Ryan Phillippe’s Gay Make Out Scene In ’54’ Will Soon Be Available For Your Viewing Pleasure

Meyer, Phillippe, Christopher at the April 24 San Francisco screening, photo credit: Christopher’s Facebook page

Good things come to those who wait patiently 17 years. After nearly two decades, Ryan Phillippe fans will finally get to see the heartthrob make out with Breckin Meyer in 54, the 1998 drama about the notorious New York City hotspot when it becomes available on Digital HD on June 2.

Originally, director Mark Christopher’s film was intended as a dark, sexy Saturday Night Fever-meets-Boogie Nights-esque tale of an ambitious Jersey boy (Phillippe) who tangles with a couple (Breckin Meyer, Salma Heyek) while catching the eye of Steve Rubell (Mike Myers), a real-life character who co-owned the famed nightclub, that wouldn’t stint on the drugs and sex so synonymous with the late-1970s party scene. Unfortunately, the film was heavily edited before its theatrical release by Miramax, then run by Bob and Harvey Weinstein and owned by Disney and it lost about 40 minutes and some cohesion. The film opened to mostly negative reviews and so-so business during the summer of ’98, but a VHS bootleg of the original cut began to circulate among film geeks and eventually it was secretly screened at L.A.’s Outfest in 2008. Phillippe told Vulture Christopher’s cut captured “the freedom of the time, but also the impending sobriety that would come with AIDS. It resonates.”

Since then, an officially restored cut of Christopher’s version of the film screened earlier this year at the Berlin Film Festival and last Friday at the San Francisco International Film Festival, which was followed with a discussion featuring Christopher, Meyer and Phillippe. The program for the SF screening, which described the new cut of the film as a “gritty masterpiece,” offered the following preview of what to expect:

The cut of the film released in theaters in 1998 removed more than 30 minutes of beautifully acted, Cabaret-like licentiousness in the form of amibisexual polyamory and rampant drug use at the Studio 54 nightclub and replaced it with 40 minutes of cloying romance and “aw shucks” dialogue in a bid to make the film palatable for mainstream audiences.

Phillippe also previously spoke about how pleased he is that people can finally see him lock lips with Meyer’s character.

Watch an early scene in the director’s cut of the film below (did anyone else forget Mark Ruffalo was in this movie?) and mark your calendars for June 2.

H/t: Vulture

Jeremy Kinser

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/6ygNdtNue4E/ryan-phillippes-gay-make-out-scene-in-54-will-soon-be-available-for-your-viewing-pleasure-20150428

Northern Ireland Health Minister Resigns After Linking Same-Sex Marriage With Child Abuse: VIDEO

Jim Redmond

www.towleroad.com/2015/04/northern-ireland-health-minister-resigns-after-linking-same-sex-marriage-with-child-abuse-video.html

Plaintiffs: No, You Can't Unmarry Us

States would never try to ‘unmarry’ couples past childbearing age — so they shouldn’t be able to do the same to same-sex couples, argued pro-equality attorneys.

read more

Sunnivie Brydum

www.advocate.com/politics/marriage-equality/2015/04/28/plaintiffs-no-you-cant-unmarry-us

Internet Tells Instagram: #FreeTheEggplant, After Social Network Decides It's a Bit Suggestive

Charles Pulliam-Moore

www.towleroad.com/2015/04/internet-to-instagram-freetheeggplant.html

Don't Mess With Dumbledore's Rights Some of Our Favorite SCOTUS Signs and Banners

Today the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on marriage equality, and people on both sides of the issue showed up with signs stating their views,

read more

James McDonald

www.advocate.com/politics/marriage-equality/2015/04/28/dont-mess-dumbledores-rights-some-our-favorite-scotus-signs-an

Breaking Up With God
Like many LGBTs that grew up in the church, when I became a teenager I was faced with a dilemma. EVERY time a cute boy would stand up to read a bible verse or play an acoustic version of “Our God is an Awesome God” my hormones would start to rage. After hitting puberty, I had to accept that decisions needed to be made.  I just couldn’t take it anymore. 

I’ve never been good at keeping secrets so staying in the closet was never an option. I was confident enough in my support systems so the fear of alienation wasn’t strong.  Like a lot of gay kids, the drama club at school provided me with a social safety-net.  Since their divorce neither of my parents maintained very good attendance at church so I wasn’t too worried about them. My extended family were devoted to their faith, but kind, so I knew they’d have my back.

God was my concern.  I loved church and I loved God.  Since I was a little boy something drew me towards religion or spirituality or whatever you want to call it. I remember being very young, lying on the grass, looking at the sky, and just feeling connected to everything God made. I would read the bible at night and pray.  God was my guy.   

The problem was I couldn’t pretend that East Renton Baptist Church was okay with the whole “gay-thing”.  I knew that homosexuality was a sin and God was not going to have it.  I knew that inevitably the time would come when I was going to have to choose between keeping a relationship with God or being true to myself.

I decided to break-up with God.  My teenage hormones made the decision easy. I packed up my bible, Christian-themed t-shirts and memorabilia, and turned my back on my faith.  I thought about praying to God, but the anger of being put in this situation I didn’t choose, stopped me from reaching out.  I figured he’d get the drift.  Besides, if God couldn’t accept me for who I am then I didn’t have anymore time for him.  

My Godless life began at fourteen.  It would be years before we were reintroduced.

Let’s flash forward to today. I’m a licensed minister and the director of Inspire Spiritual Community, a non-profit which I co-founded in 2010.  The initial idea of the organization was to host spiritual services every Sunday in a gay bar smack in the heart of West Hollywood.  We wanted to offer a different possibility for what could happen in a gay bar.  It took some time but four years later it’s caught on and we have our own center. 

A lot of people who attend services at Inspire share a similar story with me.  The idea that we had to divorce God in order to accept ourselves is a common theme with LGBTs.  It’s been a healing process for many of us to investigate the possibility of re-establishing a personal relationship with a higher power; a God that’s all-Loving and non-judgmental.  We’re letting go of the resentment towards this Santa Claus archetype that rewards us when we’re good and punishes us when we’re not.  In essence, we’re simply learning to Love ourselves.

I’m so grateful that technology has evolved enough to where LGBT youth can discover support systems online that provide a palpable “Plan B” to some of the hateful and absurd messages being offered at the pulpit.  I believe that when the beautiful principles laid out in the world’s largest religious doctrines are accurately interpreted and demonstrated then we will see a major decline in the God-divorce rate in the LGBT community and beyond. 

Until then, in honor of the little boy who would spend hours lying on the grass and gazing up at the sky, feeling connected to the beauty in God’s world, I’ll continue to send my prayers and support to all of my brothers and sisters, who at some point, felt like they had to break-up with God. 

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

www.huffingtonpost.com/jesse-brune/breaking-up-with-god_b_7155310.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices&ir=Gay+Voices

5 Facts about the Changing Marriage Equality Landscape

Now, more than ever, Americans are joining us on the right side of history.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/5-facts-about-the-changing-marriage-equality-landscape?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed