Michael Urie; the Boy-Next-Door Crush

The concept of the Boy Next Door is an archaic notion that goes back to the days of Judy Garland, Mystery Date board game and Archie Andrews from the comics. It implies wholesomeness and charm without pushing the "sexy" quotient too far. He would be the vanilla date who doesn't over step. The one you could bring home to meet the parents. But then also, the one most likely to be your buddy and friend instead of the one to sneak off into the backseat with.

 

Michael Urie would be That Guy for me. Not oozing the sexuality of a Jake Gyllenhaal or the leading man image of a Chris Evans. But I defy anyone to deny that he is aging like a fine wine and comes up aces in everything he sets out to conquer.

I was first amused by him in Ugly Betty as the eccentric Marc St. James. He had incredible chemistry with Vanessa Williams and Becki Newton. He was witty, had an impeccable fashion sense and spitfire comic timing. I am 20 years older than him, but I assume he became somewhat of a role model for young teens that were itching to see where they registered in terms of their sexuality.

I became aware that he was next seen on Broadway in the revival of How To Succeed In Business in a supporting role. I thought maybe it was "star" turn until I realized the stage was where he had really planted his roots. Being a Julliard grad gives him strong pedigree. He succeeds in any genre he takes on. He was riveting in both the revival of Torch Song Trilogy as well as the title role in Hamlet with the Shakespeare Theater Co. I was gobsmacked watching his backstage antics where he recited Hamlet dressing room speeches in costume & character as Arnold from Torch Song. A maniacal mash-up. During the pandemic, I was also astounding when he recreated his role in Buyer and Cellar, a one man show about tending to Barbra Streisand's menagerie of collectables. He dazzled in a live stream filmed entirely in his own studio apartment. Filmed exclusively by his amazing partner Ryan, it was a highlight of that very dark time.

He continues to push boundaries on stage in new works and also demands change in our social norms of what is "normal" for an openly gay male. Single All the Way on Netflix may not have been groundbreaking material. But it was a sincere story that was authentically told. Watching it a second time this holiday season a year later, I was still as smitten with him.

 

These are all his accolades as a performer. But back to that Boy Next Door quality he possesses... Rather than vanilla, he comes full scale in all the colors of the rainbow. He is genuine, articulate, has great humor and boundless enthusiasm. I admire so much how he and his partner Ryan Spahn celebrate each other's work, collaborate together, and then at other times are just present for the other. Today Ryan had a post with pics of them "eventing." That is a true relationship. I am constantly amazed that the two of them almost always respond to a comment I have made on their social media. It shows that they both listen and are hardly swept up in the paparazzi of the great work they both continue to do. Michael speaks with wisdom and candor. And as for that "sexy"? This fabulous feature in this month's Photobook checks that box off the list as well. Still an impeccable fashion sense. Photos by Ben Cope.

 

Trans History Repeating Itself

Every once in a while I use this blog to dig into deeper issues than gardening, the arts or simple opinion pieces. Right now there is so much currency in cancel culture. The divides are getting vast, to the point that they are now impacting lives that had at one point been safe. The push and pull in our cultures seems to be ebbing much more into the past. This particular article really struck me in that we are not going back years or decades. Instead, this is exactly where we were as a civilization a century ago. These same stories were wiped away and erased. This makes us not only ignorant, but an absolutely cruel species.

 Magnus Hirschfeld was a doctor in Germany at the turn of last century. He was at an age watching the onset of Facism and the Holocaust in his country. He was also gay. He was pioneering the field of sexual identity before the 1920s and was documenting the concept of gender fluidity and noted that some people found themselves somewhere in the middle. He was aware of bisexuality, transgender and non binary as being "in accordance with their nature" for these patients. It was not sick or abnormal to him. These terms we are now struggling with, were the same terms he dignified back then.

 In 1919 he purchased a villa in Berlin and opened his Institute for Sexual Research. Its stated purpose was to be a place of "research, teaching, healing and refuge" that could "free the individual from physical ailments, psychological afflictions and social deprivation." It provided sex education and clinics on contraception. This is decades before our Planned Parenthood clinics. It became a safe haven for transvestites and female activists. By 1930 he was performing the world's first gender -affirmation surgeries. While groundbreaking in the medical sense, it still faced persecution from any sort of legal rights. This should sound very familiar to us 100 years later.

With the rise of the Nazi party by 1932, by 1933 Hitler was in power. Thus began the extermination of anything deemed unworthy of living or assimilation. Sadly, Hirschfeld's Institute was destroyed on May 6, 1933. He was out of the country by then. But sadly, his bust and a library of 20,000 books and journals were torched in the street in a huge bonfire. The loss was catastrophic.

But what makes it even more painful, Erwin Gohrbandt, who was Hirschfeld's colleague and premiere surgeon chose to stay with the Reich and later utilized those same skills on prison camp patients with operations of mutilation. Despite surviving, Hirschfeld and his partner Giese both soon died in Paris. Magnus of a stroke in 1935 and Giese by suicide soon after. His work has been given some nods in pop culture on the show Transparent and the film The Danish Girl who was an actual patient of his - but he is never credited for his work in the novel or the film. His legacy has effectively been erased.

So here we stand 100 years later. The same ugly fears and arguments rear their heads again. This should be science supported by history and data. And yet we fling proverbs and moral judgements of righteousness to bar progress from being made. Both in our families and in our medical communities. This is a human travesty and this history needs to be not only revisited, but broadcast. Please read this entire article which is amazingly documented from what ashes remain.

The Forgotten History of the World's 1st Trans Clinic