Recently, while watching an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race on Logo, I was flummoxed when most of the contestants had heard neither of Edith “Little Edie” Bouvier Beale nor of Grey Gardens.  “What?!?!” I thought to myself.  “How can that be?” How can you expect to exemplify the third of Ru’s four tenets of drag (Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, and Talent), when you don’t know the basics?  It’s like expecting a kid who’s only reading at a sixth-grade level to suddenly quote the likes of Oscar Wilde or Dorothy Parker or Lucius Beebe: It just ain’t gonna happen.

I began to think about which cinematic gems would comprise the required-viewing list if I were compiling the syllabus for an imaginary multi-level course of study on “Shulman's Cinema for Queers” – which I’d like to think could serve as a primer on cultural touchstones of cinema, for anyone looking to gain a fuller grasp on the pop-cult.  I polled friends on Facebook, which brought-in some inspired selections (i.e., Hedwig and the Angry Inch, The Queen) as well as some that were downright disturbing (i.e., Deliverance, Rambo: First Blood, Pt. 2).  Of course, since I’m the one writing this series, the selections (as with anything opined) are of my choosing.

Over the next couple of weeks – interspersed between other articles – I’ll be laying-out the Required Viewing Lists (The Basics, Queer Cinema, The Tearjerkers, The Documentaries, Quotable Camp Classics, etc.), that will allow for the library to remain open, at all hours; enabling witty reads, and erudite throwings of shade (not to mention the difference between the two).

So, before you start whipping-out quips about “the pot calling the kettle ‘beige’” or about your gal-pal being “as fatale as an after-dinner mint,” come back, next time, for “Shulman's Cinema for Queers” - The Basics.

“Shulman's Cinema for Queers”

Get into it!