Kaye Sera is managed by DAREN POPE, a prolific writer, performer and broadcaster.
Despite the fact that the two are NEVER seen together in the same room at the same time, they insist the business relationship remains fruitful.
Management enquires for Ms Kaye Sera should be addressed to
darenpope@yahoo.com.au
Meanwhile, here are examples of DAREN POPE'S written work. Enjoy.
KOKODA MATESHIP
By Daren Pope
The human face of world conflict is the gritty subject of the new Australian film, Kokoda.
In the Second World War the 90 kilometres Kokoda trail in Papua New Guinea erupted into a brutal front line when Australian diggers, outnumbered one to 10, clashed with advancing Japanese troops.
This film follows a small platoon of Aussie soldiers. Isolated from sustained bombing, the men make their way along the Kokoda trail to the main body of Australian troops. It’s a classic tale of war and the power of the human spirit made more gruelling by jungle exhaustion, dysentery and malaria.
While largely an ensemble work, one of the key roles in the film is played by Jack Finsterer. The film he says is as much a modern retelling of mateship as a story of war.
"Obviously the soldiers were aware that they were fighting to save Australia but also they were fighting for the bloke next to them," says Finsterer. "I thought a lot about the group and about fighting for the guy next to you."
In particular, the emotional focus of Jack’s character is his kid brother Max, played by Simon Stone. When Max is injured, Jack is faced with the decision to either leave him behind or risk the lives of the other men in the group and stretcher him along the trail. Jack says the story is one of ‘ordinary guys doing extra ordinary things.’
"That’s where I think the script is so brilliant," he says. "We’ve really given people an insight into what it was like for the diggers."
Kokoda also stars William McInnes (Sea Change), Angus Sampson (Greeks on the Roof) and Travis McMahon. It opens in cinemas nationally on April 25.
First published Bnews April 20 2006
COMEDY WITH AN EDGE
By Daren Pope
UK funny man, Stephen K Amos couldn’t be happier. The response to his Comedy Festival show has been so enthusiastic, he’s negotiating to move to a larger room. For this, his second Melbourne gig in as many years, Amos flies the flag as an ‘out’ black comedian. As he puts it, "there are not many of us here, so I’m only too happy to."
Actually, the show is less to do with being gay and ‘out’ and more about race. Amos, who regularly performs at Pride Festivals in the UK insists this is to do with ‘removing the layers’ and dealing with one thing at a time rather than slamming the closet door.
"I wanted to make them laugh first and then bare my soul," he says. "So it’s the race thing first - they can see that I’m a black man and also a funny man but the next show, oh yes it’ll all be there."
With success at this year’s Comedy Festival pretty much in the bag the follow up Stephen K Amos show is planned later in the year.
Meanwhile, an ongoing Indigenous protest on the banks of the Yarra, spurred on from the Commonwealth Games, makes Stephen K Amos’s comedy very topical indeed.
The show opens with an hilarious characterisation of a visiting African dignitary, the set is delivered directly to the audience, accompanied by an audio translator. It’s as unsettling as it is comical, underlining our own prejudices and limited race expectations. Exactly the response Amos was after.
"I’m all about making them think and bringing them on board," he says. "I’m not going to come out and do knob jokes or sexist jokes. I’m on a different level."
For this 2006 Comedy Festival gig, Stephen K Amos is directed by his partner, Hugh Sington in what he describes as ‘a very good working relationship.’
"I’ve got my soul mate here so I don’t get lonely and I can get out of the comedy bubble thing and still be kinda normal," says the UK funnyman.
Stephen K Amos
Melbourne Town Hall
Until May 7
Details: www.comedyfestival.com.au
NASTY GIRL
The reining Queen of House music is on her way down under.
By Daren Pope
Inaya Day is in a bit of a flutter. Her plane leaves for Australia in a couple of hours and she’s yet to pack. Taking our call she confesses to rummaging through a pile of laundry looking for clean knickers.
"The guy just delivered my laundry and there are clothes all over my bed," she says in a raspy drama queen voice that could only belong to a Black singer from New York.
While dance music fans best know Day from her pumping House vocals, notably with DJ producer Mr Timothy (I Am The One, Nasty Girls) the singer was actually trained and got her break in Musical Theatre on Broadway. In 1992 she understudied Stepnanie Mills in The Wiz, taking over the lead for the New York, St. Louis and Washington run of the show. Rave reviews followed.
Musical Theatre may still be in the blood but today her burgeoning career in dance is a top priority.
"I’ll always love it," she says. "But when you’re in a show you have to be present and if you’re present on Broadway you’re absent in your own career. I took some time off Musical Theatre so I could actively pursue my music."
The first leap into dance and her own sound came while performing Little Shop of Horrors in Germany. The Director of that show introduced her to a Dance producer. A four hour train ride to Hanover and improvisational vocal session in the studio with a ‘fierce bass line’ clinched the deal.
"I just sang some things off the top of my head until I got to a hook that I liked." she says of that session.. "And they were making the ‘keep going’ sign from outside the sound booth so I knew we were onto something."
That song became Keep Pushin’ which lead to the follow up, Hold Your Head Up High, currently on release in the UK. For Day the adventure across music genre’s paid off. Her gutsy stage trained vocals hard up against thumping House gave clubbers the energy high they were after and her willingness to actively contribute and work alongside DJs set her apart from lesser known session singers.
In Australia her big break came with releases from producer/DJ Mr Timothy. I Am Tha I spent an incredible 33 weeks on the club charts and picked up an Aria Award nomination along the way. Following that Nasty Girls and Stand By Me continued the charts success.
All good, but there’s no standing still for this singer from the big apple. On the cusp of her 13th visit down under Inaya’s sifting through material for an album and planning more collaborations with Mr Timothy. Not that the offers aren’t coming in thick and fast from other producers.
"Oh my gosh, I get so many calls and emails," she says, emphasising ‘so’. "I just have to say, ‘Well, I’m not recording right now, I have four songs lined up and enough material to last to the end of this year. Let’s go for it next year."
But today, packing for her Australian tour and hunting down clean undies, it’s the shifting styles in dance that are very much in her mind.
"I like all types of music as long as it’s good," she says. "And when I hear something on the radio or in a club, I’m like ‘Wow that’s GOOD, I gotta do a record like that’. Then I’m like on the phone to Mr Timothy with "Will you make me a song’ and he’s like, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah …."
Inaya Day’s tour of Australia takes in Sydney (Midnight Shift), Brisbane (Family) and the Gold Coast (Platinum). The queen of House is in Melbourne for the Anzac weekend with gigs at Room (April 20) and the Market (April 24).
Her current single, Reach Out To Me is available through ITUNES
First published Bnews April 20 2006
SPAGHETTI ART
Marc Savoia has got a lot on his plate, quite literally. His first gallery show opens this week with a collection of mixed media paintings and this on top of a burgeoning modelling and television career.
By Daren Pope
Cable TV viewers will know Marc Savoia from the gay travel program, Out & About on FOX8, but Savoia’s creative juices run far deeper. This week his first solo gallery show, Spaghetti Mansion opens at Thierry B. Gallery in Prahran. The show features a collection of abstract canvasses embedded with cooked and raw spaghetti, sequins, tinsel, cigarette butts and even nail clippings. Savoia describes his work as ‘an emotional response’ to memories and events.
The large canvasses are finished with a high gloss EPoxy Resin and in a strange case of genetic throw back are distinctly mosaics.
"I only recently discovered my grandfather was a mosaic artist who worked in NY between 1925 and 1935," says Savoia. "I’ve never seen his work and never studied mosaics so it’s really interesting to have this in my paintings."
On first viewing the paintings are a juicy abstraction of luminous colours and patterns but closer up, forms, symbols and even objects emerge. In one canvas called Family Tree the branches representing Savoia are pointedly barren, reference to his sexuality; in another, (Heavy Glow) a perfectly preserved, petrified Dragon Fly is embedded in a swirl of sequins and colour - an ominous predatory symbol.
Savoia’s autobiographical work reveals various social addictions reflecting on the contemporary gay scene. In Night On The Town the outline of a large golden light bulb is created by hundreds of embedded cigarette butts.
"You get a piece of me in all my work," says Savoia. "It’s that thing about using yourself and your heritage to create your art and that’s something that I really respond to."
Savoia acknowledges the Surrealist painters, Salvado Dali and Freda Kohl as influences though his painterly energy is also reminiscent of Jackson Pollock (Blue Poles).
In one of the more powerful canvasses Spaghetti Mansion depicts a large finger painted cross, surrounded by faded Marlboro cigarette labels. Pink swirls, sequins and a frame of green tinsel four leaf clovers complete the composition. Irish Bishop, Pat Buckley, inspired the painting. Savoia met up with the radical clergyman after reading his book, A Spiritual life, A Sexual Life.
"Here’s an openly gay Bishop living in Northern Ireland who chooses not to be celibate and who’s practising gay marriage," says Savoia. "He’s so close to being ex-communicated, it’s not funny. I just found his courage and story amazing."
Spaghetti Mansion
Thierry B. Gallery
531A High Street,
Prahran East
Until April 29
Details: www.thierrybgallery.com
First Published in Bnews April 9 2006
GAY FOR A LAUGH
The Melbourne International Comedy Festival heads into its 20th year bigger and better than ever, but where do lesbian and gay comedians fit in? We speak to Anthony Menchetti on the cusp of his first Comedy Festival coming out show.
By Daren Pope
It seems every man, woman and media mogul wants to be a part of the joke circus and Melbourne’s International Comedy Festival is only too happy to expand to accommodate.
There are plenty of big names on offer, many with a proven gay appeal. Judith Lucy, Rachel Berger and Joan Rivers should have little trouble getting gay audiences. As for the fella’s, Adam Hills, Wil Anderson and the dreamy Danny Bhoy have obvious appeal.
In the camp stakes, the fabulous Adam Richard is sharpening his celebrity claws as we speak and that cabaret fiend, Wes Snelling is wearing his felt hat more and more like Quintin Crisp. There’s even a wicked take on The Chronicles of Narnia, appropriately renamed The Lion, The Bitch and the Closet.
At the funky Butterfly Club in South Melbourne, comedian Anthony Menchetti will have his on stage coming out at this year’s Comedy Festival. Since moving east from Perth five years ago, Menchetti has slowly but surely made his mark as a rising star. His act has been included in Festival’s Roadshow Tour and he’s spent time in the UK and at the Edinburgh. But up to now Menchetti has skirted around his sexuality on stage. He admits the resistance came from the cliché images of gay comedians working on the scene.
"One of the reasons I wanted to do this show is because I wanted to do something that wasn’t gay with a capital ‘G’," he says. "I mean, I love Adam Richard’s shows but that’s not my style. I wanted to do a show that has a gay comedian in it, who doesn’t just talk about all that ‘fabulous’ stuff. More your normal gay guy, not camp or out there but just gay."
Menchetti says the time is ripe for a new breed of gay comedians to take to the stage and camp ‘over the top’ days of Julian Clary are well and truly in the past.
"Now gays are more accepted and people don’t worry so much who’s gay and who isn’t," he says. "The time has come for comedians to be gay and just be themselves and not harp on about it all the time."
But the comedy circuit is notoriously blokey. Surely that’s part the reason gay comedians choose to censor their material. Manchetti agrees but only in part.
"When you do Edinburgh, you go over there and they heckle," he says. "I’m not saying people see me as straight because I haven’t talked about dating girls, but I was concerned at how that type of audience would handle it. But I’ve been trying out this material around Melbourne and it’s been going great. Your audience can tell when your talking about what you know. You have more fun on stage and it makes the world of difference."
www.comedyfesival.com.au
First published Bnews April 6 2006
FUNNY BUGGER WIL
Wil Anderson is one funny bugger and he’s just loving his current status as our favourite stand up straight boy. He shares a joke or two with Daren Pope
Last year a gay glossy magazine voted Wil Anderson ‘Straight Mate of the month’. The accolade hardly comes as a surprise to the funnyman whose regime lists comedian, writer and broadcaster. Is there nothing this man can’t do?
Wil knew he was on the gay radar after he noticed an increasingly large number of same sex couples at his gigs. Curiously, many seemed to be in the front row. Now, it could be they were just checking the shade of his finger nail varnish (that'd puts him in the league of Meterosexual Goth) but I’m guessing his school boy charm has something to do with it.
Yes, Wil is easy on the eye, cute even but his gay appeal runs a whole lot deeper. This after all is the straight man who is one of our strongest equal rights lobbyists, certainly in the macho halls of stand up comedy. A few years back on the Triple JJJ Breakfast show, Wil pointedly threw his celebrity weight behind gay kids in the country and suicide.
"If you’re a gay, Goth kid growing up in the country, you might have nothing," he said. "If at least you have radio you can discover there are other people like you. Suicide and stuff like that comes from people feeling a lack of connection."
An intelligence that struck a cord in the gay community, that statement even made news reports in the Sydney gay press. Not such a big deal for the kid who grew up on a diary farm in East Gippsland.
"There was part of me that played sport and that, but I liked alternative music and I was interested in the arts," he says today. "In the city you can always find a group of people who are also into that, no matter how weird, but if you’re in country you could be the only person there. So it was always important to me, without doing it in a really wanky way, to connect to those people. To let them know that it’s OK to be different."
That was on the radio. In Wil Anderson’s stand up routine, gay jokes find equal currency with other social and political issues and the humour is as far from PC as you’re likely to get. Delivered with lashings of wit and that naughty boy charm, the jokes are often just wrong. It’s very much a case of so outside the ball park, they’re redefining the meaning of funny.
Case in point is his dig at Federal Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone. The gag goes something like this.
"I’m straight now but in another circumstance, who knows. If there were only two other people left on the planet and one of them was Amanda Vanstone and other was Johnny Depp, I’d fuck Johnny Depp. In fact, if I had to fuck Amanda Vanstone, I’d use Johnny as protection."
Even over the phone that punch line is a doozy and the great thing about Anderson’s Schtick? He’s quite happy to join in the belly laugh. Not so much at the joke itself, he must have delivered it countless times before and besides, that would make him a ham, but rather in the pleasure the joke gives.
Generosity of spirit, a natural queer bent or willingness to empathise. Call it what you will. Through the inclusion of lesbian and gay issues in his show, the man wins the gay vote, hands down.
From his 2006 Melbourne International Comedy Festival show dubbed Wil Communication, expect a thought or two on gay marriage and IVF. Oh and John Howard is likely to get a ribbing too! You can also catch Mr Anderson on the long running Glasshouse (ABC TV, Wednesday 9.30 p.m.) with Corinne Grant and Dave Hughes, but you know that.
Details:www.comedyfestival.com.au
First published in Bnews April 6 2006
MATTERS OF THE GAY HEART
Craig Chester’s romantic comedy is called, Adam & Steve. Daren Pope speaks to the fiercely independent gay actor/director.
Craig Chester has carved out a niche for himself in the lofty world of independent cinema. To art house film audiences he’s that gay actor in queer films. In Swoon, his debut film performance he played a gay serial killer, in Todd Verow's Frisk he was a drugged out masochist and in I Shot Andy Warhol, real-life Factory groupie, Fred Hughes.
Even as a young actor, Chester managed to tread the testy waters of the ‘politically incorrect.’ His first professional role was reportedly on a ‘makeshift stage in the back storage room of the Dallas AIDS Resource Centre. The show was a production of AIDS: The Musical. By his own admission, he has not made many films that fit into the Politically Correct, ‘positive role model’ category.
But all of that was before he wrote, directed and starred in Adam & Steve, soon to be seen at the 16th Melbourne Queer Film Festival – driven by Volkswagen. The film is listed as one of the great successes on the festival international festival circuit, both gay and straight. A Romantic Comedy in the style of When Harry Met Sally, Adam & Steve answers the call for film stories aimed at the gay men in the 30 plus age bracket. A genre sadly neglected by most gay films says Chester.
"I stand on so many stage at all of these festivals around the world and look out on the gay audience and most of the guys are in their 30s or older. Most are just sort of average kinda guys. There not like porn stars," he says. "I think there’s a real disconnection between gay films and the porn influence."
The ‘Gay Everyman’ is the phrase Chester uses to describe the characters in Adam & Steve and true to form, the story is less concerned about sex and gym bodies than finding ‘meaningful’ relationships. Chester says he deliberately set out to make a film that moved away from ‘the gay cultural elite.’
"So many of the films I’ve worked on have been provocative and ground breaking," he says. "With Adam and Steve I wanted to make something that is really fun and silly and romantic. In way I wanted to show the thing that I haven’t seen yet in gay films – real relationships."
The story is a corker. Adam (played by Chester) first meets Steve (Malcolm Gets) in the cocaine fuelled hey day of the 80s. The setting is a New Romantic style dance party. Adam and his friend Rhonda (Parker Posey – Connie in Further Tales of the City) turn up for what they think is the weekly Goths night. All seems lost until Adam sets eyes on Steve, the lead dancer in show. The attraction is mutual but what promises to a night of frantic sex and drugs ends up becoming a major embarrassment. Not to destroy the impact, Steve flees. Years later, the couple bumps into each other but don’t recognise each other and so the Romantic Comedy plays out with hilarious consequences.
But if the humour is black and refreshingly disarming, issues of homophobia and the search of love in ‘gay middle’ age are all too real.
Chester says he wanted to deal with these outside of a ‘victim’ mentality.
"That’s what really bothers me about gay cinema," he says. "It bothers me about Brokeback Mountain. That ‘victim me’ mentality. I wanted to tell the story and comment on things like gay bashing but do it in an empowering way."
The result in Adam & Steve is a segment that incorporates the gay bashing with a traditional Romantic Comedy love montage. The juxtaposition of the two is as arresting as it is funny.
"When people are laughing they are way open to getting the point – it’s not like they’re being preached at," says Chester. "I wanted to show that our love is outed in public only when we’re holding hands – otherwise we can just blend in."
It’s a cinematic technique he says African Americans have been employing for years.
"They make fun of themselves and in the process slip in some stuff about racism – it’s such an effective way to say something."
Queer cinema he says is moving away from the angry days of HIV/AIDS and into stories that deal with ‘matters of the heart’. He cites Brokeback Mountain and Capote as part of this new wave of gay cinema.
"There are a lot of people from the old school of queer cinema that are threatened by how mainstream gay cinema is becoming," he says. "But I think it’s great and really there’s room for everybody. Everybody from Capote to Brokeback Mountain and Transamerica."
I’d add to that gay Romantic Comedies like Adam & Steve.
Craig Chester is currently working on a screen treatment of Hollywood heart throb Montgomery Cliff’s life.
Details: Melbournequeerfilm.com.au
MIANNE ON COURSE
Transgender golfer Mianne Bagger knows first-hand the effects of sexual discrimination at an elite level and the challenges of pursuing your chosen sport.
by Daren Pope
"For transgender women there is the perception of physical advantage linked to birth gender, determined as male."
Australian golf star Mianne Bagger must take heart from pro tennis player and later coach, Dr Renee Richards. Back in 1975, Dr Richards successfully sued the United States Tennis Association when it barred her from competing in the US Women's Open.
That court action established an important precedent for the rights of transsexual athletes. Dr Richards went on to coach the likes of Martina Navratilova, and her story is captured in the film, Second Serve.
For Mianne Bagger the road to competing professionally on the golf circuit has been equally challenging.
ALWAYS A WOMAN
Coming from a golfing family (both parents played), Bagger picked up the game from an early age and, given her enthusiasm had every expectation of pursuing golf professionally.
But issues around gender came to the fore and in 1992 Bagger took time out for, as she refers to it, her "treatment". Hormone therapy and gender reassignment surgery followed.
On the subject of her transgenderism, she is forthright. Her belief is that no one is transsexual per se, but rather it is a medical condition you are born with that can be treated.
"I always have difficulty with that term ‘transsexual'," she said in an interview last year. "It sounds so harsh and horrible. I have never thought of myself as 'transsexual' (or a man for that matter). I have always felt myself to be female."
Her first memory of realising she was ‘different’ from other kids, was at the age of six. The process of coming to terms with that difference has been a personal journey of self-realisation.
"It was difficult," she told bnews. "More so because the world has been led to see us as ‘a transsexual’ – not as a person or as a woman like any other. Women like myself have usually been portrayed as something less than human. That was a big part of the difficulty of 'coming out' for me, and it was also part of my motivation for being open about my life.
"I was lucky to have good friends and family and always had a lot of support and understanding around me."
A HARD STRUGGLE
In 1998 Bagger returned to golf, initially on a social level but it wasn’t long before her desire to compete professionally resurfaced. Her game continued to improve and she was asked to join a local pennant team, to play in matches around Adelaide.
After some good results she joined the South Australian state squad and from there went on to compete at state level and win her first South Australian State Amateur Championship.
Representing Adelaide she played in tournaments around Australia. Her highest national ranking was sixth in Australia before deciding to turn professional in 2003.
But discrimination in the sports world runs deep. For transgender women there is the perception of physical advantage linked to birth gender, determined as male. For Bagger, it took a year of active lobbying and letter writing to have the ‘Female at Birth’ clause removed from her entry forms. In subsequent interviews she has been outspoken on the subject of ‘transgender’ and physical strength.
"People aren't aware that there are certain physiological changes you go through with hormone replacement therapy," she says. "We lose an amount of muscle mass and overall strength as a result. After surgery, those effects are permanent and irreversible."
COMMERCIAL REALITY
With acceptance in the game largely behind her, Bagger now considers other obstacles.
"The main challenges I face now are those in the world at large. Not so much in the golf ranks," she says.
And formidable challenges they are. Competing at a professional level in any sports takes funds. It’s no secret that athletes derive a substantial amount of their income from sponsorships and endorsements. So where does that leave Bagger?
"I’ve really struggled with it," she admits. "Even with the media exposure that I’ve had. I get some help from my golf club in Denmark and some travelling expenses and bits of sponsorship come up from time to time. At the end of the day it’s going to be my results that matter and speak loudest."
Given her media profile and the promise in her game, is she surprised at the lukewarm response from the corporate sector? Society, she says, is still a "pretty conservative animal".
"It’s still afraid of things that are perceived as different or not ‘normal’," she says, emphasising the word. "The corporate world don’t like to align themselves with that. So it’s really attitudes and society that need to change.
"People need to realise there is a broader definition of ‘normal’. We have this world with six billion people in it. Everybody is not the same."
But while challenges remain in pursuing the pro golf circuit, Bagger takes heart that her story is being heard far and wide and having a positive impact.
"I get a lot of emails from people all over the world," she says. "From all sorts of people – Mr and Mrs Suburbia in America saying they’ve just found my story and they’ve got two kids and they would like to think that their kids could come out and speak to them and tell them what ever they need to and not be afraid."
This year Bagger plans to head back to Europe to compete on the Ladies European Tour.
Details:
www.miannegolf.com
First published March 09 2006
Gale force
British author Patrick Gale has made a name as one the UK’s most accessible gay authors. Daren Pope speaks to him about writing across genders and village life.
Patrick Gale has been out celebrating. He’s just finished the last engagement for his Australian book tour, which included guest speaking at both Perth and Adelaide Writer’s Festivals. His new book is called Friendly Fire and marks another feather in the literary cap of one of Britain’s most prolific gay authors.
If you had to categorise Gale’s fiction you’d be pitching somewhere between family drama and romance, which is not to down-sell his literary credentials. Though relationships in all their emotional and sexual complexities (hetero and homo) do form the backbone to Gale’s stories, he is no gay answer to Barbara Cartland. His literary bent carries far more weight. Identity and understanding, reconciling the ghosts of our past are also powerful forces at work in his stories.
Gale studied English at Oxford, after which – like most gay men – he gravitated to London where as he aptly puts it, "I was a disco bunny for about two years".
Today, home is on the farm in Cornwall with his partner Aidan Hicks. They were part of the wave of gay men and lesbians who took advantage of the UK Civil Partnerships bill last year and signed on the dotted line. "I effectively married into the family farm," he jokes, poking fun at the domesticity of his life in the country.
Commentary of Gale’s novels attribute in part his strength of characterisation and narrative energy to this country life. Gale dismisses the compliments.
"I really just reflect my life in my books and my life is kind of integrated I suppose," he says. Integrated is the word. For while Gale’s novels may include gay and lesbian characters, they can not be defined by sexuality alone. While Gale may himself be gay and live openly as a gay man in a stable relationship, he is not a ‘gay’ author and his work defies the ‘gay’ genre tag. In that respect he’s very much outside the gay literary net. In fact, he finds the whole concept of ‘literary typecasting’ mildly amusing.
"Funnily enough I’ve always written female characters as much as I’ve written gay ones," he admits. "That’s been my saving grace. Although my books were always in danger of being labelled gay they were just as much in danger as being labelled women’s fiction. And thank God frankly, because women buy a lot more books than men do."
He carries the analogy further and refers to himself in jest as "a literary tranny". Of course there are more weighty motives behind his cross gender forays.
"It’s to do with wanting to distance myself from the characters," he says. "If I begin the novel with personal elements of my life the quickest way of distancing myself is through female characters or a straight character. It enables me to write about the subject objectively."
He cites his latest book, Friendly Fire, as a case in point: in it he draws on memories of growing up a gay teenager.
"But rather than make it from my point of view, I make up this girl Sophie and I send her back in time into my memories," he says. "So then Sophie took over the book and it became the story of a motherless child trying on mothers for size."
But surely gay culture stands alone with its own riches, over and above the dominant mainstream? Gale concedes the point but says it’s now time to move on.
"Gay culture and the gay ghetto is a kind of adolescence, it’s a necessary stage and I think when a gay person comes out they really need to find out who they are and the way you do that is to immerse yourself totally in gay culture," says Gale.
"But if you’re not careful what it does is to limit your social power. Politically what it does is to put us all in a kind of zoo. And I’m a great believer in challenging people and I think you challenge them far more by moving into the house next door and being part of the village, rather than living in your own village down the lane."
Decidedly not ‘the only gay in the village’ but I’d suggest Patrick Gale is one of the most famous gay in his own village. Friendly Fire is available from all good bookshops.
Details: www.galewarning.org
First published March 23 2006
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