Originally released in 2006 on Amazon and then updated several times later, this documentary is about Boston’s most diverse dance club, open from the 70s to the 90s. Three floors, a piano bar and pool tables in the basement, a new wave punk dance floor and then a classic disco dance floor… plus in good weather a roof deck with a grill! The entire LBGT+ community was welcome and mixed together as well straight people and a few other minorities that were not welcomed in other, straighter bars at the time.
This version is recut, new graphics, where possible, with better sound and upscaled to HD. It was filmed on zero budget with an old video camera and a mono microphone from the Radio Shack so I’ve tried to improve it where possible but tech is only so magical, even these days.
The goal is to give people who were not able to go to this wonderful place and a sense of what it was like and to remind the world of Boston’s gay history and a world that is now gone and lost.
We've been soaking in "Blue Velvet" nostalgia down here in Wilmywood/"Lumberton" and suddenly everybody-and not just the hipsters-is toasting their Pabst Blue Ribbons to their fucks:
Patrick Swayze was way ahead (or behind) Frank Booth in getting to Pussy Heaven, Lumberton's only disco.
Oh, and here's a juicy tidbit to go with your PBR. Peter was in town and shared his fantastic film with us and told some great stories:
The Apple is one my favorite films. A Golan-Globus 1980 production, set in the distant future of 1994, tells the tale of 2 nice kids from Moose Jaw, Canada who get corrupted by the devilish owner of an international music company.
Watch the hero get seduced at an orgy featuring less than subtle lyrics like: "Fill Me Up With Your Fire" "Drain Every Drop Of Your Love"
because nothing says disco fever like Ernest Borgnine and Dick Van Patten
The all-star cast of premiere goers include Kristy McNichol, Penny & Cindy, Wayland & Madame, Suzanne Somers and John Travolta on the arm of his date: Lily Tomlin ("Moment by Moment - nooo don't do it!" you wanna yell at the screen).
CAUTION: Extreme epidermis exposure and '70s disco music...proceed at your own risk! Kudos to our local film fest, Cucalorus, for airing this selection.
Without a shred of self-effacing irony , Mae West played a sex bomb (at age 91?) in 1978's film SEXTETTE. oh, and what a cinematic gift she gave us! Miss West was living in her penthouse at The Ravenswood Apts on Vine Street, Hollywood -- and she was listed in the phonebook at the time (just in case a producer needed her). We all need her.
"We used to go to dinner with [Mae West] every Thursday night. Rumor had it that she was 91 years old when she made that and she wasn't very good at remembering her lines. I do remember one scene that I had to come into the bridal suite with her (she was my bride), and I used to have to say, 'Oh darling, I feel like the first man who landed on the moon' and her line was something like, 'That's a small step for man and a giant leap into the boudoir', but she could never remember it. I don't think she even knew that the Americans had landed on the moon, so there was a kind of lack of connection with this line! We did it again and again and again, and she kept forgetting, and every time we stood outside the door waiting to begin she'd tug at my sleeve and say, 'What's the line?' She'd get so, so annoyed with herself! One moment we walked in and I said, 'Darling, I feel like the first man who landed on the moon,' and she said, 'In a minute you're going to feel like you landed on Venus,' and into the boudoir we went!" (Timothy Dalton)
