Six inches forward, five inches back

by Sandra Peredo

Hedwig and the Angry Inch – a “rock‘n’roll fairytale” – began as a performance piece created by actor/writer John Cameron Mitchell and musician/composer Stephen Trask. The story of Hansel, a spunky German kid who loves rock music was developed in New York queer clubs in the 1990s, evolved to a hit off-Broadway play and in 2001 became an instant cult classic film. If you haven’t seen it you are either a homophobe or you are in for a real treat.

As in archetypal fairytales, hope and irony are key motifs. When the wall goes up and five thousand Berliners escape west, little Hansel and his mother move east. They are so poor the boy has to crawl into the oven to listen to rock on his tiny radio.

It doesn’t get easier. In his teens Hansel falls in love with an American GI. Persuaded by his mother (“To be free one must give up a little part of oneself”) he has a sex change operation. But the job is botched.

Enter the angry inch.

Oh well. “…put on some makeup, turn on the eight track, I’m pulling the wig down from the shelf.” Hansel becomes Hedwig, an outrageous almost transsexual diva with bright red lipstick, big blonde hair, flamboyant attire and a rock band backup. Clearly neither here nor there, not a complete woman or a complete man, Hedwig is a metaphorical conundrum. Even Cinderella didn’t have this much heartache. Where the hell are those glass slippers?

But Hedwig is also a warrior. (“In Berlin they threw tomatoes. After the show I had a nice salad”)  And this is a fairytale. Hedwig, incredibly, survives, spirit, ironic energy and humour intact right up to the happy ending.

Totally recommended. AMAZING music, great story, great acting, great animation and special effects. And funny. A true classic.

After the screening of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Matthew Hays, Montreal-based author of View From Here: Conversations with Gay and Lesbian Filmmakers had an onstage conversation with John Cameron Mitchell.

Hays: “It’s heartrending to watch what Hedwig’s going through and at the same time be so campy.”

Mitchell: “Obviously not every guy who is gay is overtly feminine. Something about those energies allows you to look at the world in a different way. Get pushed beyond and it’s camp. There’s this weird kind of thing called straight camp but it’s not funny. Like Barbarella.”

Hays: What about Shortbus?”

Mitchell: “Shortbus is not porn. I would like to make a porn movie. There was a moment in the 70s (Deep Throat) when it looked like porn would liberate something. Doing Shortbus (photo) was in a way purging things for me too. I’d always thought about sex. It gets you out of the house. Sex to someone who is queer is very important because you are told you can’t do it. It seemed like a good language to work on dramatically. For the actors to be comfortable they wrote it with me.”

“In my real life I’m more cerebral, so it feels like a relief to release and let go. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t become creative. Creativity keeps me alive, it’s a wormhole to reality. It can also be called empathy. If you can empathize that’s the beginning of hope. In the act of creating something there is implicitly hope.”

“Maybe it’s my catholic upbringing. Bring something useful. One audience comment after Shortbus was ‘I was suffused with joy’”.