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Best. Lesbian. Week. Ever. (August 31, 2007)

PAGE SIX: THE MORAL COMPASS OF LESBIANS EVERYWHERE The New York Post recently blasted Tammy Lynn Etheridge (the artist formerly known as Tammy Lynn Michaels) for her anti-Bush/Rove rant on her blog. In his Page Six column under the headline”Vulgar and Vile,” Richard Johnson wrote:

Tammy Lynn Michaels ought to wash her mouth out with soap. The lesbian “wife” of rocker Melissa Etheridge calls President Bush “an idiotic, parasitical, country-raping piece of [bleep]” on her blog, HollywoodFarm Girl. “How does Laura [Bush] lay her head down at night?” Michaels’ constructive and civil rant goes on to call Karl Rove a “sweaty little piggish Oompa-Loompa Elmer Fudd ass.” And if the administration doesn’t like her hate-filled profanity, she taunts, “Come arrest me, you [bleep]ers.”
Undaunted, Etheridge responded to the Post with keyboard blazing:
dear ny post,

first, i am honored that someone at your paper reads my li’l blog. indeed, the blog of which you speak was vulgar and crass and such the like as that, i agree. swearing and vulgarity is a forte of mine. (i think i listened to bette midler’s standup tapes far too young in life. i digress.) it seems that only extremism gets the message out these days, doesn’t it? the Neo-Cons (or Modern-Day-Hitlers), the terrorists (that we created), the kids shooting other kids in school, the hollywood whorlets who show their vagina to the world AND go to jail AND still make magazine covers… see? so a lesbian, using filthy language, swearing and daring for the criminals to take the lamb’s clothing off…. of course i make the ny post.

i bet you’ll be surprised and disappointed to know that i’ve already had my mouth washed out with soap, a coupla times, in fact, when i was a kid. my caretaker, evelyn, was a believer in “soap cleans out the dirty words”. and i was a believer in dirty words. i can clearly recall not only the taste of the soap in my mouth- but also the texture of the washrag as she rubbed it into my tongue. i guess she didn’t rub hard enough, huh? LOL …

To read her post in its entirety, go here.

Etheridge’s rant closes with this parting shot:

so thank you for passing my ideas and feelings on to other parts of the world my blog cannot reach alone. thank you.

love is all there is.

Sincerely, Hollywood Farm Girl (who has legally changed her name to Etheridge, so you might wanna print the correct name next time. no biggie.)

I also must need my mouth washed out with soap, because I totally agree with everything she wrote. In fact, I’m so on board with Tammy that I’m thinking of changing my last name to Etheridge too.

JODIE FOSTER: THE OPINIONATED ONE In promotion of her new film, The Brave One, star Jodie Foster recently spoke at length to Rachel Abramowitz of the Los Angeles Times about violence. And “the dumb ass who lives down the street.”

The film, about one woman’s transformation after experiencing a violent attack, is already causing controversy for potentially glorifying revenge and vigilante justice. Foster told the Los Angeles Times, “There’s something incredibly true about the rage and fear that we don’t lay claim to, but once you experience it, you know it’s been there all along and everybody else walking down the street is lying to themselves.”

In the article, Abramowitz speculates that some viewers will be “titillated by Foster’s descent into a cold-fingered executioner,” while others “will find it an exploitation movie tricked out like an art film, a morally repugnant exercise in which vengeance is celebrated.”

Foster theorized: “It wouldn’t even be a quarter as polarizing if it was opening on three screens with some German actress. The fact that it’s me and it’s opening on 3,000 screens is what makes people uncomfortable liking it. It’s a ’70s movie and everyone is going to see it including the dumb ass who lives down the street who tortures pets.” Then she added, “Oh, that’s a bad quote.”

Below are some production stills from the film, which opens Sept. 14: Based on these stills, are you “titillated” or repulsed? Yeah, I thought so.

MAJORING IN MAYHEM – AND MURDER! Have you heard of the independent feature-length horror film Women’s Studies? What, you say, a horror film about feminist theory? And it wasn’t funded by the Bush administration?

The press materials for the film state that it “follows a grad student who along with her friends becomes a visitor at a women’s academy where female empowerment is taken to murderous extremes.”

If these photos are any indication, fashion is also taken to murderous extremes. The official website for the film is designed to look like the homepage for the fictional university, Ross-Prentiss Women’s Academy, at which the story takes place.

According to the syllabus press release, Women’s Studies “is an intelligent horror film that explores what makes one person fall over the edge into terrorism while others take a more peaceful route to change.” In the film, lead character Mary and her collegiate friends get a ride to a nearby academy that they discover is a “‘girl’s only’ school emphasizing women’s studies, business, political science, and genetics.”

Gee, maybe their first clue that something was awry should have been the fact it was called a “girl’s only school.” What is this, Eastland Academy? No self-respecting women’s college would call itself a “girl’s” school. It’s “women,” with a capital “W.” And sometimes with a “Y.”

Naturally, the students of the academy “have a darker side: indoctrinating women into their apocalyptic sect and then sending them out into the world to strip men of power and status and enslave them. Slowly, Mary begins to realize that Judith and the cultists will do anything to fulfill their dogma … including murder.”

This film looks like my dad’s worst nightmare about where my undergrad women’s studies minor would lead me. Although, come to think of it, so does my current job description. Go figure!

WE GOTTA HAVE FAITH, FAITH, FAITH A reader (thanks Jennifer from Pittsburgh!) has tipped us off to the fact that Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s resident bad ass (and Sarah Warn favorite) Faith has returned!

Faith (played in the television series by Eliza Dushku) saunters back into our lives in the sixth issue of the Season 8 comic book, which goes on sale Sept. 5. The issue is penned by Lost co-producer Brian K. Vaughan, who series creator Joss Whedon had originally chosen to write a direct-to-DVD movie featuring Faith – a project that, sadly, never came to fruition. Vaughn told TVGuide.com that his story presumes “that some of the girls around the world who now have Slayer powers aren’t necessarily good. So when it comes to who will slay a Slayer, Giles turns to Faith. She’s the person to go for, as she says, ‘dirty deeds, done cheap.'”

Below is one of the panels from Issue 6: Something tells me that when it comes to ponying up to see some of Faith’s legendary “deeds,” her lesbian fans would be anything but cheap. (But they might be just a little bit dirty.)

FROM BIRD FLU TO MURDER: CAROLYN DANDO UPGRADES HER RESUME The lesbian subplot has thickened (we hope) in the cinematic version of Alice Sebold‘s novel The Lovely Bones, now that New Zealand actress Carolyn Dando has been cast as teen (and future lesbian) Ruth Connors. Dando’s only credit to date is the television movie Fatal Contact: Bird Flu in America.

Carolyn is pictured here (left) with Lovely Bones co-star Rose McIver: Dando joins a cast chock full of heavy-hitters including Susan Sarandon, Rachel Weisz, Stanley Tucci, Ryan Gosling and Michael Imperioli, and the film is set to begin filming in October.

Though it will be directed by Academy Award-winner Peter Jackson, who gave AfterEllen.com favorite Kate Winslet her start as a lesbian icon with his film Heavenly Creatures, there is no definitive word yet as to whether or not the character of Ruth will keep her lesbian status in the transition from page to big screen. We’ll keep you posted.

SADLY FOR ELIZA DUSHKU FANS, IT’S NOT THE MOVIE VERSION OF TRU CALLING Filming recently wrapped on Tru Loved, a feature-length film written and directed by Stewart Wade (Coffee Date) about “a sixteen-year-old girl (Tru) who has been uprooted by her lesbian Moms from her comfortable gay-friendly home in San Francisco and moved to a conservative, suburban community in Southern California. Her only friend is a closeted football player — and even that friendship is jeopardized when she starts the school’s first Gay-Straight Alliance.”

As if the premise weren’t enough reason to see it, some of the stars of the film include out actors Jane Lynch and Alec Mapa, out writer Bruce Vilanch, and Different World favorite (Whitley!) Jasmine Guy. Tru is played by Najarra Townsend, and her two moms are played by Cynda Williams (Tales of the City) and Baywatch‘s Alexandra Paul – who played a lesbian in here! Films’ movie Trapped.

One of the film’s publicists told us that the filmmakers are working with community partners such as the Gay Straight Alliance Network, the ACLU, PFLAG and the L.A. Gay and Lesbian Center, and that the film has already raised the ire of the Catholic Church.

All of that’s enough for me to already give it an “A” for effort (and “Agitate”).

¡CHICA, USTED ES FEROZ! AfterEllen.com reader Rogue, who runs the Spanish lesbian blog Lesbicanarias, recently alerted us to a couple of nifty lesbian news items.

Spanish prime-time program Hospital Central, which caused a stir back in 2005 when it televised the first same-sex wedding on Spanish television, is introducing a new lesbian character to be played by actress Carolina Cerezuela. Cerezuela will play the love interest of pediatrician Maca (Patricia Vico), one of the brides in the history-making wedding episode (Whoops! Guess the marriage isn’t working out).

Below are some photos of Cerezuela: For more info, check out Rogue’s blog.

Next, on Supermodelo, a Spanish reality television show similar to America’s Next Top Model, contestant Jessica RuÀz recently came out when asked if her partner supports her aspirations to model.

Below is a photo of Ruíz from the Supermodelo website: Hmm. How do you say “One down, 11 to go!” in Spanish?

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE! Newsweek‘s “My Turn” column this week is written by Loraine Barr, an older lesbian who recalls coming of age in the closet (thanks to AE reader Corky for the tip).

Noted Latina lesbian activist, historian and author Yolanda Retter, 59, died this week in Los Angeles.

This year, the Venice International Film Festival will present the Queer Lion award (akin to the festival’s main Golden Lion prize) to the best full-length film featuring a gay theme or character. The festival opened on Aug. 29 and runs through Sept. 8.

Lesbian cabbie Melissa Plaut’s new memoir, Hack: How I Stopped Worrying About What to Do With My Life and Started Driving a Yellow Cab (Villard, $21.95), was published this week.

Theater Offensive has announced the schedule for its upcoming 2007 Out on the Edge Festival of Queer Theatre (running Oct. 20-Nov. 10 in Boston).

The lesbian soccer event Festival of the Babes celebrates its 17th birthday this weekend in Portland. The theme? “Barely legal!”

BBC America’s acclaimed dramatic series Jekyll, which prominently featured a lesbian couple, came to a close this week. Read more about the show in Sarah’s blog.

Finally, AfterEllen.com is closing up shop this coming Monday, Sept. 3, in observance of Labor Day. This means that you should look for the We’re Getting Nowhere video blog (and the old-timey South of Nowhere written recap) this coming Wednesday instead of Tuesday. Vloggers and recappers need to celebrate holidays too!

That’s it for this week! Check back next Friday for another edition of Best. Lesbian. Week. Ever.

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