a&e features
‘It’s a Sin’ captures joy, heartbreak in ‘80s London
AIDS saga an uplifting emotional roller coaster
“It’s A Sin,” the UK miniseries that debuted in America on HBO Max Feb. 18, began its long gestation in the mind of out screenwriter Russell T. Davies back in 1995, even before he wrote his first high-profile gay TV drama, “Queer as Folk.”
Following a group of young gay men (and their straight female BFF) through the early days of the AIDS epidemic in London, the series draws heavily on Davies’ own memories of the ‘80s, and of friends he knew during the era, with an eye toward delivering an authentic presentation of gay experience while providing a wide-angle view of the disease’s impact as it took its toll across various sectors of British society. Touted as the first British television drama to deal seriously with the AIDS epidemic, its debut in England proved an unequivocal success – a surprise considering it was rejected by the nation’s BBC One and ITV networks for its subject matter before it was finally taken on for development by Channel 4. Even more gratifying, its airing resulted in a boost to HIV awareness in Britain, resulting in an uptick of almost 400% in testing.
Written and directed by out gay men and featuring out gay actors in all its gay roles (including cameos by two out “big names,” Neil Patrick Harris and Stephen Fry), the series has won well-deserved praise for its success in capturing both the exuberance and the heartbreak of gay life in 1980s London, and for Davies’ success in weaving together so many threads and characters without sacrificing the depth and emotional layering of his story.
An outstanding ensemble cast, led by Years and Years lead singer Olly Alexander and aided by veteran director Peter Hoar, delivers universally excellent performances, taking viewers through the emotional roller coaster of its narrative with the authenticity that can only come from deep commitment and investment to their roles. It’s no spoiler to say that things get pretty grim, but Davies’ script doesn’t allow it to become unrelentingly mournful; instead, he makes sure that the good stuff about being young, gay, and out – the fun, the friendship, and yes, the joy – are never far out of focus. When “It’s A Sin” reaches its conclusion, despite the multiple tragedies it makes us endure alongside its characters, the impression it leaves feels more like a celebration than a lament.
Unsurprisingly, as with any show covering a subject that casts such a shadow over an entire generation, there have been objections. Some who were on the front lines of activism during the epidemic have criticized the series for vagueness and inaccuracy on the historical context surrounding the battle against the disease, and of course there are many people – queer and straight alike – who feel that LGBTQ experience has been depicted as tragic for long enough in our cultural narratives and that creators should strive instead for more positive, aspirational stories.
An issue that has raised predictable controversy with straight audiences (and due to concerns about representation, with some non-straight ones as well) is the show’s depiction of gay sex. While some have been shocked by its explicit-if-not-graphic sex scenes (filmed with the extensive involvement of intimacy coordinators to make them as authentic as possible), others have taken exception to the fact that the people in them are simply having too much fun. After all, in a show about a sexually transmitted disease that has killed millions to date, is it really appropriate to make sex look so enjoyable?
The answer, according to Hoar, is a resounding “yes.”
The director, whose credits include the cult hit “Dr. Who” and both “Daredevil” and “The Umbrella Academy” for Netflix, told DigitalSpy, “I’m not going to worry about how people feel about it because this is our sex, and this is the way it is,” says Hoar. “And how can you show the story of men having a life they loved, and dying from it, if you don’t show that sex?
“We have to see how much fun it is.”
Those gleefully authentic scenes go a long way toward refuting and rejecting the shame that has long been so tenaciously attached to gay sex. Besides sending a refreshingly contemporary message of sex positivity, they also serve as a defiant counterpoint to the repressive homophobia and bigotry that haunts so many of the show’s other scenes – and that cuts right to the heart of what Russell Davies is ultimately trying to get across in “It’s A Sin.”
In its final minutes, the series includes a stirring monologue in which Jill (Lydia West), who has served as the emotional glue at the center of the story as well as for her circle of friends, confronts the mother of one of her fallen comrades with the hard truth that it was her own shame she instilled in her son over his own very nature, that ultimately led to his death. This is not a new argument – the idea that internalized homophobia was a factor that helped to fuel transmission has been expressed many times before.
But “It’s A Sin” does more than just tell us that. It shows us, in myriad ways we don’t necessarily connect until they culminate in that climactic speech, how the effects of all that hate become entwined into the personas of its people and manifest in their choices and behavior. We see gay men who deny their sexuality even while having furtive sex with other men, who endure sexual harassment from closeted bosses for fear of being exposed, who resign themselves to the vitriolic hate hurled upon them by random strangers on the street; we see gay men lose their jobs with no explanation, rejected and bullied by their own families, and locked away as outcasts or prisoners simply for being sick; most to the point, we see gay men so used to being demonized that they greet a killer disease with disbelief and denial, who end up becoming infected and then go on to infect others, simply because they are more afraid of being found out than they are of dying.
So, when Jill offers that searing indictment at the end, she is not just speaking about social theory. She is testifying as a witness to the things we have seen for ourselves. And while it might be oversimplifying matters to explain such a complex bundle of issues with a single unifying thread, no matter how profound, it might just as easily be overcomplicating them not to acknowledge a patently obvious connection.
Whether or not “It’s A Sin” makes a convincing case for its equation is up to the individual viewer, of course, but what is hard for anyone to deny is the show’s success at creating an infectious and emotionally satisfying saga that manages to both engage and uplift us while still honoring the weight of its subject matter. Intended as neither a documentary nor an activist’s-eye view of social injustice, it is instead popular entertainment at its best – the kind that seeks to enlighten and inform with just as much passion as it puts into its sex scenes.
a&e features
Queery: Meet artist, performer John Levengood
Modern creative talks nightlife, coming out, and his personal queer heroes
John Levengood (he/him) describes himself as a modern creative with a wide‑ranging toolkit. He blends music, technology, civic duty, and a sharp sense of wit into a cohesive artistic identity. Known primarily as a recording artist and performer, he’s also a self‑taught music producer and software engineer who embodies a generation of creators who build their own lanes rather than wait for one to appear.
Levengood, 32, who is single and identifies as gay and queer, is best known as a recording artist who has performed at Pride festivals across the country, including the main stages of World Pride DC, Central Arkansas Pride, and Charlotte Pride.
“Locally in the DMV, I’m known for turning heads at nightlife venues with my eye-catching sense of style. When I go out, I don’t try to blend in. I hope I inspire people to be themselves and have the courage to stand out,” he says.
He’s also known for hosting karaoke at Freddie’s Beach Bar in Arlington, Va., on Thursday nights. “I like to create a space where people feel comfortable expressing themselves, building community, and showcasing their talents.”
He also creates social media content from my performances and do interviews at LGBTQ+ bars and theatres in the DMV. Follow the Arlington resident @johnlevengood.
How long have you been out and who was the hardest person to tell?
I have been fully out of the closet since 2019. My parents were the hardest people to tell because my family has always been my rock and at the time I couldn’t imagine a world without them. Their reactions were extremely positive and supportive so I had nothing to fear all along.
I remember sitting on the couch with my mom, dad, and sister in our hotel room in New Orleans during our winter vacation and being so nervous to tell them. After I finally mustered up the nerve and made the proclamation, I realized my dad had already fallen asleep on the couch. My mom promised to tell him when he woke up.
Who’s your LGBTQ hero?
My LGBTQ heroes are Harvey Milk for paving the way for gays in politics and Elton John for being a pioneer for the fabulous and authentic. My local heroes in the DMV are Howard Hicks, manager of Green Lantern, and Tony Rivenbark, manager of Freddie’s Beach Bar. Both of them are essential to creating spaces where I’ve felt welcome and safe since moving to the DMV.
What’s Washington’s best nightspot, past or present?
Trade tops the list for me because of the dance floor and outdoor space. It’s so nice to get a break from the music every once and a while to be able to have a conversation.
We live in challenging times. How do you cope?
I’m still figuring this out. What is working right now is writing music and spending time with family and friends. I’ve also been spending less time on social media going to the gym at least three times a week.
What streaming show are you binging?
After “Traitors” Season 4 ended, I was in a bit of a show hole, but “Stumble” has me in a laughing loop right now. The writing is so witty.
What do you wish you’d known at 18?
At 18, I wish I would have known how liberating it is to come out of the closet. It would have been nice to know some winning lottery numbers as well.
What are your friends messaging about in your most recent group chat?
We are planning our next trip to New York City. If you can believe it, I visited NYC for the first time in 2025 for Pride and I’ve been back every quarter since. Growing up in the country, I was subconsciously primed to be scared of the city. But my mind has been blown. I can’t wait to go back.
Why Washington?
It’s the closest metropolitan area to my family, but not too close. I love the museums, the diversity, the history, and the proximity to the beach and mountains. It’s also nice to live in a city with public transportation.
Aging RFK Stadium has come down, but the RFK grounds are still getting lit up. Welcome back to the stage Project GLOW, D.C.’s homegrown electronic festival, on May 30-31. Back for its fifth year on these musically inclined acres, Project GLOW returns with an even more diverse lineup, and one that continues to celebrate LGBTQ antecedents, attendees, and acts.
Project GLOW 2026 headliners include house and techno star Mau P, progressive house legend Eric Prydz, hard-techno favorite Sara Landry, and bass acts Excision b2b Sullivan King, among the lineup of trance, bass, house, techno, dubstep, and others for the fifth anniversary year.
President & CEO Pete Kalamoutsos — born and raised in D.C. — founded Club GLOW in 1999. In 2020, GLOW entered into a partnership with global entertainment company Insomniac Events to produce live events like Project GLOW, which kicked off in 2022.
As in past years, Project GLOW not only makes space, but is intentionally inclusive of the LGBTQ community, one of its most dedicated fan bases. The festival’s LGBTQ-focused Secret Garden stage blooms again — a more intimate dance area that stands on the strength of DJs and musicians who draw from the LGBTQ community. D.C.’s LGBTQ nightlife mastermind Ed Bailey is the creative mind behind Secret Garden again. He joined Project GLOW in 2023.
“Kalamoustos says that “he’s proud of his partnership with Ed Bailey, along with Capital Pride and [nightlife producer] Jake Resnikow. It’s amazing to collaborate with Bailey at the Secret Garden stage, especially after the curated lineup we worked on at Pride last year.”
The Secret Garden will be a bit different from other stages: Eternal (“At the Eternal stage, time stands still. Lose yourself in the dance of past, present, and future, surrendering to the eternal rhythm of the universe”) and Pulse (“Feel the rhythm of the beat pulse through your veins as the heartbeat of the crowd synchronizes into one. Here, every moment vibrates with life as it guides you through a new dimension of euphoria”). The Secret Garden stage is in the round, surrounded by 16 shipping containers. The containers play canvas to muralists from around the world, who are coming in to paint them in a vibrant garden-style vibe. “We gave this stage some extra love with this layout,” K says, “ we finally cracked the code.”
K says that this will be the biggest lineup yet for the Secret Garden, featuring Nicole Moudaber b2b Chasewest, Riordan b2b Bullet Tooth, Ranger Trucco, Cassian, Eli & Fur, Cosmic Gate and Hayla. The stage is also the largest yet, featuring an expanded dance floor and 360-degree viewing.
Across all stages, K says that his goal for the fifth anniversary is “More art and fan interactive experience, more like a festival, strive to be like a Tomorrowland, as budget grows to add more experience.” Last year’s Project GLOW alone drew 40,000 attendees over two days.
K, however, was not satisfied with one festival this spring. GLOW recently announced a “pop-up” one-day event. Teaming up with Black Book Records, GLOW is set to throw a first-of-its-kind dance-music takeover of Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., headlined by electronic music star Chris Lake. Set for April 18, this euphoric block party will feature bass and vibes blocks from the White House. Organizers expect as many as 10,000 fans to attend. Beyond music, there will be food, activations, and plenty of other activities taking place around 6th St and Pennsylvania Ave NW – a location familiar to many in the LGBTQ community, as this sits squarely inside the blocks of the Capital Pride party that takes place in DC every June.
Over the past two decades, Club GLOW has produced thousands of events, from club nights to large-scale festivals including Project GLOW, Moonrise Festival, and more. Club GLOW also operates Echostage.
a&e features
New book celebrates 1970s dance music icons
‘A Night at the Disco’ features interviews with Donna Summer, Debbie Harry, more
If you’re a fan of 1970s-era dance music, don’t miss the irresistible new book by Christian John Wikane and Alice Harris, “A Night at the Disco,” which revisits more than 90 interviews conducted with some of the biggest names in pop culture.
“A Night at the Disco” (ACC Art Books) was published on March 24, and distributed by Simon & Schuster. It celebrates more than 100 artists who sparked a phenomenon in dance music from 1970-1979 and features excerpts from interviews with everyone from Donna Summer to Debbie Harry.
Lost City Books (2467 18th St., N.W.) will welcome author Christian John Wikane for a book signing and conversation about “A Night at the Disco” on Thursday, April 16 at 6 p.m. Details at lostcitybookstore.com. Bird in Hand Coffee & Books in Baltimore (11 E. 33rd St.) )will also host a Q&A with the author on Wednesday, April 15 at 6 p.m. Details at theivybookshop.com.
Below is an excerpt from “A Night at the Disco.”
“I’ll let in anyone who looks like they’ll make things fun.” Steve Rubell is guiding a New York Times reporter through Studio 54 as resident DJ Richie Kaczor dazzles the crowd with records by CHIC, Odyssey, and T-Connection. “Disco, that’s where the happy people go,” The Trammps sing as dancers spin and twirl underneath tubes of flashing lights. Seven months since Rubell and co-owner Ian Schrager opened Studio 54 in April 1977, it’s welcomed untold numbers of “happy people” … at least those lucky enough to pass through the doors.
“We were part of the chosen few,” says André De Shields, who immortalized the title role in The Wiz on Broadway at the time. “We could show up at Studio 54 and the doorman at the velvet stanchion would look over everyone and point to us from The Wiz to come in, that kind of thing.” As the lead vocalist in the GRAMMY-nominated Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band, whose debut modernized big band sophistication for the discothèques, Cory Daye had carte blanche in the club. “The energy was like a New Year’s Eve party every night,” she says. “I would go up to the mezzanine and watch the mechanical light pillars go up and down, metallic confetti falling from the ceiling, the spoon and the moon. I was so fascinated and enamored by it.
“When a certain song came on, the people would just rush to the dance floor. There was no contact dancing — the hustle was pretty much on its way out — but it was just an amazing experience to see all the cultures together. It was a fusion of cultures, which described my life and my band, so I was right at home there.”
“Studio 54 was the place,” adds Linda Clifford. “Crazy parties. If you could think it, you would see it. It was like a circus. Just an amazing place to be. I worked 54 so many times. It was like a second home to me. The people there treated me so well. The crowd always seemed to enjoy my show. I always had a good time with them. That was the most important thing: making sure that they had fun.”
Well before Studio 54 opened, disco had become a business juggernaut. “A four billion dollar market and still growing,” Billboard announced in February 1977, with dance music offering more variety than ever. “There is no longer a single, readily identifiable disco beat, but a kaleidoscope of sounds that are melodic and danceable,” Tom Moulton told the magazine. In the clubs, records by veteran artists like Stevie Wonder and the Bee Gees were mixed in with a range of new acts like Grace Jones, Boney M., and The Ritchie Family, while everyone from ABBA to Marvin Gaye scored number one pop hits with songs that had club-centric storylines.
Beyond the charts, disco itself remained as idiosyncratic as ever, especially on several productions by Laurin Rinder and W. Michael Lewis, whose studio creations, El Coco (“Let’s Get It Together,” “Cocomotion”) and Le Pamplemousse (“Le Spank”), joined their own “Lust” from Seven Deadly Sins (1977) among the most tantalizing releases on AVI Records. Rinder & Lewis also produced acts for the newly hatched Butterfly Records in Los Angeles, where Saint Tropez (“On a Rien à Perdre”) and Tuxedo Junction (“Moonlight Serenade”) reflected the duo’s high gloss sound, spanning everything from European sophistication to a more literal translation of the ’40s sensibilities popularized by Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band.
12-inch singles had also grown as the preferred format to approximate the club music experience at home. Nearly a year after Atlantic Records introduced its series of promotional 12-inch singles for DJs, New York-based Salsoul Records released the industry’s first commercially available 12-inch single, “Ten Percent” by Double Exposure, in May 1976. A year later, T.K. Records was the first label to certify a gold record for a 12-inch single when Peter Brown’s “Do You Wanna Get Funky With Me” tallied one million sales.— Christian John Wikane
(From “A Night at the Disco” by Alice Harris & Christian John Wikane. Published by ACC Art Books.)
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