Debra Messing, Harvey Fierstein, others remember Debbie Reynolds

It’s been a rough week—hell, it’s been a rough year—for entertainment royalty. Just one day after the death of her daughter, actress and writer Carrie Fisher, Hollywood icon Debbie Reynolds passed away at the age of 84.

Over the past 24 hours, the celebrity tributes and tweets have been steadily pouring out, with everyone from Bette Midler and Sean Hayes to Miley Cyrus and Sarah Paulson expressing their shock at the double loss and sending their condolences.

“This is beyond heartbreaking. Debbie was an idol,” Cher tweeted. “I have seen Singing in The Rain a million times. Loved all her films…Words are inadequate.”

William Shatner also expressed his heartbreak at the loss of “the last of Hollywood Royalty” in a tweet yesterday, summing up how most of us probably feel about this punishing year: “I’d hoped that my grieving was done for 2016.”

Reynolds was a recurring guest star on Will & Grace, playing Grace Adler’s mother in the 1990. Debra Messing posted a particularly moving tribute to the late actress via Instagram:

A photo posted by Debra Messing (@therealdebramessing) on Dec 28, 2016 at 6:52pm PST

“Debbie went to be with Carrie. She always worried about her. Carrie left too soon and now they are together again. My heart is literally broken. For 8 years she was my mom. She was pure energy & light when she came on stage. She was loving, and bawdy, and playful- a consummate pro- old school and yet had the work ethic and investment in her craft of a new fiery up and comer. She was always running off to Vegas or somewhere else “on the road” to be a hoofer, to sing and dance and make people laugh. She performed 340 days out of the year. An inspiration on every level. A Legend of course, the epitome of clean cut American optimism, dancing with Gene Kelly as an equal, a warrior woman who never stopped working. A devoted mother and grandmother, and aunt and great aunt, and friend. I lost my mom a few years ago. She loved that Debbie was my TV mom. I hope they find each other and hug and kiss and my mom says, “I got you, Debbie. Carrie’s waiting for you.” RIP Bobbie Adler.”

Meanwhile, the editors at Vulture reposted Harvey Fierstein’s anecdote about hanging out in the Theater District with Reynolds after hours during the Broadway run of Torch Song Trilogy:

“One night, we were out, Debbie Reynolds had replaced Lauren Bacall in Woman of the Year, so she was performing and we went out after the show. I think Lee Roy Reams was there, sort of egging her on — not that you had to push Debbie very hard to get her to perform. But somebody was egging her on. And she got up on the piano, and began doing Dietrich. She does all these amazing imitations. And she was singing and carrying on, and we were there until at least 4:30 in the morning.

I took a cab home to Brooklyn. I went to bed. I woke up in the morning, and I was lying in the bed and turned the TV on, and there was this announcement on the television that Debbie Reynolds had been taken to the hospital. That they feared she’d had a heart attack. And she would not be performing that day, that she would not be doing the matinee of Woman of the Year, because she had been taken to the hospital. And so I jumped up, and I looked through my phone book, and found Carrie Fisher’s phone number. I called her immediately. I said, “Don’t worry, Mom’s fine, it’s just a hangover!” Because we’d been drinking four hours before that! I called Carrie so she wouldn’t worry. But we had a lot of fun.”

Feel free to share your own tales of getting saucy with Debbie and Carrie—while watching their iconic performances or in real life—in the comments.

h/t: Variety

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The Unsinkable Debbie Reynolds

In this archival interview, the legend gabs with Greg Archer about her return to the stage, her loyal gay fans, and how Hollywood has changed since her heyday.

www.advocate.com/news/2007/12/05/unsinkable-debbie-reynolds

Donald Trump books the most antigay of antigay clergy for his doomsday inauguration

Donald Trump can’t find any musicians to perform at his inauguration next month (sad!), but he’s having no trouble booking antigay pastors to stand by his side as he’s sworn in as the 45th president of the United States of America.

Related: Donald Trump erupts on Twitter after scathing review of namesake restaurant

It was just announced that Rev. Franklin Graham will be one of several antigay religious figures who will speak at the doomsday event. Graham, of course, has been an outspoken advocate against LGBTQ people for years.

Not only did he once refer to gay people as “the enemy” and gay rights as “evil,” but he supported a constitutional amendment in North Carolina banning same-sex marriage, claimed pro-gay businesses enable predators, praised Russia’s gay propaganda law, accused Marvel’s X-Men franchise of turning kids homosexual, and once refused to buy cookies from a group of Girl Scouts because he said they supported LGBTQ equality.

Related: Franklin Graham And His Followers Have Epic Meltdowns Over Facebook Rainbow Filter

Graham will be joined by a slew of other antigay bigots on inauguration day. Dr. Samuel Rodriguez of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference will also be speaking at the event.

Rodriguez, who once called marriage equality the “legal catalyst for the marginalization of Americans who embrace a biblical worldview,” will deliver the opening prayer. Alongside him will be Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who once warned that gay marriage will turn everyone Asian, and Pastor Paula White, who once accused the Supreme Court of trying to radically transform marriage “via the conduit of judicial and executive fiat.”

Related: NY Archbishop Fears Gay Marriage Will Make Us Asian

So far, no Imam or representative of the Islamic faith is expected to speak at the event. (No surprise there.) In fact, the only non-Christian speaker will be Rabbi Marvin Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre who, thankfully, doesn’t appear to have a record of homophobia and, in fact, runs the Los Angeles’ Museum of Tolerance, which recognizes LGBTQ persecution.

www.queerty.com/donald-trump-books-antigay-antigay-clergy-doomsday-inauguration-20161229?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+queerty2+%28Queerty%29

The Top Ten Articles of 2016

These were the top single page stories you looked at this year.

www.advocate.com/world/2016/12/30/top-ten-articles-2016

PHOTOS: Bad boys talk with their bodies in Orlando
Body//Talk is a social enterprise devoted to using events to build a thriving new community in Orlando.

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Historians Imagine What Paris Sounded Like in the 18th Century

We have no recordings of the actual sounds of Paris in those early days, so to try and make those 18th-century streets and alleys of Paris come to life takes a bit of careful historical research and a little imagination.

That’s where French musicologist Mylène Pardoen, who’s been described as an “archaeologist of sound,” comes in. She’s created an “interpretation” of what Paris might have sounded like way back then.

Her latest, the “Sound of 18th Century Paris,” takes you to a Paris you’ve literally never heard before. Listening to it is like being transported back to the Grand Châtelet neighborhood of Paris two centuries ago, said Pardoen in an interview on RTS Swiss Radio.

“On the Pont au Change, one of the relatively noisy bridges of Paris, there were a great many artisans of luxury items, such as jewelers, engravers, polishers. … It is important to realize that during the 18th century there was no gas or electricity, so the artisans gathered close to the natural light, near the bridge, and that created a density of sound. The houses were very tall, so the sound stayed. It did not leave the bridge. The sound remained there and seemed thicker than it would today. It was not louder, nor was it less loud. It was denser.

“There were more sounds that collided with one another. Today that would give us an impression of being smothered. But today, we have wider streets. Back then the streets were narrow. People worked in the street and were squeezed against one another. ”

Of course, Hollywood offers up historical movies from time to time, with soundtracks to match the older era. Pardoen’s Parisian soundtrack has been similarly designed, right down to the sound of roosters crowing in the distance, the buzzing street markets and horse carriages rolling along cobbled streets.

“Again, on the Pont au Change, you hear the Seine, which is the aorta that keeps Paris alive,” says Pardoen. “On the right side, there were furriers who worked on pelts, but what you hear are the washerwomen working under the arches of the bridge. Then you hear the Notre Dame bridge pump, which brought drinking water to the Parisians. People drank the river water and lived, that’s it! That pump no longer exists, so I had to record and capture the movement of a restored water mill with a wooden mechanism.

“With my scientific colleagues, we took measurements to calculate how many rotations of the hydraulic wheel would simulate the action of the pump. We came up with six turns per minute.”

In addition to recording historically accurate sounds, Pardoen worked with experts to carefully map out the old streets of Paris. The aim was to create a 3-D rendering of Paris sound — based on one of the best maps of the day, the Turgot-Bretez Map of 1739.

But never mind the map. Just close your eyes. Listen to the “Sound of 18th Century Paris.” It’s easy to imagine you’re walking along the Seine, past shops of all kinds. Some sounds jump out at you, like a horse-pulled wagon crashing into a street cart in an 18th-century style fender-bender. Wander a little farther along, toward the famous Notre Dame bridge. There’s no Starbucks, but street makets, muddy alleys and a lot of pigs create a cacophony of sound.

Pardoen hopes you’ll hear cackling hens in the poultry market, flies buzzing around the fishmonger, the click and clack of typesetting at the print shop on Rue de Gesvres.

“For most of our history, we have used artifacts, architecture, pictures and words to create a vision of our past,” says Paris-based sound recordist Des Coulam. He’s fascinated with Pardoen’s creation, calling it “very clever and compelling.”

“It’s only in the last few seconds on our historical clock that we’ve been able to capture and archive sound so, sadly, most of our sonic heritage has passed by completely unrecorded,” Coulam adds.

I recorded sounds from here today, the Temple de la Sibylle in the Parc des Buttes Chaumont. Very challenging. pic.twitter.com/dloaS3A2ab

— soundlandscapes (@soundlandscapes) September 8, 2016

Coulam points out that art and literature afford us only a glimpse of what our past might have sounded like. Take, for instance, what American writer John Sanderson described hearing when he arrived in Paris for the first time in July 1835:

All things of this Earth seek, at one time or another, repose — all but the noise of Paris. The waves of the sea are sometimes still, but the chaos of these streets is perpetual from generation to generation; it is the noise that never dies.

Like 18th-century Paris, modern Paris — with its 12 million residents, scores of cafes and busy Metro stops — is still a noisy place. The soundscape is a vital part of the city’s character, says Coulam, and something that’s important to preserve.

“Most of our sonic heritage, the actual sounds of our past, have passed by unrecorded,” says Coulam. “I think it’s important that our contemporary sonic environment is recorded and archived so that future generations will have the actual sounds of our time to explore, to study and enjoy.

“These are not fictional sounds, these are not imagined sounds, these are not sounds I’ve created with a sound editing program. These are the actual sounds of the city today. And I think it’s really, really important that people around the world collect the contemporary soundscapes of their cities.”

Square du Temple and its Sounds t.co/aJFGQY3wpW pic.twitter.com/mrlGAXEs2j

— soundlandscapes (@soundlandscapes) October 23, 2016

Coulam takes that responsibility seriously. He’s been recording street markets, fountains and cafes in and around Paris for years. Unlike Pardoen’s imagined soundscape, many of his 3,000 recordings inevitably include music blasting out of speakers, police sirens, metro stations and the cellphone ringtones that clutter 21st-century Paris. But it’s a never-ending assignment, he adds, because Paris is changing.

“Some of today’s sounds will disappear and new sounds will be created. I set out each day to document those changes,” Coulam explains.

On a recent outing during a car-free day on the Champs-Elysees, Coulam says he recorded the quiet sounds of a tiny fountain in a small garden called Jardin de la Nouvelle France. For a few minutes, on that particular day, with no noisy traffic to interfere, Coulam says the fountain sounded like it might have sounded in Paris 200 years ago.

Marché des Enfants-Rouges t.co/182kLbtL4f pic.twitter.com/R5A5SExXhq

— soundlandscapes (@soundlandscapes) October 17, 2016

This article first appeared on PRI The World.

The post Historians Imagine What Paris Sounded Like in the 18th Century appeared first on Towleroad.

Historians Imagine What Paris Sounded Like in the 18th Century