that makes people feel seen and heard, I can’t ask for anything else.” Q Chris Azzopardi is the editorial director of Pride Source Media Group and Q Syndicate. He has interviewed a multitude of superstars, including Cher, Meryl Streep, Mariah Carey and Beyoncé. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, GQ and Billboard. Reach him via Twitter @chrisazzopardi.

December, 2023 |

ISSUE 354 |

A&E | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | 39

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40 | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | COMICS

Matthew Shepard’s Dad ACROSS

48 Come quickly 49 Look lecherously 52 Tony of “Some Like it Hot” 57 End of the quote 61 1963 movie role for Liz 62 Become inedible 63 Bars for gay chefs 64 Start of a Shakespeare title 65 Fred’s first partner 66 Little bit 67 Martin’s “Ed Wood” role 68 Hotel quote 69 Places for sweaty embraces, perhaps

1 David Bowie genre 5 “Hairspray” list 9 Thin puffs 14 “I” of Socrates 15 Cave ricochet 16 Big name in China 17 Start of a quote from Dennis Shepard 20 Pass on 21 Place to say “Ooh, long!”

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DOWN 24 Parting words, old 1 Colette’s Parisian style heroine 25 Cold-cocks 2 Fruit of the ___ 28 Tools for woody 3 Lying on targets 4 Lady’s title 30 More of the quote 5 “Oh, well!” to Rim35 Broadway acronym baud 37 Tiny bottle 6 NCAA org. of the 39 One who says “Hi, Boston College I’m Mr. Right” Eagles 40 Thespian stage piece 7 “I ___ Andy Warhol” 41 Religion of Allah 8 Oscar winner Marisa 43 Fateful March day 9 Exploded 44 More of the quote 10 _Cunt_ author Muscio 47 Ike’s opponent PUZZLE SOLUTIONS ON PAGE 29

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11 Oscar, to Felix 12 Winfield who played MLK in “King” 13 Something to build on 18 “The Unicorn” author Murdoch 19 He did Moor good, then harm 23 Sound of a flaming queen 25 K on Lesbos 26 “No Right Turn ___” 27 Seat at the Stonewall Inn 29 You may pick one up at a bar 31 “A Streetcar Named Desire” director Kazan 32 Middle of Caesar’s boast 33 Put out 34 OCS grads 36 Hardy stallion of the West 38 Volcanoes shoot it off 42 Janis Joplin’s “___ 51 Mary’s “MTM” Benz” girlfriend 45 Place 46 Blow away 53 Inn offerings 50 Samantha not of “Bewitched” 54 Amsterdam export

55 “___ Kick Out of You” 56 Madonna wore 45 pairs of these in “Evita” 57 Pronoun for Proust

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December, 2023

58 Jodie Foster title role 59 “Yeah, sure” in Las Vegas 60 Barneys event 61 Where a trucker parks his bottom

December, 2023 | ISSUE 354

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42 | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | QMMUNITY

Q mmunity groups BUSINESS

LGBTQ+ Affirmative Therapists Guild  lgbtqtherapists.com * jim@lgbtqtherapists.com Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce  utahlgbtqchamber.com * info@utahgaychamber.com Utah Independent Business Coalition  utahindependentbusiness.org 801-879-4928 DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

National Domestic Violence Hotline 1-800-799-7233 YWCA of Salt Lake  ywca.org/saltlakecity 322 E 300 S 801-537-8600 HEALTH & HIV

Planned Parenthood  bit.ly/ppauslchiv 654 S 900 E 801-322-5571 Salt Lake County Health Dept HIV/STD Clinic 610 S 200 E, 2nd Floor Walk-ins M—F 8a—5p Appts 385-468-4242 UAF Legacy Health  utahaids.org 150 S 1000 E 801-487-2323 Weber-Morgan Health Mon., Weds 1-4:30p 477 23rd St, Ogden Appt 801-399-7250

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Equality Utah  equalityutah.org * info@equalityutah.org 376 E 400 S 801-355-3479 Utah Libertarian Party 129 E 13800 S #B2-364 libertarianutah.org 866-511-UTLP Utah Stonewall Democrats  utahstonewalldemocrats.org  fb.me/ utahstonewalldems RELIGIOUS

First Baptist Church  firstbaptist-slc.org 11a Sundays 777 S 1300 E 801-582-4921 Mt. Tabor Lutheran Church 10:30a Sunday worship 175 S 700 E 801-328-0521  mttaborslc.org Sacred Light of Christ  slcchurch.org 823 S 600 E 801-595-0052 11a Sundays

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ISSUE 354 |

December, 2023

Wed. 7p Bountiful Men’s Group, Am. Baptist Btfl Church, 1915 Orchard Dr, Btfl Fri. 7p Stonewall Group, Mt Tabor Lutheran, 175 S 700 E Crystal Meth Anon  crystalmeth.org USARA, 180 E 2100 S Clean, Sober & Proud Sun. 1:30pm Leather Fetish & Kink Fri. 8:30pm Genderbands

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December, 2023 | ISSUE 354

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QMMUNITY | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | 43

JOIN US You know you want to sing with the Salt Lake Men’s Choir Join us Thursday nights starting Jan. 12.

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ISSUE 354 |

December, 2023

the perils of petunia pap smear

A tale of innocence lost.

BY PETUNIA PAP SMEAR

The road

to cruising is fraught with danger and excitement.

A long, long time ago, in a Ford Galaxy not so far away, I lost my innocence. Way back during the late Cretaceous period, when I was still a princess in training and had yet to acquire my very first wig and breasticles, I was just beginning to explore the big wide world outside of Cache Valley and starting to inch my way out of the closet and explore the big wide world of “self-expression.” In doing so, through much trial, error, embarrassment, and compromising situations, I discovered the world of cruising.

It took me many months/years of careful discrete observation and practice to learn the basic tenets of cruising. The adventure and thrill of discovering a likely cruising location. The skill and subtlety of making the first furtive eye contact, even without mascara. Recognizing his sly grin and ever-so-slight and suggestive head nod towards the nearby bushes or other secluded location. Learning to wear easily accessible clothing. Sadly, due to the introduction of internet dating apps, cruising in person has become somewhat of a lost art these days.

But I digress. For the purposes of this story, let’s go back to my very first time.

After discovering the Studio Theater on State Street, which showed porn movies, and the Magazine Shop on Main Street, which marketed a section of adult magazines, I observed that Third South, between Main and State, was an active cruising zone for randy men on the prowl looking for a quick and easy conquest.

This particular block was indeed perfect for cruising. One building even had some pillars behind which a shy cruiser could hide if a cop car were approaching. Also, there was a very convenient parking terrace with a nice stairwell that was out of view for more “private assignations.”

In my effort to learn the “secret, not sacred” rules of cruising, I went to the

Hardee’s on Second South, which is no longer there (since there was not a buffet located conveniently on Third South) and bought a couple of burgers. Then I drove Queertanic to Third South and parked right beside the drinking fountain to eat my burgers while watching the boys in action. I observed that a car would drive slowly by, circle the block a few times, and then eventually stop.

A boy, leaning tantalizingly against the building, would then approach the car.

The driver would roll down the window, and the boy might ask, “What time is it?” or “Nice weather, isn’t it?” So, after several sessions of viewing and consuming many, many cheeseburgers, I finally determined that it was my turn.

On this specific occasion, I determined that a caftan and wig might not be the best wardrobe, so I wore my most seductive short shorts and a sleeveless muscle shirt. Please keep in mind, this was many, many buffets ago when I could still pull off a sort of a come-hither look. I leaned against the building as I had observed the other boys do. I noticed a car slowly passing by while the driver was looking intently at the boys on display. He circled the block several times, finally stopping his car in front of me. My heart began racing with anticipation and fear. I finally gathered up all my courage and tentatively approached his car. He rolled down his window. He was pretty handsome, fit, and somewhere in his early forties. I noticed that he was wearing Spandex running tights. Now you all should know that I have a great weakness for Spandex clothing. Spandex IS the patron fabric of the gods! I leaned up against his car and asked if he knew what time it was. Just then, I realized that I was wearing a wristwatch.

How foolish of me! So, in a desperate effort to not appear stupid, (too late), I quickly clasped my other hand over my watch. We continued to exchange pleasantries for a couple of minutes, and then he invited me into his car.

He drove us to a secluded area beneath a freeway overpass. We parked. He could tell I was extremely nervous. Ever so gently, he stroked my bare thigh with the back of his hand. He gave my hair a soft tassel, then dropped his hand to caress my chest gently. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. He then proceeded to tenderly schlob my knob. After about 15 minutes, the sloppy-toppy finished when my yum-yum cannon exploded. “Oh, sweet mystery of life, I’ve finally found you!”

I quickly pulled my shorts back up. He wanted to engage in a little post-tonsil-hockey conversation. This being my very first time, I was suddenly overcome with dread, guilt, and regret. I asked him to please just take me back to my car.

He kindly obliged. I sat in visibly distressed silence as he drove back to Third South. He parked beside Queertanic and said a very polite thank you. At this moment, I lost my composure and began an outburst of regret. “I’ve never done this before. I’m Mormon, and I’m going to go to Hell!” I stammered between tearful gasps. He patted me on my thigh calmly and said, “Don’t worry. I’m a bishop, and you’re going to be just fine.”

With that, I exited his car, and he drove away.

This story leaves us with several important questions: 1. Should classes in how to cruise be taught in princess finishing school?

2. Was this a different kind of “priesthood blessing”?

3. Did this bishop ordain me to be gay?

4. Should I create a chain of cruising-themed buffets in cruise-worthy locations?

5. Why can’t all bishop’s interviews be like this one?

6. As I advance in age, can these cruising techniques be adapted to electric mobility scooters?

These and other eternal questions will be answered in future chapters of The Perils of Petunia Pap Smear. Q

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