Connect with us

Arts & Entertainment

Dishing with Bruce

Hollywood funny guy on ‘70s drugs, the Oscars and hanging out with Robert Reed

Published

12 years ago

on

Bruce Vilanch, gay news, Washington Blade
Bruce Vilanch, gay news, Washington Blade

Bruce Vilanch is in town to honor Carol Burnett at the Kennedy Center this weekend. He’s at Cobalt Friday night. (Photo by Rick Stockwell)

Bruce Vilanch — perhaps America’s favorite gay funny man — will be at Cobalt Friday night to greet fans. Famous for his Oscar jokes and appearances on “Hollywood Squares,” we caught up with him by phone two weeks ago where he was in a jovial mood, cracking jokes the whole time. His comments have been slightly edited for length.

WASHINGTON BLADE: Is it harder to make people laugh in the Internet age? How do you still make people laugh when they’ve seen it all?

BRUCE VILANCH: Well yeah, it’s harder to come up with original stuff because someone will write something, post it online then it’s out there before it’s even been performed. It’s like instantaneous. So it’s harder now to surprise people. But on the other hand, people are so much more connected now that they get every joke. Things are in touch almost to a sickening amount so that by the time you try something live, they get every reference because they’ve had a chance to be exposed to it. I guess there are plusses and minuses. I think also the chances of offending somebody have quadrupled.

BLADE: Why?

VILANCH: Everybody feels their opinion is valid and they have a place to post it publicly now. It used to be reserved for the people who had the platforms but now anybody can post their opinion.

BLADE: Is it hard to keep doing it? I think many of us outside of Hollywood imagine it must be constant pressure.

VILANCH: Well, you have to keep working at it. Fortunately as a writer, you can generate your own work. Actors have a hard time doing that. But then you have to go off and try to sell it. You can never afford to be asleep at the switch, unlike the people who run trains in Chicago. But thankfully there are no real term limits on these kinds of things. I guess at a certain point you start fighting a creeping ageism but if you’re distinctive enough, people don’t mind. Everybody loved Rodney Dangerfield and now he’s up there with God. God must be happier now.

BLADE: What brings you to our fair city?

VILANCH: I’ll be in town to be part of the Mark Twain Prize ceremony to Carol Burnett at the Kennedy Center (on Sunday), so while I’m here I’ll be making a little appearance at Cobalt as well.

BLADE: Will you be performing at Cobalt?

VILANCH: Not really a performance. More of a meet-and-greet and maybe answer some questions. And getting some phone numbers hopefully. Facebook is unreliable. You have to save them in your phone.

BLADE: Did you do any writing for Carol’s show back in the ‘70s?

VILANCH: No, I never did. She and her husband at the time believed in hiring writing teams. They seemed to like what they were getting with the contracts for a writing team and I didn’t have a writing partner. I had a sex partner, but that’s not what they were interested in. Later I worked with her on some specials and some personal appearances but not anything where she was in character.

BLADE: What was the show she did in the early ‘90s on NBC?

VILANCH: Oh yeah, “Carol & Company” I think. It did fairly well I think, but she stopped because she said it was like shooting a new pilot every week. Each episode was like a one-act play and that’s very hard to pull off on a weekly basis. I think she had some success with it but she just didn’t want to work that hard all the time.

BLADE: The Screen Actors Guild just came out with a study on actors and anti-gay discrimination. It seemed a little surprising considering how many power gays we have in Hollywood like Ellen and Neil Patrick Harris.

VILANCH: Who look remarkably similar, don’t they?

BLADE: We see lots of LGBT actors, but is it still squeamish in the boardrooms? What’s been your experience?

VILANCH: I think it’s a lot less squeamish than it was. I’m not really in the boardrooms, so I can’t really comment on that. It’s just like every place generally. We’ve become part of the mainstream. We’re probably getting very close to having a big male action or romantic star who’s gay. I don’t know who it would be. Maybe if Cheyenne Jackson got a big role or something we could test the long-held theory that they won’t buy you in a big action or romantic role if you’re gay. It’s happening more in pro sports. … Maybe someday we’ll have somebody say, “Yes, I’m James Bond. And I enjoy a good old fudgepacking.”

BLADE: Of course we have to talk about the Oscars. The host job seems notoriously brutal. The critics seem like they can’t wait to hate anybody new who tries it. Yet you always seem to come out smelling like a rose. Is it because you’re not out there on stage?

VILANCH: I’m flattered you think that but obviously you don’t read the same blogs I do. I get slammed all the time. I get slammed for Oscar shows I didn’t even write, that I had nothing to do with. People are always saying, “Why don’t they get rid of that guy?” I’m like, “Well, if you stayed to read the credits, you’d see,” but I guess nobody is awake to read the credits at 4 or 5 in the morning so I really can’t blame them. But that’s the hallmark of the Internet really. People cutting loose with ignorant opinions, so I continue to get blamed. I feel like I wake up covered in mud. Even when the show’s a hit, or I win an Emmy, people are saying, “Oh, it was boring, it was horrible.” I remember the producer of the Oscar show used to have two framed reviews on his office wall. One was a rave from the New York Times and one was a slam from the Los Angeles Times. They were as extreme as they could be and they were about the same show. So you really never win, except, I guess, when you do.

BLADE: But why are people so tough on the host? I remember watching David Letterman and Jon Stewart do it and laughing throughout the night. They may not have been the best ever, but they didn’t seem to me to be as bad as everybody thought they

VILANCH: Well, just by the sheer numbers you realize that a lot of people who watch must be unfamiliar with these hosts beforehand. Suddenly you’re up there in front of 35 million people, so everybody has an opinion. And they’re working within a certain limitation, so they can’t just do what they do on their own shows. And sometimes things play differently at home but didn’t play that well in the house. Sometimes it’s just the wrong energy. With Letterman I think it was kind of like, “OK, we don’t need TV boy here coming out and making fun of our names.” But then he used that as a running gag on his own show forever. … And a lot of these people who watch aren’t even people who go to the movies. It’s like people watching the Super Bowl who never watch football. It’s just kind of a cultural experience people feel they have to share in. It’s like the people going out on New Year’s Eve and that’s the only time they go out. So you’re not always working with the best possible audience to be honest.

BLADE: You wrote for the “Brady Bunch Hour.” Was Robert Reed out to you?

VILANCH: Oh sure. He lived with his mother but we would go out to clubs together. He was kind of into rough trade. But he was afraid to go anywhere much because he was afraid of being seen. So we would arrange to sit back in some dark corner. It was very pre-Stonewall. I mean, it wasn’t technically pre-Stonewall, but it still felt like pre-Stonewall.

BLADE: What was he like? Was he fun to hang out with?

VILANCH: Well, he was so deeply closeted it was hard to get him to let loose and just have fun. He was always very nervous about it. A lot of these people living this kind of big secret tend to be pretty tightly wound because so much is at stake. But yeah, once you broke through all that, he was fun. I was always out and I was this big flamboyant comedy type and he was comfortable with me. I kind of helped him lubricate his way so to speak (laughs).

BLADE: For all the great stuff you’ve done, you’ve also been involved in some of the most ignominious bombs in all of pop culture history with stuff like “The Brady Bunch Hour” and the “Star Wars Holiday Special.” I hope you’re not offended by this question, but did you have any sense at the time, these would attain such train wreck

VILANCH: Well, you always go into something thinking it’s a good idea but you have to remember, this was the ‘70s and so we were all a bit chemically altered at the time. You have to also realize, like with the Brady show, this type of variety show concept was still popular at the time. We didn’t realize it was breathing its last. It’s the kind of thing that could have been really terrific if any of them could sing and dance. I mean they did a little on their original show but it became clear pretty quickly when we tried this sort of hybrid thing, that it wasn’t going to work. It’s still fun to roll the dice. Now had you told me if would have become like this kind of cult thing, that would have surprised me at the time.

BLADE: Obviously when you’re writing an awards show, you have to know the material that’s nominated. How do you have time to watch whole seasons of TV shows and all the Oscar nominees?

VILANCH: Well, it’s a lot easier than it used to be because they just send you screeners now and you can sit at home. It sure beats having to go to screenings, which were horrible experiences. No popcorn. But I go to the movies anyway. To get paid for it just tickles me to no end.

BLADE: Obviously most of us are not Hollywood insiders, so something I’m always curious to ask people who are is this: Does the cream always rise or have you seen true cases of highly talented people who just never got the right break? Sometimes it feels surprising to watch some of the stuff that does get a green light.

VILANCH: Have I seen people fall through the cracks, yes I have. There’s a feeling that there’s a kind of natural selection at work and it’s survival of the fittest. You kind of have to have the right combination too. It’s not always enough to just have the talent. You have to have the talent and the ambition and the kind of personality that allows you to hang in there long enough and have a thick hide so that you can get through life with all that rejection. So yes, there have been lots of people who didn’t have just that right combination. Maybe there were too dependent on something or they just didn’t have the oomph to push themselves through. With others, the talent seems to rise briefly because they get lucky but the ones who really last really do have unbelievable stamina and manage to break through all the other stuff. It sounds terribly dry, but it’s true.

BLADE: Where do you live?

VILANCH: In West Hollywood. I was up in the Hills for 28 years, but now I have a fabulous loft right on the boulevard. I stand out on my balcony like Eva Peron for the AIDS Walk and Pride and Halloween. And now I can stagger home.

BLADE: Do you hang out at gay bars in West Hollywood?

VILANCH: Yeah, some. Usually the reason you go out to a bar is to meet people who don’t answer your job description. But now there’s Grindr and that stuff, so you don’t have to go out as much.

BLADE: Some of the stuff they try for the Oscars seems a little head scratching at times. Like one year, they handed out some categories down in the aisles. Another year they had all the nominees come up on stage. Do you have any say in those kinds of decisions?

VILANCH: Um, no. Listen, at the time that kind of stuff is usually a response to some criticism that’s come up. Like that year, somebody had said, “Gee, how can we save some time here?” All those technical awards, the people are sitting in the back and it takes them so long to get to the stage. Somebody thought maybe having some of that done in the aisle would save some time. That was the perceived solution, but then everybody thought it made them seem like second-class citizens. There’s a little bit of reinventing the wheel every year but with a lot of it, there’s not a whole lot you can do. And the networks aren’t really upset with the long running time, because that just allows them to sell more ads so even when it’s absurdly long, they’re still pretty happy. I think one year they added like three or four honorary awards and that ended up adding like 45 minutes to the show and the network said, “OK, guys, this is a little ridiculous.” But one thing that’s worked is to hand some of those technical awards out at its own separate function, then just show highlights as a clip package and that saved a lot of time. The innovation I really liked the most was when Bill Condon had previous winners come out and salute the nominees individually. Then they said, “Oh it was too long,” so they only did it in two categories the next eyar and it didn’t have the same impact at all. I thought it was a fabulous innovation but the only problem was after awhile you would run out of previous winners. You only get one each year in each category.

BLADE: Well, you could just keep having Luise Rainer (age 103) come out every year to do it, God bless her. She’s been great about coming back for the milestones.

VILANCH: Yes, wasn’t that great? And one year Olivia de Havilland flew in from Paris, that was just great too.

BLADE: What’s one thing you miss about ‘70s-era Hollywood and one thing you don’t miss?

VILANCH: Well I guess I miss the drugs. It was the ‘70s so there was all this hedonism so you had that and the porno mustaches, which I love. But on the other hand, to be honest, I don’t miss the drugs. I really don’t miss everybody being loaded all the time and they really were. It was probably the first time there was really this relentless

VILANCH: Um, no. Listen, at the time that kind of stuff is usually a desire to be young and that really hasn’t gone away but it was hysterical then when I was young. People would be wearing these flowered shirts with love beads and just trying very hard to be hip when really they were all barracudas. They did make us laugh.

BLADE: For all of us gays who love Carol, but will never get to schmooze with her, please give her our regards.

VILANCH: (laughs) OK.

Related Topics:
Advertisement
FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM
SIGN UP FOR E-BLAST

Theater

Magic is happening for Round House’s out stage manager

Carrie Edick talks long hours, intricacies of ‘Nothing Up My Sleeve’

Published

2 days ago

on

February 14, 2026

By

Carrie Edick (facing camera) with spouse Olivia Luzquinos. (Photo by Anugraha Iyer)  

‘Nothing Up My Sleeve’
Through March 15
Round House Theatre
4545 East-West Highway
Bethesda, Md. 20814
Tickets start at $50
Roundhousetheatre.org

Magic is happening for out stage manager Carrie Edick. 

Working on Round House Theatre’s production of “Nothing Up My Sleeve,” Edick quickly learned the ways of magicians, their tricks, and all about the code of honor among those who are privy to their secrets. 

The trick-filled, one-man show starring master illusionist Dendy and staged by celebrated director Aaron Posner, is part exciting magic act and part deeply personal journey. The new work promises “captivating storytelling, audience interaction, jaw-dropping tricks, and mind-bending surprises.”

Early in rehearsals, there was talk of signing a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) for production assistants. It didn’t happen, and it wasn’t necessary, explains Edick, 26. “By not having an NDA, Dendy shows a lot of trust in us, and that makes me want to keep the secrets even more. 

“Magic is Dendy’s livelihood. He’s sharing a lot and trusting a lot; in return we do the best we can to support him and a large part of that includes keeping his secrets.” 

As a production assistant (think assistant stage manager), Edick strives to make things move as smoothly as possible. While she acknowledges perfection is impossible and theater is about storytelling, her pursuit of exactness involves countless checklists and triple checks, again and again. Six day weeks and long hours are common. Stage managers are the first to arrive and last to leave. 

This season has been a lot about learning, adds Edick. With “The Inheritance” at Round House (a 22-week long contract), she learned how to do a show in rep which meant changing from Part One to Part Two very quickly; “In Clay” at Signature Theatre introduced her to pottery; and now with “Nothing Up My Sleeve,” she’s undergoing a crash course in magic. 

She compares her career to a never-ending education: “Stage managers possess a broad skillset and that makes us that much more malleable and ready to attack the next project. With some productions it hurts my heart a little bit to let it go, but usually I’m ready for something new.”

For Edick, theater is community. (Growing up in Maryland, she was a shy kid whose parents signed her up for theater classes.) Now that community is the DMV theater scene and she considers Round House her artistic home. It’s where she works in different capacities, and it’s the venue in which she and actor/playwright Olivia Luzquinos chose to be married in 2024. 

Edick came out in middle school around the time of her bat mitzvah. It’s also around the same time she began stage managing. Throughout high school she was the resident stage manager for student productions, and also successfully participated in county and statewide stage management competitions which led to a scholarship at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) where she focused on technical theater studies.   

Edick has always been clear about what she wants. At an early age she mapped out a theater trajectory. Her first professional gig was “Tuesdays with Morrie” at Theatre J in 2021. She’s worked consistently ever since. 

Stage managing pays the bills but her resume also includes directing and intimacy choreography (a creative and technical process for creating physical and emotional intimacy on stage).  She names Pulitzer Prize winning lesbian playwright Paula Vogel among her favorite artists, and places intimacy choreographing Vogel’s “How I learned to Drive” high on the artistic bucket list. 

“To me that play is heightened art that has to do with a lot of triggering content that can be made very beautiful while being built to make you feel uncomfortable; it’s what I love about theater.” 

For now, “Nothing Up My Sleeve” keeps Edick more than busy: “For one magic trick, we have to set up 100 needles.” 

Ultimately, she says “For stage managers, the show should stay the same each night. What changes are audiences and the energy they bring.”

Continue Reading

Calendar

Calendar: February 13-19

LGBTQ events in the days to come

Published

3 days ago

on

February 13, 2026

By

Friday, February 13

Center Aging Monthly Luncheon With Yoga will be at noon at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. Email Mac at [email protected] if you require ASL interpreter assistance, have any dietary restrictions, or questions about this event.

Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Happy Hour Meetup” at 7 p.m. at Freddie’s Beach Bar and Restaurant. This is a chance to relax, make new friends, and enjoy happy hour specials at this classic retro venue. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite. 

Women in their Twenties and Thirties will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is a social discussion group for queer women in the D.C. area. For more details, visit the group on Facebook. 

Saturday, February 14

Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Brunch” at 11 a.m. at Freddie’s Beach Bar & Restaurant. This fun weekly event brings the DMV area LGBTQ community, including allies, together for delicious food and conversation.  Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

The DC Center for the LGBT Community will host a screening of “Love and Pride” at 1:30 p.m. This event is a joy-filled global streaming celebration honoring queer courage, Pride, and the power of love. It’s a bold celebration of courage and community — a fearless reminder of what we’ve overcome, how love is what makes us unstoppable, and how we have always turned fear into fierce. For more details, visit the Center’s website. 

Sunday, February 15

LGBTQ+ Community Coffee and Conversation will be at 12 p.m. at As You Are. This event is for people looking to make more friends and meaningful connections in the LGBTQ community. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite. 

Monday, February 16

Queer Book Club will be at 7:00p.m. on Zoom. This month’s read is “Faebound” by Saara El-Arifi. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website. 

“Center Aging: Monday Coffee Klatch” will be at 10 a.m. on Zoom. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ+ adults. Guests are encouraged to bring a beverage of choice. For more information, contact Adam ([email protected]).

Tuesday, February 17

Center Bi+ Roundtable will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is an opportunity for people to gather in order to discuss issues related to bisexuality or as Bi individuals in a private setting.Visit Facebook or Meetup for more information.

Wednesday, February 18

Job Club will be at 6 p.m. on Zoom upon request. This is a weekly job support program to help job entrants and seekers, including the long-term unemployed, improve self-confidence, motivation, resilience and productivity for effective job searches and networking — allowing participants to move away from being merely “applicants” toward being “candidates.” For more information, email [email protected] or visit thedccenter.org/careers.

Thursday, February 19

The DC Center’s Fresh Produce Program will be held all day at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. To be fair with who is receiving boxes, the program is moving to a lottery system. People will be informed on Wednesday at 5 p.m. if they are picked to receive a produce box. No proof of residency or income is required. For more information, email [email protected] or call 202-682-2245. 

Virtual Yoga Class will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This free weekly class is a combination of yoga, breath work and meditation that allows LGBTQ+ community members to continue their healing journey with somatic and mindfulness practices. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.  

Continue Reading

Movies

As Oscars approach, it’s time to embrace ‘KPop Demon Hunters’

If you’ve resisted it, now’s the time to give in

Published

4 days ago

on

February 12, 2026

By

The KPop Demon Hunters get ready for action. (Image courtesy of Netflix)

If you’re one of the 500 million people who made “KPop Demon Hunters” into the most-watched original Netflix title in the streaming platform’s history, this article isn’t for you.

If, however, you’re one of the millions who skipped the party when the Maggie Kang-created animated musical fantasy debuted last summer, you might be wondering why this particular piece of pop youth culture is riding high in an awards season that seems all but certain to end with it winning an Oscar or two; and if that’s the case, by all means, keep reading.

We get it. If you’re not a young teen (or you don’t have one), it might have escaped your radar. If you don’t like KPop, or the fantasy genre just isn’t your thing, there would be no reason for that title to pique your interest – on the contrary, you would assume it’s just a movie that wasn’t made for you and leave it at that.

It’s now more than half a year later, though, and “KPop Demon Hunters” has yet to fade into pop culture memory, in spite of the “new, now, next” pace with which our social media world keeps scrolling by. It might feel like there’s been a resurgence of interest since the film’s ongoing sweep of major awards in the Best Animated Film and Best Song categories has led it close to Oscar gold, but in reality, the interest never really flagged. Millions of fans were still streaming the soundtrack album on a loop, all along.

It wasn’t just the music that they embraced, though that was definitely a big factor – after all, the film’s signature song, “Golden,” has now landed a Grammy to display alongside all of its film industry accolades. But Kang’s anime-influenced urban fantasy taps into something more substantial than the catchiness of its songs; through the filter of her experience as a South Korean immigrant growing up in Canada, she draws on the traditions and mythology of her native culture while blending them seamlessly into an infectiously contemporary and decidedly Western-flavored “girl power” adventure about an internationally popular KPop girl band – Huntrix, made up of lead singer Rumi (Arden Cho), lead dancer Mira (May Hong), and rapper/lyricist Zoey (Ji-young Yoo) – who also happen to be warriors, charged with protecting humankind from the influence of Gwi-Ma (Lee Byung-hun), king of the demon world, which is kept from infiltrating our own by the power of their music and their voices. Oh, and also by their ability to kick demon ass.

In an effort to defeat the girls at their own game, Gwi-Ma sends a demonic boy band led by handsome human-turned-demon Jinu (Ahn Hyo-seop) to steal their fans, creating a rivalry that (naturally) becomes complicated by the spark that ignites between Rumi and Jinu, and that forces Rumi to confront the half-demon heritage she has managed to keep secret – even from her bandmates – but now threatens to destroy Huntrix from within, just when their powers are needed most.

It’s a bubble-gum flavored fever-dream of an experience, for the most part, which never takes itself too seriously. Loaded with outrageous kid-friendly humor and pop culture parody, it might almost feel as if it were making fun of itself if not for the obvious sincerity it brings to its celebration of all things K-Pop, and the tangible weight it brings along for the ride through its central conflict – which is ultimately not between the human and demon worlds but between the long-held prejudices of the past and the promise of a future without them.

That’s the hook that has given “KPop Demon Hunters” such a wide-ranging and diverse collection of fans, and that makes it feel like a well-timed message to the real world of the here and now. In her struggle to come to terms with her part-demon nature – or rather, the shame and stigma she feels because of it – Rumi becomes a point of connection for any viewer who has known what it’s like to hide their full selves or risk judgment (or worse) from a world that has been taught to hate them for their differences, and maybe what it’s like to be taught to hate themselves for their differences, too.

For obvious reasons, that focus adds a strong layer of personal relevance for queer audiences; indeed, Kane has said she wanted the film to mirror a “coming out” story, drawing on parallels not just with the LGBTQ community, but with people marginalized through race, gender, trauma, neurodivergence – anything that can lead people to feel like an “other” through cultural prejudices and force them to deal with the pressure of hiding an essential part of their identity in order to blend in with the “normal” community. It plays like a direct message to all who have felt “demonized” for something that’s part of their nature, something over which they have no choice and no control, and it positions that deeply personal struggle as the key to saving the world.

Of course, “KPop Demon Hunters” doesn’t lean so hard into its pro-diversity messaging that it skimps on the action, fun, and fantasy that is always going to be the real reason for experiencing a genre film where action, fun, and fantasy are the whole point in the first place. You don’t have to feel like an “other” to enjoy the ride, or even to get the message – indeed, while it’s nice to feel “seen,” it’s arguably much more satisfying to know that the rest of the world might be learning how to “see” you, too. By the time it reaches its fittingly epic finale, Kane’s movie (which she co-directed with Chris Appelhans, and co-wrote with Appelhans, Danya Jimenez, and Hannah McMechan) has firmly made its point that, in a community threatened by hatred over perceived differences, the real enemy is our hate – NOT our differences.

Sure, there are plenty of other reasons to enjoy it. Visually, it’s an imaginative treat, building an immersive world that overlays an ancient mythic cosmology onto a recognizably contemporary setting to create a kind of whimsical “metaverse” that feels almost more real than reality (the hallmark of great mythmaking, really); yet it still allows for “Looney Toons” style cartoon slapstick, intricately choreographed dance and battle sequences that defy the laws of physics, slick satirical commentary on the juggernaut of pop music and the publicity machine that drives it, not to mention plenty of glittery K-Pop earworms that will take you back to the thrill of being a hormonal 13-year-old on a sugar high; but what makes it stand out above so many similar generic offerings is its unapologetic celebration of the idea that our strength is in our differences, and its open invitation to shed the shame and bring your differences into the light.

So, yes, you might think “KPop Demon Hunters” would be a movie that’s exactly what it sounds like it will be – and you’d be right – but it’s also much, much more. If you’ve resisted it, now’s the time to give in.

At the very least, it will give you something else to root for on Oscar night.

Continue Reading

Popular