Cynthia Nixon is someone I really admire as an actress and who I appreciate as an activist for her eloquent defense of marriage equality.
But she got herself into a bit of mess when instead of simply saying she is bisexual, Nixon said that for her being gay is a choice.
She has released a statement to The Advocate in which she clarifies it all. It seems sufficiently clear so that we can all move on with our lives and continue to appreciate the artistry of this very fine actress who is currently on Broadway in Wit.
‘While I don’t often use the word, the technically precise term for my orientation is bisexual,’ Nixon said in a statement to The Advocate. ‘I believe bisexuality is not a choice, it is a fact. What I have ‘chosen’ is to be in a gay relationship.’
I’ve written more about this over at Gay Star News so hop on over there to read the rest!
Nice to see a handful of openly gay stars at last night’s Screen Actors Guild.
Hopefully one day soon we’ll see even more.
Pictured: Cheyenne Jackson of 30 Rock, Alan Cumming of The Good Wife,Chris Colfer of Glee,Jane Lynch of Glee and Jesse Tyler Ferguson of Modern Family.
All extremely multi-talented people – and looking gorgeous too!
Last month, Dustin Lance Black asked for prayers for his brother, Marcus Raul Black, as he battled cancer.
Sadly, Marcus lost that battle on Jan. 24.
Lance pays tribute to his brother in a blog post:
We survived so much together growing up. Our biological father abandoned us when I was 6 years old. So when Marcus was only 10, he became the man of the house, and did a damned good job of it. And when our first stepfather turned out to be abusive, it was my big brother who saved my life by chasing him off with a baseball bat on more than one occasion. If it wasn’t for my big brother I’m not sure I would have made it to adulthood. But it wasn’t all bad. Not by a long shot. My big brother taught me how to catch tadpoles out at Farmers Lake, he memorized all the lyrics to Michael Jackson’s Thriller with me, then introduced me to The Dead Milkmen and punk rock. When I came out to him at a bar in New Jersey well over a decade ago, he told me he loved me just the same and I knew he meant it. And when he finally found the courage to come out to me a few years ago, he moved out to California and into my home. I did my best to give him a crash course in gay culture. He was a quick learner. Maybe he knew deep down he didn’t have much time.
Over the past 11 months now I’ve watched him wither away from a cancer that started in his bladder and quickly spread to his bones and spine. I spent all of Christmas moving him from Michigan to my mom’s house in Virginia. I flew back to LA thinking we had plenty of time, but my mom called two days ago and said I needed to come back home immediately.
Last night, surrounded by family, my big brother drifted in and out of consciousness. It was tough to tell if he was even there anymore. But late in the night when it was just he and I and our little brother, we asked him if he wanted a shot of Crown Royal (his favorite), and he broke out into a big grin. I’m sure it goes against any doctor’s advice, but we pulled out that bottle of whiskey and he sucked down two sponge lollipops of it… no problem. His eyes lit up for the first time in a long while and my little brother put on some old Dead Milkmen tunes. For the next few minutes Marcus mouthed along to the lyrics of “Bitchin’ Camaro”– just like when we were little boys.
Me and my little brother slept on the couches beside him all night. Then, at 12:10PM, my big brother’s breathing became very shallow, and he passed away.
I can’t put into words how much I will miss my big brother. My protector.
I love you Marcus.
Funeral services for Marcus will take place on Tuesday at 11am at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
The address is: 6000 Santa Monica Blvd.
Hollywood, California 90038 www.hollywoodforever.com
323.469.1181
Writes Lance:
Marcus will be buried near some of his favorite folks: Two Ramones, the one and only Vampira and Mel Blanc.
We encourage those who knew Marcus and/or our family to please attend these services.
For those of you who would like to send flowers or remembrances, please send them to the address above. There is also a floral shop on the grounds that can be reached at the number above.
My brother loved people – all kinds of different people. We are working hard to reach all of these friends so they can pay their respects and help celebrate his life. Any help you can lend in passing this information on to folks who knew Marcus would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you for all of your love and support during this time.
Fans of HBO’s Game of Thrones are familiar with this Danish heartthrob named Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
The 41-year-old actor got his first big break in Danish film came with the 1994 hit Nattevagten (Nightwatch). He then began to make a transition to American film with the 2001 movie Black Hawk Down.
A succession of other roles followed in such films as Enigma, Kingdom of Heaven, Wimbledon, and Firewall.
Before Game of Thrones came along, Coster-Waldau has starred in the short-lived Fox series New Amsterdam.
All the while, he continues to also stay busy in Danish cinema with a steady succession of movies.
Great to see that the first Screen Actors Guild Award handed out tonight was to Christopher Plummer for his performance as a gay man in the film Beginners.
“I just can’t tell you what fun I’ve had being a member of the world’s second oldest profession,” he said in accepting his first-ever SAG Award. “Actors are gregarious and wacky are they not? I love them dearly. When they honor you, it’s like being lit by the holy grail.”
Plummer also thanked his co-star Ewan McGregor who he said “makes acting look so impossibly easy.”
It’s a good thing I noticed a tweet from Melissa Gilbert reminding everyone that today is her little sister’s birthday.
That little sister happens to be Sara Gilbert, current co-host of The Talk and an alum of the long-running sitcom Roseanne.
Sara is dating musician Linda Perry and actually talked about it a little bit on The Talk.
When I chatted with Sara in summer 2010 about the show, she had just begun to publicly talk about being a lesbian.
“I’m naturally kind of a private person,” she told me then. “I’m at a place in my life where I’m excited about this project and I want to share more. How much that is I guess I’ll get to find as the show goes. I’m not someone who’s been a talk show host before so I’m going to follow the lead of people like Sharon [Osbourne] and Julie [Chen] who have a lot more experience than I do and try and find the right zone for myself and my family.”
We will have a much better idea of Meryl Streep’s Oscar chances for The Iron Lady after tonight’s Screen Actors Guild Awards.
Her main competition appears to be Viola Davis from The Help. While Meryl won the Golden Globe two weeks ago, Viola won the Critics Choice Award a few night’s earlier.
I happened to be stationed backstage at the SAG Awards three years ago when Meryl won for Doubt and I have never seen her so happy after a win. She probably thought Kate Winslet would win for Revolutionary Road as she did at the Globes.
Winslet had won earlier that evening in the supporting category for The Reader, a role that she was nominated in the best actress category for at the Oscars and won.
Anyway, if Viola does win tonight, Meryl has only herself to blame as you will see in this 2009 SAG speech. She had appeared in Doubt with Davis and said to the industry during the speech: “Someone give her a movie!”
In one of the most stupendous finals in Grand Slam history, Novak Djokovic continued his reign atop men’s tennis and his mastery of Rafael Nadal with a record-setting 5-7, 6-4, 6-2, 6-7 (5), 7-5 victory in the Australian Open final.
The match lasted five hours, 53 minutes, shattering the record for the longest Grand Slam final in history.
“We made history tonight and unfortunately there couldn’t be two winners,” Djokovic said after the match.
It was his third straight major title for reigning Wimbledon US Open champion Djokovic who joins Rod Laver, Pete Sampras, Roger Federer and Nadal as the only men in the Open era to accomplish that feat.
Djokovic also has won seven finals in a row against Nadal, including in each of the last thee slam finals. The Spainiard became the first man in the Open Era to lose three straight major finals.
Having reduced Federer to tears when he won the title over five sets in 2009, Nadal maintained his composure during the on-court speeches—and even managed a joke.
“Good morning, everybody,” Nadal said, earning laughs and loud applause from the crowd. “Congratulations to Novak and his team. They deserve it. They are doing something fantastic, so congratulations.”
The previous longest major singles final was Mats Wilander’s win over Ivan Lendl at the U.S. Open in 1988, which lasted 4 hours, 54 minutes.
The longest Australian Open final also involved Wilander in 1988, when the Swede beat Pat Cash. Sunday’s match was also the longest in the tournament’s history.
The win was the fifth grand slam title and third Australia Open crown for Djokovic who had toiled for years in the shadows of Nadal and Federer.
He’s now the biggest star in tennis and celebrated his victory by literally ripping his shirt off much to the delight of straight women and gay men everywhere!
It seems like only yesterday that he was getting banned from ABC because of a risque appearance on the American Music Awards and getting arrested after a drunken fight with his boyfriend in Finland.
Well, okay, Finland was practically yesterday – it was just last month!
But Adam is a hard-working superstar with a real connection to his extremely loyal fans. And on his birthday, Adam does not want any gifts from those fans – he’d prefer they donate the charity: water organization.
Last year for my ‘golden birthday’, you gave me the best birthday present I could have asked for — you donated $323,803 to bring clean water to over 16,000 people! It felt so amazing to have my fans, friends and family do something so inspiring for my birthday.
I’ve been asked what I would like people to do this year for my 30th birthday. I’d like to invite you to join me and “give up” your birthday this year.
Wait until you see how amazing it feels.
Together, I bet we can raise over $1 million and bring thousands more people clean water.
Happy 52nd birthday to Greg Louganis, one of the greatest Olympic athletes in history who overcame great obstacles in his life to reach the top of his sport and who remains an inspirational figure for so many.
Greg’s story means so much to me because I was coming out in a big way in the mid-90s and it was then that he also came out and wrote a deeply-felt memoir called Breaking the Surface in which he revealed that he had been HIV positive when he won his third and fourth gold medals at the 1988 Olympics.
I interviewed Greg back in 2010 (that’s us pictured below at the Pantages Theatre) and he had a lot to say about HIV awareness.
When Greg announced that he was HIV-positive in the mid-90s, there were not yet the drugs available that prevent the disease from being a death sentence. But, he said, the breakthroughs are no reason to not remain vigilant.
“Sure, we’ve made great strides with medications and treatments. But what I try and share with young people is all the hardships. I wouldn’t wish my drug regiment on anyone. I swallow a lot of pills and the side effects from the medications are not pleasant.”
“The things that I’ve had to go through and endure and in and out of the hospital and that sort of thing. Yes, Magic Johnson and myself, we’re out and about, we’re active and we’re doing good things but it doesn’t mean that the disease is manageable. I can’t stress it enough how important it is to be responsible. It’s something that they can avoid! We’ve learned this through education and we’re trying to get that through to young people who think that they’re indestructible.”
On another note, there is a Facebook page campaigning for Greg to be asked to participate in Dancing With the Stars. He’d be an excellent choice and if you want to join the effort, here is a LINK to the Facebook page.
So how do you replace Tony winner Catherine Zeta-Jones and the legendary Angela Lansbury in a successful Broadway production of A Little Night Music?
You land two stars who are just as big: Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch!
Peters starred as Desiree Armfeldt and Stritch as Madame Armfeldt from July 2010 to January 2011.
A reviewer for The New York Times wrote: For theater lovers there can be no greater current pleasure than to witness Bernadette Peters perform the show’s signature number, “Send In the Clowns,” with an emotional transparency and musical delicacy that turns this celebrated song into an occasion of transporting artistry. I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced with such palpable force – or such prominent goose bumps – the sense of being present at an indelible moment in the history of musical theater.
I had never heard of Richard Arlen until a clip of a scene from the 1927 Best Picture winner Wings surfaced on YouTube.
It’s a silent film there’s a very tender scene between Arlen and Buddy Rogers and they sure look to be madly in love.
Too bad one of them dies!
Before he started in movies, Arlen attended the University of Pennsylvania then served as a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps during World War I.
Then he went to the oilfields of Texas and Oklahoma and then found work as a tool boy, a messenger and sporting editor of a newspaper before going to LA to try and break into movies.
He had no success initially but caught a break in an unusual way: He was working as a delivery boy for a film laboratory when the motorcycle he was riding landed him a broken leg outside the Paramount Pictures lot. A sympathetic film director gave him his start as an extra.
He successfully made the transition from silent films to talkies appearing in nearly 150 films between 1921 and 1977. He died in 1976 which his final film, A Whale of a Tale, coming out after his death.
Talk about huge wins, Victoria Azarenka not only won the Australian Open earlier today over Maria Sharapova, she also became the number one ranked player in the world.
Will she stay at number one awhile and win more slams or will she follow in the footsteps of recent single slam winners Li Na, Samantha Stosur, Petra Kivitova, Francesca Schiavone who have failed to turn their victories into tour domination?
Kim Clijsters has won three slams since returning to the tour in summer of 2009 but she has only spent one week as number one while Serena Williams, winner of 13 slam titles, has not been playing enough tour events in recent years to remain at number one.
The game could use a new superstar and Azarenka could very well be it.
Time will tell.
Meanwhile, Caroline Wozniacki has got to be somewhat relieved to no longer be the number one after reigning for one year and four months.
During that time, Wozniacki failed to win – or even make it to the finals – of a single grand slam tournament.
This basically has made the top ranking a big joke.
Before Wozniacki’s slamless reign, only Jelena Jankovic (18 weeks) and Dinera Safina (26 weeks) had been the number one player without ever winning a grand slam before, during or after their time at the top.
That had never happened during the first 33 years of official ranking when all-time greats such as Chris Evert (260 weeks, 18 slams), Martina Navratilova (332 weeks, 18 slams), Steffi Graf (377 weeks, 22 slams), and Monica Seles enjoyed stellar runs at the top and won slams left and right. (Seles surely would have been number one longer than 178 weeks and won more than 9 slams had she not been stabbed by a madman during the peak of her career).
The men’s game has benefited from having its true superstars at the very top. Either Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal was number one from early 2004 through July of 2011 when Novak Djokovic became the top player while winning three of the year’s four slams.
Tomorrow, Djokovic and Nadal face off in a slam final for the third straight time when they play for the Australian Open title.
If Nadal wins, it will be his 11th slam title overall tying him with Bjorn Borg on the all-time list. (Federer holds the record with 16 slam wins). If Djokovic prevails, it will be his third Australian Open title and fifth slam overall.
Okay Adam Lambert fans, we know you are waiting patiently for his album Trespassing to come out in March.
Until then, Adam is pushing its lead single Better Than I Know Myself.
In this video, he talks about the song saying it’s “about the relationship you have with yourself, between your dark and light side. It’s about duality; it’s about that balance and finding it and struggling to maintain it and what it means.”
Stefan Edberg is one of my all-time crushes. Top five, lifetime. This is famous people crushes I’m talking about!
The gorgeous Swedish tennis star is in town this week to play some exhibition matches at the LA Tennis Open at UCLA and lost a close match on Wednesday evening to old rival Jim Courier who he beat in the final of the US Open in 1991.
Stefan, now 43, was the number one tennis player in the world on and off in the early 1990s and has been inducted into the sport’s Hall of Fame. In all, he won two US Opens, two Wimbledons and two Australian Opens.
He would have been one of the few players to complete a career grand slam had he been able to defeat Michael Chang in the 1989 French Open final. He lost in five close sets to the then 17 year old. Edberg (pictured, left, joking around Wednesday night at UCLA) will face Chang in another exhibition match tonight.
Edberg not only had then-rising stars like Chang, Andre Agassi and Pete Sampras to contend with, but he also competed regularly on the tour against such all-time greats and former number ones as Becker, John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors, Ivan Lendl, and Mats Wilander.
Edberg played on four championship Davis Cup teams in his career, won the gold medal at the 1984 Olympic Games when tennis was an exhibition sport, and also won three grand slam titles in doubles. He and McEnroe are the only two male players in the history of the tour to have been ranked number one in both singles and doubles in their career.
His serve and volley game was so exciting to watch and so were his incredible legs! From the looks of the photos taken this week, he’s still in terrific shape and very crush-worthy.
But most of all, Edberg was the consummate gentleman – so much so that the Association of Tennis Professionals tour sportsmanship award is named after him.
Total class act.
The video below is a nice compilation of Edberg’s career to Tina Turner’s Simply the Best. Enjoy the music, enjoy the beautiful tennis, and enjoy Stefan’s glorious short shorts!
If you are a fan of the Tales of the City books, then I have some superb news for you: Author Armistead Maupin has told his 5,000 Facebook friends (I’m one of them!) that he is busy working on a ninth Tales book which will be out next year.
If you have missed any of the previous books, Maupin says all eight of them will be available via eBook next week!
I can’t say I’ve read all the books but I say I’ve seen all three of the miniseries which starred Laura Linney as Mary Ann Singleton. Olympia Dukakis, Billy Campbell, Parker Posey, Thomas Gibson, among others.
I chatted with Miss Linney about two years ago and she said of Tales: “It’s my favorite job, hands down. It was the first time I was on something from beginning to end, I had a lot of responsibility, I met people who I still feel so privileged to know. It was a great, great magical job.”
When she took on the role of Mary Ann, Linney was already an established New York theater actress but had only a few small previous screen credits.
“Thank God I wasn’t aware of what a beloved character that was or I would have been completely intimidated,” she said. “I was really lucky to fall into job and the people were wonderful and they are people who I have remained friends with for 20 years now.”
Twitter
Facebook
Beaming. 
Nice to see a handful of openly gay stars at last night’s Screen Actors Guild.
Comedy ensemble
Last month, Dustin Lance Black asked for prayers for his brother, Marcus Raul Black, as he battled cancer.
I can’t put into words how much I will miss my big brother. My protector.
Fans of HBO’s Game of Thrones are familiar with this Danish heartthrob named Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
It’s a good thing I noticed a tweet from Melissa Gilbert reminding everyone that today is her little sister’s birthday.
We will have a much better idea of Meryl Streep’s Oscar chances for The Iron Lady after tonight’s Screen Actors Guild Awards.
Wow.
Adam Lambert is growing up so fast!
So how do you replace Tony winner Catherine Zeta-Jones and the legendary Angela Lansbury in a successful Broadway production of A Little Night Music?
Talk about huge wins, Victoria Azarenka not only won the Australian Open earlier today over Maria Sharapova, she also became the number one ranked player in the world.
Okay Adam Lambert fans, we know you are waiting patiently for his album Trespassing to come out in March.
Originally posted July 30, 2009
Edberg played on four championship Davis Cup teams in his career, won the gold medal at the 1984 Olympic Games when tennis was an exhibition sport, and also won three grand slam titles in doubles. He and McEnroe are the only two male players in the history of the tour to have been ranked number one in both singles and doubles in their career.
If you are a fan of the Tales of the City books, then I have some superb news for you: Author Armistead Maupin has told his 5,000 Facebook friends (I’m one of them!) that he is busy working on a ninth Tales book which will be out next year.
I chatted with Miss Linney about two years ago and she said of Tales: “It’s my favorite job, hands down. It was the first time I was on something from beginning to end, I had a lot of responsibility, I met people who I still feel so privileged to know. It was a great, great magical job.”
