Seattle Gay News
Issue 34, Volume 45, August 25, 2017
Arts & Entertainment
Mayor Murray to honor Gay authors Felice Picano & recipients of the 2017 Mayor’s Eric Andrews-Katz to appear Arts Awards August 31 at UW Book Store Sept 8
Murray will host 2017 Mayor's Arts Awards at Seattle Center – Photo by Elaine Thompson/AP
Mayor Murray will honor recipients of the 2017 Mayor’s Arts Awards at a public ceremony on Thursday, August 31 at 4pm, at Seattle Center’s Mural Amphitheatre (or the Fisher Pavillion Rooftop). The event is free and open to the public. The Mayor’s Arts Awards recognize the accomplishments of artists, arts and cultural organizations and community members committed to enriching their communities through the arts. We envision a city of people whose success, safety and health are not pre-determined by their race, class, sexual
orientation, gender, age, mental or physical ability. We work toward our vision by addressing and working to eliminate institutional racism in our programs, policies and practices. Awards will be presented in the following categories: Cultural Ambassador: Awarded to an individual who has significantly contributed to Seattle’s arts and cultural community
see AWARDS page 3
Rousing Patti Cake$ an electrifying debut
Felice Picano and Erik Andrews-Katz – Photo courtesy of LA Review of Books
Felice Picano is one of the legendary movers and shakers of the modern LGBT literary movement. Felice has been writing since the 1970’s, while living in New York, and became a founding member (along with Edmund White and Andrew Holleran) of the famous Violet Quill group, as well as a founding member of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis. Between 1988 and 1990, AIDS claimed the lives of four of these men. He’s published over 40 books, includ-
ing the great gay epic saga, Like People in History, as well as short stories and plays, and has chronicled his extensive, colorful life in several memoirs. His latest memoir Nights at Rizzoli, recalls the latter half of the 1970’s in New York City when Felice worked at the prestigious bookstore while exploring the city’s exploding, pre-Stonewall, pre-AIDS, gay lifestyle.
see AUTHORS page 6
Loosening up and taking risks Writer/director Geremy Jasper raps about breathing life into Patti Cake$
Geremy Jasper at SIFF's screening of his debut film Patti Cake$ – Photo courtesy of SIFF The cast of Patti Cake$ – Photo courtesy of 20th Century Fox
by Sara Michelle Fetters SGN A&E Writer PATTI CAKE$ Now playing Patricia “Patti Cake$” Dombrowski (Danielle Macdonald) has big dreams. She’s obsessed with becoming the next big name in Rap, daydreaming of being brought up onto the stage by her idol O-Z
(Sahr Ngaujah), a legendary musician with his own record label who has sold millions of records all around the globe. But she’s not exactly someone who would normally catch the impresario’s eye. Patti is 23-years-old, lives with her failed rock star of a mother Barb (Bridget Everett), takes care of her wheelchair-bound grandmother Nana (Cathy Moriarty), works at a local
see PATTI CAKE$ page 12
by Sara Michelle Fetters SGN A&E Writer PATTI CAKE$ Now playing Patti Cake$ is an easy movie to dismiss. The story of a young, moderately overweight New Jersey store clerk named Patti who dreams of becoming a major rapper with fans screaming her name, the whole things sounds a little bit too much like a gender-swapped 8 Mile remake more than
it does anything else. But writer/director Geremy Jasper’s feature-length debut is so honest, so well plotted, so filled with complex, three-dimensional characters who burst forth from this world with electrical aplomb for every second of the film’s running time, the whole thing proves to be gloriously entertaining no matter how predictable many of the narrative constructs might prove to be. Anchored by a performance from star-in-the-making Danielle Macdon-
see JASPER page 12