#9 Stories of sisterhood, and Gwyneth's soiled sheets
Death By Consumption
7/1/24 - 7/7/24
This week went by like a blur — it started with ungodly long work days, and ended with a slow, hot, lazy 4th of July weekend, so as a result, there wasn't a ton of cultural consumption — it was more alcohol and hot dog consumption. But wow, we're really just in the thick of summer now, huh? And as someone who genuinely loves talking about the weather, I couldn't be happier about how much of it we're getting. It's so humid! And then it's so stormy! And then it's humid again! Hurricanes are arriving faster and stronger than ever before, eager to kill us all! The planet is on its way out but small talkers are thriving. My time is now.
The Women's House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison, by Hugh Ryan — in paperback
I loved Hugh Ryan's first book, When Brooklyn Was Queer, so I don't know why it took me so long to pick his second book up, but Pride compelled me to finally visit a bookstore and get it. It's absurd to me that for like 50 years there was a women's prison smack dab in the center of the Village, and I had no idea? Did you know??? I walk by the park on the former grounds of the prison, like, several times a week. What the fuck, you guys!
Hugh is an excellent historian and writer, so this book, like his first, seamlessly balances exploring and explaining the macro perspective on the overall time period, with intimate looks at individuals' lives (or at least what can be reconstructed of their lives). We meet many women and transmen who passed through the prison, many who are practically forgotten, so their lives have to be pieced together by shoddy official documents, but a handful of whom are known (most notably Angela Davis, Andrea Dworkin, Ethel Rosenberg, and Afeni Shakur). It's equal parts informative and moving.
Throughout the story of this prison, Hugh beautifully connects it to the changes in the wider world (while artfully and mostly successfully arguing that the prison was fundamental in actively shaping those changes, not just a witness to them). The book traces the foundations of the struggle for Black liberation, feminism, gay rights, and all the many ways those struggles intersect and conflict. (Particularly shameful is the detail that the gay liberation movement splintered literally days after Stonewall, because some white gays didn't want to protest outside the House of Detention in support of the Black Panthers who were held there — white gays have been in it for ourselves since the very start, huh?) I loved reading this book, and I'll never look at that corner of the Village the same way again. The perfect way to end Pride.
Pnin, by Vladimir Nobokov — in paperback
I'm about to say something shocking: Nobokov could really write! Written at the same time as Lolita, supposedly as a necessary mental break from creating the monster Humbert Humbert, Pnin is the exact opposite of Lolita — light, silly, and tragic in a funny way, not in a sexual predator way. And, it really needs to be said again: Nobokov can write some goddamned sentences!!!!!
Like, he introduces us to a woman as having "two bright eyes basking in blue lunacy." I actually gasped at that, embarrassingly. And then four pages later he describes the house of a couple whose daughter has just moved out as a "nice old drafty house that now seemed to hang about them like the flabby skin and flapping clothes of some fool who had gone and lost a third of his weight.” Every time I've ever read anything by Nabokov, I end up taking a psychotic amount of photos of different paragraphs like I'm at a concert. I think he's going to be a famous writer!
"Love Island USA", season 6 episodes 1-10 — on Peacock
Wellllllll... it happened. I got Love Island-pilled. I really tried to resist, please believe me! Other than a brief obsession with the UK version in the darkest depths of early covid, I've successfully avoided the commitment that is Love Island (they air, like, 5 episodes a week or something?? It's brutal). But the one-two punch of Vanderpump's scorned queen Ariana Madix becoming the new host, plus a zillion people suddenly raving about it being one of the "best reality TV seasons of all time" (ok it is genuinely great but everyone should chill a little), I declared to Justin, "We're going to become Love Island watchers," and with no choice in the matter I dragged him into this mess. And, damnit, we're hooked.
The premise, for those unfamiliar, is deeply demonic: sexy single straights are sequestered in a Fijian villa for 6 weeks, where they are forced to "couple up," because if you're single you're BANISHED. Every few days, the producers introduce new "bombshells" to the villa: incredibly gorgeous and dumb men and women who without fail drive everyone into a screaming, crying, horny tizzy. And all the while it's happening live, so America is also voting on which couples to protect, and which couples to torment. A show like this is a point in favor of Christian fundamentalists who insist Satan walks the Earth, which is probably why I love it so deeply.
Despite binging as much as I could whenever we had a free hour or two over the 4th of July weekend, I'm still, like, 15 episodes behind, and I'm not sure if I'll ever manage to catch up before the end. Which is annoying, because I need to know what's going on in the villa right now!!!! I am deeply invested in the women's journeys (the men, on the other hand, should all be forced to stay in Fiji forever — our country is much safer with them on the other side of the world). The show constantly forces the women to wildly alternate between moments of beautiful sisterhood, and moments of devious competition for the same man's attention.
It's embarrassing for everyone involved, and yet I find myself rooting for the women — not to find a guy, but to reject the whole thing, to revolt against the producers, to smash the cameras, to throw the boys in the ocean and start a new Amazonian society on the beaches of Fiji, to lead us all into a brighter future.
Why am I at work right now when I could be watching Love Island??? Do yourself a favor and don't start it, because you will become hooked. Just pick up vaping or something healthier, honestly.
A Quiet Place: Day One (2024) — at Nitehawk Cinema
Let me bravely come out as someone who enjoyed the first A Quiet Place. I love an alien movie, and the premise was fun and suspenseful, plus Emily Blunt is always watchable despite seeming like she might be annoying in real life. It was a good old fashioned summer movie! So when I heard there was a second one — starring Lupita Nyong'o!!! — I was like, all right, you got me again! I wasn't sure what a prequel could offer on a narrative level, considering there's not really anything left to explore after the first film, but I figured they must have had a good reason to make it.
Turns out they did not have a good reason to make it. This movie sucked!!!! It was basically the first movie again, but worse, with parts of the Alien franchise also worked in, also done worse. At best it was boring, at worst it was annoying. They overly relied on jump scares, but even the effect of those wore off about halfway through. Mostly, I spent the entire film regretting our choice of caramel popcorn (something I've never once ordered at a movie theater... this day was full of bad choices), as I desperately tried to crunch as quietly as possible during the many completely dead-silent scenes. Lupita did serve the eye performance of the year with this almost wordless role, but she can only do so much.
The Derek Blasberg/Gwyneth Paltrow diarrhea drama — first in the Daily Mail, then in Variety
Finally, celebrity gossip is good again! (Please note: Gwyneth is the celebrity I'm referring to. We do NOT recognize Derek Blasberg as a celebrity, though after this we may have to start.) I really have nothing to add to the two stories linked above other than: I absolutely love this, but it is literally my worst nightmare come true. I have a famously Jewish stomach and have ruined many a night out by forcing entire groups of friends to change all our plans in a matter of minutes, just so we can find a luxury hotel lobby with gorgeous bathrooms for me to commit unspeakable horrors in, so this story sent a cold chill down my spine. I can't even imagine pooping in one of Gwyneth's pristine toilets, let alone on her SHEETS. I would flee too! Who wouldn't? I am anxiously awaiting her oblique, barely concealed Instagram post about it — my money is on her announcing some sort of GOOP-branded high thread count linen sheets with a cheeky caption.