Arts & Entertainment
AIDS Conference and related events
Blade archival photo exhibit among offerings


One of the images that will be included in a Blade exhibit at the Conference. (Blade file photo by the late Doug Hinckle)
TODAY (Friday)
Today and Saturday, the D.C. Center, National Coalition of LGBT Health, Whitman-Walker Health and Us Helping Us at George Washington University (2029 G Street, NW) are hosting theĀ Gay Menās Health Summit. Registration is $85, $65 for students. For more information, visitĀ gmhs2012.org.
The International Working Group on HIV & AIDS presents theĀ International Indigenous Pre-ConferenceĀ starting today at 8 a.m. and running through Saturday at 5 p.m. It will take place at the Four Points by Sheraton Hotel (1201 K St., N.W.). The event is free but registration is required. For more information, visitĀ indigenouspreconference.
Saturday, July 21
TheĀ Men Who Have Sex with Men Pre-ConferenceĀ is at FHI 360 (1825 Connecticut Ave., N.W.) starting at 9 a.m. going all day today. The theme for this year is āFrom Stigma to Strength: Strategies for MSM, Transgender People and Allies in a Shifting AIDS Landscape.ā This event is free. For more information, visitĀ msmgf.org.
Jay BrannanĀ plays U Street Music Hall (1115A U Street NW) this evening at 7 p.m.Ā Ā Picking up his first guitar at age 20, Brannanās addiction to music helped him kick alcohol and allowed him to make connections with other performers. Tickets are $20. For more information, visitĀ ustreetmusichall.com.
Starting today and running through July 27, theĀ Textile MuseumĀ (2320 S Street NW) is showing a special display of one panel from the AIDS quilt. An $8 donation is suggested. For more information about this event or other places that will be showing panels of the quilt, go toĀ quilt2012.org.
Town is holding theĀ āAIDS Conference PartyāĀ tonight at 10 p.m. A drag show starts at 10:30 p.m. There are $3 drinks until 11 p.m. Cover is $8 from 10-11 p.m. and $12 after 11 p.m. For more information, visitĀ towndc.com.
Sunday, July 22
Thereās aĀ March on WashingtonĀ involving several different local organizations to open the International AIDS Conference from noon to 2 p.m. today.
The Global Forum on MSM and HIV and the National Gay Menās Health Summit presentĀ āMeet the Men of the International AIDS ConferenceāĀ at Cobalt (1639 R St., N.W.) tonight at 9:30 p.m. Cover is $10. For more information, visitgmhs2012.org.
Monday, July 23
Arena Stage (1101 6thĀ St. SW) hosts a benefit show ofĀ āThe Normal HeartāĀ tonight at 8 p.m. The award-winning show presents a look at the sexual politics of New York during the AIDS crisis. Tickets are $65. For more information, visitĀ arenastage.org.
Tuesday, July 24
Whitman-Walker Health hosts theĀ āReturn to Lisner: A Forum on the State of HIV/AIDS,āĀ tonight at the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University (2029 G Street, NW) at 7 p.m. The event is free but registration is required. For more information, visitĀ whitman-walker.org.
Reel Affirmations presents theĀ International AIDS Film Festival. It kicks off tonight with an opening reception at Number 9 (1435 P St., N.W.) starting at 5 p.m. Then at the Carnegie Institute of Science (1530 P St., NW) at 7 p.m., the festival is screening the film āStill Aroundā and will have a panel discussion with the directors following the showing. The last event of the evening is the screening of āMeeting the Challenges of HIV/AIDS in Ethiopiaā tonight at 9:15. Individual ticket prices is $10, but the festival is offering a $25 package for all the screenings. For more information, visitĀ reelaffirmationsaidsfilmfest.
Wednesday, July 25
TheĀ International AIDS Film FestivalĀ continues tonight at the Carnegie Institute of Science (1530 P St., NW) starting at 7 p.m. with a screening of āPills Profit$ Protestā and a later screening āSex In An Epidemicā at 9 p.m. Individual tickets are $10 and a package price is $25. For more information, visitĀ reelaffirmationsaidsfilmfest.
For more events, visit the AIDS2012 Reunion website atĀ aids2012reunion.org.
Photos
PHOTOS: DCGFFL 25th Anniversary Party
Gay flag football league marks milestone at Penn Social

The D.C. Gay Flag Football League (DCGFFL) held a 25th season anniversary party at Penn Social on Saturday, Sept. 23. Proceeds from the event benefited the LGBTQ youth services organization SMYAL as well as the D.C. Center for the LGBTQ Community.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)



















Books
New book goes behind the scenes of āA League of Their Ownā
āNo Crying in Baseballā offers tears, laughs, and more

āNo Crying in Baseball: The Inside Story of āA League of Their Ownā
By Erin Carlson
c.2023, Hachette Books
$29/320 pages
You donāt usually think of Madonna as complaining of being ādirty all dayā from playing baseball. But thatās what the legendary diva did during the shooting of āA League of Their Own,ā the 1992 movie, beloved by queers.
āNo Crying in Baseball,ā the fascinating story behind āA League of Their Own,ā has arrived in time for the World Series. Nothing could be more welcome after Amazon has cancelled season 2 of its reboot (with the same name) of this classic film.

In this era, people donāt agree on much. Yet, āA League of Their Ownā is loved by everyone from eight-year-old kids to 80-year-old grandparents.
The movie has strikes, home runs and outs for sports fans; period ambience for history buffs; and tears, laughs and a washed-up, drunk, but lovable coach for dramady fans.
The same is true for āNo Crying in Baseball.ā This āmaking ofā story will appeal to history, sports and Hollywood aficionados. Like āAll About Eveā and āThe Rocky Horror Picture Show,ā āA League of Their Ownā is Holy queer Writ.
Carlson, a culture and entertainment journalist who lives in San Francisco, is skilled at distilling Hollywood history into an informative, compelling narrative. As with her previous books, āIāll Have What Sheās Having: How Nora Ephronās three Iconic Films Saved the Romantic Comedyā and āQueen Meryl: The Iconic Roles, Heroic Deeds, and Legendary Life of Meryl Streep,ā āNo Crying in Baseball,ā isnāt too āeducational.ā Itās filled with gossip to enliven coffee dates and cocktail parties.
āA League of Their Ownā is based on the true story of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). From 1943 to 1954, more than 600 women played in the league in the Midwest. The leagueās players were all white because the racism of the time prohibited Black women from playing. In the film, the characters are fictional. But the team the main characters play for ā the Rockford Peaches ā was real.
While many male Major and Minor League Baseball players were fighting in World War II, chewing gum magnate Philip K. Wrigley, who owned the Chicago Cubs, founded the league. He started the AAGPBL, āTo keep spectators in the bleachers,ā Carlson reports, āand a storied American sportāmore important: his business afloat.ā
In 1943, the Office of War Information warned that the baseball season could be āscrappedā ādue to a lack of men,ā Carlson adds.
āA League of Their Ownā was an ensemble of womenās performances (including Rosie OāDonnell as Doris, Megan Cavanagh as Marla, Madonna as Mae, Lori Petty as Kit and Geena Davis as Dottie) that would become legendary.
Girls and women still dress up as Rockford Peaches on Halloween.
Tom Hanksās indelible portrayal of coach Jimmy Dugan, Gary Marshallās depiction of (fictional) league owner Walter Harvey and Jon Lovitzās portrayal of Ernie have also become part of film history.
Filming āA League of Their Own,ā Carlson vividly makes clear, was a gargantuan effort. There were āactresses who canāt play baseballā and ābaseball players who canāt act,ā Penny Marshall said.
The stadium in Evansville, Ind., was rebuilt to look like it was in the 1940s āwhen the players and extras were in costume,ā Carlson writes, āit was easy to lose track of what year it was.ā
āNo Crying in Baseballā isnāt written for a queer audience. But, Carlson doesnāt pull any punches.
Many of the real-life AAGPBL players who OāDonnell met had same-sex partners, OāDonnell told Carlson.
āWhen Penny, angling for a broad box-office hit chose to ignore the AAGPGLās queer history,ā Carlson writes, āshe perpetuated a cycle of silence that muzzled athletes and actresses alike from coming out on the wider stage.ā
āIt was, as they say, a different time,ā she adds.
Fortunately, Carlsonās book isnāt preachy. Marshall nicknames OāDonnell and Madonna (who become buddies) āRoā and āMo.ā Kodak is so grateful for the one million feet of film that Marshall shot that it brings in a high school marching band. Along with a lobster lunch. One day, an assistant director āstreaked the set to lighten the mood,ā Carlson writes.
āNo Crying in Baseball,ā is slow-going at first. Marshall, who died in 2018, became famous as Laverne in āLaverne & Shirley.ā Itās interesting to read about her. But Carlson devotes so much time to Marshallās bio that you wonder when sheāll get to āA League of Their Own.ā
Thankfully, after a couple of innings, the intriguing story of one of the best movies ever is told.
Youāll turn the pages of āNo Crying in Baseballā even if you donāt know a center fielder from a short stop.
The Blade may receive commissions from qualifying purchases made via this post.
Theater
Rupert Murdochās powers on full display in āInkā
Media baron helped pave the way for Brexit, Prime Minister Thatcher

āInkā
Through Sept. 24
Round House Theatre
4545 East-West Highway, Bethesda, MD 20814
$46-$94
Roundhousetheatre.org
Yes, Rupert Murdochās loathsome traits are many, but his skills to succeed are undeniably numerous.Ā
In the first scenes of John Graham’s West End and Broadway hit drama āInk,ā an exciting year-long detail from the life of a burgeoning media baron, Murdoch’s powers of persuasion are on full display.
Itās 1969 London. Over dinner with editor Larry Lamb, a young Murdoch shares his plan to buy the Sun and rebrand the dying broadsheet, replacing the Daily Mirror as Britainās best-selling tabloid. Whatās more, he wants to do it in just one year with Lamb at the helm.
Initially reluctant, Lamb becomes seduced by the idea of running a paper, something thatās always eluded him throughout his career, and something Murdoch, the outsider Australian, understands. Murdoch taunts him, āNot you. Not Larry Lamb, the Yorkshire-born son of a blacksmith, not the guy who didnāt get a degree from Oxford or Cambridge, who didnāt get a degree from anywhere. Not you.ā
Still, Lamb, played convincingly by Cody Nickell in Round House Theatreās stellar season-opener, a co-production with Olney Theatre Center, remains unsure. But Murdoch (a delightfully brash Andrew Rein) is undeterred, and seals the deal with a generous salary.
Superbly staged by director Jason Loweth, āInkā is riveting. Its exchanges between Lamb and Murdoch are a strikingly intimate glimpse into ambition involving an ostensibly average editor and a striving money man who doesnāt like people.
Once on board, Lamb is trolling Fleet Street in search of his launch team, played marvelously by some mostly familiar actors. He makes his most important hire ā news editor Brian McConnell (Maboud Ebrahimzadeh) ā in a steam bath. The remainder of the Sunās new masthead falls handily into place: Joyce Hopkirk (Kate Eastwood Norris) the womenās page editor whose forward thinking is marred by her casual racism; Zion Jang plays Beverley Goodway, an awkwardly amusing young photographer; persnickety deputy editor Bernard Shrimsley (Michael Glenn) who learns to love ugly things; and an old school sports editor who proves surprisingly versatile, played by Ryan Rillette, Round Houseās artistic director.
At Lambās suggestion, the team brainstorms about what interests Sun readers. They decide on celebrities, pets, sports, free stuff, and ārather revolutionarily for the time āTV. Murdoch is happy to let readersā taste dictate content and the āWhyā of the sacred āfive Wsā of journalism is out the window.
Murdoch is portrayed as a not wholly unlikable misanthrope. He dislikes his editors and pressman alike. He particularly hates unions. His advice to Lamb is not to get too chummy with his subordinates. Regarding the competition, Murdoch doesnāt just want to outperform them, he wants to grind them to dust.
Loewith leads an inspired design team. Scenic designer Tony Cisekās imposing, inky grey edifice made from modular walls is ideally suited for Mike Tutajās projections of headlines, printed pages, and Reinās outsized face as Murdoch. Sound designer and composer Matthew M. Nielson ably supplies bar noises and the nonstop, pre-digital newspaper clatter of presses, linotypes, and typewriters.
From a convenient second tiered balcony, the Daily Mirrorās establishment power trio Hugh Cudlipp (Craig Wallace), Chris Lee Howard (Chris Geneback) and Sir Percy (Walter Riddle) overlook all that lies below, discussing new tactics and (mostly failed) strategies to remain on top.
Increasingly comfortable in the role of ruthless, sleazy editor, Lamb is unstoppable.
Obsessed with overtaking the Daily Mirrorās circulation, he opts for some sketchy reportage surrounding the kidnapping and presumed murder of Muriel McKay, the wife of Murdochās deputy Sir Alick (Todd Scofield). The kidnappers mistook Muriel for Murdochās then-wife Anna (Sophia Early). Next, in a move beyond the pale, Lamb introduces āPage 3,ā a feature spotlighting a topless female model. Awesta Zarif plays Stephanie, a smart young model. She asks Lamb if he would run a semi-nude pic of his similarly aged daughter? His reaction is uncomfortable but undaunted.
For Murdochās purposes, history proves he chose well in Lamb. By yearās end, the Sun is Britainās most widely read tabloid. Together they give the people what they didnāt know they wanted, proving the pro-Labour Daily Mirrorās hold on the working class is baseless and paving the way for things like Brexit and a Prime Minister Thatcher.
āInkā at Round House closes soon. See it if you can.
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