Click On Over To The New JMG!

The new JMG is live right now so you can click right over and create a bookmark for JoeMyGod.com. But keep the old bookmark for a bit as we're going to keep this here Google-hosted version live for a day or so. After all, something could go horribly wrong during the launch and we'll want you beautiful people to come back here during the fix. Also, surprise, it's taking a rilly rilly long time to port over millions of your brilliant comments. So until your Disqus histories are finished loading onto the new site, you can still come back here and finish up this weekend's arguments. Anyway, off you go, there's a full page of new posts waiting for you.

Some Changes Are Coming To JMG

After more than 11 years on the Google, late this weekend this here website thingy will migrate to Wordpress and will be hosted on JoeMyGod.com, which I've owned for a decade and has been redirecting to this Blogspot address. Things won't look very different on your end, but you should be pleased by a much zippier site load, added social media interactivity, and more searchable archives. The biggest visible change will be fewer posts on the main page with a "next page" clicky-thing at the bottom. And of course, you'll want to bookmark the new URL.  There may be a glitch or two during the change and we'll likely be making more tweaks in the coming weeks. I'll be participating in the comments of this post to answer any questions and tell you a bit more.

JMG Commenting Reminder

As I do a couple of times a year, today I again caution you that even the most idle and "jokey" threats of physical harm to any person or property are completely unacceptable on JMG.  Also strongly discouraged are expressed wishes of physical harm to others by any means, including natural ones. Please remain aware that JMG comments are often scoured by the enemies of civil equality who look for any opportunity to republish ill-considered reactions to the news reported here.

We sometimes see more than 50,000 - 100,000 comments per month and I cannot personally read but a fraction of them. Therefore I must rely on the JMG community to stay self-policing and notify me by email should any comment concern you. Be advised that in many cases these comments are posted by drive-by trolls in order to grab triumphant screen-shots for use elsewhere. You've been remarkably great about observing these very few commenting rules and I thank you for that.

TONIGHT: JMG Reader Meetup At London's Duke Of Wellington Pub

We won't have the marriage ruling to celebrate tonight, but I'm sure we can find another reason or three to lift a few pints at the Duke Of Wellington pub in Soho. And the first three guys that come up to me and say "Obergefell" get a free JMG t-shirt. I'll be there around 9PM providing I don't get lost.

JMG Interview: Ireland's Panti Bliss

A few day after Ireland's historic marriage referendum, I interviewed activist / drag legend Panti Bliss for Pride Magazine. An edited version of the interview is now in print and the full interview is below.

JMG: First of all, huge congratulations on the marriage referendum! What's it like to find yourself on the front pages of newspapers and websites around the world?

PANTI: It depends which picture they used! But clearly even God Herself was thrilled about marriage equality coming to Ireland because Dublin was bathed in glorious unseasonal sunshine that day so everybody looks great in the pictures. And even a bad picture couldn't dampen a drag queen's mood that day. It was a magnificent, joyous, tearful, happy, celebratory day, not just for Ireland's LGBTI community, but for our families, friends and allies too. I suspect that on that day, even some of our opponents secretly wished they were drag queens too.

JMG: We've read that your activist days go back to the 90s. Who came first, Rory the activist or Panti the gender discombobulator?

PANTI: I guess they've always gone hand-in-hand. I've always been stubborn and willful, and I am the child of two principled parents who have never been afraid to stand up and call out what they see as unfairness, and some of that rubbed off on me. But as Rory I am quite reserved, and drag gave me a kind of armour from behind which I felt more comfortable being the focus of attention. And in a way it amplified my voice - people pay more attention to an annoying 6'6" colourful drag queen than they do to an annoying 6' brown-haired guy in a shirt. Though of course as a twenty year old drag queen I was more interested in the free drinks and the boys than I was in changing the world! And I took all the free drinks and all the boys.

JMG: You first got wide notice in the USA with your now-legendary noble call video. How did that speech come about?

PANTI: At the time I was embroiled in a big news story here (which became known as "Pantigate") after I suggested on a TV chat show that Ireland had a problem with homophobia, and named a number of well known journalists and an ultra-Catholic, right-wing organisation which campaigns against equality for LGBTI people. This led to both me and Ireland's national broadcaster being sued for defamation, which in turn led to a national debate about homophobia, free speech, censorship, and the role of the national broadcaster. It was in the middle of all that when the Abbey Theatre (our national theatre) invited me to speak and I agreed because I already had a good relationship with the Abbey, having had my show there previously. But I had absolutely no expectations of that speech. As far as I was concerned I was just making another speech, and assumed the only people who would ever hear it were the five hundred people in the auditorium that night. If I had known then how many people would eventually end up watching it I would have brushed my fucking hair!

JMG:  Following the noble call clip going viral, you made an equally viral TedX talk. Many here commented that you would make a great chat show hostess. Any plans for becoming the Irish Graham Norton?

PANTI: Right now I'm still enjoying traveling with my theatre shows and "discombobulating" people with my activist work, but I've always thought I'd like to do a chat show sometime. I've had a few approaches over the years, but they were never quite right. I haven't ruled it out. I never rule anything out! Except maybe sex with Michael Flatley. I've definitely ruled that out.

JMG: Tell us a bit about your popular Dublin club Pantibar. What kind of crowd do you get? How often do you perform? Do you "channel" any particular artists?

PANTI: I've had the bar for eight years. There aren't many options for aging drag queens (!) so as I approached my forties I thought it might be my pension plan. I imagined myself growing disgracefully old, hanging out behind the bar making a fool of myself over hot Brazilian boys and pulling pints for the gays. Thankfully it all worked out, if not quite how I imagined (except for the growing old part). All the hot Brazilian boys now work behind the bar so hitting on them would be called "workplace sexual harassment", and I ain't ruining my nails by pulling pints! We get a fairly mixed crowd (mostly gay boys of all ages, but plenty of lesbians too, and gay tourists) and although I don't always succeed because I travel a lot with my show, I try to be in Dublin at weekends and hang out and perform there. I don't really "channel" any particular artists, though I am a big Dolly Parton fan. My biggest drag influence is the 1969 movie The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, starring Maggie Smith. (I know! I can hear the younger gays scratching their heads. Sheesh! Download it kids!)

JMG:  Maury Povitch in 1998. Spill!

PANTI: Haha! You've been doing your research! One day (not long after I got my first e-mail address) I got an e-mail from The Maury Povitch Show who were looking for men, who lived as women, to go on the show with their mother or sister. And the mother/sister would then ask Maury to give their son/brother a 'back to boy make-over'. Of course I’m only a part-time woman (and my poor mother would rather die than go on TV with her drag queen son!) so I just thought it was mildly amusing and forgot about it.

But, that night I was in the pub and told my friend Katherine about it and she said, "I should pretend to be your sister and we could get a free trip to New York out of this!" Well, I young and broke, and that sounded like fun, so I said, "Katherine, welcome to the family!"

So the next day I e-mailed them back and told them about my "sister" Katherine and before we knew it we were getting on a flight to New York. We spent the flight getting drunk and inventing a whole new family background for ourselves and making up stories of our childhood. The whole thing was a hoot and we got a few days in New York hanging out with friends and doing the usual touristy stuff out of it. Of course we also had to record the show, and I had to get an embarrassing "back to boy makeover" on TV, but of course this was many years before YouTube (and Maury wasn't shown in Ireland at the time) so we thought nobody we knew would ever see it! But the Goddamn internet put paid to that, LOL. Oddly, I tell the whole story in my current show. It is a really good story!

JMG: Back to the referendum. One of the most fascinating moments on Saturday was watching you being interviewed alongside Gerry Adams, who is fairly well known among the Irish-American community here on the US east coast. How did you two get on? What did he say to you?

PANTI: Well, I am not a Sinn Fein supporter (these things are much more complicated on this side of the pond), and I was very aware that those photos would get a lot of attention. But I ended up with Gerry simply because he and I and the Minister for Justice were being interviewed together on the live TV broadcast. However, Sinn Fein have long been supporters of gay rights, and long before any of the other major parties they would have a presence in Pride parades here etc. Also earlier that same week Gerry met and was photographed shaking hands and chatting with Prince Charles so I thought I'd top his English prince with an Irish queen!

And it was such a wonderful and celebratory day that I was happy to be pictured with all comers. And on that day there were all comers! Every politician from every party was only too thrilled to embrace the gay that day, and you don't get gayer than me! Gerry is very personable and was very enthusiastic about the result. Everyone was swept up in the incredible atmosphere that day. He's also very quirky-fun. If you haven't already you should check out his Twitter. It's nuts! A mixture of political stuff and the adventures of his stuffed toy bear and his bath toys. Seriously. It is.

JMG: This year you marched in the LGBT-inclusive St. Pats For All Parade in Queens. Do you think the result of the referendum might finally convince NYC's St. Patrick's Day Parade to allow LGBT folks to participate?

PANTI: I'd like to think so but I doubt it. The Ancient Order of Hibernians who organise the Manhattan parade are so calcified and so stuck in a bizarre 1950's view of Ireland I'm not sure they are capable of change anytime soon. However, even if they do, I hope the St. Pats For All Parade continues, because it's a really wonderful, grassroots, charming event with real heart that stands on its own.

JMG:  Now that marriage is settled, what's next for the LGBT movement in Ireland?

PANTI: There are a few small legislative issues that still need to be tackled, in particular law that allows institutions with a "religious ethos" to discriminate against LGBTI people. It is particularly a problem here where primary schools are almost entirely under the control of religious orders. Historically, back when the Republic was young and broke, the state ceded the responsibility of primary schooling to religious orders and so LGBTI teachers are often forced into the closet for fear of losing their jobs. However hopefully that will be tackled soon as this government has committed to removing it. After that, like all minorities, we will still have to agitate to maintain our respect. Marriage equality and the achievement of full and equal citizenship under the law is huge, but as they say, "hearts and minds" change more slowly.

JMG:  Finally, let's get a wee bit personal. Is there a man in your life? What would your dream date look like?

PANTI: No there isn't! Which is a goddamn crime! I think part of the problem is that I'm a national fucking treasure, and nobody wants to fuck a national treasure. I think they think it'd be like masturbating on Mount Rushmore! But I live in hope. I live in hope of a mocha-skinned big-dicker top. But don't we all...

NEXT WEEK: JMG Reader Meetup At London's Duke Of Wellington Pub

As I mentioned on Facebook a few days ago, the overlords at Pride Magazine have rather abruptly decreed that I'm to go to London next week for a few days of "synergy and digital integration planning" with the team of sister publication, Pride Life.  This mean that I'll miss NYC Pride for the first time since I've lived here (argh!) and that I'll be out of position time-wise (so to speak) when the SCOTUS ruling comes down. On the other hand - free trip to London - so after consulting the Facebook mind hive, we've decided on the Duke Of Wellington pub in Soho for a JMG reader meetup on next Thursday at 9PM. We'd do it earlier, but I'll be blogging on my regular US schedule while I'm there. London Pride is that Saturday, so if you don't make the meetup, look for me with the Pride Life crew.

Pride Magazine Relaunches As Pride Life

For its 17th annual issue Pride Magazine has changed its name slightly and you'll soon find it stacked around the gayborhoods as Pride Life - which is the same name as its sister publication in the UK. Inside you'll find my interview with the always hilarious Panti Bliss, which I'll excerpt here once the physical copies hit the streets.

Austin Ruse: Satan Controls JMG Readers

"Last week I warned you that certain undesirables were reading your mail. I called them sexual weirdoes. And boy was I ever right. I mentioned Right Wing Watch and a filthy blog called Joe.My.God. And right on time, like clockwork, like Pavlov’s Dog, they read your mail and they attacked. There were the usual attacks against the Church, against Christians, against Our Lord. Purely awful. Purely disgusting. [Ruse quotes several JMG comments.] And these were the comments that are printable. Most are simply filthy and vulgar. The reason I mentioned these websites and these sexual revolutionaries is to demonstrate what we are up against. Almost pure evil. And by that I do not mean these people. They are simply deluded by their own bad habits and by the Father of Lies. Even so, they have huge power behind them. And they are busy undermining all that is good and true and beautiful and it has been given to us to stop them." - C-FAM leader and Breitbart columnist Austin Ruse, in a money beg for $100,000 to stop you beautiful sexual "weirdoes."

TODAY: Eleven Years Of JMG

Today is the eleventh blogiversary of this here website thingy. As is tradition for today, here is my very first post.

April 29th, 2004

I was born and raised in rural North Carolina.

My fondest childhood memory is of playing in the dense, acrid, poison fog that was belched out by the county mosquito control truck during its daily dusk-time trip down our dirt road.

The cry of "Smokey! Smokey!" would fly up and down Nine Foot Road once the first faint sound of the pest control truck's generator was detected in the distance. Trailer screen doors would slam open and kids would pour into the street for ten minutes of gleeful, giddy, mad dashing around in the thick white clouds of DDT. We would smash into each other with full force in the blinding swirls and just scream and laugh hysterically, pick ourselves up and start running again. Parents had not a whit of concern about their children playing directly behind the spewing pipes of a pest control truck. In fact, NOT being allowed to play in the poison fog was often held out as potential punishment for misbehavior.

I think this explains a lot about me.

Counting this one, we're at 52,321 posts over eleven years, the last seven of which have been without a day off. Because I'm crazy committed or am crazy and should be committed. I very much appreciate all of you being here for these last eleven years. Help yourself to some well-deserved punch and cookies. Please don't let the cat out. And onward to JMG year twelve.

Eighth Cativersary

Eight years ago this week I brought Shelley (formerly "Little Gray") home from the East Harlem ASPCA. She was 20 months old, very underweight, timid, and FIV+, the last of which might explain the "owner surrender" notation on her adoption papers. Shelley was so freaked out upon arrival in my apartment that she first tried to escape by climbing up the chimney, then spent the next three days cowering under the sofa. Today she's a healthy ten pounds, the friendliest cat I've ever worked for, and spends her days growling at pigeons and ensuring that the elderly German shepherd across the alley doesn't even think about climbing the fire escape. As I like to do on this date, I encourage you to visit your local shelter and consider adopting an adult cat. At this writing there are dozens of adult cats up for adoption at the East Harlem shelter.

RELATED: The ASPCA has a fantastic "cats over three are free" program for adult cats: "The Free Over Three adoption package includes spaying or neutering, vaccinations and micro-chipping. Adopters will also receive a certificate for free follow-up veterinary care at the ASPCA Animal Hospital within 14 days of adoption, a pet carrier and literature about cat behavior." The APSCA also supports a no-kill coalition of animal shelters all over the New York City area.

AFA Dares Us To Freep Their Poll

As longtime readers know, we have freeped the fuck out of American Family Association polls many times, sometimes forcing them to zero-out the results and start over or take the poll down entirely. But most AFA polls are completely laughable with options that all say the same thing in different ways. As in "Choose one: A) Gay people are going to hell. B) There is a hell and gays are going there. C) Hell is totally full of gays." Today's poll is just like that. Don't freep, just giggle.

TODAY: SiriusXM At 3:30PM

Today at 3:30pm I'll be on Michelangelo Signorile's SiriusXM show to talk about some of the latest LGBT news items making headlines here on JMG. Mike's channel is SiriusXM Progress 127 and you can listen live online if you sign up for a freebie account. What's on your mind?

JMG Commenting Reminder

As I regularly do, today I again caution you that even the most idle and "jokey" threats of physical harm to any person or property are completely unacceptable on JMG.  Also strongly discouraged are expressed wishes of physical harm to others by any means, including natural ones. Please remain aware that JMG comments are often scoured by the enemies of civil equality who look for any opportunity to republish ill-considered reactions to the news reported here.

We sometimes see more than 50,000 - 100,000 comments per month and I cannot personally read but a fraction of them. Therefore I must rely on the JMG community to stay self-policing and notify me by email should any comment concern you. Be advised that in many cases these comments are posted by drive-by trolls in order to grab triumphant screen-shots for use elsewhere. You've been remarkably great about observing these very few commenting rules and I thank you for that.

JMG Is A Shorty Awards Finalist

This here website thingy is a 2015 finalist for the Shorty Awards. From their about page:

The Shorty Awards honor the best of social media, recognizing the people and organizations producing content on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, YouTube, Instagram, Vine, and the rest of the social web. The awards ceremony takes place in April in New York City and are livestreamed to a global audience. Previous Shorty Awards ceremonies welcomed Ricky Gervais, George Takei, Jimmy Kimmel, Retta, Jerry Seinfeld, Kiefer Sutherland, Jim Gaffigan, Amanda Palmer, Conan O'Brien, Cory Booker, Natasha Leggero, Sesame Street's Grover, Ted Leo, Shaquille O'Neal, Stephen Fry, Suze Orman, Rachel Maddow, and William Shatner.

Winners are selected by members of the Real-Time Academy of Short Form Arts & Sciences which is comprised of luminaries from advertising, media, entertainment and the internet. The group includes Apple co-founder Steve “The Woz” Wozniak, actor Adam Scott, CMO of Virgin America Luanne Calvert, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver, actor and producer Nick Cannon, Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger, YouTube Comedy Duo The Fine Bros, Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, actress and philanthropist Alyssa Milano, co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post Arianna Huffington, and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.

Among the finalists in various categories are Neil Patrick Harris, Laverne Cox, and Ellen DeGeneres. Oh, and Beyonce. Another finalist in my category is Jason Kottke, who basically invented blogging, so....

TODAY: SiriusXM At 3:30PM

Today at 3:30pm I'll be on Michelangelo Signorile's SiriusXM show to talk about some of the latest LGBT news items making headlines here on JMG. Mike's channel is SiriusXM Progress 127 and you can listen live online if you sign up for a freebie account. What's on your mind?

JMG Top Ten For 2014

For the second year in a row, my favorite track of the year is by out and openly HIV+ singer/songwriter John Grant, whose collaboration with Hercules & Love Affair spawned a gorgeous modern dance video interpretation of Grant's tale of coming out positive to a lover. Culled from my Spotify playlists, here's my top ten for 2014.

1. John Grant - I Try To Talk To You
2. The 2 Bears - Not This Time
3. Duke Dumont - I Got U
4. Perfume Genius - Queen
5. Royksopp & Robyn - Monument
6. SBTRKT - New Dorp, New York
7. Clean Bandit - Rather Be
8. Dave Aude w/Andy Bell - Aftermath
9. Le1f - Boom
10. Bright Light Bright Light - I Believe

My 2013 list is here, my 2012 list is here. Let us know what your favorites for 2014 have been.

MORE FAVORITES:
Sufjan Stevens - A Little Lost
Erasure - Elevation
Aphex Twin - Minipops 67

JMG Interview With Jimmy Somerville Plus Worldwide Debut Of Travesty Re-Edit

I recently had the privilege of speaking with groundbreaking dance artist Jimmy Somerville about his new album and his history as one of the loudest and proudest gay artists. 

JMG: Hi, Jimmy! Let's start with today and work backwards. Tell us about your coming album, Homage, and its first single, Travesty, which made its worldwide debut on my site last month to much acclaim from my readers. From the first single, this feels like a total throwback to the lush orchestrated disco sound of the 70s.

Jimmy Somerville: That's it, exactly. This is the album I've always wanted to do. This is the album that if it came out when I was 15 years old, I'd have been dancing around my bedroom to it.

JMG: I've been dancing around my bedroom to it and I'm a few multiples of 15 years old. It's been five years since your last album and a decade since one was released in the US. Why the long break? 

JS: Well, it all had to do with money, confidence, and direction. After my contract to London [Records] came to an end - my relationship [with them] was so toxic - it destroyed my belief in myself as a writer and performer. Only in the last two and half years did everything turn in my head. It was like, "I can do this. I'm doing this for me." It's like I'm starting my career all over again.

JMG: Speaking of starting your career, you came out as a proud gay artist in the early 80s when few others would. At that time you publicly slammed artists like Boy George who were still being coy about their gayness. How do you think things have changed for young gay artists today?

JS: It all depends on how you want to further your career, sadly. When it's all about your sexuality that sometimes means it's automatically turned into a negative. You create this smokescreen and that's kind of sad. I was coming from a political agenda and different mindset. I was very much a radical at the front of a political awakening.

JMG: Sam Smith has been out pretty much from the start.

JS: He's out there, he's really successful, and you know what, nobody gives a shit. But even today it's a brave thing to do. I take my hat off to him.

JMG: As to your political awakening, like many gay men my age, 1984's Smalltown Boy was part of my own political awakening. For so many of us, that song was so painfully personal but also truly beautiful. I can't think of any other song that was so simultaneously heartbreaking and empowering.

JS: It never fails to move when I hear that. It never fails to make me tearful. It's not even really my song anymore. It means too much to so many other people.

JMG: When Bronski Beat was touring back then, my friends and I drove hundreds of miles to hear you at Fort Lauderdale's Copa. But when we got there, no Jimmy Somerville.

JS: Yeah, sorry about that. It was just Frank [Bronski] and Larry [Steinbachek] at that point. The club didn't tell you?

JMG: Nope. People were pissed and they let the other guys know it by chanting,  "Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy."

JS: (Chuckles.) I'm sure that went over well.

JMG: Last year you appeared in a wildly viral video in which you seemed to surprise a Berlin street busker as he was singing Smalltown Boy. Was that really just a happy random circumstance?

JS: Um...half and half. He knew I was nearby.

JMG: A Bronski Beat concert is a major plot point in the movie Pride, which is in US theaters right now. How did that come about?

JS: Mark, the main character, was my best friend [in real life]. He kept hitting on my boyfriend. We had a massive fight and then we were inseparable. I wrote For A Friend [Communards, 1987] for Mark when he died.

JMG: Since you mentioned a Communards song, dare I ask if you keep in touch with [bandmate] Richard Coles?

JS:  We keep in touch by email. You know, he's an Anglican priest now and he's written a book. Look it up on Amazon, there's actually a halo on the cover.

JMG: So what's next for you?

JS: Basically I'll just keep writing material for another album. Some touring for this one, but there's no band. I'm not on a label and this album cost hardly anything to do. It was just made with so much love and friendship.

JMG: My San Francisco readers are dying for a concert.

JS: San Francisco! I'd love to play there.

JMG: Thanks very much, Jimmy. Before we go, since your new album is old school disco, I'm wondering what your personal all-time favorite disco song is?

JS: Oh, that's so hard!. There's so many, it's impossible to say, really. But if I had to pick just one...hmm...I'd guess I'd say Divine's Native Love. You just can't hear that without wanting to move.

The single and extended 12" version of Travesty are now available for download. Homage will be released in early 2015. Below is the worldwide debut of legendary Saint DJ Robbie Leslie's eleven-minute re-edit of Travesty.

JMG On Maddow

Lots of you emailed to point out that this here website thingy made a fleeting appearance on last night's Rachel Maddow Show. The highlighted post was the one about the anti-gay Norfolk County clerk being forced to sign the marriage license of the plaintiffs in Bostic. 

JMG Worldwide Exclusive Premiere:Jimmy Somerville's New Single Travesty

Via press release:

The euphoric joy of disco has been one consistent thread, which has run through the diverse, illustrious thirty-year career of pop legend Jimmy Somerville. Famous for re-making disco classics as his own, “Travesty”, Jimmy’s first original disco-styled single will make its debut on JoeMyGod on Sept. 15th and will be serviced promotionally (single version and extended mix) to media outlets and clubs. “Travesty” will be available from all digital retailers on October 28th (via Membran). “Travesty”, written by Jimmy and produced by long-time producer John Winfield, is a taster of his forthcoming album Homage that as the title suggests, pays homage to the disco era.

The emphasis throughout the recording of the new album has been on achieving the musical authenticity of the original disco era Jimmy grew up with and loves so much. A proud Jimmy Somerville comments: “I've finally made the disco album I always wanted to and never thought could. If I was 15 again I'd buy it, sit on my bed, slowly open the gate-fold, slide out the vinyl, place it on the turntable then jump off the bed and imagine someone just passed me a tambourine...I'd be in heaven! The horns, the strings, the bass, the guitars, the drums, the backing vocals and the melody....the escape. So open your ears embrace the groove and pay homage to an all too easily derided sound ... I LOVE Disco!"

I've been playing this track nonstop since Friday and as you'll hear, Travesty does indeed live up to its old school disco billing. You'll have to wait a bit to hear to the fantastic full eight-minute 12" version - but disco-heads are guaranteed to flip for it.

Ricky Loved Madonna

Gentle readers, today is Madonna's 56th birthday. Below is a short story that first appeared on JMG on this day in 2006, a date which, as you'll see, plays a role in the story.


Ricky Loved Madonna

Twenty years ago today, August 16th 1986, I was a few months into a new job with AMC Theatres, a position that I would hold for seven years after having spent a few years after college drifting around bartending and DJing. After burning through three DJ gigs in about a year, I took the management job with AMC almost in desperation, happy to finally have a regular paycheck. I bought my first brand new car. I had several dozen underlings. I had a business card. I felt like a grown-up, almost.

Twenty years ago today, it was a Saturday. As the assistant manager, I had to be at the theater at 10am even though I had closed the midnight shows the night before, not getting home until almost 4am. I stumbled through the still-unfamiliar opening procedures. My mind was on Ricky. I took the cash drawers out to the concession stand and the box office and turned on the air conditioners and lights in all the auditoriums. The first movie, a Disney cartoon, started at 11:30am and we had hundreds of people in front of the box office before I even rolled up the mall gates.

Twenty years ago today, the night before was a Friday. It was the opening night of the remake of The Fly starring Jeff Goldblum. My six-plex was jamming. The Fly sold out at every show, driving the overflow audiences into Top Gun and Aliens, which were still doing decent business on their own. All six auditoriums sold out by 8pm and I rushed to get that show's money counted before the first of the auditoriums began to let out and we had to start the process all over again. I pushed into the counting room inside the manager's office and dumped several thousand in $20s onto the countertop.

The intercom buzzed.

"Mr. J., there's a man here to see you."

In the lobby was my friend Todd. "Joe, I'm on my way to see Ricky. Can you come? He's worse."

I looked out into the mall where hundreds of teenagers milled around in front of closed storefronts. The Interstate Mall was on its last legs. All that was left within view was the theater, a pinball arcade, an adult novelty shop, and the driver's license bureau, which was closed at that hour. The teens roamed the broad unswept avenue of the mall in swirling, shrieking packs, anxious for the late show to begin.

I shook my head. "Todd, I'm the only one here. I have the late show and then the midnights. The last movie doesn't let out until almost 3am. I have to lock up." Todd nodded and made a move like he was going to hug me, then realized that a dozen of my employees were watching. Awkwardly, he stuck out his hand as if that's what he'd intended all along. I shook it and he left. I had never shaken Todd's hand before.

Twenty years ago today, one week earlier, Ricky went into the hospital. He'd had a seizure on the bathroom floor of his sister's condo. Todd and I went to the hospital the next day and found him lying unconscious in his bed, unattended, in a pool of feces. Todd staggered into the hallway and tried to control his retching while I looked for a nurse. At the nurses' station, the stout Jamaican woman behind the counter nodded curtly but didn't get out of her chair when I asked that Ricky receive some attention. I went back to find Todd sitting out in the lounge.

"Joe, I can't be here. I'm freaking out. Do you know we walked right in there without a mask on?"

"I think the mask is more for him than us....so if..."

"I have to go."

At Todd's insistence we stopped at the Burger King a few blocks away and washed our hands. Even though we hadn't touched Ricky or anything but the door of his hospital room, we scrubbed the front and backs of our hands like we'd seen surgeons do on television.

Twenty years ago today, two weeks earlier, Todd and I dropped in at Ricky's sister's condo. Ricky had been forced to move in with her. He'd lost his job at the giant hotel near Disney where he'd been training to be a pastry chef. For a long time he'd managed to keep his illness a secret, wearing long shirts even in the hot kitchen so that nobody saw the purple lesions that were marching inexorably from his elbows to his wrists. A lesion appeared on the back of his hand and that one he covered with make-up, but when one appeared right on the tip of his nose, the head chef and head of human resources had called him in on his day off to fire him. Surely he understood, they told him, that they couldn't have him handling food. 

When Ricky's sister opened the door, she made a face. "He's not feeling well." She'd already made it clear to Todd on his previous visit that she did not like her brother's "friends." Todd said quickly, "Oh, well, we just wanted to drop off a present for him." I had Madonna's latest release, True Blue, on CD in a sparkly bag. We knew that he'd gotten the vinyl album earlier in the summer, but since he was such a big fan, we knew he'd like to have the CD version too.

His sister led us into the bedroom where we found Ricky shrouded in blankets and watching television. He was cranky and inattentive to us, but momentarily brightened when we gave him the CD. He examined the cover. "It's the same as the album, just smaller." He didn't have a player, hardly anyone did yet, so he laid the longbox reverently on his nightstand, propped against the lamp. His sister hovered in the doorway, smoking, anxious for our departure, and we soon obliged her.

Twenty years ago today, three months earlier, I met Ricky for the first time at a party thrown by Todd. I'd heard from Todd that Ricky was "sick," as we nervously called it back then, but he seemed fine to me. We stood outside on the patio and watched guys jumping into the pool.

Ricky said, "So what do you do, Joe?"

I said, "Well I just started working for AMC Theatres."

Ricky screamed a little bit. "Which ONE?"

I stepped back. "Interstate Six, why?"

"Because I am in there ALL the time. I saw At Close Range about five times just to hear Madonna's song in it!"

"She wasn't in the movie, was she?"

"No, but I'm just a freak for her." He paused, then added dramatically, "We have the same birthday!"

"Oh....really." I began to look around for Todd.

Ricky began to get very animated and his words tumbled out. "Yes. Same day, same year. I was born exactly at midnight and my mother always said I could have August 15 or August 16 for my birthday - it was my choice - and for the longest time I had it on August 15 cuz that's Julia Child's birthday and she's a chef and I wanted to be chef and so she was my idol when I was little. Such a fag, right? Anyway, when Madonna came out and I found out her birthday, I was all...that's IT. I'm August 16 from now on!"

Ricky continued professing his undying love for Madonna until I was finally able to make a graceful escape. Later, Todd told me that Ricky had dressed as Madonna for the previous Halloween and belonged to her mail-order fan club and we laughed a little bit at his adorably nutty fandom.

Twenty years ago today, August 16th 1986, it was a Saturday. The theater had brisk business for the morning show, selling out the Disney movie. After all the houses were rolling, I pulled the money from the box office and sat alone in the office to count it. I turned on the radio so I could hear Casey Kasem counting down the Top 40.

Todd called. "Well, the hospital just told me Ricky died around midnight last night."

"Oh, no. Did you get in to see him...before.....?"

"No, his sister and mother were there, so I just left without going in."

"Right." That's how it often went back then.

Todd hung up and I sat there finishing up my money counting. I didn't know how to feel. I really couldn't call Ricky a friend. I had to count and recount the money several times, I kept losing my place. Then I heard Casey Kasem say, "Hitting number one today is Madonna with Papa Don't Preach."

I called Todd back. "So, did they give you a time of death for Ricky?"

"Yeah, midnight."

"Right, but is that today or yesterday?"

"What?"

"Well, today is his birthday and it's Madonna's birthday and I just heard that she's number one today...and.....it would be, you know, sorta nice if it was today."

"What the fuck is nice about dying on your BIRTHDAY?"

We never talked about it again. I never did find out what day was listed for Ricky's death. As the years went on and Madonna's fame increased, the press began to note her birthday. And ever since that started, I think of Ricky on August 16th. I never knew Ricky's last name. He wasn't a close friend. But he has stuck with me over these two decades.

Twenty years ago today, Ricky, aged 28, died on his birthday. I will always hope that it was his August 16th birthday. Ricky loved Madonna.