Arts & Entertainment
Calendar: Feb. 24
Parties, concerts, meetings and more through March 1


The Washington National Opera presents ‘Così fan tutte’ at the Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) on Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. (Photo by Richard H. Smith for the Royal Opera House, courtesy Kennedy Center)
TODAY (Friday)
The D.C. Center (1318 U St., N.W.) is hosting a community conversation on the National Strategy for Black Gay Youth tonight at 6:30 p.m. with featured guests Frank Walker and Ezra Littleton from Youth Pride Services.
Busboys & Poets will be hosting ASL open mic poetry tonight at 11 p.m. in the Langston Room at its 14th and V streets location (2021 14th St., N.W.). Anyone with sign language knowledge may sign up to recite a poem or sign a song by e-mailing [email protected]. There is a $5 cover.
D.C. Women4Women presents “Tryst,” a monthly professional lesbian happy hour at its new location, Topaz Bar (1733 N St., N.W.) tonight from 7 to 10 p.m.
Fab Lounge (1805 Connecticut Ave., N.W.) presents “Honey, I Shrunk the Queers!” tonight from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. featuring music from the ‘80s and ‘90s. All attendees to this free event must be 21 or older.
Phase 1 of Dupont (1415 22nd St., N.W.) presents “Talkin’ Bout’ Dub,” a queer dubstep night featuring DJ Encryption from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. Attendees must be 21 and older and there is a $10 cover.
DJ Chad Jack will be spinning at Town (2009 8th St., N.W.) tonight. Cover is $8 before 11 p.m. and $12 after. Attendees must be 21 or older. Doors open at 10 p.m.
Cobalt (1639 R St., N.W.) is having a military party tonight with DJ Sean Morris on the main floor and DJ Keenan Orr in the 30degrees lounge. Doors open at 10 p.m. and the open vodka bar starts at 11.
Saturday, Feb. 25
SpeakeasyDC is performing as part of Intersections tonight at the Sprenger Theater at Atlas (1333 H St., N.E.) from 7 to 9:30 p.m. SpeakeasyDC will be exploring the impact of queer culture featuring Regie Cabico, Andrew Korfhage, Natalie E. Illum and Sandra Faria.
Irish music ensemble Cherish the Girls plays Wolf Trap (1645 Trap Rd., Vienna) tonight at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $25 and available online at wolftrap.org.
Tom From Prague brings “Tainted Love: An International ‘80s Dance Party” to Green Lantern (1335 Green Court, N.W.) tonight from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. There is a $5 cover.
“Several Species: The Pink Floyd Experience” is at Rams Head Live (20 Market Place, Baltimore) tonight at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20 in advanced, $25 day of show and can be purchased online at ramsheadlive.com.
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 “Consequences.”
The Duke D.C. LGBT Network is hosting a networking social at Nellie’s (900 U St., N.W.) today at noon as the Blue Devils take on Virginia Tech.
Sunday, Feb. 26
Busboys & Poets presents “Mature Voices,” an open mic for performers 55 and older, hosted by Saleem Wayne Waters tonight in the Zinn room of its Hyattsville location (5331 Baltimore Ave., Suite 104) at 6 p.m. There is a $5 cover. For more information, visit busboysandpoets.com.
The Washington Ballet honoring choreographer Twyla Tharp is at the Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) tonight at 8 p.m., in a program showcasing her work spanning two decades. It will include performance of Tharp’s “Nine Sinatra Songs,” “Push Comes to Shove” and “Surfer at the Styx River.” Tickets range from $20 to $125 and can be purchased online at kennedy-center.org.
The Lodge (21614 National Pike, Boonsboro) presents Saving Grace with the Draghetti Sisters, starring Araya Sparxx, Dannica Lauder and Jayden Elyse with special guest performances by Nicole James and Chi Chi Ray Colby at 6:45 p.m. followed by karaoke from 8 p.m to close. Doors open at 6 p.m. There is no cover.
Monday, Feb. 27
Out singer/songwriter Melissa Ferrick plays Jammi’ Java (227 Maple Ave., E Vienna) tonight at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $20 and can be purchased online atjamminjava.com.
Tuesday, Feb. 28
GLAA is having a membership meeting tonight in the second floor community room at the Reeves Center (2000 14th St., N.W.) from 7 to 8:30 p.m.
Lace Lounge (2214 Rhode Island Ave., N.E.) presents “Meet the Chef Tuesdays” tonight from 6 to 9 p.m. with Chef Raymond. There will be cooking tips, recipes, food samples and live demonstrations.
The Washington National Opera presents “Così fan tutte” tonight at the Kennedy Center (2700 F St., N.W.) at 7:30 p.m. The show follows two friends as they make a bet about their fiancées fidelity. The opera is performed in Italian with English supertitles. Tickets range from $25 to $300 and can be purchased online at kennedy-center.org.
Wednesday, Feb. 29
Singer/songwriter Lauryn Hill plays Warner Theatre (513 13th St., N.W.) tonight at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $55 to $150 and can be purchased online atlivenation.com.
Grammy-winning band Buckwheat Zydeco plays Wolf Trap (1645 Trap Rd., Vienna) tonight at 8 p.m. Tickets are $24 and available online at wolftrap.org.
Busboys & Poets’s monthly book club is meeting tonight at its Shirlington location (4251 S. Campbell Ave., Arlington) at 7 p.m. to discuss the book “The Change I Believe In: Fighting for Progress in the Age of Obama” by Katrina vanden Heuvel. The book will be available for purchased in the Global Exchange store.
The Lambda Bridge Club meets tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Dignity Center (721 8th St., SE — across from Marine Barracks) for duplicate bridge. No reservations needed; newcomers welcome. Visit lambdabridge.com if you need a partner.
Thursday, March 1
Gregory Lawson of Morgan Stanley Smith will be presenting a seminar in wealth planning for LGBT couples at the MAA Carriage House (1781 Church St., N.W.) tonight starting at 6:30 p.m. with a reception. Space is limited so attendees are asked to RSVP to [email protected].
SAGE Metro D.C. is having a steering committee meeting today at the D.C. Center (1318 U St., N.W.) at 12:30 p.m. The center is also is hosting a transmen discussion group tonight at 7 p.m.
D.C. Lambda Squares, a local gay square dancing group, is having its annual meeting tonight as well as its weekly club night with mainstream and plus dancing at the National City Christian Church (5 Thomas Circle, N.W.) from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.
Movies
‘Pee-wee’ spills the tea in outstanding new documentary
Reubens’s sexuality emerges as the show’s focus

Most of us who have lived long enough to get nostalgic for our formative years have, by now, watched enough documentaries about a beloved entertainment icon from our past to know what to expect when a new one comes along.
Such offerings are typically slick biographical portraits blending archival material with newly filmed “talking head” reminiscences and commentaries, and perhaps punctuated by eye-catching animations or other flourishes to add an extra layer of visual interest; heavy on the nostalgia and mostly reverent in tone, they satisfy us with pleasant memories, supplement our knowledge with behind-the-history insights and revelations, and leave us – ideally – with a renewed appreciation and a reinforced feeling of comfortable familiarity. Many of them are little more than retrospectives, more glossy tribute than in-depth profile; occasionally, a few go beyond the surface to give us a deeper sense of personal connection with their subject – but rarely enough, even in the best of them, to make us feel as if we know them well.
No matter how many of these docs you have seen, however, or jaded your expectations may be when you approach it, “Pee-wee as Himself” is still going to surprise you.
Directed by filmmaker Matt Wolf, the two-part HBO docuseries – which premiered May 23 and is now streaming on Max – is built around material culled from 40 hours of interview footage with the late Paul Reubens (the creator and performer behind nerdy, manic cultural phenomenon and children’s show host “Pee-wee Herman,” for anyone that needs to be told), and conducts a “guided tour” of Reubens’ singular career in the limelight. The first installment traces a path from his Florida childhood through his early adventures as an actor and performance artist in Los Angeles to his rapid rise to fame through the popularity of his carefully crafted alter-ego; part two continues the story to explore the expansion of his fame through the phenomenon of “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” but soon shifts gears to cover his sudden fall from grace after a notorious “public indecency” arrest in an adult theater, and the subsequent accusations of collecting “child pornography” that unfairly branded him as a pedophile in the public eye — and comes full circle to document his return to favor as an underdog hero for the generation that had grown up watching him.
Besides its detailed chronicle of these already-well-known chapters in Reubens’ life, however, Wolf’s doc (and Reubens, via frequent full-frame close-up commentary throughout) delves into publicly uncharted territory to give us a look at something we’ve never been allowed to see before: Paul Reubens himself.
That includes, of course, removing any ambiguity that might remain about the sexuality of the man behind the bow tie, who never publicly identified as gay before his death from cancer in 2023. It’s not so much a “coming out” — after all, he artfully teased his queerness to fans for years — as it is a dropping of pretense. There’s no need for a definitive statement announcing something that everybody already knew, anyway.
That’s not to say he skirts the issue as he delivers his full-frame close-up testimonial to the camera; on the contrary, he reflects often and with bittersweet candor about the carefully-managed matter of his sexuality – or the public’s perception of it, at any rate – with the matter-of-fact eloquence of someone who’s spent a lot of time thinking about it. He openly discusses his choice to keep the closet door closed on his personal life in order to preserve Pee-wee’s ambiguously wholesome yet irresistibly subversive persona in the public’s imagination, and to abandon his openly queer life (as well as a loving long term relationship, one of the series’ biggest “reveals”) to do so.”I was as out as you could be,” he reflects with rueful irony, “and then I went back in.”
Indeed, it’s Reubens’s sexuality that ultimately emerges as the show’s core focus — even more than the rich treasure trove of personal photos, home movies, behind-the-scenes footage, and all the other fan-thrilling delights it provides — and gives it a larger significance, perhaps than even the man himself. It’s a thread that runs through his story, impacting his choices and the trajectory of his career, and reflecting the familiar shared experience of many audience members who may be able to relate; later, it manifests on a societal level, as Wolf and his subject explore the homophobic attitudes behind the legal persecution that would bring his rising star into a tailspin and hang over his reputation for the rest of his life. It serves as both a reminder of the power of cultural bigotry to repress queerness and a cautionary tale about the personal cost of repressing oneself.
A good number of Reubens’ longtime friends (like Cassandra Petersen, aka “Elvira, Mistress of the Dark,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” costar David Arquette, and former “girlfriend” Debi Mazar, who provided support, acceptance, and companionship in the wake of his legal troubles), come along for the ride, offering their own reminiscences and insights into official record, as well as lesser-known members of an inner circle that comprised the late artist’s chosen family. Yet all these testimonials, authentic as they may be, are not what enable “Pee-wee as Himself” to bring us closer to the real Paul Reubens. It’s Reubens himself who does that.
Maintaining an ambiguously hostile edge in his interviews, bringing to light a clash for control between himself and director Wolf with as much clarity as he illuminates the vast archival material that is shown to document his career, he demonstrates firsthand the need to manage his own narrative, balking, even openly resisting, certain questions and interpretations that arise throughout. It gives the real Reubens the same vague menace with which Pee-wee was also infused — and also creates a sort of meta-narrative, in which the conflict between subject and director must also be resolved before the story can truly achieve closure, calling into question whether Reubens (a veteran of avant-garde theater and lifelong fan of the circus) might not be adding yet another layer of mystery and performance to his image even as he gets honest publicly for the very first time.
That closure eventually comes in the form of a voice recording made by Reubens the day before his death — after a six year battle with lung cancer (he was a heavy smoker, another personal detail he painstakingly hid from the public) which, save for those in his innermost circle, he never revealed until the end — in which he delivers a final message to the world. With it, he finally accomplishes what he never could during his life, and lets us see, at last, who he was when he wasn’t being Pee-wee.
And it’s a beautiful thing.

The Opening Reception for the 34th annual D.C. Black Pride was held at the Capital Hilton on Friday, May 23. Presenters, speakers and entertainers included Ts Madison, Monroe Alise, Billy the Goat, Kerri Colby, Apple Brown Betty, Heather Mahogani, Lyrical Mar, Lolita Leopard, Ink, and Bang Garçon. Anthony Oakes was the host.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)





















The 2025 Silver Pride Resource Fair and Tea Dance was held at the Eaton Hotel on Wednesday, May 21.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)









