Parting Glances
Gay composer Leonard Bernstein's 1956 broadway musical "Candide" has a bravura soprano song, "Glitter and be gay" written for and originally sung by Barbara Cook (still giving concerts at 80-something).
I thought of the show stopper when Newt Gingrich got bedazzled with a box full of fairy dust last week. It was truly a sparkling moment of gay actvism. Although rather tame when compared to what happened to another bigot 37 years ago.
That pulp non-fiction event was totally shocking. Downright naughty, even. Anti-Christian. Yet so deliciously thrilling to the hundreds of angry gays who just happened to be watching a late Florida TV newscast.
Anita Jane Bryant, America's homophobe du jour, beaming her famous Sunshine State cocoa-butter-wouldn't-melt-in-my-mouth smile ("as God is my witness"), got pie plastered mid anti-gay rant right in her pert-and-pretty, little lip-smeared kisser.
For once, the demonessa of Dade County, Fla. – the self-styled Queen of Orange Juice – titular forerunner to gridiron gruntbox, now jailbird O.J. Simpson – was struck dumbfounded. Speechless. It was heavenly. Couldn't have happened to a nicer fundygelical!
But in spite of her castor-oil-in-the-OJ hostility, her pulp-and-pits deceitfulness about us gays, in the long run we owe the 1959 Miss America runner up, turned popular, saccharine "Paper Roses" juke box, now-near-forgotten songstress a historical footnote of grudging thanks. (Grunt.)
It was she who, more than anyone else then, and perhaps now, served as a catalyst by default to bring gay/lesbian communities together, uniting our movement to an unexpected solidarity. (I had almost forgotten how zealous she was. How sweetly go-for-the-jugular in her rant and rancor. How holier than thou. Sorta like Sarah Palin.)
So, let's peel the orange for oldtime sake. Pulp, seeds and rind. Pesticide unavoidable…
Pert angelic Anita, spokesperson for the Florida Citrus Commission, wasn't too happy when a gay rights Dade County ordinance passed. Six months later, speaking as a Southern Baptist mom, she launched a Save Our Children repeal crusade. She mouthed lies, lip-synced stereotypes.
She crooned to the media rafters. Gay people are wicked. Godless. Out to stalk school playgrounds. "As a mother I know that homosexuals cannot biologically reproduce," she shrilled. "They must recruit children. If gays are granted rights, next we'll have to give rights to prostitutes, people who sleep with St. Bernards, nail biters."
Her blend of nail technician, canine venom worked. On June 7, 1977, Dade County's anti-discrimination ordinance was rescinded by a margin of 69 to 31 percent. But her cohorts didn't count on a gay backlash. "Anita brought us together big, big time," says a nameless lesbian interviewed in the 1970s documentary, "After Stonewall."
Across America, literally hundreds of thousands gays, lesbian, allies militantly marched in major cities across America. Some carried posters of Anita, side by side with posters of Adolf Hitler. Bryant the Bigot! The Demon Mom from Dade County!
Gay activists brilliantly organized a nationwide OJ boycott (some posting letters, enclosing $2, asking crop growers for a nonexistent pamphlet linking OJ with homosexuality.) The fallout from gay political activism poisoned her career big time.
She lost her Florida Orange Grower Commission hefty salary, followed by Coca Cola, Kraft Foods, Holiday Inn, Tupperware TV commercial accounts. Her marriage to hubby Bob Green also squeezed out. In 1980 she dumped him. (He wanted to pulp her.)
She married a second spousal lemon, Charlie Hobson Dry, in 1990. They tried to salvage her career, booking a series of small venues (including a Windsor, Ont. weekend).
Comeback proved fruitless. The Drys left behind unpaid employees and creditors. Bankruptcy pie hit twice. In 2005, dry throat Anita, 65, was parodied on "Will & Grace." Her lemon merin(gay) moment occasionally replays on YouTube. Let's drink to that! Milk over OJ, anytime.
