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Calendar: Jan. 13

Parties, concerts, support groups and more through Jan. 19

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Blowoff DJs Bob Mould, left, and Richard Morel. (Photo by Jeff Smith)

Friday, Jan. 13

Town (2009 8th St., N.W.) is hosting a “Mega Bear Happy Hour” tonight in honor of Leather Weekend. Doors open for happy hour at 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. for the general public. Attendees must be 21 or older from 6 to 10 p.m.

The Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) presents its production of “Billy Elliot: The Musical” directed by Stephen Daldry and featuring music by Elton John, tonight at 7:30 p.m. Tickets range from $25 to $150 and can be purchased online at kennedy-center.org. The show closes on Sunday.

Touchstone Gallery (901 New York Ave., N.W.) is hosting an opening reception for its newest exhibit, “Into the Wild,” featuring paintings by Paula Lantz, tonight from 6 to 8:30 p.m.

Women in Their Twenties, a social discussion and dinner group, meets tonight from 8 to 9:30 p.m. at the D.C. Center (1318 U St., N.W.).

Nellie’s (900 U St., N.W.) presents Beat the Clock happy hour tonight from 5 to 8 p.m. Prices for all bottles, Miller Light and house vodka drinks start at $2 and go up a $1 every hour.

Code D.C. is hosting a special party for Mid-Atlantic Leather tonight at Green Lantern (1335 Green Court, N.W.). General admission is $15 and MAL package holders get in for $10. Doors open at 10 p.m. For more information, visit codedc.com.

Saturday, Jan. 14

Blowoff, a dance party featuring gay DJs Bob Mould and Richard Morel, will be at 9:30 club (815 V St., N.W.) tonight. Doors open at 11:30 p.m. Attendees must be 21 or older. Tickets are $12 and can be purchased at 930.com.

Busboys & Poets presents “The Intersection of Art and Activism” featuring Ethelbert Miller and John Feffer in the Cullen Room of its 5th and K location (1025 5th St., N.W.) at 5 p.m. Miller is the Board Chair of the Institute for Policy Studies and Feffer is a playwright and political analyst. This is a free event.

Zoom: Urban Lesbian Excursions presents “The Smoker’s Room,” at Shelly’s Back Room (1331 F St., N.W.) tonight at 6 p.m. The event is free to RSVP, but there is a $12 minimum purchase at the venue. For more information, visit phatgirlchic.com/zoom.

Black Cat (1811 14th St., N.W.) presents Hellmouth Happy Hour where every week an episode of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” will be screened and drink specials will be offered. This week the episode is “The Wish,” featuring the first appearance of “a little gay” Willow.

Emmy Award-winning actress Holland Taylor comes to the Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) with her one-woman play “Ann” today at 1:30 and 7:30 p.m. The show tells the story of Ann Richards, the second female governor of Texas. Tickets range from $54 to $95 and can be purchased online at kennedy-center.org. The show closes on Sunday.

The International Deaf Leather Meeting is being held at the D.C. Center (1318 U St., N.W.) today from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. For more information, visit thedccenter.org.

Sunday, Jan. 15

D.C.’s Got Talent presents a Martin Luther King, Jr. birthday celebration at Busboys & Poets Hyattsville location (5331 Baltimore Ave., Suite 104) tonight at 8 p.m.. The event will feature artists performing spoken work, songs and poems in tribute to King. Tickets are available by calling 202-705-5048 or 240-381-5553 and at the door.

Nellie’s (900 U St., N.W.) presents Drag Brunch hosted by Shi-Queeta Lee today at 11 a.m. with a $20 brunch buffet, then stick around and watch the Baltimore Ravens take on the Houston Texans in the NFL Playoffs at 1 p.m.

As part of Mid-Atlantic Leather Weekend, 495 Bears is hosting a special Bears Can Dance tonight from 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. at Green Lantern (1335 Green Court, N.W.). This is no cover for this event.

Monday, Jan. 16

Stephanie Mills plays the Birchmere (3701 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria) tonight at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $69.50. Mills will also be performing on Tuesday night.

The Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) and Georgetown University are hosting a musical celebration tonight at 6 p.m. featuring Grammy award-winning vocalist Bobby McFerrin and the “Let Freedom Ring!” Choir. Free tickets will be given away two per person in line in the Hall of Nations starting at 5 p.m.

The D.C. Coalition, the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club and the D.C. Center will be marching as a single contingent in the Martin Luther King Junior Holiday Parade today at 11 a.m. The parade starts at Friendship Public Charter School and ends at Leckie Elementary School. For more information, visit mlkholidayparadedc.org.

Tuesday, Jan. 17

Riot Act Comedy Theater (801 E St., N.W.) presents its weekly trivia night, hosted by Ashley Linder and Lauren Zoltick tonight at 8 p.m. in the upstairs bar. There is also a bonus question worth three extra points online at riotactcomedy.com.

Join Burgundy Crescent Volunteers to help pack safer sex kits from 7 to 9 p.m. tonight at FUK!T’s packing location, Green Lantern, 1335 Green Ct., N.W.

Wednesday, Jan. 18

Town (2009 8th St., N.W.) is hosting a dance party fundraiser for U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) tonight with Mixtape DJs Shea Van Horn and Matt Bailer. Doors open at 8 p.m. and there is a $25 cover for this 21 and older event. For more information, visitindependentaction.org.

The D.C. Ice Breakers will be having its monthly skate and social tonight. The group will be skating at Kettler Capitals Iceplex (627 N. Glebe Rd.) in Arlington from 8 to 9 p.m. then they’ll hit a local bar for a social hour. Skating is $8 and skate rentals are $3.

The Tom Davoren Social Bridge Club, for gay bridge players, meets tonight for social bridge at the Dignity Center (721 8th Street, S.E.). No partner is needed. Visit lambdabridge.com for details and click on “social bridge in Washington.”

Thursday, Jan. 19

Christine Lavin plays Wolf Trap (1645 Trap Rd., Vienna) tonight at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20 and available online at wolftrap.org.

D.C. Lambda Squares, a local gay square dancing group, is having its plus with as-needed mainstream club night tonight from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. at National City Christian Church (5 Thomas Circle, N.W.). For more information, visit dclambdasquares.org.

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Television

ICYMI: ‘Overcompensating’ a surprisingly sweet queer treat

A sweet, savvy show about breaking free to embrace your true self

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Holmes, Benito Skinner and Wally Baram in ‘Overcompensating.’ (Photo courtesy of MGM Amazon)

Pride month 2025 is now behind us, and while it’s safe to say that this year’s celebrations had a darker edge than usual, it’s also true that they came with a particularly rich bounty of new queer movies and shows to entertain us – so many, in fact, that even if we are facing a lull until the fall another harvest of fresh content, there are still plenty of titles – which, for whatever reason, were off your radar – for you to catch up on in the meantime.

One of the most notable of these –  the bingeworthy series “Overcompensating” (now streaming on Amazon Prime) – will most definitely have been ON the radar for the plentiful fans of creator and star Benito Skinner, the actor/comedian who rose to viral fame through his content on platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. For anyone else, it might have easily slipped through the cracks.

Created and written by Skinner as a loosely autobiographical “college comedy,” it aims for the kind of raucous, explicitly sexed-up tone one expects from the genre as it centers on Benny (Skinner), newly arrived as a freshman at prestigious Yates University. A former football jock and “golden boy” at his midwestern high school, he’s the picture of idealized youthful masculinity; he’s also deep in the closet, struggling to keep his sexuality hidden and maintain his macho front under the intense scrutiny of the college’s social scene – and under the resentful eye of his older sister Grace (Mary Beth Barone), who has already secured her own place at the top of the pecking order.

In the first episode, Benny’s difficulties are eased when he meets Carmen (Wally Baram), another freshman trying to navigate the politics of college life; a gamer from a home marred by tragedy, she’s an outsider who feels like she’s putting on an act, too, and they click – giving him the convenient “cover” of female companionship while providing them both with much-needed support and encouragement. He’s also befriended by a handsome film major from England (Rish Shah), who has already caught his eye, stirring other kinds of feelings and possibly even reciprocating them. Meanwhile, he’s being courted by the school’s “exclusive secret society” – headed by his sister’s aggressively “alpha” boyfriend Pete (Adam DiMarco) – and trying to stay interested in his studies, despite a growing realization that a career in business doesn’t actually appeal to him all that much.

That’s a lot to juggle for anybody, even an overachiever like Benny – whose “lucky” life so far has largely been the result of playing a role he is finding harder and harder to maintain. As the series goes on through its eight-episode arc, it becomes clear that he’s not the only one who is “keeping up appearances,” and he, along with the other confused and damaged young people in his orbit, begins the painful (but often hilarious) process of evolution that is required in order to become truly oneself.

Directed toward appealing to a younger demographic, “Overcompensating” is the kind of show that requires a few episodes worth of invested time to make an impression that feels like substance. Full of the bawdy farcical antics that go hand in hand with stories about hormonally charged college kids, it’s not above leaning into the formulas and tropes that have always driven these kinds of comedies. At first, while its broadly comedic strokes and frequently explicit sexual hijinks might elicit plenty of chuckles, the show might easily feel tiresome for more mature audiences; there’s a nostalgic fun to it, made even more appealing, somehow, by the “political incorrectness” of its frequently sexist and homophobic humor, but for a while things may feel like an unnecessary attempt to reinvent “Animal House” for the Gen Z crowd.

By the time the season reaches its halfway point, however, things have started to get real. The antics of these horny almost-adults take on a more pointed absurdity, informed by the increasingly tangled web of defensive deceit they weave among themselves – and, as things draw toward a cliffhanger climax, the consequences of maintaining it – until it achieves a sense of empathy toward them all. There’s a wisdom that smacks of lived authenticity underlying the whole affair, transforming it from the “sexploitative” teen comedy of its surface into something deeper. To be sure, things stay expectedly wacky, and the soap-operatic melodrama of its twists and reversals continue to maintain the show’s “mature YA” appeal; but beneath those trappings, by the end of the season a truer identity has begun to emerge, just as its characters have begun to find their own levels of self-actualization for themselves.

As creator, primary writer, and star, it’s obviously Skinner who deserves much of the credit. While it might be tempting, early on, to dismiss the show as an “ego project,” the internet-spawned sensation proves his talents quickly enough to get past such judgy suspicions, delivering a pitch-perfect blend of sauciness and sensitivity that extends its appeal toward both ends of the taste spectrum; just as crucially, he brings the same aforementioned “lived authenticity” to his winning performance – after all, he’s essentially playing himself in a fictionalized version of his own life – while also making sure that equal time (and compassion) is afforded all the other characters around him, each of whom are pushing at the boundaries of their own respective “closets,” too. It’s unavoidable to notice that – like most of his co-stars – he’s plainly a decade too old to be playing a college student; but by the time we reach that crucial halfway turning point, we’ve become too engaged by him to care.

The show is full of excellent performances, in fact. Relative newcomers Baram and Barone offer layers of complex nuance, while the more familiar DiMarco (“White Lotus”) is close to heartbreaking as the toxic BMOC clinging to the illusion of power as his life begins unraveling around him. Other standouts include the mononymic actress Holmes as Carmen’s “wild child” roommate, solidly likable turns as Benny’s parents from mature veterans Connie Britten and Kyle MacLachlan (whose presence, along with stylish elements in several key scenes, hints at an homage-ish nod to the late David Lynch), and podcaster Owen Thiele as an openly gay fellow student who has Benny “clocked” from the moment they meet. Finally, Lukas Gage makes a deep impression as a former high school teammate at the heart of Benny’s most haunting memory.

There’s no official word yet on whether “Overcompensating” will be renewed for a second season, despite the multiple loose ends left dangling at the end of its first; it has proven to be popular, and Skinner’s large fanbase makes it likely that the story will continue. Even if it doesn’t, the place of uncertainty in which it has left its characters rings true enough to serve as a satisfying endpoint.

As for us, we hope that won’t happen. For all its sophomoric humor, generic plot twists, and purposefully gratuitous sexual titillation, it’s one of the sweetest, kindest, and most savvy shows we’ve seen about breaking free from conformity to embrace your true self – and that’s a message that applies whether you’re queer, straight, or anywhere in between.

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Photos

PHOTOS: Independence Day Weekend in Rehoboth

Wicked Green Pool Party, fireworks among festivities

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A fireworks show was held in Rehoboth Beach, Del. on Saturday, July 5. (Washington Blade photo by Daniel Truitt)

Vacationers and residents alike enjoyed Independence Day Weekend activities in Rehoboth Beach, Del. The Wicked Green Pool Party drew hundreds to the CAMP Rehoboth fundraiser on Saturday. That evening, revelers went to the rooftops to watch the fireworks display.

(Washington Blade photos by Daniel Truitt)

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Music & Concerts

Red, White, and Beyoncé: Queen Bey takes Cowboy Carter to D.C. for the Fourth of July

The legendary music icon performed on July 4 and 7 to a nearly sold-out Northwest Stadium.

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Beyoncé performs on July 7. (Washington Blade photo by Joe Reberkenny)

Just in time for Independence Day, Beyoncé lit up Landover’s Commanders Field (formerly FedEx Field) with fireworks and fiery patriotism, bringing her deeply moving and genre-defying “Cowboy Carter” tour to the Washington, D.C. area.

The tour, which takes the global icon across nine cities in support of her chart-topping and Grammy-winning country album Cowboy Carter,” landed in Prince George’s County, Maryland, over the Fourth of July weekend. From the moment Beyoncé stepped on stage, it was clear this was more than just a concert — it was a reclamation.

Drawing from classic Americana, sharp political commentary, and a reimagined vision of country music, the show served as a powerful reminder of how Black Americans — especially Black women — have long been overlooked in spaces they helped create. “Cowboy Carter” released in March 2024, is the second act in Beyoncé’s genre-traversing trilogy. With it, she became the first Black woman to win a Grammy for Best Country Album and also took home the coveted Album of the Year.

The record examines the Black American experience through the lens of country music, grappling with the tension between the mythology of the American Dream and the lived realities of those historically excluded from it. That theme comes alive in the show’s opening number, “American Requiem,” where Beyoncé sings:

“Said I wouldn’t saddle up, but
If that ain’t country, tell me, what is?
Plant my bare feet on solid ground for years
They don’t, don’t know how hard I had to fight for this
When I sing my song…”

Throughout the performance, Beyoncé incorporated arresting visuals: Black cowboys on horseback, vintage American iconography, and Fox News clips criticizing her genre shift — all woven together with voiceovers from country legends like Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson. The result was a multimedia masterclass in storytelling and subversion.

The “Cowboy Carter” tour has been a social media sensation for weeks, with fans scrambling for tickets, curating elaborate “cowboy couture” outfits, and tailgating under the summer sun. At Commanders Field, thousands waited in long lines for exclusive merch and even longer ones to enter the stadium — a pilgrimage that, for many, felt more like attending church than a concert.

One group out in full force for the concert was Black queer men — some rocking “denim on denim on denim on denim,” while others opted for more polished Cowboy Couture looks. The celebration of Black identity within Americana was ever-present, making the concert feel like the world’s biggest gay country-western club.

A standout moment of the night was the appearance of Beyoncé’s 13-year-old daughter, Blue Ivy Carter. Commanding the stage with poise and power, she matched the intensity and choreography of her mother and the professional dancers — a remarkable feat for someone her age and a clear sign that the Carter legacy continues to shine.

It’s been nearly two decades since Beyoncé and Destiny’s Child parted ways, and since then, she’s more than lived up to her title as the voice of a generation. With Cowboy Carter,” she’s not just making music — she’s rewriting history and reclaiming the space Black artists have always deserved in the country canon.

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