The GLAAD Wrap: 'Orange is the New Black' trailer, 'Fragments of Him' video game, and more!

www.glaad.org/blog/glaad-wrap-orange-new-black-trailer-fragments-him-video-game-and-more

Corey Stoll On How His Gay Sex Scenes Stayed High Brow On “Girls”

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Missouri Town Officials Can’t Stop Posting Outdated Homophobic Drivel

Well, stop the presses, there’s a homophobic politician in Missouri ranting about queers on Facebook. Will wonders never cease.

This time it’s St. Robert City Councilman Allan Johannsen, and he’s ticking off all the boxes for “ignorant bigot.” Among his greatest Facebook hits: “I think queers need to stop trying to recruit more perverts this sick mental illness is not any better than child molesters,” and, “Why don’t you guys act right and find a nice woman instead of a person of the same sex.”

Good one, Al. That’s so creative.

Allan’s rants were triggered by some activism by the publisher of the local newspaper, the Pulaski County Daily News. Publisher Darrell Todd Maurina (pictured) is upset that there’s going to be a drag show at the local community center and wants it moved to someplace else, because there are “athletic fields next door.”

Uh, okay dude. Not sure what the proximity of an athletic field has to do with anything — are you worried that if a drag queen stands too close to a football field it turns into a discotheque?

Just for some context, here’s the kind of debauchery he’s worried about:

Yup, a drag queen calmly adjusting her hair and saying, “hi.” If there’s anything to object to here, it’s a white person wearing fake dreadlocks — eek, cultural appropriation.

The video does get a little off-color when she encounters a cute boy in the audience: “Look how cute he is! Don’t you want to put it in his butt?” Oh no, a joke about anal sex, nobody has ever done such a thing within earshot of an athletic field!

Maurina’s been making a name for himself with homophobia for years, and you can find some more unpleasant Facebook posts from him here, and also get a closer look at his profile pic.

What is it about homophobes that they all look like they’re waiting for a mug shot to be taken for doing something naughty in a men’s room?

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Rachel Maddow Tells Seth Meyers How She Thinks Hillary Can Beat Trump: WATCH

Last night, Rachel Maddow gave her assessment of what likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton can do to defeat Donald Trump in the upcoming general election.

Maddow told Seth Meyers that she believes one key reason why none of Trump’s Republican challengers were able to take him down was because they tried to paint him as a phony conservative who doesn’t pass the Republican litmus test–a test, it turns out, Republican voters didn’t care about.

“He’s not really running on one individual policy,” Maddow says. In other words, trying to attack Trump solely based on policy will fail to gut his candidacy.

Maddow explains,

“Policy is just like whatever he grabs out of the air that’s floating around him. It’s not been what he’s running on. He’s sort of running on who he is. He’s this big rich guy who doesn’t pay attention to what people want from him, and he’s willing to be politically correct, and he’s self-funding. If you don’t go at that, if you don’t go at who he is and you try to keep it based on his policies which he doesn’t even understand let alone necessarily believe in, I think yu kind of miss the point and you miss the chance to take him apart where it counts.”

Of Hillary’s chances of winning, right now Maddow says it’s 50/50 and predicts 6 really ugly (but important!) months ahead.

Watch, below.

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Ryan Gosling, Amazon, Joan Rivers, Nyle DiMarco, Apple, Greg Berlanti, Donald Trump: NEWS

2016 ELECTION. Donald Trump comes for Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, claims company has ‘huge antitrust problem’: “This (Washington Post) is owned as a toy by Jeff Bezos, who controls Amazon. Amazon is getting away with murder tax-wise. He’s using the Washington Post for power so that the politicians in Washington don’t tax Amazon like they should be taxed,” Trump said. “He’s using the Washington Post … for political purposes to save Amazon in terms of taxes and in terms of antitrust. He thinks I’ll go after him for antitrust. Because he’s got a huge antitrust problem because he’s controlling so much, Amazon is controlling so much of what they are doing.””

ANNOUNCEMENTS. Jimmy Kimmel announces run for Vice President.

TAKE IT OFF. Spencer Tunick to take mass nude photo at Republican National Convention: “For this particular shoot, titled “Everything She Says Means Everything,” 100 naked women will hold up large mirror discs that, according to the artist’s website, represent “reflecting the knowledge and wisdom of progressive women and the concept of ‘Mother Nature’” onto the convention center where the RNC is taking place.”

SETTLEMENTS. Joan Rivers’ family settles medical malpractice case surrounding her death: “Joan Rivers’s daughter, Melissa, filed a malpractice suit in January 2015, alleging doctors posed for selfies with her mother while she was unconscious. In a statement, she said the settlement allowed her to “put the legal aspects of my mother’s death behind me and ensure that those culpable for her death have accepted responsibility for their actions quickly and without equivocation”. The Rivers’ lawyers said the doctors had not denied responsibility.”

BERMUDA. Activists prepare for referendum on same-sex marriage: “The referendum on same-sex marriage and civil unions will be held on June 23, giving campaigners on either side six weeks to get their message across to voters. A formal notice was published in the Official Gazette yesterday, confirming the two questions that will appear on the ballot paper: Are you in favour of same-sex marriage in Bermuda? Are you in favour of same-sex civil unions in Bermuda?”

BAHAMAS. Prime Minister Perry Christie insists there will be no gay marriage there as long as he’s alive: “Mr Christie appeared agitated by the continued argument that the fourth Constitutional Amendment Bill could lead to same-sex marriage, telling The Tribune on Friday night that he is “almost embarrassed by” this line of thinking.”

DiGORGEOUS. Photographer Marco Ovando has been releasing some stunning shots of Nyle DiMarco.

BUSINESS. Apple just dropped $1 billion investment in Uber’s competitor in China: “We are making the investment for a number of strategic reasons, including a chance to learn more about certain segments of the China market,” he said. “Of course, we believe it will deliver a strong return for our invested capital over time as well.”

PRODUCER OF THE YEAR. Greg Berlanti talks to The Hollywood Reporter.

CLOSE TO YOU. People will do anything to get close to Ryan Gosling.

NASA. An awesome time-lapse video of Mercury’s transit of the Sun from earlier this week: “Around 13 times per century, Mercury passes between Earth and the sun in a rare astronomical event known as a planetary transit. The 2016 Mercury transit occurred on May 9, between roughly 7:12 a.m. and 2:42 p.m. EDT.”

FRIDAY FLESH. Howie Tung.

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Donald Trump Pretended to Be His Own Spokesperson to Brag About Himself – AUDIO, VIDEO

Donald Trump masqueraded as his own spokesman earlier in his career to brag about his accomplishments, his wealth, and his alleged desirability to famous women.

The Washington Post obtained an audio recording of a 1991 call from a man claiming to be on Trump’s PR team, who responded to a request from People magazine reporter Sue Carswell for a comment on Trump’s divorce from wife Ivana and his increasingly complicated relationship with model Marla Maples:

A recording obtained by The Washington Post captures what New York reporters and editors who covered Trump’s early career experienced in the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s: calls from Trump’s Manhattan office that resulted in conversations with “John Miller” or “John Barron” — public-relations men who sound precisely like Trump himself — who indeed are Trump, masquerading as an unusually helpful and boastful advocate for himself, according to the journalists and several of Trump’s top aides. […]

Within five minutes, Carswell got a return call from Trump’s publicist, a man named John Miller, who immediately jumped into a startlingly frank and detailed explanation of why Trump dumped Maples for the Italian model Carla Bruni. “He really didn’t want to make a commitment,” Miller said. “He’s coming out of a marriage, and he’s starting to do tremendously well financially.”

Miller turned out to be a remarkably forthcoming source — a spokesman with rare insight into the private thoughts and feelings of his client. “Have you met him?” Miller asked the reporter. “He’s a good guy, and he’s not going to hurt anybody. . . . He treated his wife well and . . . he will treat Marla well.”

As Miller, Trump touted his reputation as a playboy, explaining that famous actresses and even the likes of Madonna call him wanting to date him.

Trump using the pseudonyms John Miller and John Barron was a fact well-known among New York journalists at the time. Trump would eventually admit that the call to People was a “joke gone awry.” And prior to that call, in 1990, Trump said of the name ‘John Miller,’ “I believe on occasion I used that name.”

Today, Trump denies that fact:

In a phone call to NBC’s “Today” program Friday morning, Trump denied that he was John Miller. “No, I don’t think it — I don’t know anything about it. You’re telling me about it for the first time and it doesn’t sound like my voice at all,” he said. “I have many, many people that are trying to imitate my voice and then you can imagine that, and this sounds like one of the scams, one of the many scams — doesn’t sound like me.” Later, he was more definitive: “It was not me on the phone. And it doesn’t sound like me on the phone, I will tell you that, and it was not me on the phone. And when was this? Twenty-five years ago?”

CNN also notes that in the interview with Today, Trump got testy:

“You’re going so low to talk about something that took place 25 years ago whether or not I made a phone call?” Trump said. “Let’s get on to more current subjects.”

More from WaPo on Trump’s history with using pseudonyms to play the role of Trump PR man:

Trump has never been terribly adamant about denying that he often made calls to reporters posing as someone else. From his earliest years in business, he occasionally called reporters using the name “John Barron.”

A “John Baron,” described as a “vice-president of the Trump organization,” appeared in a front-page New York Times article as early as 1980, defending Trump’s decision to destroy sculptures on the facade of the Bonwit Teller department store building, the Fifth Avenue landmark he was demolishing to make way for his Trump Tower. Barron was quoted variously as a “Trump spokesman,” “Trump executive,” or “Trump representative” in New York magazine, The Washington Post and other publications.

Of the 1991 phone interview, Carswell recalls thinking, “It’s so weird that Donald hired someone who sounds just like him.” When Carswell played the tape of the interview for others, including famed New York Post gossip columnist Cindy Adams as well as Marla Maples herself, all identified the voice as Trump’s.

Today, Carswell says of the interview,

“This was so farcical, that he pretended to be his own publicist. Here was this so-called billion-dollar real estate mogul, and he can’t hire his own publicist. It also said something about the control he wanted to keep of the news cycle flowing with this story, and I can’t believe he thought he’d get away with it.”

Listen to the tapes, below:

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HHS Implements Critical New Regulation to Protect LGBT People From Discrimination in Healthcare

Today, HRC praised the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights for implementing a regulation that provides explicit protections from discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sex stereotyping, including for lesbian, gay, and bisexual people, in healthcare and insurance under the provisions of Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

“Access to healthcare should never be denied because of your sexual orientation or gender identity,” said HRC President Chad Griffin. “LGBT people have too often faced healthcare systems that provide inequitable and hostile treatment. This new and important regulation will address many of these disparities and is critical to help end discrimination against transgender and gender nonconforming people in healthcare and insurance. The Affordable Care Act has made a tremendous impact on the lives of millions of Americans, and this regulation makes clear that LGBT people and their unique needs are included in the protections it provides.”

HRC has repeatedly called on the Administration to implement these essential protections. In November of last year, HRC staff delivered 13,398 public comments from our members and supporters in response to the proposed rule change.

Discrimination has touched the lives of many LGBT people at all points in the healthcare system – from being unable to access insurance coverage, to outright refusals to provide care, to verbal and physical abuse at the hands of medical professionals.

This new regulation makes clear that transgender people must be treated consistent with their gender identity and cannot be denied care provided to anybody else, even when it’s transition-related care. We are disappointed that the regulation does not provide sufficient clarity around discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. However, prohibitions on discrimination resulting from sex-stereotyping will provide significant protections for lesbian, gay, and bisexual people. Any individual who has experienced discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity in the provision of health care or insurance should file a complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights.

www.hrc.org/blog/hhs-implements-critical-new-regulation-to-protect-lgbt-people-from-discrimi?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

Horror Hunks: The Men Of Friday The 13th

The Friday the 13^th films may be best known for final girls and gratuitous gore, but the iconic horror film franchise is a feast of mancandy as well.

From the sweetest pupcakes to the hardest hunks, here are 13 reasons we’d love to spend this – or any other Friday – at Camp Crystal Lake.

1. Jack (Kevin Bacon) Friday the 13th (1980)

In one of his earliest big screen roles, Kevin Bacon’s Speedo-loving Jack in the original Friday the 13th made many fans long to be much closer than six degrees away from the future award-winning actor.

2. Lawrence (Arlen Escarpeta) Friday the 13^th (2009)

One of the many male cast members who cranked up the heat in this 2009 reboot, Arlen Escarpeta’s “Lawrence” is exactly the kind of man frat-boy fantasies are made of.

3.) Scott (Russell Todd) Friday the 13^th Part 2

Those piercing blue eyes and kissable lips are only two reasons gay/bi horror fans have been dying to take a walk in the woods with Russell Todd since he first appeared in this slasher sequel.

4. Stoney (Yani Gellman) Jason X

Evil isn’t the only thing that gets an upgrade in the time of Jason X. Yani Gellman’s Stoney is a twink 2.0 who makes going back to the future worth the trip.

5. Doug (Peter Barton) Friday the 13^th: The Final Chapter

Thanks to the casting of 80s heartthrob Peter Barton, the death of Doug in The Final Chapter is also one of the sexiest shower scenes in horror movie history.

6. Trent (Travis Van Winkle) Friday the 13^th (2009)

He may have been one of the biggest dicks in the series, but Travis Van Winkle made being bad look oh-so-good.

7. Eddie (John Robert Dixon) Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning

John Robert Dixon’s Eddie easily earns a place among Jason’s hottest victims. We don’t blame the machete-wielding murderer for strapping this stud to a tree.

8. Tommy Jarvis (John Shepherd) Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning

Who could have guessed the nerdy little boy from part IV would grow up to be such horror hottie one film later? John Shepherd’s shirtless work makes Friday the 13^th Part V a new beginning indeed!

9. Tommy Jarvis (Thom Mathews) Friday the 13^th Part VI

Taking the final-boy baton from John Shepherd, Thom Mathews more than fills the shoes – and shirt – of our hunky hero in the sixth installment of the Friday franchise.

10. Nick (Kevin Spirtas) Friday the 13^th Part VII: The New Blood

Boasting a campy telekinetic heroine and numerous gay cast members, it isn’t hard to see why The New Blood has earned the nickname “FriGay the 13^th” from fans. But come on! Kevin Spirtas’ Nick is the kind of leading man who can make even straight guys question their sexuality.

11. Chewie (Aaron Yoo) Friday the 13^th(2009)

Aaron Yoo’s Chewie wormed his way into the hearts of gay horror fans the moment he offered Jason a hockey stick because it was an accessory that “completes your outfit.” Of course it doesn’t hurt that he’s easy on the eyes as well.

12. Mark (Tom McBride) Friday the 13^th Part 2

Before making his feature film debut in Friday the 13^th Part 2, out gay actor Tom McBride was one of the models who portrayed the Marlboro Man on billboards posted throughout New York City. By the time he appeared in this scream-worthy sequel, there were legions of audience members who were dying to take the wheelchair-bound Mark for a ride.

13. Clay Miller (Jared Padalecki) Friday the 13^th (2009)

Spoiler Alert! One of the few men to survive a run-in with our favorite machete-wielding maniac, Jared Padalecki’s Clay Miller is a hero we’d hold out for any day of the week.

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Woody Allen’s ‘Café Society’ — Cannes Movie Review

The 69th annual Cannes Film Festival began last night in the south of France, with the premiere of Woody Allen’s Café Society. Here’s a sneak peek review of the film which hits US theaters on July 15th.

Few things in life are as regular as Woody Allen movies. For the past 40 years or so they arrive exactly once a year. In recent years they generally premiere out of competition at Cannes and predictably reignite the endless cycle of media wars about Woody Allen.

The only thing irregular about the experience is the reviews, box office, and Oscars. For the past 10 years or so it’s been especially hard to predict. In that time he’s delivered critical and commercial Oscar winning hits that the media fawned over (Blue Jasmine, Midnight in Paris), well received films that didn’t quite crossover to that same extent (Match Point, Vicky Cristina Barcelona), critical flops that did surprisingly okay at the box office (To Rome With Love), trifles that people tolerated (Scoop), reanimated abandoned projects that everyone wished had stayed dead (Whatever Works), as well as critical and commercial flops (You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, Cassandra’s Dream).

In short (too late!) his films come with a lot of history and even more baggage.

His latest, Café Society, begins with very little literal baggage as a young optimistic man named Bobby (Jesse Eisenberg) leaves New York for Hollywood for reasons that don’t extend much beyond “trying something new.”

The first half of the picture takes place in Hollywood where Bobby gets work with his big deal uncle Phil (Steve Carell) a powerful agent in the movie business and befriends colorful figures like a happily married sharp-tongued couple (happily married in a Woody Allen picture — come again?) played with brassy aplomb by Parker Posey and Paul Schneider.

Bobby also meets an innocent hooker (Anna Camp) because this is a Woody Allen picture and if a character doesn’t work in academia, showbiz, art, organized crime, or publishing in his universe, they’re an innocent hooker.

While in Hollywood Bobby falls head over heels for his uncle’s secretary Veronica nicknamed “Vonnie” (Kristen Stewart) who is unfortunately already attached. To whom, she won’t say.

Once you get past the double-take oddness of Kristen Stewart’s modernity accessorized with a dainty bow in her hair — she makes no effort to play “period” — she’s compellingly ambiguous in both her romantic feelings and the depth of her character.

In the second half of the picture we return to New York City where the heartbroken Bobby joins his gangster brother (Corey Stoll, underused but fun) in the nightclub business. Soon everyone in high society knows Bobby’s name.

Enter another lovely Veronica (Blake Lively) to steal his heart. It’s not a spoiler to reveal that the original Vonnie, still otherwise attached, reenters the picture because it’s not a Woody Allen movie without multiple adults self-sabotaging their relationships!

Like many of the infamous director’s pictures, Café Society often plays out more like a novelistic stage comedy or radio serial than a standard movie since the narrator (Woody himself) fills in all the backstory, character profiles, and gaps between proper scenes as the plot zooms through several years.

This picture evolves into a wistful romantic dramedy that’s caught between the coasts – its soul and family are in New York City but its eyes and body are perpetually seduced by Hollywood glamour. To that end, praise is in order for Woody’s long time production designer Santo Loquasto (Oscar nominated for Zelig, Bullets Over Broadway and Radio Days) for parading the wealth of the characters around in their environments and the legendary cinematographer Vittorio Storaro (a three time Oscar winner for the classics Reds, Apocalypse Now, and The Last Emperor) who grants the movie considerable warmth and a soft lushness.

Blake Lively and Kristen Stewart, the two Veronicas, really ought to build shrines to Storaro because they’ve never looked more beautiful onscreen.

Café Society, in the grand scheme of the director’s long filmography, is overly familiar and insubstantial; it won’t convert any new fans. While the movie’s individual parts (adulterous romance, gangster business, Old Hollywood, Jewish family comedy) are all fairly compelling, they aren’t truly in conversation so its unclear what any of them really have to do with each other beyond catering to their creator’s whims.

Still, taken on its own, it’s a perfectly pleasant if featherweight dramedy with one eye on Old Hollywood (masturbatory name-dropping galore for movie buffs) and the other one on neurotic Jewish families. The scenes with Bobby’s siblings (Stoll, and the very funny duo of Sari Lennick & Stephen Sunken) and ever-bickering parents (Jeannie Berlin & Ken Stott, both terrific) are easily the film’s funniest and most endearing.

Between its bicoastal identities, though, whatever lingering effect the movie conjures comes from the melancholy of its lost romance and those dreamy looks in Bobby and Vonnie’s eyes when they think of the other.

The Cannes Film Festival runs through May 22nd. Director George Miller (Mad Max Fury Road) presides over the competition jury. Café Society premiered Out of Competition.

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Here is the Obama Administration’s Sweeping Transgender Guidance for Schools: READ IT

Last night we reported that the Obama administration was set to issue direction calling on all U.S. school districts to allow transgender students to use the bathrooms they choose.

This morning, the Department of Justice and the Department of Education released that guidance, explaining how Title IX applies to a wide variety of sex segregated activities and facilities including restrooms, locker rooms, athletics, single-sex classes, single-sex schools, social fraternities and sororities, and housing and overnight accommodations, and you can read it below.

Write Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education Catherine E. Lhamon and Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General and head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division Vanita Gupta in a post introducing the guidance:

The Departments’ guidance identifies the key requirements that schools need to keep in mind to comply with Title IX and other federal laws. The companion document offers real-life examples of how schools are making sure transgender and all students have a safe and respectful learning environment. Both documents show that protecting transgender students’ right to be who they are does not harm other students; instead, they show that equality for transgender students is not only required by law but achievable through common-sense approaches that foster safety and a positive learning environment for all students.

The documents address common questions – like how to handle educational records of transgender students and how to address harassment of transgender students. They also highlight sensible ways that schools around the country have been able to address concerns from other students and parents without infringing upon transgender students’ civil rights. The guidance does not require any student to use shared bathrooms or changing spaces, when, for example, there are other appropriate options available; and schools can also take steps to increase privacy within shared facilities.  And it reiterates that Title IX does not prohibit medically- and scientifically-sound requirements to ensure physical safety and competitive fairness in school sports.

Taken together, we hope these new resources assist everyone – from state and local leaders to educators to students and families – about how to create a safe, welcoming, and supportive learning environment for every student.

Also included in the documentation are a set of suggestions or ’emerging practices’ used by schools around the country. The doc explains:

The examples in that document are taken from policies that school districts, state education agencies, and high school athletics associations around the country have adopted to help ensure that transgender students enjoy a supportive and nondiscriminatory school environment. Schools are encouraged to consult that document for practical ways to meet Title IX’s requirements.

Read the document:

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