learning the lingo
by
Douglas Messerli
Jesse Archer and Sean Hanley (writers and directors) Half-Share / 2011 [29 min.]
The popular short from 2011 Half-Share was evidently made as a pilot for what appears to have been an unsold TV series, and it looks like it. Although the short uses the gay lingo of Fire Island queers, it doesn’t feature any sexual scenes except for the hero of the film, Mac (Kyle Spidle) sleeping in the same bed with his shared-room partner, Lex (Jesse Archer, the co-writer of this work), who assures Mac that they have not yet become “friends” (meaning in Fire Island speak, that they have not yet had sex). “But there’s a whole summer ahead.”
In a sense, this work is a kind of repeat
of Andy Warhol’s My Hustler (without a handsome hustler laying upon
the beach), Stan LaPresto’s Sticks and Stones without the pretentious
hangers-on or the hippie-like leftovers circling the cadavers of the dead drunk
or stoned-out natives, along with a jigger or two of Boys in the Band without
the mean-spirited Michael to turn every party into a sour evening of
self-detestation.
The always hilarious comedian-actor Alec
Mapa plays the “house mother” Ito, who cooks up gourmet dinners each evening
that are seldom eaten by a “family” who, too often, have already filled up on hors
d'oeuvres (translate as cocaine).
Even on the boat over the Oregon dressed
and bearded Mac regrets his decision to get over his breakup by spending a few
weekends with gay friends, having evidently known Ito years before. In a call
to his mother he claims his choice to spend time on Fire Island to be one of
the biggest mistakes of his life “Everyone is so happy and giddy. I’m feel like
I’m gonna be invaded by the bodysnatchers.” On encountering his new housemates,
Mac is so self-righteous and critical of everyone that they almost are tempted
to vote him off the island. But promises his emotional fragile friend that he’ll
see be just fine. “Misery loves sodomy.”
And on his very first night he lucks out,
or perhaps is truly invaded by a bodysnatcher, after at an afternoon tea he
makes a date with Wee (Marcus Shane), an Asian man with—unexpectedly so the
racist one-liner that dominates this short work chortles—endowed with the
largest cock on Fire. Whether he prefers to give or receive anal sex, that
night is a pain in the ass for Mac that arouses envy from several of his new housemates.
Mac grows fond of his queer (everyday
speak for “odd”) new friends and throws the gift of an expensive watch his
lover once gave him but now wants back, into the ocean. The past is halted and
life with his magical time with the lost boys of Fire Island has apparently
just begun.
I too might not have chosen to invest in
this slight if somewhat charming tale trying too hard (author’s pun) to turn itself
into a sit-com. When you don’t speak the lingo of such gay stereotypes it’s simply
tempting to describe their happy and giddy saga as a turn off, despite the
well-endowed Wee and the perfectly sculpted body of Lex.
Los Angeles, November 8, 2020
Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog and World Cinema Review (November 2020).
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