The Chicago House, a social service agency that provides relief for homeless people impacted by HIV/AIDS, was able to book Clinton, who happened to be in town anyway for an event on the eighth. Clinton, who started the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative (CHAI) was no doubt an ideal choice to kick off the series and this crowd was thrilled to have him. He glowed as he entered the ballroom and delivered his trademark thumb gesture before taking the podium. As I gazed upon Clinton from the balcony where they placed the media, and where I gazed upon 1,000 plates of prime rib, fruit cups and cheesecake, I found myself straining to hear him several times, so please pardon the occasional paraphrasing in this post.

Clinton began by praising Chicago and noting that the Palmer House was both the place where he celebrated winning the Democratic nomination for presidency in 1992, and also offered up a touching anecdote about a rare picture he treasures of his father dining at the hotel decades ago. He acknowledged Veteran’s Day and used it as a segue into the tragic events at Fort Hood last week. Clinton talked of conflicts created by people and nations trying to protect their separate interests instead of coming together and uniting under common interests.

He described our health care system as unsustainable and noted that 85% of bankruptcies in this decade were generated by the health care crisis. He also stated that the rising health care costs were what crippled GM including the shocking figure that GM doles out $1,500 per car in health care costs while Toyota pays out just $100. He also warned of the dangers of government stimulus noting that Obama made the right decision at the time, but ultimately government’s job is to spark the private sector asserting that the ‘08 election was won the day Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy. “This election occurred on September 15, make no mistake about it.” Finally, Clinton tied in education and climate change, first praising Arne Duncan but also adding that every year since World War II, America has ranked #1 in the number of people with four year college degrees except for the last ten years when we dropped to #10.

But all of this was to drive home the point that no matter how much Congress and the President do to fix the nation, ultimately there will still be a gap between what the private sector can produce and what the government can provide. Hence the need for organizations like Chicago House. Clinton passionately extolled the virtues of social service agencies. “The rise of of a civil society is stunning,” he said as he talked of America’s one million foundations, half a million of which have sprung up since he took office in 1993.

Clinton directed comments toward the HIV/AIDS crisis and Chicago House, noting his own shame at the discriminatory policy that bars HIV positive people from entering the country (which Obama recently lifted). He also said that Chicago has the sixth largest HIV/AIDS problem in the country. “But you’re doing your job because you’re not the sixth largest city,” he said in a praiseworthy nod toward Chicago House and its efforts. He called us one of the best organized big cities in the world (although he’s obviously never ridden the CTA) and harked back to the beginning of his speech nicely by noting that every time folks invest in agencies like Chicago House, they’re putting their common interests above their individual ones.

As Clinton wound down he made a quip about Mad Men. “If I keep watching this program,” he mused, “Will I ever find a happy person?” His point was that the show, while enjoyable, serves a reminder of the mistreatment of blacks and women. Finally, Clinton hit it home with a couple-feel good aphorisms. “One of the things that makes life so rewarding is that people like us have the power to make a difference,” he said. “People betting against the U.S. will lose a lot of money.” Although we may take a while, “we finally get it right.”

In the opening sketch, for example, the fuss over gay marriage is brought front and center as a male couple in the Hawkeye state frets over the doldrums of domestic life. “I want the free rings, but not the baggage they bring,” one groom laments. The solution? Marry in Iowa for wedded bliss, but cross back over the Illinois border for bachelorhood.

In other sketches, Gayco points fun at gender reassignment surgery and its impact in the workplace, Anderson Cooper’s unwillingness to come out and the Daley Machine. It also takes swipes at FOX news and its claim to be fair and balanced as three news anchors wonder if Obama is turning our nation socialist, black and gay. Is this even a parody, you may wonder. It’s a thin line at best. But the show is funny mostly because GayCo has never had trouble making fun of the LGBTQA (LMNOP) community and all its foibles. In the best sketch of the evening, the infinite number of speeches given at gay rallies gets spoofed. “We’re here to represent the super cougar sub dom lesbian community!” one woman shouts through the megaphone as anxious protesters wait in vain to hit the streets.

While the show is unabashedly queer (but still straight accessible), educational and entertaining, it’s also not perfect. Audacity aims to spoof the broken promises made by president Obama, but is missing the man himself. Racial diversity has never been a GayCo strong suit. That’s not entirely their fault of course, out improvisers of color are probably lacking. But without one, the satire is limited.

Ultimately, fences are mended in Audacity. A finale finds a same-sex couple bonding with a group of Iowa women over ham balls. Who would’ve guessed that big, meaty balls would ultimately bring straight women and gay men together? No comment.

The Audacity of Nope plays Thursdays, Fridays and Saturday through December 5. Tickets are $20 and can be purchased at gayco.com.

The film begins during the roaring twenties with a figure named Henry Gerber (after whom Gerber/Hart Library is partially named) who, in 1924, chartered the first gay-rights organization in the United States, the Society for Human Rights. Although it disbanded shortly thereafter, it set the stage for gay visibility in the Midwest. Fast forward to 1928 and gay life flourished among the bohemians and artists in a neighborhood called Tower Town (what we now call Streeterville).

The 105-minute doc uses a digital map of Chicago to document the places where the LGBT community thrived, mostly in the form of seedy taprooms including Benny the Bum’s and Volli-ball on north Clark Street, the Patch in Calumet City and lesbian hangout Big Lou’s on North Avenue to name just a few. Pajak has rounded up a fascinating circle of people including the late Studs Terkel, activist Vernita Gray, the late Valerie Taylor and many others to illuminate the story of Chicago’s queer past. We learn, for example, that Chicago’s own leather granddaddy Chuck Renslow played a key part in the burgeoning physique pictorial magazines that thrived during the 1950s. We later see his foray into early gay erotica with giggle-worthy film titles like Rubdown and Forced Entry. We learn about the epicenter of black gay life at establishments like Omar’s and the racism gay blacks often faced (needing 4 to 5 pieces of I.D. to gain entry into white gay bars, for example), and we learn of the pioneering work of lesbian attorney Pearl Hart (the other surname in Gerber/Hart).

There’s much to enjoy here. The film comes alive during the 1960s when rampant bar raids and New York’s Stonewall riots eventually led to the formation of an organized gay civil-rights movement in Chicago. Pajak spends a robust amount of time interviewing the people at the center of the movement—which had its first public expression on June 28, 1970, when roughly 200 activists gathered in Bughouse Square (at Clark and Oak) and took to Michigan Avenue, declaring their rights for the first time in the Midwest.

Unfortunately, the documentary ends there. Given its running time, this seems fair enough, but I found myself wanting stories of the Belmont Rocks and the Rocks parties, the emergence of Lakeview and Andersonville as gay ghettos, the evolution of Pride, Mayor Daley’s outreach to the LGBT community and so much more.

Pajak appears in person at both screenings.

From Scooty & JoJo (i.e., Scott Bradley and Jonny Stax), the one-hour Carpenters Halloween works on conceit alone: a live staging of John Carpenter’s 1978 fright fest Halloween set to Carpenter tunes. That’s clever stroke No. 1. As audience members huddle around Mary’s tiny stage, the bar’s TVs play the film’s opening segment: The camera-as-young-Michael approaches the house where he dispatches his first victim—to the three-piece band’s soothing tones of “We’ve Only Just Begun.”

Clever stroke No. 2: just the right mix of campy cross-gender casting. A deadpan Bradley as Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode saunters around with ’70s-teen sass, flipping his Fawcett-era ’do. Clever stroke No. 3: All the adult figures are played by puppets. Spit and tape hold this happily slapdash endeavor together (the actors establish different locales by spinning some flimsy-looking flats, which look like they’ll topple over at any second).

Two caveats: First, the laugh factor depends a good deal on your familiarity with the original film; it’d be a funnier (and funner) evening with more stand-alone humor. Second, arrive early: Last year I saw this fringe hit from the back of the crowded bar and didn’t enjoy it half as much as I did from a seat up front. And, of course, an early arrival means more time to imbibe: You’ll want to get your camp buzz on by show time.

Not every partner production was on the exact schedule (my Twitter stream informed me that Trinity Rep’s reading in Providence was finished by the time both New York and Chicago were at intermission), but many theaters were waiting to stream a live preshow video feed from Tectonic’s reading at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. So many were trying to connect to the stream, apparently, that Lincoln Center’s bandwidth was under strain—hence Metzgar’s vamping, during which she invited About Face Youth Theatre member and Walter Payton College Prep student Scott Jaburek onstage to talk about what AFYT means to him. (The Chicago reading was a benefit for the Youth Theatre program, which was founded in direct response to Shepard’s death.)

Once the video was working, we watched the Lincoln Center evening’s host Glenn Close introduce Matthew’s mother, Judy Shepard, who’s become a tireless activist in the years since her son’s death. Metzgar noted earlier that she’d been in D.C. on Sunday for the National Equality March (as had some others in the Chicago audience), where Judy had been a featured speaker; President Obama, in his speech to the Human Rights Campaign on Saturday evening, tried to score a point by mentioning his meeting with Judy Shepard in the Oval Office. Judy talked briefly about the reverential way people speak to her about The Laramie Project before introducing Moisés Kaufman and the writers of Ten Years Later, Leigh Fondakowski, Stephen Belber, Greg Pierotti, Andy Paris and dramaturg Jimmy Maize, who explained the project’s (re)genesis and the multi-city debut’s inspiration by the Federal Theatre Project before turning it over to the local live productions.

Chicago’s top-notch cast included Mary Beth Fisher, Patrick Andrews, Stephen Louis Grush, Patricia Kane, Keith Neagle, Dael Orlandersmith (the reading was staged on the set of her current solo show, Stoop Stories), Tanya Saracho, Chris Sullivan and Eddie Torres, with Youth Theatre members Matt Farabee and Jeremy Harris. Andrews and Kane both returned from About Face’s all-star reading of the original Project last October, and picked up some of the same characters they tackled then.

Because it’s marked as “an epilogue,” I’d expected a relatively brief piece. Instead, Ten Years Later is a new full-length, two-act script, but it’s far from bloated. In the first act, the Tectonic writers revisit some of the memorable personalities from the original, including officer Reggie Fluty, the first responder at the crime scene (she’s now retired from the force) and Fireside Bar owner Matt Mickelson (who notes that he sold the bar, where Shepard was last seen with his killers Russell Henderson and Aaron McKinney, after his sales dropped from $850,000 in 1998 to under $50,000 in ’99).

Updates are relayed about signposts both physical—the fence that Shepard was lashed to is gone—and metaphorical: the struggle for domestic partner benefits at the University of Wyoming, the introduction of a “defense of marriage” constitutional amendment in the Wyoming legislature (defeated at the behest of Republicans, the play happily reports). Much is rightly made of attempts by residents to downplay or dismiss the event’s significance by labeling it a botched robbery or drug deal rather than a hate crime, in spite of the facts on record in the trial. According to the new play, this is largely attributable to a 2004 report by Elizabeth Vargas on ABC’s 20/20 that attempted to spin the crime as a meth binge gone wrong, essentially implicating Matthew Shepard in his own murder. In Ten Years Later, the investigating officers say they were duped by 20/20’s producers’ claims that they had no agenda in revisiting the case. (The PBS series In the Life took issue with the 20/20 report in a segment titled “Hindsight is 20/20,” downloadable here.)

The second act is structured around interviews with three subjects not directly represented in the original Project: Russell Henderson, Aaron McKinney and Judy Shepard. Tectonic’s Belber (portrayed here by Chris Sullivan) interviews Henderson (Keith Neagle), who pled guilty and expresses remorse; Pierotti (Patrick Andrews) questions McKinney (Stephen Louis Grush), who claims remorse for, in his words, “all the wrong reasons”: He’s sorry for Matthew’s parents and for his own father, but he says, “The night I did it, I did have hatred for homosexuals,” and of Judy Shepard: “Still, she never shuts up about it, and it’s been like ten years.”

Of a number of affecting, alarming or inspiring moments in Ten Years Later, the one that really kicked me in the gut came shortly after, when Kaufman, portrayed here by Eddie Torres, asked Judy Shepard, played by Mary Beth Fisher, if she’d heard they had interviewed McKinney this time. Fisher gave Judy’s words a wry, brittle twist as she replied something like, “Yes. I can’t wait to hear what he has to say this time.” I paraphrase because I was too gobsmacked to take notes as I realized that at approximately that very moment, the Lincoln Center attendees were watching an actor speak those words of Judy’s while the real Judy Shepard sat among them, having just heard McKinney’s heartless dismissal of her tenacity. Meanwhile Fisher-as-Judy went on to tell of a friend who’d recently asked her if it wasn’t time to “let him go”—”Aren’t you just keeping him alive?” And that, of course, is the point.

Tectonic conducted a live Q&A following the concurrent performances with questions submitted via SMS and Twitter. Tectonic continues to take questions to be eventually answered at community.laramieproject.org. You can submit queries via Twitter @LaramieQA or text to 40404, with the hashtag #laramie10.

In one two-hour show we got Barbarella-style sci-fi airline hostess (“Come into my World”), Stephen Sprouse-inspired ’80s acid-house flashback (“Shocked”), buff guys showering in a gym/bathhouse while Kylie sings on a pommel horse (“Spinning Around”), cheerleaders with marching-band horns (“Wow”), military chic (“Like a Drug”), Hollywood starlet on chaise lounge flanked by rococo gold hounds (“I’m a Diamond for YouWhite Diamond”), New Orleans brothel with Kylie in lingerie (a reworking of “Locomotion”) and occasional “Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore” and video wall interludes—the whole night opened with echoes of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

Kylie might be something of an unknown in American pop circles—and she’s never played here, so she was extra thankful and warm—even inviting a superfan on stage for a photo opp. Later, she and her leggy back-up singers joined together for an impromptu acapella by request.

She’s not above referencing the competition—or a Madonna video—the harlequins with eyepatches and vaguely S&Mish outfits struck a pose for a whispery vamp on “Vogue.” Truthfully, I found myself comparing the Kylie show to the last Mad-stravaganza I saw live and finding Kylie a helluva lot more fun—way more spontaneous for sure. Kylie can go campy or over-the-top without embarrassing herself or us—there’s a wink and a nudge in there somewhere—which makes the theatrical stuff work so well in small chunks. But all would have been for naught if Kylie couldn’t sing—which, up until last night, I wouldn’t have put much money on. The 41-year-old bounced back from breast cancer surgery and chemo to tour more than 21 countries last year—and has honed her vox, stage show, banter and occasional dancing and punched things up with live horns (prominently on the devastating “Two 2 Hearts”) and what sounded to my ears like a live set with some sequencing filling out the mix—there were no less than ten LCD screens in the sound booth, so someone was controlling sequenced rhythms.

Her enthusiastic gay Chicago fanbase was in full effect (one can only assume Boystown was quiet at 9pm) if a bit subdued—I spied only one full sailor costume, but otherwise it was couples of various ages, Euro, U.K., Aussie and Kiwi expats with a smattering of indie-pop types—plus glamour girls of all ages sating their curiosity.

Kylie knows when she’s got a good thing—in addition to her surefire hits like “In My Arms,” she dropped a tune from her upcoming album called, I think, “Better than Today,” which, oddly enough, was my favorite song of the night—its slow-motion, not-quite-funky disco came to an abrupt end with Kylie nonchalantly dropping the microphone stand on cue.

Kylie and band wrapped up her set with a funked-up “Kids” (originally sung with Robbie Williams but tonight with her two sidekick divas), “Your Disco Needs You” and “In My Arms,” before coming back for “Better the Devil You Know”—a slice of Eurovision cheese, then a big thank you—finally ending with a confetti shower and “Love At First Sight.” For most of us, it was literally first sight—and Kylie, as small as she is, made it count.

Photos: Amy Mokris

*Thanks to David Humphrey for song title corrections.

In Outrage, an exhilarating new film from director Kirby Dick (This Film is Not Yet Rated, Twist of Faith), the lives of closeted gay politicians are brought to light. It points to a number of Washington lawmakers including Florida governor Charlie Grist and former New York City mayor Ed Koch among others as examples of how closeted politicians damage both their own lives as well as that of gay and lesbians Americans. We spoke with Dick about the film’s impact so far. Outrage debuts on HBO on October 5.

Some critics noted that the film sets out to expose closeted lawmakers, but that isn’t at all what Outrage is about, is it?
Not at all. I was reporting on the hypocrisy of closeted politicians who vote anti-gay. This is something the gay press has been reporting on for 20 years. In fact, this film is built in large part on the work of the gay press, and they’ve been making the case very persuasively that this kind of hypocrisy is really damaging to gays and lesbians throughout the country. Audiences were completely taken aback by this information—even a majority of gay audiences—because the mainstream media hasn’t reported on this. I think this film has already gone a long way toward changing how this issue is reported on by the mainstream media.

The film was released theatrically last spring. What have been some of the responses you’ve heard so far?
I expected some people to be opposed to this kind of reporting. I haven’t had that happen in one single Q&A, and I think it’s a testament to the fact that the film makes a very strong case for reporting on closeted politicians who vote anti-gay. Also, what I found is that audiences seem to be very grateful. I have people line up just to shake my hand and say, “Thank you so much for making this film.” I think there was a real feeling that this is a story that just absolutely wasn’t being covered. It’s a very important story, and audiences are very grateful that this film is out there.

Were you surprised by any of the politicians outed in the film?
I guess the surprise came right at the beginning when I was in Washington, D.C., and people just started rattling off names. I said, “But there’s been no mainstream coverage of this and this issue of hypocrisy?” and people said, “No,” so I thought this was a perfect opportunity to make a film.

Was there a specific incident that acted as the catalyst for making this film?
It was August 2006, this is before the Mark Foley scandal and before Larry Craig, I was in Washington, D.C., and somebody mentioned, just in passing, that Karl Rove [who is not mentioned in the movie] was gay, and I did a double take. That would make a great film. I just started probing and then everything else came out about the closet in politics, and it was really at that point that it had everything going for it as a film. It was an urgent political issue in the way that it affected policy, it was psychologically very complex, and it was something the mainstream media had avoided covering for two decades. I had been working on another film at that time, hadn’t started production, and just put that aside and decided this is the film I want to make.

What was it like then, in the middle of filming this, having the Mark Foley and Larry Craig scandals unfold around you?
It was definitely helpful. It put the story on the map so that when the film came out people were ready for a more in-depth look at it. It made the film seem extremely current.

Were there closeted politicians you were following that you would’ve like to have included but you just couldn’t get enough information on them to make a credible case?
There were a number of politicians that I’m aware of that I strongly believe are closeted, that do vote anti-gay; I just didn’t feel like I had enough information to conclusively report on them in my film. What’s interesting is that people really keep these secrets for a long time. I’d talk to people who would have information and be very supportive of the film, seem to want to go on camera, and then when I’d get back in touch with them a few days later they’d had second thoughts. People were very afraid that either personally or in terms of their business, there’d be very serious repercussions. These politicians are very powerful, certainly within their district, and certainly within D.C., and people are very careful. Careers could be destroyed if people come forward and tell the truth.

Any response from people inside Washington about the film?
No. Classically, the way that politicians have dealt with this reporting is to ignore it. And this was for the most part no different. Ed Koch did come forward and say that he was outraged by Outrage. I have to say I appreciated the fact that he mentioned the title of the film twice in his comment.

Why does the media tacitly go along with this?
There’s a number of reasons. I think reporters, over the last decade in particularly, have wanted to report on this and the decisions have been made higher up not to report on this. Some of these journalistic outfits are afraid of turning off or offending readership by reporting in detail on issues that have to deal with homosexuality. Other [media outlets] have close relationships with these politicians and they feel like, why should they anger them or jeopardize their access to politicians by doing this kind of reporting. It’s the responsibility of the press to report on hypocrisy wherever they find it; they shouldn’t in any way limit or censor themselves.

Will this film really enact a change in dialogue among the public or will we let this tacit agreement of not talking about the issue continue?
No single film can really change things. It has influenced the press, and the press has influence over the public. But in another way, I think it influences people going into politics and people in politics. Many, many people who are gay and young and going into politics are going to see this film and they’re going to realize that it’s the wrong decision and very destructive personally and politically, and I think this film is going to influence that group of people. As a result of this, I think you’re going to see more people running as out politicians over the next generation.

Quite frankly, it’s about time someone introduced this legislation into the state senate, but with a stalled civil unions bill (HB-2234) sitting in the House Rules Committee since May (the legislation was initially introduced in 2007), her primary opponent, openly gay Jim Madigan is crying foul. His campaign offered this response: “Today’s ill-timed press conference by State Senator Steans demonstrates that she is more interested in pandering and politics than in doing the hard work of crafting a strategy and passing legislation…Not once, but twice State Representatives have introduced marriage equality bills in the Illinois House. Senator Steans did not sign on as a Senate sponsor of those marriage equality bills since she was appointed in February 2008.”

With two weeks left in the current legislation and a civil unions bill stalled elsewhere, this bill is unlikely to have much traction. It’s also true that District 7, which includes Andersonville, Ravenswood, Rogers Park, Lincoln Square, Uptown and other homo heavy hoods, might have Steans worrying about holding her seat. Is it wrong for her to court the LGBT vote? Not at all, but I don’t think we’ll see this bill passing anytime soon.

I’m no fan of local politics at the moment. Last weekend I attended a health care town hall at the Holiday Club on Sheridan Road. I arrived shortly after 11am along with a large handful of concerned folk, many of them seniors. By noon, we had packed the place to talk reform with local pols. Governor Quinn delivered an amiable speech, while Jan Schakowsky really rallied the troops and even promised a signed health care bill with a public option by year’s end. But the talk stopped there. It turns out that health care reform was just the hook. One after another, local and state politicians (including Steans) delivered their stump speeches on why we should elect or re-elect them in 2010. Health care turned into a platitude. No questions were allowed and no policy details were ever mentioned. It was politics as usual.

For example, the show kicked off with Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe arriving on stage in fetching black windbreakers with colored cubes covering their faces to sing Heart, a song that die hards will recall was meant to be submitted to Madonna to record, but ended up becoming a U.K. #1 for the Boys instead. As images of heart-shaped balloons flooded the giant screen behind him, Tennant, sounding as droll and bewitching as ever, belted out the song’s classic lines before segueing into new tracks Did You See Me Coming?, Pandemonium (which mixed in a few verses from Can You Forgive Her?) and Love, etc. from their newest album, Yes.

These tracks were fine of course, but the audience hardly seemed energetic until midway through “Building A Wall” (another new track) when the screen behind Tennant literally crumbled into a dozens and dozens of blocks that were then artfully incorporated into the rest of the show. This grand act of drama made for a nice transition into the great gay anthem “Go West,” a Village People cover and a major hit for PSB back in 1993. Here we saw finely tuned dancers Jazzercising away while Tennant sang about the gay migration westward (a typically recalcitrant Lowe remained perpetually in the shadows tinkering away on his computer and beating occasionally on drum machines).

“Two Divided by Zero” and “Why Don’t We Live Together?” featured rousing urban backdrops and the latter included joyful dancers dressed as skyscrapers alongside Tennant. Hits Brenda Lee’s “Always on My Mind” and “New York City Boy” took the energy level at the Chicago Theatre to new heights. A section devoted to ballads like “King’s Cross” and “Jealousy” proved less compelling, especially when male and female dancers played out a typically hetero normative domestic squabble as Tennant sang “Jealousy.”

The Pet Shop Boys were here to deliver their greatest hits. The show wound down with a string of chart and fan favorites including “Suburbia,” “Se A Vida E,” “It’s A Sin” (here the entire set and backup performers were drenched in lily white while Tennant alone wore black), “Being Boring” and “West End Girls.” Sure, the concert was a trip down memory lane for most, but it was one to which you could tap your feet.

The set:

1. More Than A Dream (instrumental)
2. Heart
3. Did You See Me Coming?
4. Pandemonium/Can You Forgive Her? (medley)
5. Love Etc.
6. Building A Wall (incorporating “Integral”)
7. Go West (incorporating “Paninaro” and “Opportunites (Let’s Make Lots Of Money)”)
8. Two Divided By Zero
9. Why Don’t We Live Together? (incorporating “Left To My Own Devices”)
10. Always On My Mind
11. New York City Boy
12. Closer To Heaven (truncated)
13. Left To My Own Devices
14. Do I Have To?
15. King’s Cross
16. The Way It Used To Be
17. Jealousy
18. Suburbia
19. All Over The World
20. Se A Vida É (That’s The Way Life Is)
21. Viva La Vida (Coldplay cover incorporating “Discoteca” and “Domino Dancing”)
22. It’s A Sin
23. Being Boring
24. West End Girls