Feature image from Lauren Morelli’s Instagram.
It’s your weekly Pop Culture Fix! I’m Carmen and I will be your trusted tour guide on this summer’s day. Please keep hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times!
+ “I Hadn’t Known Myself Before I Had Sex With a Woman” Lauren Morelli talks Tales of the City with E. Alex Jung over at Vulture, and she talks about Samira Wiley a bit, too.
(Want even more Lauren Morelli? Well, did you read our interview with her that came out just last week?? Did you? Get on that!)
+ I’M FULL FREAKING OUT RIGHT NOW!!!! CLUTCHING MY PEARLS DOESN’T BEGIN TO DESCRIBE IT!! Viola Davis To Play Black Queer Blues Legend Ma Rainey on the Big Screen
+ While we are on the subject, here’s 10 Black LGBTQ Heroes Who Need Biopics. Get on it, Hollywood, immediately.
+ You’ve probably heard this incredibly hot news by now, but just in case – “The L Word: Generation Q” Has Cast Four Attractive Humans To Play Some Gay Parts. Read it if you want some blisteringly funny Riese Bernard commentary.
+ Jill Soloway and Margaret Cho Talk “Unbelievable Relief” of Post-Weinstein and Louis C.K. Hollywood. To paraphrase our very own Drew Gregory, as if the Transparent set was super safe for its employees against sexual harassment in 2017. Sure, Jill. (Since we’re already here, Jill Soloway is also going to replace Bryan Singer on that Red Sonja movie. I hope this means Trace Lysette gets to play the lead!)
+ These Six Songs Tell You As Much about Aretha Franklin as Any Memoir Ever Could
+ The Upside Down Speaks in the New Stranger Things Trailer!
+ ‘My So-Called Life’ 25 Years Later: Claire Danes and Wilson Cruz Look Back. Want to do some more looking back on the last 20 years of baby gays on TV, both My-So Called Life and otherwise? Oh hey, wouldn’t ya know it, the TV Team did a roundtable on that very subject!
+ “Discovering gender freedom improved so many aspects of my life. But it didn’t make it easy to audition or win dramatic roles.” Vida star Ser Anzoategui wrote an Op-Ed about being a non-binary actor for the The LA Times. (You should know going in, Ser disapproves of the title that the editors selected, even though they are proud of the piece.)
+ From Caroline Framke at Variety, How TV Failed Me on Bisexuality — And Then Got Its Act Together. And related reading from The AV Club, Bi Erasure Is a Problem on TV as in Life, but One That’s Gradually Improving. That AV Club piece has this whammy of a line: “Mia Kirshner played a bisexual psychopath on 24 and The L Word” WOW.
+ I Couldn’t Help but Wonder, What If “Girlie” Shows Did the TV Revolution’s Invisible Labor? For Mother Jones, Becca Andrews in conversation with Emily Nussbaum about her new book.
+ Did you like Wine Country? How does a Paula Pell fronted murder-mystery comedy series sound to you? Because that’s a thing that’s happening.
+ Hey Reese Witherspoon, Tig Notaro Wants to Clear Something Up!
+ This List of Woman and Non-binary-Run Music Organizations Is the Future of the Industry
+ MJ Rodriguez made you a Pose-inspired playlist, for all your streaming needs:
https://open.spotify.com/user/spotify/playlist/37i9dQZF1DWYJyFPHRAL1S?
+ You know the Broadway musical Prom? The one with the lesbian kiss? The memory of Santana Lopez be damned, Ryan Murphy is making it into a Netflix movie and it’s going to star Ariana Grande and Meryl Streep!
+ This is very cool news!! Grace Ellis is writing a YA Graphic Novel about Lois Lane for DC Comics. And it’s going to be illustrated by Brittney Williams! You might know Brittney from our Saturday Morning Cartoon series and Grace will always be our forever intern, Grace Ellis (and you also know Grace from Lumberjanes, obviously).
+ Have you played this game yet? A twitter thread that’s actually a “Choose Your Own Adventure” to being Beyoncé’s assistant. Don’t get fired!
+ Sunday night was the BET Awards and, like every year, it left me thinking about the ways that “mainstream award shows” love to showcase black talent for audience views, but have little respect for the actual depth of black culture. BET is not the best when it comes to queer politics, still I return to it year after year. This piece is from a few years ago, but gets to the heart of why: The BET Awards Are Still Essential to the Black Pop Culture Zeitgeist
+ This trailer premiered at BET and I don’t know if Queen & Slim is going to be gay, but it’s written and produced by Lena Waithe. If you keep your eyes peeled, you’re going to see Indya Moore!
+ PS: The newest Orange is the New Black trailer dropped today. I have very little to say about this show anymore, but take me seriously about this:
If, at the VERY LEAST, Taystee isn’t saved by The Innocence Project and let out of that f*cking jail before it all ends…. If Piper gets to breathe fresh air…. and Taystee is left behind bars…. I’m going to riot.
+ This was already included in Monday’s Also.Also.Also. Link Round Up, but it’s so good that I absolutely wanted to make sure you read it: “You Can’t Get Rid of Your Girl That Easily” By Megan Rapinoe herself.
+ And speaking of my imaginary wife (just for the sports season. Sports!) Megan Rapinoe, have you heard this yet? Megan on if the USWNT wins the World Cup: “I’m not going to the fucking White House.”
+ Ok one last Megan Rapinoe thing! She scored both of the goals – I legit almost called them baskets! hahaha, sports! – in the USWNT’s nail biter against Spain on Monday. Don’t worry Heather Hogan recapped it for you using small clear words that even I could understand. The US Women’s National Team now advances to the quarterfinals to play France – in actual Paris OMG!! – on Friday.
+ And finally, even more sports! SPORTS! This week, Serena Williams became only the second black woman to have her own Wheaties box!
Someone on Twitter posted an excerpt from Jill Solloway’s book that covers the fallout from Jeffrey Tambour. It does not like make her look good at all. The way she treated Tracy pissed me off. I don’t think there is really anything these women should be proud of in terms of a “post-Harvey/Louis CK” Hollywood. Especially Solloway, who was concerned about her own self-preservation when it came to the bullshit happening on her own set. I’m not in the business but it doesn’t look like much has changed to me. Every time one of these men gets exposed(and their have been many since Harvey) a good portion of these people turn around and bemoan “cancel culture” and stick up for the men they know personally. But these men never truly get cancelled anyway. The only ones who are experiencing any real consequences are people like Harvey and Cosby but that is only due to the severity of the crimes and the number of victims. They couldn’t continue to push it under the rug like they can do when there is only one victim coming forward.
I swear, I re-read Andrea Long Chu’s panning of Soloway’s book at least once a month bc it is that good/bad:
https://www.affidavit.art/articles/no-one-wants-it
“My So-Called Life” 25 YEARS LATER! Stop. STOP! *sticks fingers in ears* Lalalalalalalalalala…I’m not old. I’m not old.
Right? I watched it when it aired. *Sigh*
I recently described myself as “a grown-up Angela Chase with short hair and tattoos”, and then had to explain to my Millennial friends who that was 😬
I should just bite the bullet and buy a Megan Rapinoe jersey
And Marta, Carmen? Rapinoe’s jersey will go under Marta’s, no?
Well, Since the Bolsonaro supporters co-opted the Brazil jersey I have been having a hard time wearing that…. or being seen wearing one and people will take me for one of them…
Don’t let those fuckers do this to you!!!! Never be ashamed of wearing your colors. Brazil belongs to you as much as it belongs to them, and even more because you’re taking your colors around the world and making Brazil PROUD.
Non-Bolsonaro supporters decided to wear the blue jersey for this World Cup so we can support the team and, at the same time, not be confused with the ducks
About Aretha’s Dr. Feelgood performance on Montreux Jazz Fest: “Search as much as you like; she never sang the song quite like that in any other recorded performance.”
I think she never sang any song the same way: same year, 1971, at Fillmore West, same song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2x8zpoHkTU
PD: and yes, Miss Aretha, I agree with you, SEX IS DIVINE when you sing about it.
I thought that you were talking about her doing a cover of Mötley Crüe’s “Dr. Feelgood”, and I was VERY confused.
No way in hell!!!! Although I must say I had used some AC/DC as sex-soundtrack, but that’s my limit on troglodyte rock and roll.
Its beautiful what she says
Serena!!!!!!
I remember Mia’s character from 24(and In college had a screen grab of her holding a gun from one of the episodes as my desktop background), but I don’t remember the character being bi?
Could I ask you to please take down that photo it’s literally the cutest thing I’ve ever seen and I can’t stand it thanks
Lauren Morelli’s first essay she did on Mic about coming out was my anchor the entire year I was figuring out I was gay and ending my marriage with my husband. I read it probably once a week. Thank you, Lauren!