Can you explain it, please? (Bay Area Reporter-Giselle 1980)

[Meliss]

Bay Area Reporter, Volume 10, Number 7, 27 March 1980

Publication date 1980-03-27

Publisher Benro Enterprises, Inc

"A touch of camp came from Ruth Mayer as Giselle’s mother. Ms. Mayer’s pantomime provided a wonderful impression of Charles Pierce as Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Lovett. But she was no match for Lucia Chase, whose performance as the Queen Mother in SWAN LAKE has finally outdistanced Ruth Gordon. Chase’s frantic gesticulations as she tried to convince Alexander Godunov to get married evoked laughter from the audience. It was more ironic in light of Godunov’s quickie divorce at Kennedy Airport and his subsequent appearances in certain dance bars in Los Angeles and San Francisco".

What kind of bars are meant and what was Godunov doing there? And what does this have to do with the performance?

[Helene]

I assume it was asking whether Godunov was actually gay.  
Of course, the quickie divorce snarky comment is false. 

As for why he was at the dance clubs, like many other people, gay or straight or somewhere in between or identifying in any other way, we’ll never know without someone speaking to it. It wasn’t remotely unusual.

[volcanohunter]

I immediately remembered a very snarky review by Alastair Macaulay from 2007.

"Not much better is Georgina Parkinson’s snobbish, flamboyant, arch Queen Mother. (She seems to be saying to her son, “But dahling, if you don’t marry one of these dreary girls, all these frightful yobs will think you’re gay.”)

[NYT, 27 June 2007]

[Meliss]

18 hours ago, Helene said:

I assume it was asking whether Godunov was actually gay.  
Of course, the quickie divorce snarky comment is false. 

As for why he was at the dance clubs, like many other people, gay or straight or somewhere in between or identifying in any other way, we’ll never know without someone speaking to it. It wasn’t remotely unusual.

Oh. Thank you. So that's what the dance bars were about.

[Meliss]

14 hours ago, volcanohunter said:

I immediately remembered a very snarky review by Alastair Macaulay from 2007.

"Not much better is Georgina Parkinson’s snobbish, flamboyant, arch Queen Mother. (She seems to be saying to her son, “But dahling, if you don’t marry one of these dreary girls, all these frightful yobs will think you’re gay.”)

[NYT, 27 June 2007]

Thank you. It already looks like a traditional joke accompanying this scene from Swan Lake).

[volcanohunter]

San Francisco has long been the "gay capital" of the United States, and the Bay Area Reporter is a specifically gay newspaper, so it's entirely possible that the reviewer was winking at readers about the sort of clubs Godunov had, apparently, visited.

[Meliss]

22 hours ago, volcanohunter said:

San Francisco has long been the "gay capital" of the United States, and the Bay Area Reporter is a specifically gay newspaper, so it's entirely possible that the reviewer was winking at readers about the sort of clubs Godunov had, apparently, visited.

Godunov, unlike some others, was one hundred percent straight. But the joke about the Queen Mother convincing the prince to get married is really funny.

[volcanohunter]

That doesn't mean that Godunov couldn't have visited gay bars or nightclubs that were popular among gay men, because he was invited or curious or came with a group of people. It's entirely possible that the reviewer from the Bay Area Reporter was well versed in gay night spots in both San Francisco and Los Angeles. In any case, I don't think Godunov sued the newspaper for defamation.

[Meliss]

1 minute ago, volcanohunter said:

That doesn't mean that Godunov couldn't have visited gay bars or nightclubs that were popular among gay men

Godunov generally treated gays normally (at least as long as they did not express special attention towards him). There were a lot of gays in the ABT.