By Tom Temprano
Last night’s Sacramento Realness fundraiser for David Campos at El Rio made for the mixing of two of my favorite communities of San Franciscans: drag queens and politicos. Dealing with either is like herding cats, so throwing an event that successfully combined the two made me feel like one of the brave herdsman in my all-time favorite Super Bowl commercial.
Fortunately, this party was as fun, stress-free and successful as any political fundraiser can be. Only in San Francisco will a candidate for elected office share the stage with drag queens like Raya Light, who during her number lit candles that were melted onto her head and Vivvyanne ForeverMORE! who led the party’s 100+ attendees in a sing along of Wind Beneath My Wings with a 5 o’clock shadow deliberately poking through her makeup.
The event, its large attendance, and the numbers performed by the queens, most of which referenced the feeling of being forced out of the city, couldn’t have better captured the sense of worry amongst San Francisco’s queer community.
Heklina, my co-hostess and usually not one for heartfelt sincerity, summed it up best when she recalled reading Tales of The City and coming to San Francisco to be a part of a storied queer legacy. She then called upon the room to make sure that future generations of young queer people had the same opportunity.
You know that things are getting dire when Heklina is getting political and eliciting tears instead of eye rolls.
The Giant’s season is in full swing and given our win one, lose one record over the past half a decade, I’m officially predicting another World Series victory for us in 2014. Unfortunately, there are already a few losers early in the season at AT&T park, and I’m not talking about Timmy’s awkwardly pubescent mustache.
I headed down to China Basin for the Giant’s home opener this Tuesday but skipped the bleachers and stood out front instead with picketing members of Unite Here! Local 2, which represents 750 concession workers who haven’t seen a raise since Brian Wilson had a baby face. Well, maybe not THAT long, but since the concession workers’ contract expired in March 2010 — and their wages have been frozen as the Giant’s have stacked up trophies and thrown millions of dollars at as many players as they could find.
Though a one-day strike last year didn’t force concessions from Centerplate, the Giants vending subcontractor, this picket showed signs that the union was on the verge of winning the fans over to their side. Literally signs – ones that read “NO JUSTICE, NO GARLIC FRIES” which is inarguably the best picket slogan ever and hits fans where it hurts the most: their hungry stomachs.
At the picket I saw Tony Kelly, who has the omnipresence of a guy who is taking his run for District 10 Supervisor seriously, and had a chance to chat about his campaign. He told me he had a great time at the Gayview Night Out organized by the lovely Tyra Fennell a couple weekends ago at the Speakey Brewery. Folks keep telling me about the growing LGBT community in Bayview and I’m happy to hear that people who are running for office in the neighborhood are getting to know this constituency.
MOVIE TIME: After several aborted date-night attempts at seeing American Hustle, my boyfriend and I managed to catch it this past Sunday On Demand. Given that my boyfriend slept through half of it, and I spent a good portion scrolling through Instagram on my phone I can’t say that it lived up to all of its hype. The performances by the four main actors, Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Jennifer Lawrence, and Bradley Cooper, were admittedly fantastic and worthy of their across- the-board Oscar nominations, but the story lulled too often where I wish it had soared.
That said, I thought that Jeremy Renner’s portrayal of Mayor Carmine Politio, which seemed to fly under the awards radar, was the strongest of the bunch. His portrayal of a good-hearted and hard working public servant who did what he thought he had to do to help his constituents plucked at my heart strings and made me really uncomfortable at the same time.
TOM’S TOP TWO THINGS TO DO THIS WEEKEND
1) AtmosQueer’s Spring Fling. Saturday from 1-5pm at the LGBT Center.
This great LGBT community meet up will give folks a chance to learn about a bevy queer resources as they mix and mingle to the sounds of DJs with food and drink in hand. The Harvey Milk Club will be there which means that I will be there telling you all the reasons you need to join up and become a member and who wouldn’t want a hard sell from me on a Saturday afternoon?
2) SF Underground Short Film Festival. Saturday, all day at The Victoria Theatre.
San Francisco’s undisputed queen of cinema, Peaches Christ, will be bringing you a program of her favorite shorts in this day-long filmfest. If the feature length selections she brings to the Castro are any indication there will be lots of camp, dark humor and witty banter on screen.
