Articles in Alaska communities
ICP Ball 2011: Happily Ever After…A Storybook Masquerade
Hansel and Gretel, The Gingerbread Man, Red Riding Hood, or the Big Bad Wolf? Who was your favorite? Come to the ICOAA Imperial Crown Prince and Princess Ball XIX dressed as your favorite storybook character!… and don’t forget, it’s also a Masque!
Celebrate with Imperial Crown Prince XVIII R.J. and Princess XVIII Ashley, as they take you through a fairy tale night marking the end of their year as ICP, and the beginning of a new year, for three hopeful candidates — Imperial Crown Prince Candidate Steve Smith and Imperial Crown Princess Candidates Alexis Kellie and Colleen Crinklaw. Voting will take place at the Ball!
Date/time: Sunday, May 1, 5:00 to 8:00 PM
Location: Mad Myrna’s, 530 E. 5th Ave, Anchorage
Cost of admission: $15.00. Tickets available at the door, or you can purchase your ticket in advance (check with R.J., Ashley, Empress 38 Paige, or Emperor 38 Cory) All proceeds to benefit the Imperial Court of All Alaska
Further info: See the Facebook event page
The new & improved Bent Alaska events calendar
Bent Alaska has a really good events calendar now! Check it out.
Illusions of Delusion — Anchorage’s newest drag show
The Crazy Horse Saloon: most people probably think of Anchorage’s oldest female strip bar. But now it’s even crazier, with Illusions of Delusion, Anchorage’s newest drag experience, every Friday & Saturday night beginning at midnight.
The Who’s “Tommy” at Mad Myrna’s
The Tony-Award winning Tommy, Pete Townshend’s tale of a young a “deaf, dumb, and blind boy” is now an ambitious local production with performances being held at Anchorage’s Mad Myrna’s every Friday and Saturday through May 14.
Out North goes to the PAC with Bridgman/Packer’s “Double Expose” and “Under the Skin”
Out North Contemporary Art House has brought New York City-based Bridgman/Packer Dance to Anchorage for two performances at the Discovery Theatre at the Alaska Center for the Performing Arts.
A celebration of Celebration 2011
Since the first Celebration of Change on September 19, 1983 at the Red Ram Motor Lodge, Celebration has arguably been the Anchorage women’s community’s premiere annual social & arts event. Here’s a photographic celebration of this year’s show, the 27th Celebration of Change.
Step Up, Step Out for Alaska Pride
The NorthView‘s spring issue is online, full of updates on the activities at Identity, including a review of the Community Center fundraiser, their new visibility campaign “I am Identity,” and this Alaska Pride article by incoming co-chair Felix Rivera (reposted with author’s permission.)
Alaska Pride asks each and every one of us to Step Up, Step Out
By Felix Rivera, Incoming Co-ChairThis year, the steering committee behind Alaska Pride is looking to step up the 9-day celebration in June, the annual Alaska Pride Fest. The dates this year are June 18 – 26.
The theme the group has selected is reminiscent of happenings throughout the country: Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was repealed, the Defense of Marriage Act is being scrutinized by White House administration, and states around the country are passing pro-equality laws.
But still, the work is not done. Anchorage still does not have an equal-rights ordinance protecting GLBT folks from undue discrimination. Even more, our GLBT brothers and sisters in Africa face threats to their lives on a daily basis. Some have even lost their lives fighting for justice.
This summer, we ask each and every Alaskan to Step Up, Step Out. So what does that mean exactly? Haven’t attended Pride Fest in a few years? We ask you to Step Up and support your local community. Want to put on an event for Pride or volunteer, but haven’t found the motivations to do so? We ask you to Step Out of your comfort zone and become involved.
Each and every one of us should follow this motto. This year, Alaska Pride asks that you run with it! After all, that is what Pride is all about: Alaska Pride promotes state-wide gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender equality through education and celebration.
This year, to help us better follow our motto, the steering committee has decided to put the two umbrella events of Alaska Pride Fest and Pride Conference under one label: Alaska Pride. Both of these serve to help educate ourselves on what it means to be GLBT in Alaska, but also to celebrate our Pride.
In essence, Alaska Pride Fest serves as the heart of Alaska Pride. Alaska Pride Conference serves as the
head. Head and heart. One cannot exist without the other.One heart, one mind, Alaska Pride.
Please check out our website at AlaskaPride.org, and email us at info@identityinc.org if you are interested in being a sponsor, individual donor, vendor, or volunteer.
Thanks to Felix Rivera and Emily Kloc for stepping up as the incoming Alaska Pride co-chairs, and to current co-chairs Johnathan Jones and Gail Palmer for the great work they’ve done and are doing for Alaska Pride.
What are you going to do for Alaska Pride?
Gay pride flags thrown in mud outside youth dance
136 queer and allied youth from Anchorage and the Mat-Su Valley attended the Glee-themed Pride Prom last weekend at Out North – and at least one vandal, who took down four of the five rainbow flags decorating the outside of the building. A flag was hung upside down, others were thrown on the ground in the mud.
Kaboom by Gregg Araki, Monday at Bear Tooth
Gregg Araki’s newest film, Kaboom, is screening at the Bear Tooth tonight as the 8pm Art House Movie.
Kaboom is “a wild, witty and sex-drenched horror-comedy thriller featuring a gorgeous young cast.” Araki, a pioneer of new queer cinema, describes it as “a bisexual Twin Peaks in college… a mash up of at least five or six different genres… It’s really fun and sexy and kind of crazy.”
Here is the plot summary:
Kaboom is a thriller/comedy telling the story of Smith (Thomas Dekker from Heros) an ambisexual 18 year old college freshman who stumbles upon a monstrous conspiracy in a seemingly idyllic seaside Southern California town.
Smith’s everyday life in the dorms – hanging out with his arty, sarcastic best friend Stella, hooking up with a beautiful free spirit named London, lusting for his gorgeous but dim surfer roommate Thor – all gets turned upside-down after one fateful, terrifying night.
Tripping on some hallucinogenic cookies he ate at a party, Smith is convinced he’s witnessed the gruesome murder of an enigmatic Red Haired Girl who has been haunting his dreams. What he discovers as he tries to find out the truth leads him deeper and deeper into a mystery that will forever change not only the course of his young life but the destiny of the entire world.
What does Araki mean by ambisexual?
There are various forms of it: the omnisexual, polysexual, etc., and all of it means that sexuality is a fluid thing. It’s ambiguous. Bisexual sounds to me like an old school scientific kind of category. I have always believed that sexuality is not really black and white, that it is a gray area. As time goes on, people become more open and fluid in terms of their views of sexuality. The younger generation, their view is not really about labels and categories and declaring themselves. It is more about the experience and attraction and not so black and white. I find that that is becoming more and more common, even more so than the mid 90s.
Watch the trailer:
Kaboom
Directed by Gregg Araki
Cast: Thomas Dekker, Chris Zylka, Roxane Mesquida, Juno Temple, Haley Bennett
Monday, April 25th, 8:00 PM, $3.50 GA
Bear Tooth Theatrepub
Art House Monday premiere
US/France sci-fi comedy, “new queer cinema” 86 minutes.
Not rated, graphic sexual situations, nudity, violence and strong language. Persons under 18 not admitted.
Jerry Merryman (1938–2011)
Jerry Merryman lived in Anchorage for 17 years and his ‘home away from home’ was The Raven. He died of massive heart failure on Tuesday, Jan. 18, 2011 in Alturas, California. A friend who also used to live in Anchorage sent the obituary to Bent Alaska today. Jerry’s family did not know how to contact his friends in Alaska (and did not acknowledge in the obituary that he was gay.)
