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 04 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
Top 10 local stories of the year
A year that started on a down
note for most with the inauguration
of President Trump ended with a
stunning political upset in Virginia that
lifted the spirits of LGBT advocates
nationwide. Here, a look back at the
biggest local stories of 2017.
Sen. RICH MADALENO announced in July his
bid for governor.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
10. MADALENO RUNNING
FOR MD. GOVERNOR
Maryland State Sen. Rich Madaleno
(D-Montgomery County), who
became the first openly gay member
of the Maryland General Assembly in
2002, announced his candidacy for
governor in July.
  Madaleno, 52, is among the
lawmakers and advocates who played
a lead role in to secure passage of
Maryland’s same-sex marriage bill
in 2012 under then-Gov. Martin
O’Malley. In addition to his outspoken
support for LGBT rights Madaleno is
known in Annapolis among political
insiders as a highly knowledgeable
lawmaker on a wide range of other
issues, including financial matters.
  Others competing with Madaleno
for the Democratic gubernatorial
nomination next year are Prince George’s
County Executive Rushern Baker, former
NAACP President Ben Jealous, and
former State Department official Alec
Ross. If he were to win the nomination
he would be running against incumbent
Republican Gov. Larry Hogan.
 “I will never back down on civil rights,
on LGBTQ rights, on workers’ rights,
on women’s rights, on voting rights,”
Madaleno said in his announcement
speech. “Our rights cannot and will
not be sacrificed with Rich Madaleno
as governor,” he said.
9. ANTI-LGBT GROUPS CHALLENGE
TRANS POLICY IN FREDERICK
 A 17-year-old transgender student
in Frederick County, Md., filed a motion
in federal court on Oct. 20 to defend
the county school board against
a lawsuit seeking to overturn the
board’s sweeping policy of protecting
trans students from discrimination
and harassment at school.
  James van Kuilenburg, an honor
student at Governor Thomas Johnson
High School in Frederick, filed his
motion to intervene in the case as a
defendant with the aim of presenting
a separate legal argument for why
the lawsuit lacks merit and should be
dismissed by the U.S. District Court
of Maryland, according to a team of
attorneys representing him.
 The Frederick School Board adopted
its transgender nondiscrimination
policy in June with widespread
support from the community,
according to LGBT activists.
  With legal representation from an
attorney known to be aligned with
anti-LGBT groups, a cisgender female
student and her mother anonymously
filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn
the policy on grounds that it violates
students’ privacy rights.
Martha Pfeiffer was forced to resign from her job
in Delaware.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY LOU CHIBBARO JR.
8. FORCED RESIGNATION OF
PRO-LGBT DEL. TEACHER
PROMPTS COMMUNITY
response     The verdict shocked friends and
 The forced resignation of a popular
LGBT supportive teacher and theater
director at Cape Henlopen High
School in Lewes, Del., prompted
LO CA L N EW S
community meetings and the creation
of a school district sponsored
committee to look into reports of anti-
LGBT bullying and harassment.
  Several students and parents who
know now former teacher Martha
Pfeiffer said they believe school
district officials forced her to resign
because of her outspoken support for
LGBT students in her role as faculty
adviser for Cape Henlopen High’s
Gay-Straight Alliance club.
 Reports of bullying and complaints
by LGBT students that school officials
were ignoring their appeals for help
surfaced at a June 19 community
forum in Rehoboth Beach organized
by the LGBT community center CAMP
Rehoboth.
  Schools Superintendent Robert
Fulton told the Blade he created the
Cape Henlopen LGBTQ Outreach
Committee following media reports
of concerns expressed by students
at Cape Henlopen High that school
officials were not adequately
addressing longstanding concerns of
anti-LGBT bullying at the school.
Tyonne Johns was stabbed to death; her
accused killer was found not guilty.
7. VA. MAN FOUND NOT GUILTY IN
KILLING OF LESBIAN CHEF
  A Fairfax Circuit Court jury on
Oct. 4 found a former county parks
employee not guilty in the August
2016 stabbing death of lesbian chef
and caterer Tyonne Johns during an
altercation at a wedding reception in
a park that Johns catered.
co-workers of Johns, who disputed
claims by defendant Kempton A.
Bonds, 20, who testified that he
stabbed Johns in self-defense after
she attempted to strangle him in an
altercation that started over a dispute
about who owned folding chairs used
at the reception.
 Bonds had been charged by Fairfax
County, Va., police with second-
degree murder at the time of the
incident. The not-guilty verdict came
three months after a mistrial was
declared in July at the conclusion of
an earlier trial when the jury became
deadlocked and could not reach a
verdict for Bonds.
 
JIM GRAHAM died June 11.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
6. JIM GRAHAM DIES AT 71
Jim Graham, a gay attorney who
won election to four terms on the D.C.
City Council after serving for 15 years
as executive director of the Whitman-
Walker Clinic during the height of the
AIDS epidemic, died June 11 from
complications associated with an
intestinal infection. He was 71.
  During a ceremony in which
Graham’s coffin lay in state in the John
A. Wilson Building, which serves as
D.C.’s City Hall, Mayor Muriel Bowser,
City Council Chair Phil Mendelson,
and others who knew and worked
for him spoke of what they called
Graham’s dedication and outspoken
advocacy for city residents who often
were overlooked and in need of city
services.
 In a gesture considered appropriate
by those who knew Graham and
his trademark fashion statement
of always wearing a bowtie when
dressed for work, his former Council
staff members arranged for a rainbow
flag shaped into a giant bowtie to be
draped over the coffin.
  “As we were thinking about all
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 0 5

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 06 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
of the cultures that Jim touched, of
course the primary one was the gay
community because that’s where he
came from,” said Calvin Woodland
Jr., who served as chief of staff for
Graham’s Council office.
 
5. REPORT SHOWS HATE CRIMES
ROSE 59 PERCENT
  The number of anti-LGBT hate
crimes in the District of Columbia
increased in 2016 by 59 percent,
from 37 cases reported in 2015 to 59
cases reported in 2016, according
to the city’s annual bias-crime report
released in March.
 The report showed that hate crimes
targeting people based on their
“gender identity/expression” and
“sexual orientation” came in third and
fourth place in the percentage increase
among the categories of hate crimes,
behind “ethnicity/national origin” and
“religion” related hate crimes. But the
report said anti-trans and anti-LGB hate
crimes continued their multi-year trend
of comprising the largest number of
hate crime cases.
 The number of reported anti-trans
hate crimes increased by 90 percent,
from 10 in 2015 to 19 in 2016. The
number of anti-LGB hate crimes rose
by 48 percent, from 27 in 2015 to 40
in 2016, the report shows.
 At a news conference at which the
report was released, Mayor Muriel
Bowser and then acting Police Chief
Peter Newsham reiterated the city’s
commitment to combat hate crimes
targeting all population groups.
4. TRUMP APPOINTS
LGBT-SUPPORTIVE U.S.
ATTORNEY FOR D.C.
Jessie K. Liu, who President Trump
appointed as U.S. Attorney for the
District of Columbia, told a community
meeting in October that she is
committed to aggressively prosecuting
all forms of hate crimes, including
those targeting LGBT people.
  Her office organized the meeting
in partnership with D.C. government
officials and members of community
groups, including the D.C. LGBT
Center’s Anti-Violence Project.
 “I want to thank our community and
government partners, the D.C. Anti-
Violence Project…and the Mayor’s
Office of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
Transgender, and Questioning Affairs,
who helped our office plan this event
tonight,” she said.
 “As a woman of color myself I feel
Pride protest, Gay Games disappointment and Danica wins
BY LOU CHIBBARO JR.
LCHIBBARO@WASHBLADE.COM
very emotionally strongly that we can’t
tolerate anyone in our community
being targeted because of race
or religion or sexual orientation or
gender or gender identity or any of
the protected classes,” she said in
referring to groups protected under
the D.C. hate crimes law.
A crowd of supporters joined MAYOR BOWSER
at a rally in support of D.C.’s Gay Games bid
earlier this year.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
3. D.C. LOSES BID TO
HOST 2022 GAY GAMES
The Federation of Gay Games in
October announced it had selected
Hong Kong over D.C. and Guadalajara,
Mexico, to host the 2022 Gay Games,
the quadrennial international LGBT
sports event that is expected to
attract as many as 15,000 athletes
and thousands more spectators to the
host city.
  The announcement came days
after Mayor Muriel Bowser headed
a 32-member D.C. delegation that
traveled to Paris to make the city’s
final presentation on why it should be
selected as the host city for the Games.
Earlier in the year the FGG selected
D.C., Hong Kong, and Guadalajara as
the three finalists among more than a
dozen cities that submitted bids for
becoming the host city.  corporate sponsors of the parade
Some speculated that the FGG’s
selection committee, which included
Europeans, may have passed over D.C.
because of hostility toward President
Trump. FGG officials insisted the
selection was based strictly on its findings
following detailed site visits of which city
could best host the Games and advance
the FGG’s objectives of advancing LGBT
equality in sports and society.
LO CA L N EW S
No Justice No Pride protesters block the Pride
parade in June.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
2. Protesters disruPt
CAPITAL PRIDE PARADE
Ten protesters from the local group
No Justice No Pride stood in the street
and locked arms to block the path of
D.C.’s Capital Pride Parade on June
10 on P Street, N.W., to voice what
the group said was its objections
to participation by D.C. police and
certain corporate sponsors in the
annual Pride events.
  D.C. police, including Police Chief
Peter Newsham, were present on the
street when the disruption occurred.
As angry parade participants shouted
at the protesters to leave the street
police rerouted the parade. Capital
Pride organizers said the disruption
delayed the completion of the parade
by about 90 minutes.
  No Justice No Pride members
said the decision to block the parade
came after Capital Pride leaders,
following a community meeting in
which No Justice No Pride voiced
its concerns, declined to agree to
the dissident group’s demands that
police, including the department’s
LGBT Liaison Unit, be banned from
the parade. Protesters also wanted
Capital Pride to drop its ties to several
and Pride festival set to take place
the following day on grounds that the
corporations had policies harmful to
Native Americans and people of color
despite their support for LGBT rights.
  Capital Pride leaders promised to
reassess their corporate sponsorship
policies but said it was too late in the
organizing to make any changes for
the 2017 events. The protest triggered
heated debate and disagreements
among some in the LGBT community
about how Capital Pride should
operate each year.
DANICA ROEM stunned homophobe Bob
Marshall in November.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
1. DANICA ROEM UNSEATS BOB
Marshall in Va. house race 
Transgender rights advocate and
former journalist Danica Roem made
history on Nov. 7 when she won
election to a seat in the Virginia House
of delegates, becoming the first
transgender person in the country set
to be seated in a state legislature.
  Roem, a Democrat, drew both
nationwide and international
attention, in part, by defeating Bob
Marshall, a Republican who held the
seat in the House of Delegate’s 13th
District in Northern Virginia’s outer
suburbs of Washington, D.C. since
1992 and who was known as the
state legislature’s most outspoken
opponent of LGBT rights.
 Political observers said Roem ran a
highly effective and strategic campaign
that stressed local infrastructure
issues. Her well researched proposals
for alleviating traffic congestion and
traffic backups along a route in her
district that impacted large numbers
of residents as they commuted to and
from work every day resonated with
voters, observers said.
Despite Marshall and his supporters’
attempts to portray Roem as a militant
activist promoting a transgender
“agenda” over the needs of the
district, Roem beat Marshall by a 54-
45 percent margin.
 
 
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 0 7

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 08 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
Top 10 national news stories of 2017
From Trump’s attacks to sexual misconduct scandals, a look back
As many predicted, 2017 brought
an end to the progressive Obama
era and the beginning of an assault
on LGBTQ rights from the new Trump
administration. Below is a ranking of
the 10 biggest LGBTQ stories of the
year as determined by Blade staff.
10. THE PUSH FOR ‘RELIGIOUS
FREEDOM’ BILLS
Although anti-LGBT forces sought
to pass an anti-trans bathroom bill in
Texas, the measure was defeated in
the state legislature following outcry
from the business community and
LGBT advocates.
The measure, which would have
barred transgender people from
using bathrooms in public schools,
government buildings and public
universities based on their gender
identity, seemed dead when it failed
to pass during the general session,
but Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called
a special session exclusively for the
purpose of passing the bill.
Major businesses — including IBM,
which has a large presence in Texas —
opposed the legislation. Although the
Senate approved the legislation, the
House didn’t follow suit and the bill
finally died.
Although the bathroom bill was
defeated, the legislature passed and
Abbott signed into law an anti-LGBT
“religious freedom” measure allowing
taxpayer-funded adoption agencies
in Texas to refuse placements to LGBT
homes. South Dakota and Alabama
enacted similar laws this year.
9. SEXUAL MISCONDUCT
SCANDALS ENSNARE
SPACEY, TAKEI
The tidal wave of allegations of
sexual misconduct this year that
brought down numerous public
figures beginning with Hollywood
mogul Harvey Weinstein also affected
gay men in media.
“Star Trek” actor Anthony Rapp
accused Kevin Spacey of sexually
assaulting him in 1986, when Rapp was
14. The “House of Cards” star issued a
statement saying he didn’t recall the
incident and was coming out as gay.
That didn’t stop outcry against him
and 15 more accusers from coming
BY CHRIS JOHNSON
cjohnson@washblade.com
Actor KEVIN SPACEY drew widespread
condemnation after coming out as gay in the
wake of sexual assault allegations against him.
PHOTO BY VONORA;COURTESY BIGSTOCK
forward, which essentially ended
Spacey’s career. Netflix fired Spacey, his
Gore Vidal biopic was cancelled and he
was cut from scenes in the Ridley Scott
film “All the Money in the World.”
Also accused of sexual misconduct
was George Takei. A former model
said the “Star Trek” actor groped him in
1981. Takei denied the allegation
and was able to weather it after no
subsequent allegations emerged.
8. EDITH WINDSOR DIES
Four years after her historic victory
at the U.S. Supreme Court against
the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act,
Edith Windsor died this year at age 88.
Dubbed the “mother of marriage
equality,” Windsor sued the U.S.
government because under DOMA
she was required to pay $363,000
in estate taxes after the death of
her spouse, Thea Speyer. In 2013,
Windsor’s lawsuit led the Supreme
Court to strike down the law in a
decision that was a precursor to the
2015 ruling guaranteeing marriage
equality nationwide.
After the decision, Windsor
continued her activism, serving as
grand marshal for Capital Pride
in 2016. Windsor supported the
Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton
in the 2016 election.
At her memorial service at Temple
Emanu-el in New York City, Clinton
made a surprise appearance and
honored Windsor as someone who
N AT I O N A L N EW S
Residents of La Perla, an oceanfront
neighborhood in San Juan, that suffered
extensive damage during Hurricane Maria, have
erected handwritten signs asking for water and
other basic supplies.
“helped change hearts and minds,
including mine.”
7. HURRICANE MARIA
DEVASTATES PUERTO RICO
Amid a Trump administration
response widely seen as inadequate,
much of Puerto Rico this year was
devastated in the aftermath of Hurricane
Maria, including its LGBT residents and
an HIV/AIDS organization.
An estimated 70 percent of the
island was without power six weeks
after the storm, which claimed the
lives of nearly 500 people there. More
than 50,000 Puerto Rico residents
were displaced from their homes,
many of whom resorted to consuming
water from a contaminated site.
Also without power was the San
Juan-based organization Bill’s Kitchen,
which delivers meals to people with
HIV/AIDS. Food and Friends in D.C.
donated between $30,000-$35,000
to the organization to buy a generator
for the Puerto Rico organization.
San Juan Mayor Yulín Cruz, a
Democrat, called the situation a
“terrifying humanitarian crisis” and
called for the U.S. government to speed
up its response. That angered President
Trump, who tweeted Puerto Rico officials
“want everything to be done for them.”
6. ROY MOORE LOSES SENATE BID
In an answer to the prayers of
LGBT people, Democrat Doug Jones
defeated notorious homophobe Roy
ROY MOORE has a long anti-LGBT record.
PHOTO COURTESY TWITTER
Moore this year in a special election
for a U.S. Senate seat.
Moore was defeated after nine
women accused him sexual misconduct.
Six said he inappropriately dated them
decades ago when they were teenagers
and he was in his 30s. Three others
accused him of sexual assault.
Over the course of his long career,
Moore established an anti-LGBT
record. Moore urged Alabama
probate judges to refuse to marry
same-sex couples after the 2015
Supreme Court ruling for marriage
equality, which resulted in him being
removed as Chief Justice of the
Alabama Supreme Court.
Jones, however, was endorsed by the
Human Rights Campaign and supports
LGBT rights. He said on video President
Trump was wrong to have rescinded Title
IX guidance protecting transgender
students to ban transgender people
from the U.S. military.
5. VEGAS REPLACES ORLANDO AS
DEADLIEST SHOOTING
A deadly attack at a country music
show in Las Vegas this year surpassed
the massacre at a gay nightclub in
Orlando, Fla., as the worst mass
shooting in modern U.S. history.
The shooter, Stephen Paddock, killed
59 people by converting an assault
rifle into an automatic weapon and
CONTINUES ON PAGE 10
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 0 9
 10 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 N AT I O N A L N EW S

Top 10 national news stories of 2017

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 08
firing upon concert-goers from a room
in Mandalay Bay hotel. An additional
546 individuals were wounded.
The motive for Paddock, who killed
himself as law enforcement officials
entered his room, remains unknown.
Among the victims was a Utah
gay couple: Cameron Robinson and
Robert Eardley. Robinson died after
being struck in the neck. Eardley was
wounded after being shot in the back.
The tragedy — and an additional
shooting this year at a church in
Sutherland Springs, Texas — did nothing
to influence Congress to advance gun
control legislation amid ongoing efforts
from activists like Gays Against Guns to
convince lawmakers to act.
Thousands protested the Trump administration
in June.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
4. NATIONAL EQUALITY MARCH
DRAWS THOUSANDS
Tens of thousands of protesters took
to the streets this year for the National
Equality March on Washington,
including many demonstrators who
waved Pride flags and carried signs in
opposition to President Trump.
An estimated 50,000-80,000
people demonstrated in the streets
of D.C. and marched in front of the
White House before emptying onto
the National Mall.
The Women’s March on Washington,
which drew between 440,000 to
500,000 people as well as 5 million
supporters worldwide, served as the
inspiration for the Equality March.
The idea came about after New York
gay activist David Bruinooge started a
Facebook page scheduling the march
for D.C. on June 11.
Although protesters were energized,
the media attention to the march was
scant in comparison to coverage of the
Women’s March. Some insiders said
the event was haphazardly organized
and saved at the last minute by
contributions from the Human Rights
Campaign and Planned Parenthood.
The Washington Blade also made a
financial contribution to the march.
3. SUPREME COURT HEARS
MASTERPIECE CAKESHOP CASE
In its first major consideration of
a gay rights case since the ruling for
marriage equality, the U.S. Supreme
Court this year heard arguments on
whether the First Amendment allows
a Colorado baker to deny making
wedding cakes to same-sex couples
despite a state non-discrimination law.
The Supreme Court agreed to take
up the Masterpiece Cakeshop case
after state courts determined Jack
Phillips violated the Colorado Anti-
Discrimination Act by refusing to make
wedding cakes for Charlie Craig and
David Mullins, who sought to purchase
a custom-made cake for their wedding
in 2012, but were denied service.
U.S. Associate Justice Anthony
Kennedy gave conflicting signals
during oral arguments. At times,
Kennedy expressed concern about
the dignity of the same-sex couple,
but Kennedy also expressed
consternation Colorado wasn’t
tolerant of Phillips’ religious beliefs.
Oral arguments yielded no clear
indication of how the court will rule. A
decision is expected in June.
2. TRANS CANDIDATES SCORE
HISTORIC WINS
Transgender candidates won a slew
of historic victories in local races this
year on Election Day, a milestone that
could lead to more wins in 2018.
The most prominent win belonged
to Danica Roem, a transgender
journalist in Virginia who unseated
notoriously anti-LGBT Del. Bob
Marshall. Roem was set to become
the first openly transgender person
elected and seated in a state
legislature in the United States.
Other transgender candidates
— Andrew Jenkins and Phillipe
Cunningham — claimed notable
victories in the election for the
Minneapolis City Council. Both were
the first transgender candidates elected
to a major U.S. city council and the first
transgender people of color elected in
any public office in the United States.
Meanwhile, Tyler Titus won election to
the Erie School Board in Pennsylvania,
Lisa Middleton won election to the
Palm Springs City Council and Stephe
Koontz won a spot on the Doraville City
Council in Georgia.
DONALD TRUMP took office this year and
almost immediately began attacking LGBT
rights.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
1. TRUMP TAKES OFFICE, BREAKS
PROMISE TO SUPPORT
LGBT AMERICANS
Although President Trump
campaigned in 2016 on being a friend
to LGBT people, his first year in office
was marked by an erosion of LGBT rights
after significant gains in recent years.
The infuriation within the LGBT
community over Trump’s hostility to
LGBT rights spanned the entirety of
2017 and stood in stark contrast to
progress during the Obama years.
The attacks helped fuel the “resist”
movement against him, making the
“Year of Trump” the Washington
Blade’s No. 1 story for 2017.
A ban on transgender people in the
military, withdrawal of Title IX guidance
assuring transgender students access
to the bathroom consistent with their
gender identity, arguments in litigation
LGBT people aren’t protected under
existing civil rights law and intervention
on behalf of an anti-gay baker before
the U.S. Supreme Court are a few
high-profile ways the administration
undermined LGBT rights in Trump’s
first year at the White House.
Rea Carey, executive director
of the National LGBTQ Task Force
said the first year of the Trump
administration has been “horrendous,
horrific and hellish when it comes to
this administration’s actions toward
LGBTQ people and our families.”
“He has turned back the clock on
decades of progress, or is attempting
to turn back the clock on decades of
progress that we have made not only
in our community, but also for people
in this country who are women, who
are black, who are immigrants, who are
Muslim, who are poor — and he has been
a disaster for democracy,” Carey said.
The first major rollback from the
Trump administration on LGBT rights
was the revocation in February of
Obama-era guidance that assured
transgender kids have access to
school restrooms consistent with
their gender identity. Bucking the
views of numerous courts, the
Trump administration asserted the
prohibition of sex discrimination
under Title IX of the Education
Amendments of 1972 doesn’t apply
to transgender discrimination.
As a result of the decision, the U.S.
Supreme Court nixed consideration
of transgender student Gavin Grimm’s
lawsuit against his Virginia high
school, which barred him from the
boys’ room. Grimm graduated without
relief, although his lawsuit remains
pending in lower federal courts.
The Education Department issued
a new memo asserting discrimination
and harassment against transgender
students in school may amount to
sex discrimination under federal
law, but the issue of bathrooms isn’t
necessarily covered Title IX.
A few months later in July, Trump
announced via Twitter transgender
people won’t be able to serve in the
U.S. military “in any capacity.” That
tweet and subsequent guidance to the
U.S. military reversed the Obama-era
change scrapping medical regulations
against their service and enabling
them to serve in the armed forces.
As a result of four separate lawsuits
and court orders against the ban, the
Pentagon was barred from enforcing
Trump’s policy, which meant the
administration was blocked from kicking
out troops for being transgender
or denying payment for gender
reassignment surgery. The U.S. armed
forces were also required to admit
qualified transgender enlistees starting
Jan. 1 consistent with a target date set
by Defense Secretary James Mattis in a
June 30 letter prior to Trump’s tweet.
CONTINUES ON PAGE 11
 NATIONAL NE WS DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 1 1
Top 10 national news stories of 2017
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10
The Trump administration went after
the other components of the LGBT
community after the U.S. Seventh Circuit
Court of Appeals ruled Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars sex
discrimination in the workplace, also
prohibits employment discrimination
on the basis of sexual orientation.
When the issue came before the
U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals,
the Justice Department voluntarily
filed a friend-of-the-court brief and
sent a high-ranking attorney to argue
existing civil rights law doesn’t protect
gay people from discrimination. That
move put the Justice Department at
odds with another U.S. agency, the
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission, which has determined
Title VII protects gay people.
Transgender people came next.
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions
in October issued a memo declaring
anti-trans discrimination also doesn’t
amount to sex discrimination under
existing law, reversing a memo from U.S.
Attorney General Eric Holder asserting
transgender people are covered.
That wasn’t the only the time
Sessions issued a memo endangering
LGBT rights. In the aftermath of
Trump’s “religious freedom” executive
order, Sessions issued a memo
asserting broad protections from
individuals and businesses under
the Religious Freedom Restoration
Act. Without limiting principle in the
document against discrimination, a
Social Security worker could refuse
to process applications for same-
sex spousal benefits, or an employer
could refuse to grant family and
medical leave to LGBT families.
The Justice Department also took the
side of “religious freedom” over LGBT
rights at the U.S. Supreme Court when
justices considered the Masterpiece
Cakeshop case. A Colorado baker
seeking a First Amendment right to
refuse to make wedding cakes for
same-sex couples brought the case.
The Trump administration sent to
argue on behalf of the baker U.S.
Solicitor General Noel Francisco, who
indicated during oral augments a
shopkeeper should be able to put up
a sign saying no wedding cakes for
same-sex couples — a belief the White
House said Trump shares.
The Supreme Court would likely not
have even taken up the Masterpiece
Cakeshop case if U.S. Associate
Justice Neil Gorsuch wasn’t confirmed
to the bench. Appointed by Trump in
January, Gorsuch was opposed by
major LGBT rights groups. Since his
confirmation, the Supreme Court took
up the Masterpiece Cakeshop case
and he has issued dissents arguing the
fight for marriage equality isn’t over
after the 2015 Obergefell decision.
Trump also ignored the LGBT
community in more symbolic ways, such
as neglecting to issue a proclamation
recognizing June as Pride month.
The Trump administration has been
found to have eliminated questions in
federal surveys allowing respondents
to identify as LGBT and reportedly
barred the Centers for Disease Control
from the using the word “transgender”
among other science-related words
from budget documents.  the board of the U.S. Export-Import
Additionally, the administration’s
budget request would have restricted
funding for civil rights enforcement
and cuts HIV/AIDS programs and
research by billions of dollars.
Carey said these items — especially
the “religious freedom” guidance,
which she said is “extraordinarily
damaging, and will have long-term
impacts for the country” — are among
the big-ticket items, but “there are
dozens and dozens of things that have
happened that aren’t in the news.”
“I’ve been working in Washington,
D.C., since 1989, and I have worked
with Democratic and Republican
administrations, I worked through Bush
1 and Bush 2,” Carey said. “And this is
nothing like those administrations. We
always have policy differences, but I
think the kind of haphazard and harmful
nature of so-called governing by this
administration is certainly something
that our community hasn’t seen.”
The actions against LGBT people,
Carey said, are consistent with the Trump
administration’s efforts targeting other
communities, such as the travel ban
on Muslim countries, the elimination
of deferred deportation for DREAMers
and the elimination of the contraception
requirement in health care.
Defenders of Trump on LGBT issues
will point to a statement issued earlier in
the year in which the White House said
Trump is “respectful and supportive
of LGBTQ rights” and would keep in
place a 2014 executive order signed
by President Obama barring federal
contractors from engaging in anti-
LGBT workplace discrimination.
Trump also made at least openly four
LGBT appointments, although they’re
few and far between compared to the
hundreds former President Obama
appointed to the administration at all
levels of government and the judiciary.  letter to the Russian Foreign Minister
The highest-profile openly gay Trump
appointee is Richard Grenell, a Fox News
commentator and foreign policy expert
who was nominated as U.S. ambassador
to Germany. Democrats are blocking
his confirmation over comments he
made about the appearance of women
on Twitter.  the basis of sexual orientation.
Other openly gay appointments are
James Abbott, who was confirmed
to the Federal Labor Relations
Authority; David Glawe, under
secretary for intelligence and analysis
at the Department of Homeland
Security; and Claudia Slacik, who was
nominated, but not yet confirmed, to
Bank. Trump also re-nominated lesbian
Democrat Chai Feldblum to the U.S.
Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission, which by law requires
appointments of both parties.
Gregory Angelo, president of
Log Cabin Republicans, noted his
organization withheld its endorsement
from Trump as a candidate in 2016, but
also pledged to call “a ball a ball, and a
strike a strike” if he became president.  “Trump’s foreign policy has been
“This administration has done things
that are worthy of praise like maintaining
the LGBT non-discrimination executive
order, like acknowledging the human
rights abuses of gay men in particular
in the refugee executive order that
was put out earlier this year and the
appointment of openly gay individuals,
several of whom are members of
Log Cabin, to prominent posts in his
administration,” Angelo said.
ButAngelo said his organization opposed
the Trump administration’s elimination of
transgender student guidance and the
transgender military ban.
Treatment of LGBT issues is
arguably different in certain U.S.
agencies, most notably the State
Department. Secretary of State Rex
Tillerson retained the position of U.S.
special envoy for international LGBT
rights, and although Randy Berry
left the role, the State Department is
expected to fill it. Tillerson also has
issued statements recognizing June
as Pride month and the Transgender
Day of Remembrance.
Although President Trump and the
White House have said nothing about
reports of anti-gay persecution and
concentration camps in the Russian
republic of Chechnya, U.S. ambassador
to the United Nations Nikki Haley said
she was “disturbed” by the reports and
Tillerson privately raised the issue in a
Sergey Lavrov.
The U.S. mission to the United Nations
also joined with France and Brazil to
block efforts from Egypt and Russia to
remove from an Olympics resolution a
reference to Principle 6 of the Olympics
Charter, which bars discrimination on
Jessica Stern, executive director
of OutRight Action, cited these
examples as indications LGBT rights
“are increasingly integrated into U.S.
foreign policy in spite of the president.”
“We have succeeded by working
with allies within this government,
allies from other governments, using
long-standing policies, and motivating
unlikely suspects to recognize that
LGBTI people globally deserve
our respect,” Stern said. “All of this
happens because our movement is
strong, loud and insistent.”
However, Stern said the Trump
administration’s approach to foreign
policy as a whole has by far not been
without failures or inconsistent with
his domestic LGBT policy.
about isolationism, militarism,
Muslim-bashing, border construction,
the control of women’s bodies, and
an overall rejection of human rights,”
Stern said. “In that sense, his foreign
and domestic policies have been
remarkably aligned.”
What’s next? The administration will
likely continue to fight transgender
military service in the courts even if
accession begins on Jan. 1 as well as
LGBT protections under existing civil
rights law. Depending on the outcome
of the Masterpiece Cakeshop case at
the Supreme Court, the administration
will likely embrace a decision in favor
of the anti-gay baker, or reject a ruling
in favor of the same-sex couple who
unsuccessfully sought a wedding cake
from him.
Carey said she expects the Trump
administration to “still take actions
that will be harmful to our community”
— such as U.S. agencies implementing
the religious freedom guidance
against LGBT people — but any such
actions against LGBT people will
“absolutely” be met with opposition
from the community.
n CONTINUES AT WASHINGTONBLADE.COM
 12 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 I N T ERN AT I O N A L N EW S

Top 10 international stories of the year

MARIELA CASTRO, the daughter of Cuban PEDRO SANTOS, who’s gay, told the Blade his San Juan Mayor CARMEN YULÍN CRUZ has
President Raúl Castro, spearheads LGBT-specific father, former Vice President Francisco Santos, criticized the Trump administation’s response to
issues. strongly opposes the peace agreement. the hurricanes
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY PHOTO COURTESY SANTOS WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY TOM HAUSMAN

Here are the top 10 international
LGBT news stories of 2017, as ranked by
the Washington Blade’s editorial staff.
10. TRUMP ROLLS BACK
NORMALIZED U.S., CUBA
RELATIONS
President Trump on June 16
reinstated travel and trade restrictions
with Cuba.
The directive that Trump signed
at a theater in Miami’s Little Havana
neighborhood bans individual “people-
to-people” trips to the Communist
island. It also says Americans who
travel to Cuba on organized trips
must “engage in a full-time schedule
of activities that enhance contact
with the Cuban people, support civil
society in Cuba, or promote the Cuban
people’s independence from Cuban
authorities.”
Then-President Obama in 2014
announced the U.S. would begin to
normalize relations with Cuba.
Mariela Castro, the daughter of
Cuban President Raúl Castro who
spearheads LGBT-specific issues,
is among those who remain highly
critical of the U.S. embargo against
Cuba that remains in place. The
Cuban government said Trump’s
policy favors an “extreme minority” of
exiles who live in Florida.
9. LGBT CANDIDATES AROUND
THE WORLD WIN ELECTION
A number of prominent LGBT
elected officials took office around the
world in 2017.
Gay Irish Prime Minister Leo
Varadkar assumed office on June
14. Ana Brnabić on June 29 became
Serbia’s first woman and openly
lesbian prime minister.
Michelle Súarez, who is the first
openly transgender person elected to
the Uruguayan Senate, was officially
sworn in on Oct. 11. Diane Rodríguez
earlier this year won a seat in Ecuador’s
congress when she ran on the ticket of
current Congressman Carlos Vera.
8. LGBT-INCLUSIVE COLOMBIAN
PEACE AGREEMENT
IMPLEMENTED
The Colombian government and
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia in 2017 began to implement
an LGBT-inclusive peace agreement
that ended a decades-long war.
Representatives of Caribe Afirmativo
and Colombia Diversa — two LGBT
advocacy groups — are among those
who took part in peace talks that took
place in Havana. Caribe Afirmativo
has opened four “Houses of Peace” in
northern Colombia in support of the
agreement.
Voters in October 2016 narrowly
rejected the agreement in a
referendum. The country’s Congress
later ratified it after President Juan
Manuel Santos renegotiated it.
Santos’ gay nephew, Pedro Santos,
told the Washington Blade in
September during an interview in the
Colombian capital of Bogotá that his
father, former Vice President Francisco
Santos, strongly opposes the
agreement. Pedro Santos nevertheless
said he is willing to support the
agreement’s implementation.
“I can just cry about it and try to
deny it happened or help people and
try to make it work,” he said, referring
to the war that killed more than
200,000 people.
7. HURRICANES DEVASTATE
CARIBBEAN LGBT COMMUNITIES
Hurricanes Irma and Maria caused
widespread destruction throughout
the Caribbean in September.
Irma caused widespread destruction
in Barbuda, St. Barts, St. Martin,
Anguilla, the U.S. and British Virgin
Islands, the Turks and Caicos and the
Florida Keys. It also damaged an LGBT
community center in Santo Domingo,
Cuba, when it made landfall on the
island’s north central coast on Sept. 9
with 160 mph winds.
Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico
on Sept. 20 with 155 mph winds.
The hurricane caused widespread
damage in Dominica and St. Croix
before hitting the U.S. commonwealth.
People with HIV/AIDS who live on
the hurricane-battered islands were
unable to access medications in the
aftermath of the storms.
Activists in Puerto Rico with whom
the Blade spoke after Maria said the
hurricane has made LGBT people even
more vulnerable to discrimination
because of their sexual orientation
and gender identity. San Juan Mayor
Carmen Yulín Cruz — who champions
LGBT rights in the U.S. commonwealth
— remains among the most vocal
critics of the federal government’s
response to Maria.
6. ANTI-LGBT VIOLENCE PERSISTS
Violence based on sexual
orientation and gender identity
remained pervasive throughout the
world in 2017.
David Valle, a prominent LGBT
rights advocate in Honduras, was
brutally attacked inside his home in
the country’s capital of Tegucigalpa in
July. Karla Avelar, executive director
of Comunicando y Capacitando a
Mujeres Trans, a Salvadoran trans
advocacy group, in October sought
refuge in Ireland after she received
death threats.
She spoke with the Blade on Sept.
22 in her office in the Salvadoran
capital of San Salvador.
“To work in the fight for the human
rights of my community is part of my
conviction,” she said. “This is the vision
that I have for the future, to see that
my country gets better.”
U.N. High Commissioner for Human
Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein earlier
this month acknowledged during
a Capitol Hill panel that anti-LGBT
violence persists around the world. He
specifically cited a Slovenian activist
who told him in September that
homophobic attacks have increased
“very suddenly” in his country, despite
efforts to extend rights to the country’s
LGBT community.
“When you’re fighting for rights, you
don’t relax for one moment,” said al-
Hussein.
5. MORE COUNTRIES LEGALIZE
MARRIAGE
Same-sex couples in several
countries won marriage rights in 2017.
The Australian House of
Representatives on Dec. 7 nearly
 INTERNATIO NA L NE WS DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 1 3
Canadian Prime Minister JUSTIN TRUDEAU
apologized to Canadians who suffered
persecution under his country’s laws.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL K. LAVERS
unanimously approved a same-sex
marriage bill. Gays and lesbians can
begin to marry in the country on Jan. 9.
Lawmakers in Germany and Malta
in 2017 approved measures that
extended marriage rights to same-sex
couples.
The Austrian Constitutional Court on
Dec. 5 ruled same-sex couples will be
able to tie the knot by the beginning
of 2019. The Taiwanese Constitutional
Court on May 24  said same-sex
couples will be able to legally marry
if lawmakers fail to “amend or enact
relevant laws” within two years.
Chilean President Michelle Bachelet
on Aug. 28 introduced a bill that would
extend marriage and adoption rights
to same-sex couples. Lawmakers in
Bermuda this month approved a bill
that would rescind marriage rights
for same-sex couples in the British
territory.
4. WORLD LEADERS PROMOTE
LGBT RIGHTS
Canadian Prime Minister Justin
Trudeau is among the world leaders
who championed LGBT rights in 2017.
Trudeau on Nov. 28 apologized to
Canadians who suffered persecution
and discrimination under his
country’s anti-LGBT laws and policies.
Trudeau, along with French President
Emmanuel Macron and German
Chancellor Angela Merkel, has
publicly condemned the crackdown
against LGBT Chechens that began
earlier this year.
Bachelet on Aug. 28 introduced a
bill that would extend marriage and
adoption rights to same-sex couples.
The world hates Trump; hurricanes create havoc
BY MICHAEL K. LAVERS
mlavers@washblade.com
Russian President VLADIMIR PUTIN has sought
to dismiss reports of an anti-gay crackdown in
Chechnya.
PHOTO BY VVERVE; COURTESY BIGSTOCK
She has also urged Chilean lawmakers
to approve a trans rights bill.
Panamanian First Lady Lorena
Castillo was the grand marshal of
Panama City’s Pride parade in July.
Costa Rican Vice President Ana
Helena Chacón — who, like Castillo,
is a vocal supporter of LGBT rights, is
among those who spoke at a same-
sex marriage conference that took
place in her country’s capital of San
José in November.
3. AUSTRALIA VOTERS BACK
SAME-SEX MARRIAGE
A majority of Australian voters
who participated in a non-binding
plebiscite on whether to extend
marriage rights to same-sex couples
voted “yes.”
The results that the Australian
Bureau of Statistics announced on
Nov. 14 indicated 61.6 percent of
voters said “yes,” compared to 38
percent of voters who said “no.” Nearly
80 percent of eligible voters took
part in the plebiscite for which Prime
Minister Malcolm Turnbull called
Australian lawmakers approved a
same-sex marriage bill less than a
month later.
Alex Greenwich, a member of the
New South Wales Parliament who co-
chairs Australian Marriage Equality,
a group that campaigned in support
of the issue, told the Blade on Dec.
10 during the Victory Institute’s
International LGBTQ Leaders
Conference in D.C. the plebiscite
“was an experience nobody wanted.”
Greenwich nevertheless added the
“yes” campaign “galvanized people
The world hates DONALD TRUMP.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
like never before to support their
LGBTI friends and family members.”
2. ANTI-LGBT CRACKDOWNS IN
CHECHNYA, EGYPT
Anti-LGBT crackdowns in several
parts of the world made headlines in
2017.
Novaya Gazeta, an independent
Russian newspaper, in April reported
authorities in Chechnya have arrested
more than 100 men because of their
sexual orientation since the beginning
of the year. At least three of these men
died after their arrest, while others
were beaten and tortured and sent to
a secret prison.
The crackdown has also targeted
women they suspect are lesbians.
The Kremlin has claimed it has
launched an investigation into the
allegations, even though Russian
President Vladimir Putin has sought
to downplay or even dismiss these
reports. Chechen President Ramzan
Kadyrov, who is a close Putin ally, in
July said he doesn’t “have any gays”
in the semi-autonomous Russian
republic.
Human rights advocates have said
Egyptian authorities since September
have arrested dozens of LGBT people.
They have also criticized officials in
Azerbaijan for arresting more than
80 people in September on grounds
they were protecting public morality
and health.
1. TRUMP SPARKS OUTRAGE
AROUND THE WORLD
LGBT rights advocates around the
world in 2017 were sharply critical
of President Trump and his foreign
policy.
Andrea Ayala, executive director
of Espacio de Mujeres Lesbianas
por la Diversidad, an LGBT advocacy
group in El Salvador, in September
described Trump’s immigration policy
as “inhumane.” Ayaz Shalal, a human
rights activist from Kurdistan, was
unable to attend a Human Rights
Campaign conference in D.C. earlier
this year because Iraq was among the
countries the Trump administration
included in its controversial travel ban.
Iraq was not included in a revised
version of the policy, but advocates
remained highly critical of Trump
throughout 2017.
The U.S. on Sept. 29 voted against a
U.N. Human Rights Council resolution
that included a provision condemning
the death penalty for those found
guilty of committing consensual
same-sex sexual acts. Trump has also
not publicly condemned the anti-
LGBT crackdown in Chechnya.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State
Randy Berry is no longer the special
U.S. envoy for the promotion of LGBT
and intersex rights abroad. The U.S.
nevertheless continues to promote
these issues abroad.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson this
year acknowledged Pride month and
the Transgender Day of Remembrance.
The U.S., France and Brazil  blocked
Russian and Egyptian efforts  to
remove a gay-inclusive reference
to discrimination from an Olympics
resolution the U.N. General Assembly
unanimously adopted on Nov. 13.
 14 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 Y EA R I N P H OTO S

MARTEL BROWN, Jr. of Pittsburgh is chosen as Mr. Mid-Atlantic Leather at the Mr. Mid-Atlantic ‘Gays for Trump’ hold a ‘DeploraBall’ at the Bolger Center in Potomac, Md. following the inauguration
Leather Contest on Jan. 15 at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill. of President Donald Trump on Jan. 20.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

Several million people gather in protest of the Trump presidency in cities across the globe following WERK for Peace holds a ‘dance protest’ in front of Trump International Hotel to highlight the anti-LGBT
the inauguration of Donald Trump. policies of the Trump administration on Feb. 3.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

President Trump speaks to his first Joint Session of Congress on Feb. 28. Baltimore’s Grand Central celebrates its 25th anniversary on March 25.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY CHRIS JENNINGS
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 1 5
 16 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 Y EA R I N P H OTO S

Calvary Baptist Church in Washington adopts a new senior minister model with married couple Rev.
SALLY SARRATT and Rev. MARIA SWEARINGEN. New officers are sworn in as the head of the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

Human Rights Campaign activists protest in front of the Russian ambassador’s residence on May 9
The Equality Act is reintroduced on Capitol Hill on May 2. following an anti-LGBT crackdown in Chechnya.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington performs ‘And The Tony Goes To’ at the Lincoln Theatre on
June 3. Cumberland, Md. holds its first pride celebration
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY PHOTO BY JACKIE STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 1 7

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 18 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 Y EA R I N P H OTO S

Activists protest President Trump’s proposed ban on transgender military service at a rally in front of
the White House on July 26. Family members embrace in sorrow following the verdict in the murder case for Deoni Jones.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington performs at the D.C. United Night Out on Sept. 09. Northern Virginia Pride is held at Bull Run National Park in Manassas, Va. on Oct. 1.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

The protest group ‘No Justice No Pride’ blocks the entrances to the Human Rights Campaign National Activists stand before the United States Supreme Court as oral arguments are held in the ‘Masterpiece
Dinner because of HRC’s affiliation with Wells Fargo, among other concerns. Cakeshop’ case in December.
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY TOM HAUSMAN
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 1 9

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Edith Windsor, Jim Graham among notable 2017 LGBT deaths
Robert Osborne, Liz Smith, ‘True Blood’s’ Nelsan Ellis also died this year
EDITH WINDSOR
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY
Many acclaimed LGBT people died
in 2017 from the world of politics, the
entertainment industry and beyond.
They include:
Acclaimed British actor Alec
McCowen died, at 91, on Feb. 6 at his
London home. He was renowned for
playing Mark in the one-man show “St.
Mark’s Gospel.”
Max Ferra, founding director of New
York City’s INTAR Hispanic American
Arts Center, died at 79 on February 4 in
Miami. The Center nurtured numerous
Latino playwrights, including Pulitzer
Prize winner Nilo Cruz, Lisa Loomer and
Milcha Sanchez-Scott. Ferra left Cuba,
his native country, in 1958. “There were
a bunch of young Latino playwrights
coming of age who were writing plays
in English that had a Hispanic essence,”
he told the “New York Times, “but there
was no arena for them.”
Turner Classic Movies host Robert
Osborne, a lifelong aficionado of Old
Hollywood and its movies, died at 84
on March 6 in his Manhattan home.
During his 25 years at TCM, he told
viewers intriguing stories about stars
from Bette Davis to Audrey Hepburn.
“I love those people,” Osborne told
“CBS Sunday Morning.” “These were
people that once ruled the world.”
GeorgeWeinberg,thepsychotherapist
who coined the term homophobia in
the 1960s, died on March 20 in New
York City at 87 of cancer. “As long as gay
people suffer from homophobic acts, the
word (homophobia) will remain crucial
to our humanity,” Weinberg wrote in the
BY KATHI WOLFE
JIM NABORS
PHOTO COURTESY CBS TELEVISION DISTRIBUTION
Huffington Post.
Gilbert Baker, creator of the
rainbow flag, known as the “gay Betsy
Ross,” died at 65 at his New York City
home on March 31. The first rainbow
flags were unveiled during the San
Francisco 1978 gay pride parade. “We
... watched and saw the flags, and their
faces lit up,” gay rights activist Clive
Jones told the New York Times. “It
needed no explanation. People knew
immediately that it was our flag.”
William M. Hoffman, who wrote the
groundbreaking play “As Is” during the
height of the AIDS epidemic and the
libretto for John Corigliano’s opera
“The Ghosts of Versailles,” died at 78 of
cardiac arrest in the Bronx on April 29.
Gay attorney Jim Graham, who was
elected to four terms on D.C. Council,
died at 71 on June 11 at George
Washington Hospital following
complications from an intestinal
infection. “LGBT activists ... say he
played a key role in advancing the
city’s fight against HIV/AIDS during
the early years of the epidemic while
serving as executive director of
Whitman-Walker from 1984-1999,”
the Blade reported.
Queer actor Nelsan Ellis, who
played Lafayette Reynolds, a gay
cook, on the HBO vampire series “True
Blood” died at 39 on July 8 of heart
failure due to alcohol withdrawal. Ellis
waged a long battle with alcohol and
drug addiction.
Tony Award-winning producer
Stuart J. Thompson died at 62 from
I N MEMO RI A M
ROBERT OSBORNE
PHOTO COURTESY TCM
complications of esophageal cancer in
Manhattan on Aug. 17. He produced
and served as general manager to
more than 70 Broadway, Off Broadway
and national touring productions.
Gay Republican operative Arthur
J. Finkelstein, who helped boost the
careers of conservative Republicans
from James. L. Buckley to Jesse Helms,
died at 72, from metastasized lung
cancer on Aug. 18 at his Ipswich, Mass.,
home. He “sells his talents to lawmakers
who would outlaw his family’s very
existence,” a New York Times columnist
said of Finkelstein in 1996.
Gay novelist Mark Merlis died
on Aug. 15 at 67 from pneumonia
associated with amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis at a Philadelphia hospital.
In his debut 1996 novel “American
Studies” and three subsequent works,
Merlis wrote sensitively about the joy,
turmoil and pride of American 20th
century gay life.
Kate Millett, the queer,
groundbreaking second wave feminist
writer, whose iconic 1970 book “Sexual
Politics, transformed our cultural
understanding of gender roles, died at
82 from cardiac arrest while on vacation
in Paris with her spouse Sophie Keir.
When “Sexual Politics” came out, the
New York Times called the work “the
Bible of women’s Lliberation.”
Marriage equality icon Edith (Edie)
Windsor died at 88 in Manhattan
on Sept. 12. In her landmark case
the Supreme Court for the first time
granted federal recognition to same-
sex married couples. The Windsor
decision struck down the Defense
of Marriage Act, which prohibited
same-sex couples from receiving the
1,138 federal benefits available to
heterosexual married couples. “I had
the privilege to speak with Edie a few
days ago, and to tell her one more
time what a difference she made to
the country we love,” former President
Barack Obama said.
Gossip column doyenne Liz Smith,
died on Nov. 12 at 94 at her Manhattan
home. For decades, Smith on New
York City TV and in the tabloids (from
the Daily News to the New York Post)
regaled viewers and readers with
tidbits about the lives of the rich
and famous. She had relationships
withe men and women, including
archaeologist Iris Love.
Drag pageant impresario Jack
Doroshow died at 78 in Manhattan.
As drag queen Flawless Sabrina,
Doroshow began organizing shows
in 1959. “The Queen,” a documentary
about his 1967 Town Hall show in New
York, is a queer cultural touchstone.
Actor Jim Nabors, known for
playing Gomer Pyle on the CBS TV
shows “The Andy Griffith Show” and
“Gomer Pyle: U.S.M.C.,” died at 87 on
Nov. 30 at his home in Honolulu. Stan
Cadwallader, his husband, said he
had been in ill health for more than a
year. Nabors said that he “never made
a big secret” about being queer, but
he didn’t officially come out until he
married Cadwallader in 2013.
 W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 2 1

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 22 • DECEMBER 29, 2017
A whirlwind year for the Blade
2017 brings renewed
urgency to our work — and
2 new publications
KEVIN NAFF is editor of the Washington Blade
and can be reached at knaff@washblade.com.
Last year at this time, I predicted that 2017
would bring new attacks on the LGBTQ
community from an adversarial Trump
administration. Sadly, I was right.
Among those attacks we’ve endured this
year: an attempted ban on transgender
military service; a rollback of LGBT civil
rights protections at the Justice Department;
sending an attorney to a federal court to
argue firing people for being gay is legal;
and new “religious freedom” guidance that
green lights the denial of services to LGBT
people. Earlier this month, the administration
said it supports the right of business owners
to post signs in their windows announcing
they won’t serve gay customers.
These attacks and other factors led to quite
a year for us at the Blade as our work took on
new urgency. Thank you to our readers and
advertisers for your support this year. As has
been my custom in this final issue of the year,
a look back.
First and foremost, we published 52 issues
of the Washington Blade while feeding our
digital and social media platforms 24/7.
Early in the year, we began eyeing a new
opportunity in Los Angeles, the second
largest market in the country, and one that
was underserved by alternative media. In
partnership with gay media veteran Troy
Masters, we launched a sister publication,
the Los Angeles Blade in March. A diverse
cross section of LA residents — from
longtime activists to young digital media
entrepreneurs to the West Hollywood
mayor — turned out for our launch party
in West Hollywood. In sharp contrast to
Trump’s attacks on “fake news,” LA residents
and businesses welcomed the Blade
enthusiastically. Shortly after, we were thrilled
to welcome veteran journalist Karen Ocamb
to the LA team as news editor. Together,
Karen and Troy are proving a dynamic duo,
breaking important stories in LA and helping
us build this exciting new enterprise.
Meanwhile, back in D.C., we kept busy
covering the Trump administration, with our
political reporter Chris Johnson toughing
it out in the White House briefing room
each day, sometimes going weeks without
being called on as officials try to ignore and
suppress alternative voices like ours in favor
of outlets peddling alternative facts instead.
With our international news editor
Michael Lavers at the helm, we undertook
a deep dive into the plight of LGBTQ
people in Latin America and the Caribbean,
visiting Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras,
Cuba, Chile, Puerto Rico, Costa Rica,
Colombia, and the Dominican Republic.
We enlisted new contributing writers on
the ground in those countries to continue
our work. We published more than 100
news stories and op-eds from thought
leaders in the region, often in both English
and Spanish and I’m excited to announce
that we will expand that project in 2018,
starting with a January visit to Puerto Rico
to cover the ongoing hurricane recovery
effort and the Trump administration’s
shameful neglect of the island.
In D.C., longtime senior news reporter
Lou Chibbaro Jr. continued his unparalleled
coverage of our local community, with plans
to kick off 2018 with a comprehensive and
disturbing report on the unsolved murders
of local gay and transgender residents.
When word got out that the Baltimore
Sun planned to shutter the 40-year-old City
Paper, we started meeting with key players
in Baltimore and decided the city needed
an independent voice. To that end, we
launched the Baltimore Beat in November,
a new general interest alt weekly giving
voice to the city’s underrepresented
communities.
V I E WP O I N T
In other highlights: we won multiple
awards for our journalism and our design
thanks to the creative team of James Neal
and Tiara Slater; we gave back to our
local community by sponsoring a range
of events and organizations, including
Capital Pride, SMYAL and the D.C. Gay
Flag Football League, among many others;
we contributed to organizing the National
Equality March, which brought thousands
to D.C. on Pride weekend to protest the
Trump administration; we hosted a singles
party in February, brought comedian
Kate Clinton to town for a Pride show;
attended the White House Correspondents
Association Dinner, interviewed scores of
artists and celebrities thanks to the hard
work of Joey DiGuglielmo and Mariah
Cooper. We documented D.C.’s LGBTQ
community in thousands of photos and
videos thanks to photo editor Michael
Key; kicked off the summer beach season
with our annual party in Rehoboth; honored
the Best of Gay DC in our annual special
issue and ever-growing party; and broke
innumerable stories about the LGBTQ
community here and abroad. And it was
all made possible by the tenacious work of
our sales and marketing team, led by Lynne
Brown, Brian Pitts, Stephen Rutgers, Phil
Rockstroh, Joe Hickling and our friends at
Rivendell Media.
As always, thank you for reading and
supporting the Blade(s) — and now the
Beat. The world needs more independent,
alternative voices and we look forward to
another busy year in 2018. Best wishes for a
safe and happy holiday season.
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 VIEWPOIN T DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 2 3
2017: A year of destruction, a ray of hope
Unfit president attacks
public institutions; special
election sets him back
RICHARD J. ROSENDALL is a writer and activist.
Reach him at rrosendall@starpower.net.
Leaves skittered across the brick path
on a deserted Lafayette Square the night
Doug Jones defeated Roy Moore on Dec.
12. It was 25 degrees. Thirty months before,
a crowd had gathered on a warm summer
night as the White House north front was lit
in rainbow colors in honor of the marriage
equality victory in Obergefell. This night I
greeted a lone protester keeping vigil in a
small tent behind hand-written posters.
Donald Trump, to put it mildly, had had
a bad week. The Pentagon had responded
to another setback in federal court for his
I N S I DE LGB T WA SH INGTON
A toast to a better 2018
New year brings
key election as the
resistance ramps up
PETER ROSENSTEIN is a D.C.-based LGBT rights
and Democratic Party activist. He writes regularly for
the Blade.
I can’t imagine a worse start to 2017 than
Donald Trump being inaugurated as the
nation’s 45th president. My Blade column
immediately following his election was a
simple statement in a black border “Let Us
Pray.” We quickly understood prayer wasn’t
going to do it and instead we had to take to
the streets and then VOTE.
First came the Jan. 21 ‘Women’s March’
where millions of women, and the men who
transgender military ban by announcing
that trans recruits could enlist beginning in
January. United Nations Ambassador Nikki
Haley, widely touted as a likely presidential
contender, had defended the rights of women
who accused Trump of sexual harassment to
be heard. Now Trump was rebuked by voters
in one of the nation’s deepest-red states after
going all in on behalf of a twice-disgraced
judge and accused child molester.
Watching the fountain in front of the
presidential mansion, I could almost hear a
collective sigh of relief. It had been a long,
dark year as Trump outdid himself daily
with false, ignorant, crude, spiteful, self-
absorbed and reckless words and actions
as our 45th president.
I lack space for the full catalog of
presidential offenses and embarrassments.
Suffice it to say that he talked like a slow
third grader, relied on InfoWars and
Fox News instead of our intelligence
services, undermined allies in Congress
and overseas, threatened nuclear war,
praised Nazis and white supremacists,
treated storm-damaged territories like
foreign countries, demanded the firing
of protesting athletes, attacked everyone
from the free press to refugees, obstructed
justice, and was rebuked by Britain’s Tory
prime minister – all while leveraging
support them, took to the streets to say in
a loud and clear voice “we will resist.” Then
came the Science March, the Immigration
March, the Environmental March and the
March for LGBTQ+ Equality. We have shown
we will resist what we saw coming down the
pike and I don’t think many of us expected
it to be as bad as it is. Donald Trump, while
not getting any major legislation passed
(this column being written before a final
vote on his disastrous tax reform package),
has managed to take us backwards in nearly
every area of life. Trump has set a tone in the
country allowing the Klu Klux Klan and Nazis
to feel he actually welcomes their support.
The first step backwards was the
nomination and confirmation of Neil Gorsuch
to the Supreme Court. His right-wing vision
of America will hurt us for decades. Just as
will all the other lower-level federal judges
Trump is nominating and the Republican
Senate is confirming. Then came the ban
on immigrants and the nominations and
confirmation of a slew of Cabinet secretaries
in areas from Education to Environment to
Health and Human Services; all with an ultra-
conservative leaning hell-bent on rolling
back every progressive gain made during
the eight years of the Obama administration.
his public office for private profit and
frequently visiting his golf courses while
charging exorbitant fees to the Secret
Service for protecting him there.
Trump’s quest to erase Barack Obama’s
legacy included rescinding regulations
while distracting people with his tweet
storms. The FBI was a mixed bag, on one
hand issuing a scurrilous report on “black
identity extremism” that smeared and
endangered civil rights activists, on the
other hand acting as a bulwark against a
Trump dictatorship.
The #MeToo movement to expose
sexual harassment by men in public office,
entertainment, and news media surged as
victims found their voices. Those brought low
included movie mogul Harvey Weinstein,
conductor James Levine, actor Kevin Spacey,
Rep. John Conyers, Rep. Trent Franks, and
Sen. Al Franken. Trump brazened it out, but
found himself a fortnight before Christmas
tweeting grudging congratulations to an
Alabama Democrat.
The recruitment announcement by
Pentagon officials on Dec. 11 displayed
once again the resistance to Trump’s
transphobia by military leaders whose
sense of honor is utterly foreign to their
commander in chief.
Pride parades in many American cities
This includes taking money from public
education to fund private schools; rolling
back as many parts of the Affordable Care
Act as possible even without new legislation;
and trying to keep transgender people
from serving in the military among other
disgusting initiatives including recently
rolling back net neutrality.
When it comes to foreign affairs, Trump
is scaring the world with his positions and
statements. He is doing everything possible to
get us into a war alienating nearly every one of
our long-time allies. He appointed a Secretary
of State with no statecraft experience and is
decimating the State Department to the point
it can’t function. Good people are resigning
because they don’t want to be associated
with what he is doing.
Politically, we see Trump ensnared in a
massive investigation of whether or not he
or anyone else in his campaign colluded
with the Russians to win the election. We
know Russia interfered and we are seeing
by dribs and drabs more and more of his
high-level campaign staff being indicted.
Now the Special Counsel is apparently
looking at whether Trump can be charged
with obstruction of justice for trying to end
the investigation. He and Republicans in
were disrupted by radicals who displayed
their totalitarian mindset by demanding
that the entire LGBT community embrace
their hostility toward businesses and police.
It makes no sense to bar friendly police like
D.C.’s LGBT Liaison Unit, nor to ban businesses
with high Corporate Equality Index scores as
pride sponsors. In June, D.C. police simply
rerouted the parade around the No Justice
No Pride activists blocking the street.
Those self-righteous anti-capitalists must
have shaken their heads at the post-Oscars
Calvin Klein ad campaign featuring actors from
Best Picture winner Moonlight, particularly
the chiseled, expressive breakout talent,
Trevante Rhodes. Sometimes a business
transaction can be lifted by inspiration. The
notion that business is inherently predatory,
like the notion that masculinity is inherently
toxic, is the sort of dogma that blinds us to
opportunity and progress.
On election night, a friend texted me
about Moore’s refusal to concede as I
walked north through the park toward a
bus stop where restaurant workers waited.
Over my shoulder, the flag above the
White House flapped in the winter breeze.
The republic endures.
Copyright © 2017 by Richard J.
Rosendall. All rights reserved.
Congress are still clearly obsessed with
Hillary Clinton even though he won the
election.
As the year comes to an end we are
in the middle —  some think it’s just the
beginning — of a tipping point in how society
tolerates sexual harassment. We are finally
reconsidering what will be acceptable
behavior for men toward women and what
do we do to punish them for unacceptable
past behavior.
Recently, we have seen a glimmer of
hope the American people won’t accept
quietly what Trump and the Republican
Congress are doing to us. Democrats took
over the governorship in New Jersey, held
on to the one in Virginia by a large margin,
and made huge gains in Virginia legislative
races. Transgender candidates won races
across the nation. Women in huge numbers
are running for office at every level including
lesbians Angie Craig in MN 2nd district
and Gina Ortiz Jones in San Antonio, both
running for Congress. We took heart when
in Alabama enough voters actually voted for
decency for Democrat Doug Jones to win.
So a toast to 2018 and to the people who
will stand up, speak out and vote to put
Democrats back in office.
 24 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 A RT S & EN T ERTA I N MEN T

Top 10 pop culture stories of 2017

SCREEN CAPTURE VIA YOUTUBE

WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY MICHAEL KEY

10. AARON CARTER
COMES OUT, GETS
BUSTED FOR POT
Pop singer Aaron Carter,
at the time 29 though he’s
since turned 30, came out
as bisexual in an open letter
posted on Twitter in August.  was the reason for their spilt.
“There’s something I’d like
to say that I feel is important
for myself and my identity
that has been weighing on
my chest for nearly half of
my life,” Carter writes. “This
doesn’t bring me shame, just
a weight and burden I have
held onto for a long time that
I would like lifted off me.”
The star revealed he has
been attracted to both
genders since he was 13.
He also shared that he had
a sexual experience with
another man when he was 17.
Carter claimed that Madison
Parker, his girlfriend at the
time, broke up with him when
he told her he was bisexual.
Parker denied his sexuality
He also said that his older
brother Nick Carter had not
reached out to him since he
came out.  GOES DOWN
Carter brought his struggles
with drug addiction, plastic
surgery and his family on
a tumultuous September
episode of “The Doctors.” On
the show, Carter learned he
weighed only 115 pounds at 6
feet tall. He said he feared his
weight loss was due to being
HIV-positive. However, he tested
negative for all STDs. His drug
test revealed he tested positive
for marijuana, Benzodiazepines
(Xanax) and opiates
(hydrocodone). After initially
refusing to go to rehab on the
show, Carter entered rehab in
October and was released in
December.  to University of California,
9. MILO YIANNOPOULOS
Milo Yiannopoulos’ swift
descent from rising alt-
right media personality
to a defamed journalist
shunned even from his own
conservative community was
peppered with controversy.  school’s federal funding for
The year started out
promisingly for the British
political commentator who
secured an autobiography
book deal with Simon &
Schuster and was invited
as a guest on “Real Time
with Bill Maher.” He kicked
off a university speaking
engagement tour which
drew numerous protesters
Berkley. The protest became
violent as protesters refused
to let Yiannopoulos, who has
made racist, misogynistic,
transphobic and xenophobic
remarks, to speak at the
university. President Donald
Trump even weighed in on
Twitter threatening to cut the
not allowing free speech.  closed out the year on a
Yiannopoulos’ success
came to a halt when an
old interview clip surfaced
of him saying that sexual
relationships between
13-year-old boys and adult
men could be positive. His
comments caused him to
lose his job as senior editor
for Breitbart News, to have
his book deal with Simon
& Schuster revoked and
to be disinvited from the
Conservative Political Action
Conference. 
Despite the negative press,
Yiannopoulos tried to keep his
career afloat. His publishing
company Dangerous
Books published his book
“Dangerous.” Yiannopoulos
personal note marrying his
boyfriend, identified only as
 ARTS & ENT E RTA I NM E NT DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 2 5

Epic Oscar mistake, Bette and Joan return in wild, wacky year
BY JOEY DIGUGLIELMO & MARIAH COOPER

PHOTO COURTESY SONY PICTURES CLASSIC

PHOTO COURTESY VH1

PHOTO COURTESY WARNER BROS. PICTURES

“John,” in Hawaii.  of home products like shower
8. ‘CALL ME BY YOUR
NAME,’ ‘TOM OF FINLAND’
AMONG YEAR’S
BEST FILMS
It was a strong year for
LGBT-themed movies but two
especially stand out — “Tom
of Finland” and “Call Me By
Your Name.”  has drawn strong reviews for
“Tom,” a Finnish
biographical drama directed
by Dome Karukoski, stars
Pekka Strang as Touko
Laakosenen, better known
as the titular artist who
specialized in mid-century
homoerotic art. The film
inspired a Tom of Finland
renaissance of sorts with
books and an extensive line
curtains and throw pillows
featuring Tom art.  7.  SeaSon 9 of
“Call Me By Your Name,” a
leisurely paced gay romance
story between a 24-year-
old intern (Armie Hammer)
and the 17-year-old son
of his employer (Timothee
Chalamet) in Italy circa 1983,
its taste and restraint.
“(Director Luca) Guadagnino
and his actors emphasize
tenderness and feeling
capturing the magic of first-
time dalliance in a way that
makes it seem, if not wholly
innocent, at least wholesome,”
a Blade critic wrote.  interpretations of classic
It’s up for three Golden
Globe Awards including nods
for both its leads.
‘RUPAUL’S DRAG RACE’
MAKES ‘HERSTORY’
It was a banner year for
“RuPaul’s Drag Race” in
several ways. Debuting in
March on new home VH1, the
queens went apeshit when
Lady Gaga walked into the
work room and was featured
as the guest judge.
Seeming to genuinely
enjoy herself throughout the
episode, Gaga helped series
regulars Michelle Visage,
Ross Matthews and Carson
Kressley assess the queens’
Gaga looks.
It turned out to be an
unusually dramatic season,
though. Latina diva Valentina
emerged early on as a strong
contender but was sent
packing on episode nine
after pissing off Ru for initially
declining to remove a veil
during the lip-sync against
Debbie Downer Nina Bo’nina
Brown. She said later she was
in shock and hadn’t bothered
to learn the words to the
song, which all the queens
are given in advance should
they land in the bottom two.
The drama continued,
though, on perhaps the
bitchiest reunion episode
of the series’ entire run with
several queens calling out
Valentina on her fake charm.  and winningly helmed by
The finale, despite featuring
no clear standout winner,
went to Sasha Velour who
bested Peppermint, Shea
Coulee and Trinity Taylor for
the title of America’s Next
Drag Superstar. 
RuPaul won his second
consecutive Emmy Award for
hosting.
6. ‘WONDER WOMAN’
LASSOS BOFFO
BOX OFFICE
Although she’d been
seen in 2016’s “Batman v.
Superman: Dawn of Justice,”
Wonder Woman finally got
her own film this year with
a June release starring Gal
Gadot as the titular character
Patty Jenkins (“Monster”) who

Top 10 pop culture stories of 2017
won universal praise for her
effort.
Filmed over a six-month
period starting in November
2015 (development started
in 1996), it set numerous box
office records. It was the fifth
highest-grossing superhero
film in the U.S. and the 20th
highest-grossing film ever
stateside. It made more than
$800 million internationally
and is the best-ranked
superhero film on Rotten
Tomatoes. The American Film
Institute called it one of the
best 10 films of 2017.
Gadot plays the Amazon
princess Diana, a highly
trained fighter who’s been
raised on the hidden island
of Themyscira by her mother
Queen Hippolyta (Connie
Nielsen). The island’s security
is breached when American
pilot Steve Trevor (Chris Pine)
crashes his plane on the
island.
The Blade said it was
26 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
“packed with gripping action
sequences but also leavened
with generous doses of
comedy and deepened
with serious considerations
about the horrors of war and
mankind’s capacity for both
love and hatred.”
5. ‘FEUD’ REVIVES
COMPLICATED
PARTNERSHIP OF
DAVIS, CRAWFORD
“Feud,” an FX series from
Ryan Murphy, devoted its
maiden season of eight
episodes to the rivalry of Bette
Davis and Joan Crawford, co-
stars in the 1962 cult classic
“Whatever Happened to
Baby Jane.”
Jessica Lange starred
as Crawford and Susan
Sarandon played Davis. Both
were nominated for Emmys,
though the show won none of
the 10 Primetime Emmys for
which it was nominated (it won
two Creative Arts Emmys).
The series was praised for
its period detail and grand,
sweeping recreations of
pivotal moments such as a
long tracking shot showing
Lange walking backstage at
the 1963 Academy Awards.
Though declining
somewhat in ratings after a
strong start, the series fared
decently overall. Its debut was
the most-watched program
on FX that week.  said it had serious problems.  Its first episode drew 3.26
The series had an
unexpected coda with Olivia
de Havilland, a real-life friend of
Davis who replaced Crawford
in their planned follow-up
“Baby Jane” movie “Hush …
Hush Sweet Charlotte,” sued
the creators claiming in a
lawsuit filed a day before her
101st birthday that she was
inaccurately portrayed and her
likeness was used without her
permission. Catherine Zeta-
Jones played her in the series.  let’s get some and be strong
A second season of 10
episodes devoted to Charles
A RT S & EN T ERTA I N MEN T
PHOTO COURTESY FX NETWORKS
PHOTO COURTESY ABC
and Diana will premiere in 2018.  moments. Beyond that, actors
4.  ‘When We Rise’
dRaWs mixed RevieWs  making the timeline rather
“When We Rise,” an ABC
miniseries about LGBT rights that
aired Feb. 27-March 3, drew so-
so reviews from the mainstream
press but was sharply criticized
in the gay press.
Writing for the Blade,
columnist Brock Thompson,
“Though I very much
appreciate what ‘When
We Rise’ was attempting,
I couldn’t see past its
problems,” Thompson said.
“Its tone was preachy. Its
messages about unity and
strength in diversity landed
like anvils. I stopped counting
the clunky cliched lines like
‘we are stronger together,’ or
‘you don’t know how strong
we are,’ or perhaps ‘strength.
with it together.’ All this gave
way to some melodramatic
were switched out to play
their role’s older counterparts,
confusing.”
Ratings, too, were weak
for the series starring Guy
Pearce, Mary Louise-Parker,
Whoopi Goldberg and Rosie
O’Donnell as Cleve Jones,
Roma Pauline Guy, Pat Norman
and Del Martin, respectively.
million viewers to come in last
of the four major networks
for its time slot. Viewership
dropped sharply thereafter.
Scheduling was shifted after
President Trump addressed
Congress live on Feb. 28. 
Helmed by multiple
directors including writer
Dustin Lance Black and Gus
Van Sant, the eight-episode
arc was framed as an epic, 45-
year survey of the entire gay
rights movement. 
3. CHELSEA MANNING

Top 10 pop culture stories of 2017
makes glam debut  accessibility, normalcy, calm.”
After being released from
prison at Fort Leavenworth
on May 17 after nearly seven
years in prison for leaking
750,000 documents (some
classified) to WikiLeaks,
many were curious to see
how Chelsea Manning would
segue into civilian life.
Manning, 29, made her
glam debut in the September
issue of Vogue in a red Norma
Kamall swimsuit and other
high-fashion outfits with low-
key styling by Phyllis Posnick
and was praised for not being
as sexualized and in-your-
face as Caitlyn Jenner was
when she made her debut in
Vanity Fair in 2015.
“This is a far cry from the
haughty, hyper-feminine
Hollywood unveiling of
Caitlyn Jenner,” wrote Robin
Givhan in the Washington
Post. She called Manning’s
photos a “message of …
ARTS & ENT E RTA I NM E NT DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 2 7
2. ‘WILL & GRACE’ AND
‘DYNASTY’ RETURN
After 11 years off the air,
“Will & Grace” returned
to NBC Thursday nights in
September to launch a new,
16-episode run and ninth
season.  debuted in October on the
The original cast — Eric
McCormack, Debra Messing,
Sean Hayes and Megan
Mullally — were back after a
planned one-off mini-episode
that ran last fall timed to the
presidential election.
The first new episodes of
the show since 2006 found
the familiar gang at the
White House, navigating
middle-aged gay dating, Jack
discovering he’s a grandfather
(with a gay grandson), Will
making senior partner, an
appearance by Beverley
Leslie (Leslie Jordan) and
many more hijinks.  that a mistake had been made
Ratings have been solid
PHOTO BY TIM TRAVERS HAWKINS VIA WIKIMEDIA
PHOTO COURTESY NBC
PHOTO COURTESY A24
— averaging more than 10 BEST PICTURE IN was the true winner. 
million viewers per episode SHOCKING ENVELOPE Beatty and Dunaway had
— and reviews have been MISTAKE been handed the wrong
mostly positive. It was supposed to be one envelope, a duplicate of
A 10th season has already of those nice little Oscar the Best Actress envelope
been approved.  moments longtime fans of (“La La Land’s” Emma Stone
Much less successful, the Academy Awards cherish had won that award). Upon
however, has been the — beloved stars of yesteryear seeing its contents, Beatty
“Dynasty” reboot, which stride onstage reunited to was flummoxed; Dunaway,
give an award. Many stars thinking he was joshing for
CW with an all-new cast have done it over the years suspense, saw “La La Land”
featuring James Mackay as — Jimmy Stewart and Kim and announced it as the
Steven Carrington, Fallon’s Novak, Paul Newman and winner. 
(Elizabeth Gillies) gay Elizabeth Taylor. This year it Dubbed the biggest gaffe
environmentalist brother. was Warren Beatty and Faye in Oscar history, it turned
Now his being gay is no big Dunaway, stars of 1967’s out to be the mistake of
issue to dad Blake and gold “Bonnie and Clyde.” PricewaterhouseCoopers’
digger Sammy Jo is now a On the 50th anniversary managing partner Brian
gay man. Oh, and the Colbys of their cinematic classic, Cullinan who’d been Tweeting
are black this time.  they came on stage at the backstage. He and Martha
Reviews have been highly Dolby Theatre on Feb. 26 to Ruiz, who each had copies
mixed with Variety saying hand out the top prize of the of the evening’s envelopes,
it “barely gets out of the evening. “La La Land” was were later relieved of any
gate before it begins to lose announced as the winner but future Oscar duties though
steam.” Ratings have been it quickly became apparent they kept their jobs. 
anemic, averaging less than as its producers were giving “Moonlight” became the
a million viewers per episode.  their acceptance speeches first LGBT-themed film and
first film with an all-black cast
1. ‘MOONLIGHT’ WINS and gay-themed “Moonlight” to win Best Picture. 
 28 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 Q U EERY

queery SASHA ADAMS

How long have you been out and who
was the hardest person to tell?
I came out at about 18 or 19 and it was
hardest to tell myself. Growing up in a
small town in a church-oriented family, it
was hard to determine what to do when
you have such a hard Southern Baptist
upbringing. I eventually learned that my
relationship with God has nothing to do
with anyone else and their views. I’m now
happy and love myself.
Who’s your LGBT hero? “Eagle Scouts Can Be Drag Queens Too!”
My LGBT hero is my gay father, David. We
lived in the same area and he basically
rescued me and let me know it was OK.
He taught me about gay culture but still
made me buckle down in school and do
my best. He was always there and he still
would be if I needed him to this day. He
taught me it was OK to be me.
 
What’s Washington’s best nightspot,
past or present?  God, love, peace and happiness
My first recollection of D.C. nightlife was
Nation and Apex. I was so young and
naïve. But I definitely had the best times
impossible.
On what do you insist?
RESPECT. You do not have to agree with
me, but you will respect me as a person.
What was your last Facebook post or
Tweet?
NO JURY DUTY TOMORROW
If your life were a book, what would
the title be?
If science discovered a way to change
sexual orientation, what would you
do?
HELL NO! I have finally come to terms
of loving me! I love me! I love my life, no
matter how crazy it can be.
 
What do you believe in beyond the
physical world? 
What’s your advice for LGBT
movement leaders?
PHOTO BY BOBBY DICANIO; COURTESY ADAMS

there. After I moved here, my first gay bar
was JR.’s. It was my second home (you
could always find me there) when I first
moved to the area.
Describe your dream wedding.
If there were one it would be simple and
I’d be surrounded by people who love
me for me. The reception and bachelor
party would be a night from the hangover
probably.
 
What non-LGBT issue are you most
passionate about?
HIV Education. Your health is your life no
matter what your status is. Protect, love
and educate yourself and others.
What historical outcome would you
change?
Most people would change everything.
I would change nothing. Living through
issues is what makes us better as a people,
makes us stronger and makes us grow.
What’s been the most memorable pop
culture moment of your lifetime?
Seeing an African-American president,
Barack Obama. With my grandmother
being about 80 years old, it bought
joy and tears to me for her to see that,
especially since she grew up during
segregation. I honestly thought I would
never see it in my lifetime. Growing up
it always seemed as something that was
Keep fighting. You inspire so many
people and so many people support you.
They may not be loud and screaming
beside you, but trust you make a
difference to them.
What would you walk across hot coals
for?
Family (which includes my chosen family).
What LGBT stereotype annoys you
most?
Drag queen = feminine. I’m more butch
than most people know.
What’s your favorite LGBT movie?
Too many, but first to come mind is
probably “Latter Days.”
What’s the most overrated social
custom?
Saying please and thank you.
What trophy or prize do you most
covet?
My health and my family.
What do you wish you’d known at 18?
That life gets much better and you can do
whatever you set your mind to.
Why Washington?
Why not? It’s a beautiful city with lots to
do.
The D.C.-based drag entertainer answers 20 gay questions
By JOEY DiGUGLIELMO
joeyd@washblade.com
New Year’s Eve at Town Danceboutique is a festive way to ring in the New
Year.
“It’s always really busy and packed,” says Sasha Adams, a local drag
entertainer who’ll be performing that night along with Tatianna, Banaka, Riley
Knoxx, hostess Lena Lett and guest performer Trixie Mattel (who’ll be on 2018’s
“All Stars” season three), from “RuPaul’s Drag Race” season seven. “Everyone
is ready to party and filled with so much energy. It really gives you a high on
stage.”
Drag show tickets are $35 and are available at flavorus.com. Doors open at
9 p.m.; show starts at 9:30. All other admissions will be at the door. Admission
after the show is $25. DJs Ed Bailey and Joe Gauthreaux will spin. Details at
towndc.com.
Adams, aka Richard Christmas, works by day as a contractor with the federal
government and performs four-five times per week as Sasha. She won this
year’s Best Drag Queen award in the Blade’s annual Best of Gay D.C. readers’
poll. She started performing about five years ago at Town via her pal, Shiqueeta
Lee.
“She called me one day and said she needed a filler and to not fuck it up,”
Adams says. “I guess I did pretty well as I have been allowed to perform
regularly since then.”
At midnight, she plans to be with her friends and “just people I love.”
“I don’t think I’ll kiss anyone as I’m not ruining my makeup,” she says. “But I
can’t say it won’t happen.”
Her wish for 2018 is health, happiness, achieving my goals and “maybe to
find someone to share my time with.”
The 35-year-old Charlottesville, Va., native came to D.C. 10 years ago for
work. She’s single and lives in Columbia Heights. She enjoys dance, travel,
food, men and drinks in her free time.
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 2 9
 30 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
Super-gay (as usual) D.C. theatrical year
The year in theater was eclectic and
engaging, peppered with premiers
and reprises. There were new faces,
names, and titles as well as the
familiar. It was year of change and
more of the same, both challenging
and comforting.
In February, Studio Theatre trod
intriguing ground with Morgan
Gould’s new dramedy “I Wanna
Fucking Tear You Apart,” a darkly
funny play about friendship and
the politics of niceness and beauty,
and more specifically friendships
between gay men and overweight
straight women. For the play’s D.C.
premier, New York-based Gould (who
also directed) cast out actor Tommy
Heleringer as the young gay man and
Nicole Spiezio as his big bestie.
Studio explored complicated
relationships further with its summer
production “Wig Out!” penned by
out playwright Tarrell Alvin Mcraney’s
whose “In Moonlight Black Boys Look
Blue” inspired the Academy Award-
winning film “Moonlight.” “Wig
Out!” is a love story set in the African-
American drag ball scene (think Jennie
Livingston’s seminal 1990 documentary
“Paris Is Burning.”). Michael Kevin
Darnall as the House of Light’s sexual
predator father and Jamyl Dobson as
its aging, insecure drag mother were
standouts in a strong cast.
Baltimore’s Everyman Theatre
presented the excellent “Los Otros,” a
subtly made, grownup two-hander with
music by out composer Michael John
LaChisua. It starred Broadway actors
Judy McLane and Philip Hernández
as two very different middle-aged
Californians — she’s white and straight
and he’s Mexican American and gay —
who live oddly parallel lives.
The Kennedy Center hosted
a summer of fun that included
the national tour of Rodgers &
Hammerstein’s “The King and I.”
Out actor Jose Llana added a playful
dimension to the stubborn Siamese
sovereign and Laura Michelle Kelly
was luminous as Anna, the plucky
English governess.
The increasingly dynamic Mosaic
Theater Company added transgender
to its topical mix. In January, they
presented out playwright Philip
‘Wig Out,’ ‘Los Otros’ among 2017 highlights
BY PATRICK FOLLIARD
RICK HAMMERLY, seen here with FELICIA CURRY, dedicated most of his year to directing with three
back-to-back, well-received local productions.
Dawkins “Charm” starring transgender
actor B’Ellana Duquesne as Mama, an
etiquette instructor in an urban LGBT
center. Dawkins drew inspiration from
Chicago’s real-life Mama Gloria Allen,
a transgender, African-American
woman who taught deportment to
low-income, transgender and often
homeless teens in Chicago.
And more recently Mosaic
T H EAT ER
PHOTO BY DJ COREY PHOTOGRAPHY
presented “Draw the Circle,” Mashuq
Mushtaq Deen’s one-man show
recounting his tricky, real life transition
from female to male in a traditional
Muslim-American family.
For some out artists, 2017 was a time
for taking chances and exploring new
directions. Celebrated local actor Holly
Twyford sang in her first musical. As
the middle-aged stage star Desiree
Armfeldt in Signature Theatre’s sublime
production of Stephen Sondheim’s
“A Little Night Musical,” she dazzled
audiences with her heartfelt and
revelatory rendition of the show’s
standard “Send In The Clowns.”
Rick Hammerly dedicated the
year to directing. Best known for his
Helen Hayes Award-winning turn as
the titular transgender heroine in
Signature’s production of the rock
musical “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,”
Hammerly says, “This year I decided
that if I wanted people to think of me as
anything other than Hedwig, I needed
to step it up and show people what I’m
interested in, and that’s directing.”
From summer through early winter,
he directed three well-reviewed
plays back to back: a delightful youth
production titled “Junie B. Jones Is
Not A Crook” at Adventure Theatre
MTC; British playwright Cordelia
Lynn’s “Lela & Co.” at Factory 449
(where Hammerly is artistic producing
director) showcasing the dramatic
prowess of his colleague and friend
Felicia Curry in an intense but optimistic
look at cross-border human trafficking
and how male relatives are usually
complicit in such situations; and lastly
WSC Bard’s “Emilie: La Marquise Du
Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight,”
a smart comedy penned by prolific
playwright Lauren Gunderson.
“Each production was my vision of
the play and directorially that’s exactly
you want. Directing has been incredibly
gratifying and currently it’s where I find
the most satisfaction. That’s not to say
that I’m leaving the stage.”
Hammerly closed out the year by
once again donning his fat suit and
playing goodhearted Mr. Fezziwig in
Ford’s Theatre’s annual production of
“A Christmas Carol.” And looking
forward he’s slated to assistant
direct Ford’s “Jefferson’s Gardens,”
an exploration of contradictions
between our founding fathers’
ideals and the realities of freedom in
America. For spring, he’s cast to play
mature drag queen Miss Tracy Mills in
Round House Theatre’s production of
playwright Matthew Lopez’s comedy
“The Legend of Georgia McBride” to
be staged by Tom Story, another out
actor who also directs.
 FILM DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 3 1
The year of ‘Wonder Woman’
Big-budget spectacular bookended with insightful story of its creator ‘Professor Marston’
It was a very good year for movies,
especially for queer movies large and small.
In a very competitive field, the best
LGBT movie of 2017 was “Professor
Marston and the Wonder Women.”
Directed by the amazing Angela
Robinson (an out and proud woman of
color), the film explores the real-world
origins of the iconic Wonder Woman
character. Marston was involved in
a polyamorous relationship with
two women and drew on both their
relationship and his controversial
theories about submission and
domination to create the classic comic
book. Robinson explores their love
with great sensitivity and eroticism
and without sensationalism and also
celebrates the power of creativity and
intellectual curiosity.
Paired with that, the most notable
mainstream movie of the year
(although not necessarily the best)
was “Wonder Woman.” Even before
the Weinstein scandal and related
revelations rocked Hollywood, Patty
Jenkins and her team made huge
strides for women, setting box office
records and creating a powerful
female superhero who is both
commanding and caring. Gal Gadot
proved to be a worthy successor to
LGBT ally extraordinaire Lynda Carter.
Standouts among the other big
LGBT releases were Terence Davies’
stirring “A Quiet Passion” with
Cynthia Nixon’s bold performance as
poet Emily Dickinson; “BPM;” “God’s
Own Country,” a worthy descendant
of “Brokeback Mountain”; Guillermo
Del Toro’s breathtaking “The Shape
of Water”; “Battle of the Sexes”;
“My Cousin Rachel” and, Todd
Haynes’ visionary masterwork
“Wonderstruck.” There was also, of
course, the somewhat disappointing
“Call Me by Your Name” which
featured finely layered performances
by Michael Stuhlbarg, Amira Casar
and Timothée Chalamet, a weak
performance by a miscast Armie
Hammer and uneven direction by
Luca Guadagnino.
It should also be noted that three
other big releases had some interesting
appearances by gay characters. The
cast of the wonderful “Lady Bird”
includes a gay character, but to say
BY BRIAN T. CARNEY
GAL GADOT as ‘Wonder Woman.’ She proved a worthy successor to LGBT ally Lynda Carter.
more would be a spoiler. Disney’s
live-action “Beauty and the Beast”
surprised audiences by outing LeFou,
who became Disney’s first openly gay
character. And, judging by the double
frame on the family ofrenda in the
stunning “Coco,” Tío Felipe and Tío
Oscar may be Miguel’s guncles.
Other notable LGBT releases
included “I Dream in Another
Language,” “Beach Rats,” “The
First Girl I Loved,” the Norwegian
psychological thriller “Thelma,” “After
Louie” with searing performances
from Alan Cumming and David Drake,
“My Friend Dahmer,” “Princess
Cyd,” “Tom of Finland,” “Signature
Move” by the dazzling triple threat
Fawzia Mizra, and “Dusk” by rising
trans director Jake Graf.
Among LGBT documentaries,
there’s the heartbreaking “Memories
of a Penitent Heart” by break-out
director Cecilia Aldarondo and the
searing “Whose Streets?” directed
by Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis,
along with “Strong Island,” “Major!”
and “Chavela.”
Some of the mainstream releases
worth remembering include
“Mudbound,” “The Florida Project,”
“Beatriz at Dinner,” “Brigsby Bear,”
“Patti Cake$,” “The Big Sick,” “The
PHOTO COURTESY WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT
Sense of an Ending” with magnificent
performances by Jim Broadbent
and Charlotte Rampling, and the
thoughtful and visually inventive “War
for the Planet of the Apes.”
LGBT audiences in Washington are
fortunate to have several presenters
that are champions of queer
filmmakers. The Avalon, which hosted
the D.C. premiere of the new cult
classic “A Very Sordid Wedding,”
the Landmark Theatres (the E Street
Cinema, the Atlantic Plumbing
Cinema, the Bethesda Row Cinema
and the West End Cinema) and the
Angelikas (the Pop-Up at Union
Market and the Mosaic in Fairfax) all
present mainstream releases along
with great indie movies.
There are also great film festivals
all over the region, including D.C.’s
legendary Reel Affirmations, AFI Docs,
the Maryland Film Festival in its new
home at the wonderfully refurbished
Parkway Theatre, the Annapolis Film
Festival, the D.C. Independent Film
Festival, the Rosebud Festival, the
wide-ranging Washington Jewish
Film Festival and the acclaimed
Middleburg Film Festival. There’s also
the internationally renowned D.C.
Shorts, which this year brought area
audiences such treasures as “Toys,”
Amanda Quaid’s genderqueer marvel
of stop-action animation, and “The
Whole World,” a moving story of love
and family by talented Spanish artist
Julián Quintanilla.
The AFI Silver Theatre has also
been an oasis. Throughout the year its
programmers host the latest indie movies,
well-crafted retrospectives of Hollywood
and global classics, and ground-breaking
international film festivals, highlighting
the work of queer artists throughout all of
their rich offerings.
A few final items to wrap up the year:
A shout out to film restorers who are
bringing queer classics back to their
original luster. This year, the Cohen
Media Collection released restored
movies from the Merchant Ivory library,
including the gay classic “Maurice.”
Late last year, they released a
lush restoration of Julie Dash’s
revolutionary “Daughters of the
Dust” and 13 Gen released a restored
print of Cheryl Dunye’s delightful
ground-breaking mockumentary
“The Watermelon Woman.”
A spotlight on a fascinating trend:
women gone wild. “Girls Trip,” “Bad
Mom’s Christmas,” “Snatched”
and “Rough Night” all explored
the cinematic appeal of female
misbehavior and the challenge of
blending comedy, raunchiness and
sentimentality. “Rough Night” even
included several unruly gay, lesbian
and bisexual characters.
A word on late arrivals. While D.C. is
getting more notice from Hollywood
studios, some movies still get here
after the flurry of year-end releases in
New York and Los Angeles. This year’s
late treats will include “Phantom
Thread,” “Film Stars Don’t Die in
Liverpool,” “I, Tonya” “Hello, Again”
and, hopefully, “The Current War.”
There’s also “A Fantastic Woman”
starring trans actress Daniele Vega as a
trans woman whose world is torn apart
when her boyfriend suddenly dies.
And finally, some coming
attractions. Follow the Blade on
Facebook and Twitter (@WashBlade)
for the 2017 “Top Ten” from Blade film
critic Brian T. Carney (@BTCarney) and
the Dorian Awards (@DorianAwards)
from GALECA (The Society of LGBTQ
Entertainment Critics).
 32 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
The album as art form
It’s been such a shell-shocking year
in so many ways that the luxury of
being diverted by artists who continue
to create richly inspired new music is
perhaps more important than ever.
You wouldn’t know it by looking at the
dreadfully malnourished pop charts,
but 2017 yielded a long list of superb
new albums.  in their 20s during their “heyday” and
The 10 (well, make that 12 actually)
albums listed below are among
those that must not be lost in the
cacophony of a constant stream of
music and endless other information
bombarding us. Each album
reinforces the certainty that music is
for catharsis and healing as much as
for entertainment, and this process
manifests itself in wildly diverse styles
and voices. All have substantial LGBT
followings as the lines between gay
and straight acts becomes increasingly
a non-issue for music fans.  perfectly described by its title, much
10. Ride
‘The Weather Diaries’/
Slowdive ‘Slowdive’
Yeah, it’s cheating, but it’s impossible
to choose between these superb
comebacks by two of the cornerstone
bands of the ‘90s “shoegaze” sub-
genre: Ride’s first album in 21 years
and the first for Slowdive in 22.
“Slowdive” is perhaps more in line
with the narcotic rock dreaminess
for which the band is known, while
“The Weather Diaries” is spikier and
explores a wider palette of sonic
space. Despite being pigeonholed
with a lazy and meaningless label
(“shoegaze” is almost as annoying as
“grunge” or “Britpop”), the albums are
quite different. Both have an added
poignancy and world-weariness,
perhaps inevitable for artists who were
are now in the upper-reaches of their
40s. Still, both bands are obviously
fully invested in the new material and
the songs glow with unmistakable
inspiration and intensity.  songs, but there’s a gravitas and
9. Kehlani
‘SweetSexySavage’
This year was dreadful for pop music
overall, but “SweetSexySavage,” the
sleek and bold debut by Kehlani, is
an obvious exception. The album is
the same as TLC’s “CrazySexyCool”
two decades earlier. Kehlani is a
talented and versatile singer, able
to deliver a wicked edge when she
chooses. She merges pop, soul, EDM
and hip-hop vibes on songs that show
off the power of her voice (“Piece of
Mind,” for instance) and range from
doggedly defiant (“Undercover”) to
achingly vulnerable (“Advice”). The
hit single “CRZY” could be a younger
and more fiercely untamed version
of Rihanna. At only 22, Kehlani’s
debut is the kind of triumph on
which a massively successful career
can be built.  some lost corner of space. The tracks
8. Ryan Adams
‘Prisoner’
Always prolific and restless, Ryan
Adams has settled into what might
be the finest sustained groove of his
career. His self-titled 2014 release was
his best in a decade (and perhaps
his career peak so far), and his first
collection of original material since
then is almost as good. “Prisoner”
shows Adams continuing a seemingly
endless ability to churn out great
grittiness borne from experience that
his early-career classics “Gold” and
“Heartbreaker” lack. Emotions are raw
and close to the bone on “Prisoner,”
with a garage-rock sensibility
somewhat reminiscent of early Tom
Petty & the Heartbreakers.  for “Aromanticism.” It’s always been
7. Moon Duo
‘Occult Architecture
Volumes 1 and 2’
The pairing of Wooden Shjips
guitarist Ripley Johnson with
keyboardist Sanae Yamada as Moon
Duo continues to work magic with
two thematically connected albums
released several months apart. The two
volumes of “Occult Architecture” are
zoned-out psychedelic bliss, music for
late at night when the haze of smoke is
so thick the stereo lights might as well
be blurry red eyes staring out from
MU S I C
are long, trippy and resplendently
beautiful. They are also timeless:
Moon Duo’s hypnotic rhythms, rich
layers of dreamy guitar and keyboard,
and sinuous melodies travel from the
late ‘60s, weave through the ‘70s into
the present and back again. Put it on
for any random music aficionado and
ask what year it was released, you’re
liable to get guesses of any year from
1968 through … 2017? Yeah, we still
need excursions into hazy psychedelic
dreamland to escape the sometimes
rotten stench of reality and Moon Duo
provides the perfect vehicle. 
6. Moses Sumney
‘Aromanticism’
Maybe it’s the year, or generation,
mythology that one must attach to
another human to attain happiness,
although that angle isn’t often
explored in popular music. Of course,
it’s hard to even put that kind of
label on Sumney’s work. His debut
“Aromanticism” exists in a gauzy
connective dimension that touches on
sweet soul, jazz, electronica, orchestral
and folk — kinda. Sumney never really
lands on any of these labels, but rather
hints and swirls like a glittery mist just
out of reach and firmly in his own
realm. Sumney’s sublime voice, often
presented in an exquisite falsetto,
is the human anchor that wraps the
ethereal sounds of his imagination
around a heart trying to function
 MUSIC
Dismal year for pop yields several wildly creative sonic tapestries
alone in a culture that typically views
such a state as naturally unfulfilling
and incomplete. “Aromanticism” is
as stunning a collection of decidedly
unromantic yet life-affirming songs as
you’re likely to ever hear.  not all weepy maudlin ballads, though,
5. The National
‘Sleep Well Beast’
Cerebral but also soul-baringly
real, there are few bands that tap so
convincingly into the human experience
as the National. The wounded baritone
of vocalist Matt Berninger is often
whispery and half-spoken, somewhat
akin to Lou Reed. There is no more
wrenching and honest a periscope
directly into a soul’s internal monologue
as the stream-of-conscious “Walk it
Back.” On the tense title-track, Berninger
croaks out in jaded melancholy but, as
always, never allows himself to break.
Stripped down electronic-tinged rock
with plenty of space for the sounds to
breathe, “Sleep Well Beast” is the latest
top-notch offering by a band that for all
their acclaim still flies under the radar. But
then, given the unflinching introspection
of their music and the time and repeated
listens required to truly unravel it, they
could hardly fly any other way.  sparked with sonic flourishes in every
4. Margo Price
‘All American Made’
Following her outstanding 2016
debut “Midwestern Farmer’s Daughter,”
Margo Price digs even deeper into
BY CHRIS GERARD
the heartland on “All American Made.”
Although generally defined as a
country singer, Price incorporates a
variety of flavors into her gritty and
deeply felt studies of life and love. It’s
with rave-ups like the opener “Don’t Say
It” channeling the dynamic charm of
Dolly Parton with the steely-eyed vision
of the great Lucinda Williams. Price’s
voice is fresh and disarming and there
is always more there than first meets the
ear. “All American Made” is loaded with
piercing observations on modern life
despite its sometimes breezy nature.
Price is a first-rate songwriter, able to
express poignancy while still tappin’ the
toes when she feels like it.  electro-rock assaults. Complex, tense
3. Thundercat
‘Drunk’
Stephen Bruner aka Thundercat
showcases his razor-sharp wit,
dextrous musical versatility and
boundless imagination on “Drunk,” his
third and by far most accomplished
release. “Drunk” is a bracing marriage
of hip-hop, jazz and electronic
elements expressed through song
snippets with soulful melodies
direction. Some of his collaborators
include A-listers with whom he’s
worked before (Kendrick Lamar, Flying
Lotus and Kamasi Washington to
name a few) and some less expected
names (Michael McDonald and Kenny
Loggins). “Drunk” is bold but not
DE C EMB ER 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 3 3
overbearing, colorful but dreamy and
pleasantly chill. It’s an epic 23-track
midnight mix-tape cobbled together
by an intuitively talented artist that
will indeed have the listener drunk on
sound by the end.  as it may be his finest work yet.
2. Algiers
‘The Underside of Power’
It’s a tall order to follow a debut as
good as Algiers’ self-titled 2015 release,
but their second album “The Underside
of Power” is a steamroller of human
angst, raging against the machine not
in slogans or cliches but with viscerally
gripping and emotionally charged
and defiantly in-your-face, Algiers
doesn’t hold back for a second.
Fortunately they have the boundless
talent and innovation to present their
dystopian visions with enough manic
energy to reach out of the speakers and
physically shake the listener into action.
“The Underside of Power” is audacious
and experimental electronic rock that
sounds exactly like much of 2017 has
felt. Now do something.   you are indeed reading fake news, but
1. LCD Soundsystem
‘American Dream’
“American Dream” is a very different
album than Algiers’ but it sounds like
2017 as well, albeit different aspects
through a different prism. James
Murphy had famously retired LCD
Soundsystem, concluding with an epic
farewell show turned into a box set,
so his announcement of a return was
met with some degree of cynicism.
“American Dream” shows conclusively
that Murphy made the right decision,
 
Murphy operates via long electronic
grooves that echo the hypnotic
rhythms of Talking Heads’ “Remain in
Light” while seamlessly appropriating
from sources like alt-rock and disco,
among others. “American Dream” is
a sharp collection of sardonic pop,
alternately melancholy and defiant.
Murphy presents a different kind of
struggle: the bubbling uncertainty
that dominates our reality, the pent-up
anger riddled with a gnawing fear that
perhaps things really are too late and
the bad guys have won. 
Lest that sound like a misery we can
achieve simply by reading the day’s
news, Murphy sets the percolating
unease to a consistently thrilling and
inventive feast for the ears, surprising
and ingeniously constructed.
Listening to “American Dream” feels
like waking up and wanting to believe
the pulsing anxiety building in the pit
of your stomach tells you that it’s all
very real. It’s no American dream at all. 
We are untethered in a strange land
with no maps to find our way, but hey,
at least we can shuffle off into oblivion
jamming to funky airtight grooves that
wrap around our brains as tightly as
Paul Ryan’s chokehold on the throats
of the 99 percent.
 34 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
Trust me on this: when you read
more than 300 books a year, you come
across some that are not so good.
Thankfully, you come across more
of them that are good, great, or even
stellar. Here’s my list of the best of 2017,
those things that you absolutely can not
miss, the books you should want in your
hands now, in no certain order.
FICTION:
Anyone who’s read the “Little House
on the Prairie” books and loved them
will want to read “Caroline: Little
House, Revisited” by Sarah Miller.
This book imagines the thoughts and
dreams of Laura Ingalls’ mother; the
surprise is that Miller lets Caroline
Ingalls be frustrated, angry and real.
For those who need a good scare,
“The Last to See Me” by M Dressler is
what you need. Narrated by a woman
who’s dead/not dead, it’s a cat-and-
mouse tale of a “hunter” who comes
to rid an old mansion of a mischievous
spirit. But does he have the right spirit?
Gotta find out for yourself.
Page turners galore
‘Last to See Me,’ ‘The Trick’ among best novels of 2017
BY TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER
Everything about “The Trick” by
Emanuel Bergmann is going to captivate
you. Everything. It’s the story of an old man
who lived a full, tumultuous, dangerous
life; and a little boy who’s losing what he
loves best and decides to trust the most
unlikely person to fix it. It’s about love, most
of all, but it’s not sappy — it’s funny and
charming and you can’t miss it.
Here’s another chiller, but for a
different reason: “When the English
Fall” by David Williams. It’s the story
of the end of the world, told from the
point-of-view of a quiet, introspective
Amish man. It’s one of those “what if?”
novels, with a slight twist of the weird.
The ending will leave you squirming,
so what’s not to love?
And finally — a Christmas tale that
can be read any time: “The Deal of a
Lifetime” by Frederick Backman is the
story of a man who hates Christmas
because of all the horrible things that
have happened in his life. What would
he give to make the holiday better?
Read this under-70-page book but
bring the tissues. That is all.
Bonus: “One Good Mama Bone”
by Bren McClain and “The Ada
Decades” by Paula Martinac were
close runners-up. The first is about a
mother’s love; the second is a look at
history through the eyes of two lesbian
women. Both are worth a second look.
NON-FICTION:
Have you ever wondered where
your feet have been? That may be an
odd question, until you’ve read “The
Ground Beneath Us” by Paul Bogard.
Indeed, this book is about dirt but
that’s not all: you’ll read what that dirt
consists of, what else is down there, how
scientists find fossils and remains, what
keeps our ground stable (or doesn’t)
and what comes from what’s below.
There never seems to be an end to
the ubiquitous Hollywood biography,
but “Hank & Jim: the Fifty-Year
Friendship of Henry Fonda and
James Stewart” by Scott Eyman is a
keeper. It’s warm and funny, but also
very sad and poignant. This book
will give you lots of insight, not only
to these two stars and their families,
BOOKS
but also how Hollywood used to work
back in its heyday.
For the reader who loves a cheer-
worthy story, “Never Caught” by
Erica Armstrong Dumbar is the story
of Oney, who was owned by George
Washington. Through a series of
laws, Washington tried to keep her
enslaved but she was smarter than he
thought. Not only did she escape, but
she stayed free right beneath his nose.
It’s a tale that will make you outraged,
but it’ll also amaze you.
Here’s a surprise: “Scores” by Michael
D. Blutrich. It’s the true story of a gay man
who ran his New York City nightclub
with help from the Italian mafia. When
he was arrested for something totally
unrelated, he decided to work with
authorities to shut the mob down. Just a
little bit dangerous? Yep, and a rompish
can’t-miss, too.
Another pleasant surprise was “The
Long Haul” by Finn Murphy. It’s a slice-
of-life look at over-the-road trucking,
including some of those kinds of
stories you’d ask a trucker, if you could.
For the curious, it’s a must-have.
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 3 5

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—THE WASHINGTON POST

Family, a funeral, and an uncertain future—a gently

comic play about the ties we use to bind ourselves to others.

昀愀挀攀戀漀漀欀⸀挀漀洀⼀琀栀攀挀爀攀眀挀氀甀戀 ㄀㌀㈀㄀ ㄀㐀琀栀 猀琀 一圀 202.332.3300 | STUDIOTHEATRE.ORG

 36 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
The LGBT sports community in the
Washington metro area has continued
to thrive through the leadership skills
of each respective team. In 2017,
about 25 LGBT-based teams that
represent a diverse cross-section of
the LGBT community competed in
locally hosted leagues along with
tournaments around the world.
The Capital Tennis Association
launched a free Beginner’s Basics
program for members to learn basic
skills and techniques. In September
they hosted Capital Classic XXV and
in addition, offered four seasons of
league play. They picked up their
third straight win at the Atlantic Cup in
October defeating teams from Boston,
New York and Philadelphia. Their
players are also competing globally
in other tournaments on the Gay and
Lesbian Tennis Alliance world tour.
The D.C. Gay Flag Football League
completed seasons 14 and 15 in
Pride at play
Wetskins, Triangles and more enjoy banner year
BY KEVIN MAJOROS
Stonewall Climbing was one of the new LGBT sports leagues to debut in the region this year.
2017 with close to 300 players on 20
teams. Their travel teams contested in
tournaments in Chicago and Rehoboth
Beach along with Gay Bowl in Boston.
The Federal Triangles Soccer Club
hosted another successful season
of the Summer of Freedom Soccer
League along with competing in other
District leagues and tournament play.
The Washington Wetskins water
polo team hosted the Washington
Wetskins Fall Invitational in October
at the Takoma Aquatic Center and
welcomed 12 teams from the Eastern
Seaboard. They also traveled to
multiple tournaments including the
International Gay & Lesbian Aquatics
World Championships in Miami.
The Chesapeake and Potomac
Softball League hosted its biggest
MAGIC tournament in July at
Watkins Regional Park with 44 teams
participating. At the ASANA Softball
World Series in Austin, one of their
S P O RT I N ’ I N D.C .
PHOTO COURTESY STONEWALL CLIMBING
women’s teams notched third place
and one of their master’s men’s teams
took third place in their division at
the Gay Softball World Series in
Portland. The CAPS just returned from
the Bourbon Street Classic in New
Orleans.
The D.C. Sentinels basketball team
traveled to tournaments in Minneapolis
and Philadelphia. Their weekly pick-up
games continue along with the launch
of the next season of the Washington
D.C. Gay Basketball League.
The Stonewall Sports umbrella
organization continues to host play
through Stonewall Kickball, Stonewall
Dodgeball, Stonewall Bocce, Stonewall
Climbing, Stonewall Billiards and
Stonewall Yoga. The fourth annual
Stonewall Sports National Tournament
was held in July at locations throughout
D.C. including the National Mall.
The District of Columbia Aquatics
Club traveled to Miami in May
where they won 171 medals at the
International Gay & Lesbian Aquatics
World Championships. In October
they hosted more than 100 swimmers
at the Columbus Day Classic at Wilson
Aquatic Center.
All three of the local rugby teams,
Washington Scandals, Washington
Renegades and the Baltimore
Flamingos, are playing in USA Rugby’s
Mid-Atlantic Senior Men’s Division
IV conference. They are also playing
in tournaments and will travel to the
Bingham Cup in Amsterdam in 2018.
Along with their successes at out-
of-town tournaments, many of the
teams hosted their own tournaments
in D.C. and ran their own leagues.
Registrations for new seasons will
begin for many of the clubs in January.
The LGBT sports community of D.C.
continues to evolve and this year’s
new additions included Stonewall
Climbing and Rogue Darts.
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 3 7
 38 • DECEM B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7
Should old acquaintance be forgot …
The Yards (355 Water St., S.E.)
presents a family-friendly countdown
from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Kids can enjoy a
trackless train ride through the Yards,
face painting, balloon artistry, music
and more. Admission is free. For more
details, visit theyardsdc.com.
Xavier Entertainment hosts New
Years Eve Time Square, a gay men’s
New Year’s Eve party, at Karma DC
(2221 Adams Pl., N.E.) from 10 p.m.-
4 a.m. There will be two DJs, live
entertainment and a complimentary
champagne toast. General admission
tickets are $20. VIP tickets are $40
and include VIP cutline entry all night,
entry to the VIP section, a light buffet
and coat check. For more information,
visit xavierpartydc.com.
Town (2009 8th St., N.W.) hosts a New
Year’s Eve party at 9 p.m. Trixie Mattel,
Tatianna, Banaka and Riley Knoxx will
perform in the drag show at 9:30 p.m.
Lena Lotts hosts the show. Tickets are
$35. Guests not attending the party will
be allowed into the club at 11 p.m. DJ
Ed Bailey and DJ Joe Gauthreaux will
play music upstairs. Admission for the
after the show is $25. For more details,
visit towndc.com.
The Qrew and Tagg Magazine
host Cosmic Q Year’s Eve, a ladies
New Year’s Eve party, at Lucky Strike
(701 7th St., N.W.) from 10 p.m.-2
a.m. DJ Jai Syncere and DJ Tezrah
will spin tracks all night. There will
be gift bags for the first 150 people,
a complimentary champagne toast,
free food, happy hour specials, free
D.C. Brau Beer and games. General
admission tickets are $25 and include
a free buffet from 10-11 p.m. and
champagne toast. VIP tables are
$385 and include four tickets, buffet,
one bottle or beer tower, bottomless
spinach/salsa dip and tortilla chips
and champagne toast. The Ultimate
VIP Package includes the tickets, two
reserved bowling lanes, an exclusive
VIP lounge, complimentary bottle of
red wine and everything else in the VIP
table package. For more information,
visit taggmagazine.com/nye.
BKE hosts three New Year’s Eve
parties this year. First is the New Year’s
Eve Fashion Gala at the St. Gregory
Hotel (2033 M St., N.W.) from 9 p.m.-3
a.m. Festivities begin at 9 p.m. with a live
New Year’s Eve party options abound in D.C. and beyond
BY MARIAH COOPER
mcooper@washblade.com
Who will BANAKA be kissing to ring in 2018? Find out at Town on Dec. 31.
band performing in the lobby. Guests
will be greeted with a complimentary
glass of Prosecco and the opportunity
to take red carpet photos with fashion
models wearing outfits featuring local
designer brands. The ballroom opens
at 10 p.m. for the party with music
from DJ Vito Lee. Individual tickets are
$54 and includes two complimentary
glasses of Prosecco, one on the red
carpet and one at midnight. The dinner
package is $159 and includes a three-
course dinner, a complimentary glass
of Prosecco and a complimentary
midnight toast. Couples dinner and VIP
hotel suite package is $150 and offers a
three-course dinner, luxury hotel suite,
complimentary bottle of Prosecco in
room, two glasses of complimentary
sparkling wine with dinner and New
Year’s Day brunch for two.
Black Tie New Year’s Eve Gala
will be at the Washington Marriott
Wardman Park (2660 Woodley Rd.,
N.W.) from 7:30 p.m.-1:30 a.m. Each
ballroom will represent an international
DJ with music entertainment including
DJs, a jazz orchestra, Latin salsa band,
N EW Y EA R’ S EV E
WASHINGTON BLADE FILE PHOTO BY PETE EXIS
Caribbean island band and an Irish
band. There will be an open bar, two
midnight balloon drops, karaoke and
party favors. Presidential tickets are
$249 and offer 7:30 p.m. admission,
a cocktail reception and appetizers
and a three-course sit-down dinner
with dessert buffet. Ambassador
Level tickets are $205 and offer the
dinner and dessert buffet with 9 p.m.
admission. Post-dinner admission is
$110 and gives access to the party.
Dinner not included.
New Year’s Eve at the Pandora
Seafood House and Bar (36 Maryland
Ave., Rockville, Md.) is from 6 p.m.-2
a.m. Tickets are $128.74 for the three-
course dinner and four-hour open bar.
Tickets are $70.68 for just the open
bar. Admission is $33.72 for entry
with cash bar and a midnight toast.
For information on all BKE events, visit
facebook.com/eventsbke.
Black Cat (1811 14th St., N.W.)
hosts its New Year’s Eve Ball at 7 p.m.
Peaches O’Dell & Her Orchestra and
Tony Anthony & His Malvivants will
perform on the main stage. DJ Dredd
will spin tracks on the backstage.
Tickets are $30. For more details, visit
blackcatdc.com.
Rock and Roll Hotel (1353 H St., N.E.)
presents New Year’s Eve Blowout at 8
p.m. with an all night open bar, limited
appetizers and hors d’oeuvres. DJs
will play on the first and second floor.
Tickets are $85 in advance and $100
day of show. For more information, visit
rockandrollhoteldc.com.
Lindy Promotions hosts its New
Year’s Eve party at the Washington Hilton
(1919 Connecticut Ave., N.W.) at 9 p.m.
EDM DJ Vice will perform. There will be
a five-hour premium open bar, dinner
buffet from 9-11 p.m., complimentary
party favors, champagne toast and a
balloon drop. General admission tickets
are $99. Premiere VIP Access tickets
are $119 and include an additional
30-minute open bar. VIP ticket packages
range from $139-159 and offer reserved
tables, early admission and an extra
30-minute open bar. For more details,
visit lindypromo.com.
Ziegfeld’s/Secrets (1824 Half
Street, S.W.) has a New Year’s Eve party
from 9 p.m.-4 a.m. featuring naked
dancers, party favors, champagne and
a cash balloon drop at midnight. For
more information, visit ziegfelds.com.
Flash (645 Florida Ave., N.W.) hosts
a New Year’s Eve party at 10 p.m.
featuring performances from Archie
Hamilton, Chez Damier, Eddie C,
M.A.N.D.Y., Matthew Dear, Punisher
and more. Tickets range from $50-60.
For more details, visit flashdc.com.
Decades (1219 Connecticut
Ave., N.W.) presents “Back II the
Future,” a retro gala, at 8 p.m. The
party will feature ‘80s music and a
complimentary bar from 8-9 p.m.
Tickets are $40. For more information,
visit decadesdc.com.
Lighthouse D.C. hosts Gatsby Gala,
a New Year’s Eve charity benefit, at
Josephine Butler Parks Center (2437
15th St., N.W.) from 8 p.m.-1 a.m.
All proceeds benefit homeless and
low-income families transitioning
to affordable housing. There will be
an open bar, food, a live jazz band,
swing lessons, dance and costume
competitions and more. Tickets start at
$121. For more details, visit facebook.
com/lighthousewdc.
W A SH I N GTO NB LAD E.C OM D E CE MBE R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 • 3 9

It’s Like Retirement, Only Better

Ingleside at Rock Creek and Ingleside at King Farm are now expanding your possibilities for engaged
retirement living. Creekside at Ingleside at Rock Creek and Gardenside at Ingleside at King Farm, our
upcoming additions, represent even more choices for discerning people 62 years of age or better. Both
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Don’t miss your opportunity to take advantage of priority choice locations!

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3050 Military Road NW • Washington, DC 701 King Farm Blvd. • Rockville, MD
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Ingleside at King Farm is expanding with the proposed building of 121 new independent living apartments, 32 private assisted living memory support suites, and a Center for Healthy Living, subject to approval by the Maryland Department of Aging.
 40 • DECE M B E R 2 9 , 2 0 1 7 A RT S & C U LT U RE
THIS WEEK IN THE ARTS PROVIDED BY CULTURECAPITAL.COM
Eve: Dee Dee Bridgewater’s Memphis.
Dec 31. Kennedy Center.
kennedy-center.org.
FMMC: Strathmore Concert Series. Jan 4.
FMMC. Strathmore. fmmc.org.
Step Afrika!’s Magical Musical Holiday
Step Show. Thru Dec 30. Step Afrika!
at Atlas. stepafrika.org.
DC’s Finest (DooWop Cops). Dec 29.
Celtic Holiday. Dec 30. NYE Grand Foyer
Party. Dec 31. Vintage#18. Dec 31.
Millennium Stage.
kennedy-center.org.
Magnetic Fields: Expanding American Abstraction, 1960s to Today
Thru Jan 21. National Museum of Women in the Arts.
MUSEUMS
nmwa.org. Folger Shakespeare Library. Painting
Featuring evocative prints, unconventional sculptures, and monumental
paintings by twenty-one artists born between 1891 and 1981, Magnetic
Shakespeare. Thru Feb 11. folger.edu.
National Archives. Remembering
Fields places abstract works by multiple generations of black women Vietnam. Thru Jan 6.
artists in context with one another—and within the larger history of archivesfoundation.org.
abstract art—for the first time. Dumbarton Oaks. Highlights from
the Dumbarton Oaks Rare Book
First Night Alexandria Collection. Thru Jan 1. Ancient
Dec 31. Alexandria Waterfront. Textiles. Thru Mar 31. Women in
firstnightalexandria.org. Art. Thru Mar 31. Ancient Bronzes
Performers include traditional jazz & country bands and rising pop stars, in the Dumbarton Oaks Collections.
as well as clowns making balloon sculptures, face painters and magicians Thru Mar 31. Collecting in Paris and
for children. Events begin at 10:00 am and culminate with a fireworks London, 1912–1919. Thru Mar 31.
display at midnight. doaks.org.
Kreeger Museum. Reinstallation of the
Curve of Departure Permanent Collection. Thru Dec 31.
Thru Jan 7. Studio Theatre. kreegermuseum.org.
studiotheatre.org. Library of Congress. Drawing Justice:
The night before a funeral, family members gather in a single hotel room The Art of Courtroom Illustration.
in New Mexico, shuffling sleeping arrangements, dealing with absent Thru Jan 31. Echoes of the Great War:
family members, and preparing for their uncertain futures. A play about American Experiences of World War
the moments you decide how much you will give to someone you owe I. Thru Jan 1. loc.gov.
nothing to. National Gallery of Art. In the Library:
Jost Amman and Sixteenth-
The Second City’s Twist Your Dickens Century Woodcut Illustration. Thru
Thru Dec 31. Kennedy Center. Jan 4. Bosch to Bloemaert: Early
kennedy-center.org. Netherlandish Drawings from the
The legendary comedy troupe brings its infamous improvisational skills Museum Boijmans van Beuningen,
and sketch comedy mastery to the timeless tale of Ebenezer Scrooge. Rotterdam. Thru Jan 7. Vermeer
and the Masters of Genre Painting:
PHOTO COURTESY OF NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WOMEN IN THE ARTS Inspiration and Rivalry. Thru Jan 21.
Edvard Munch: Color in Context. Thru
Jan 28. Posing for the Camera: Gifts
from Robert B. Menschel. Thru Jan
28. In the Tower: Anne Truitt. Thru Apr
THEATRE mosaictheater.org. 1. Jackson Pollock’s ‘Mural’. Thru Oct
An American in Paris. Thru Jan 7. The Annie. Thru Jan 7. Olney Theatre. 28. nga.gov.
Illusionists. Thru Jan 7. Kennedy olneytheatre.org. National Geographic. Wild: Michael
Center. kennedy-center.org. The Second City Presents Nothing to Lose Nichols. Thru Jan 12. Tomb of Christ.
A Christmas Carol. Thru Dec 31. Ford’s (But Our Chains). Thru Dec 31. Woolly Thru Aug 15. nglive.org.
Theatre. fords.org. Mammoth. woollymammoth.net. National Museum of Women in the Arts.
An Irish Carol. Thru Dec 31. Keegan H Street Comedy Night w/ ET (Stand-Up Inside the Dinner Party Studio. Thru
Theatre. keegantheatre.com. Comedy). Thru Feb 24. Jan 5. nmwa.org.
Crazy For You. Thru Jan 14. Signature Capital Laughs at Driftwood Kitchen. Riversdale House Museum. Riversdale
Theatre. sigtheatre.org. capitallaughs.com. By Candlelight. Dec 29. history.
The Last Night of Ballyhoo. Thru Dec 31. pgparks.com.
Theater J. theaterj.org.
Les Misérables. Thru Jan 7. National
MUSIC Smithsonian Anacostia Museum.
Gateways/Portales. Thru Jan 7.
Theatre. thenationaldc.org. New Year’s Eve at the Kennedy Center: anacostia.si.edu.
WVTF: Queens Girl in Africa. Jan 4-Feb Thee Phantom and The Illharmonic National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian.
4. Mosaic Theater Company. Atlas. Orchestra. Dec 31. A Jazz New Year’s The Face of Battle: Americans at War,
9/11 to Now. Thru Jan 28. Marlene
Dietrich: Dressed for the Image.
Thru Apr 15. One Life: Sylvia Plath.
Thru May 20. Antebellum Portraits by
Mathew Brady. Thru Jun 3. The Sweat
of Their Face: Portraying American
Workers. Thru Sep 3. National
Portrait Gallery - Recent Acquisitions.
Thru Nov 4. Portraits of the World:
Switzerland. Thru Nov 12. Celebrating
Fifty Years. Thru Jan 6. Lincoln’s
Contemporaries. Thru May 19.
npg.si.edu.
Woodrow Wilson House. The Ghost
Fleet of Mallows Bay. Thru Feb 28.
woodrowwilsonhouse.org.
GALLERIES
District Architecture Center. The AIA|DC
2017 Awards Show. Thru Jan 26.
aiadac.com.
gallery Neptune & Brown. Wolf
Kahn: Density and Transparency
in Monotypes. Thru Jan 6.
galleryneptunebrown.com.
Gallery Underground. This is America
- National Juried Art Exhibition. Thru
Dec 29. arlingtonartistsalliance.org.
Glen Echo Park. Holiday Art Show and
Sale. Thru Jan 7. glenechopark.org.
Goethe. German Jazz (Deutscher
Jazz). Thru Jan 26. goethe.de.
Hill Center. Michael Ford: HOMEPLACE.
Thru Dec 30. Joanathan Bessaci: Maps.
Thru Dec 30. Judith Peck: Gathering
Shards. Thru Dec 30. Scott Warren: World
Views. Thru Dec 30. Rachael Bohlander:
Art of Empowerment. Thru Dec 30.
Karin Edgett: Truth. Thru Dec 30. Charlie
Visconage: Cool Guy Alert! Jan 4-Feb 25.
Stitched: Stories told in Clay, Fiber, Textiles
and Paints. Jan 4-Feb 25. Capitol Hill Art
League Juried Invitational 2018. Jan 4-Feb
25. hillcenterdc.org.
JCCNV. Charitable Art | Omanoot
L’Tzedakah. Thru Jan 25. jccnv.org.
Korean Cultural Center DC. Two
Reflections: Korean and American Artists
Confront Humanity and Nature. Thru Jan
24. koreaculturedc.org.
Montpelier Arts Center. Portraits of US.
Thru Dec 31. Chloe Irla: Year One.
Thru Dec 31. Sushama Parikh. Thru
Dec 31. arts.pgparks.com.
Publick Playhouse. Michael Moses.
Thru Jan 19. arts.pgparks.com.
The Art League. Petite December.
Thru Jan 7. Darryl Halbrooks: Natura
Morta. Thru Jan 8. theartleague.org.
Waverly Street Gallery. Holiday
Art Show! Thru Jan 6.
waverlystreetgallery.com.
Zenith Sculpture Space. Black Artists of
Today: Reinventing Tomorrow! Thru
Jan 6. zenithgallery.com.
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bY mARIAH COOPER

RObINSON TO PREACH JAN. 7

Rev. Gene Robinson gives a sermon

at St. Thomas’ Parish (1810 16th St.,
N.W.) on Sunday, Jan. 7 at 9:30 a.m.
Robinson was the first openly gay
priest to be consecrated as bishop in a
Christian denomination. He resigned
as bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of
New Hampshire in 2013. After moving
to D.C., he became St Thomas’ Parish’s
bishop-in-residence.
For more details, visit stthomasdc.og.

“Les Miserables” at the National Theater.

PHOTO COURTESY NATIONAL THEATER

TODAY Gsus will play music. There will be TUESDAY, JAN. 2

Artechouse (1238 Maryland Ave.,
S.W.) presents “Imaginary World
of the Nutcracker” with multiple
admission times throughout the
day. The interactive installation
uses augmented reality to immerse
visitors in the “Imaginary World of
the Nutcracker.” Daytime admission
is from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. and is for all
ages. Adult tickets are $15. Child
tickets, for visitors under 12 years old,
are $8. Student, senior and military
tickets are $12. Evening admission is
from 5:30-11:30 p.m. and includes
access to cocktails and drinks at the
first augmented reality bar in the U.S.
Visitors must be 21 and over. Tickets
are $15 and do not include drinks. The
installation runs through Jan. 7. For
more details, visit artechouse.com.
The Men of Onyx celebrate Rod
McCoy, American Leatherman 2017,
at Green Lantern (1335 Green Ct.,
drink specials and prizes. Cover is $5.
For more information, visit blackcatdc.
com.
Town (2009 8th St., N.W.) hosts
CTRL: Sleigh Kween, a gay holiday
dance party, tonight at 10 p.m. DJ
Adam Koussari-Amin, DJ Jeff Prior
and DJ Devon Trotter will spin tracks.
Drag show starts at 10:30 p.m. Cover
is $15 from 10 p.m.-midnight and $12
after midnight. For more details, visit
towndc.com.
DC9 (1940 9th St., N.W.) hosts Y2K,
a dance party featuring music from
the early to mid 2000s, tonight at 10
p.m. DJ Basscamp will play artists like
Missy Elliot, Destiny’s Child, Mariah
Carey, Kylie Minogue, Britney Spears
and more. Cover is $5. For more
information, visit dcnine.cm.
SUNDAY, DEC. 31
Ford’s Theatre (511 10th St., N.W.)
The D.C. Center (2000 14th St., N.W.)
hosts its ”FUK!T Packing Party” from
7-9 p.m. tonight. For more details, visit
thedccenter.org or greenlanterndc.com.
Queer Women Working Through
Trauma, a support group, meets
today at the D.C. Center (2000 14th
St., N.W.) from 6-7 p.m. The group
helps individuals process trauma
by learning therapy techniques and
behavioral processing activities such
as art, deep breathing, stretching
and meditation. For more details, visit
thedccenter.org.
WEDNESDAY, JAN. 3
National Theatre (1321 Pennsylvania
Ave., N.W.) presents the classic musical
“Les Miserables” tonight at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets range from $73.75-118. The
show runs through Jan. 7. For more
information, visit thenationaldc.org. PHOTO bY SUSAN SHACTER; COURTESY TRICKSTER PRODUCTIONS

N.W.) tonight from 10 p.m.-2 a.m. presents “A Christmas Carol,”

There will be Jell-O shots, raffles,
S&M scenes and more. Proceeds will
benefit the American Leatherman
Travel Fund. For more information,
visit greenlanterndc.com.
SATURDAY, DEC. 30
The Black Cat (1811 14th St., N.W.)
hosts Invazion, a drag show and
party, tonight at 9 p.m. Performances
include Desiree Dik, Sextia N’Eight,
Jasmine Tea and Pussy Noir. There will
be one show at 10 p.m. and another
show at 11 p.m. DJ Teara Newhole
starring Craig Wallace as Ebenezer
Scrooge, today at 2 p.m. Tickets range
from $50-105. For more details and to
purchase tickets, visit fords.org.
MONDAY, JAN. 1
Busboys and Poets (2021 14th St.,
N.W.) hosts New Year’s Day Pajama
Brunch today from 9 a.m.-4 p.m.
Guests can wear pajamas to brunch.
There will be $5 mimosas and Bloody
Marys. For more information, visit
facebook.com/busboysandpoets.
THURSDAY, JAN. 4
Asian Queers United for Action and
Asian Pacific Islander Queer Society
D.C. host a support group for the
Asian and Pacific Islander Queer
Community at the D.C. Center (2000
14th St., N.W.) tonight at 7 p.m. For
more details, visit thedccneter.org.
The Kennedy Center (2700 F St.,
N.W.) presents the Tony Award-
winning musical “An American in
Paris” tonight at 7:30 p.m. The show
runs until Jan. 7. Tickets range from
$59-175.
OUT TV mAgICIAN TO PERfORm
Magician Michael Carbonaro
performs at DAR Constitution Hall
(1776 D St., N.W.) on Sunday, Dec. 31
at 7 p.m.
“Michael Carbonaro Live” brings
the TV series “The Carbonaro Effect”
to life on stage. Carbonaro, who’s gay,
will perform his illusions mixed with
audience interaction and video clips.
This is an all ages show. Tickets range
from $17-37.
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