Features Editor:
John Liebhardt
johnliebhardt@daifyemerald. com
Thursday, April 18,2002
Review
The award-winning film ‘Kandahar’ portrays
Afghanistan all its disturbing beauty.
Page?
NPR humorist brings dark wit to Hult Center
David Sedaris
has been sharing
his life stories on
radios and in
books, but
Sunday
he’ll share his
experiences live
at the Hult Center
By Alix Kerl
Oregon Daily Emerald
David Sedaris is a pretty funny talk
er, and he’ll be talking pretty at 7 p.m.
Sunday at the Hult Center.
Humorist Sedaris displays his oddly
dark humor regularly on public radio
and intermittently in his four books. His
stories tell of his deprived bourgeois
childhood and moving to France with
his boyfriend.
Sedaris became well-known for read
ing about his adventures as a green
tights-clad elf from his story “Santaland
Diaries,” a recollec
tion of his adven
tures as an elf at
Macy’s Department
Store. The story is
from Sedaris’ first
book of short stories,
“Holidays on Ice.”
The story covers
everything from
group lectures
SEDARIS (“You are not a
dancer. If you were a real dancer you
wouldn’t be here. You’re an elf, and
you’re going to wear panties like an elf.”)
to Santa’s race. Radio was Sedaris’ first
big national exposure. It was also many
people’s first exposure to Sedaris’ work.
“I remember sitting in my living
room in the early morning, listening to
NPR,” University journalism Professor
Kellee Weinhold said about listening to
“Santaland Diaries” for the first time. “I
remember laughing so hard I couldn’t
breathe.”
Weinhold appreciates Sedaris’
uniquely dark sense of humor.
“He is the voice of the dark,” Wein
hold said. “But, he really, truly is some
thing that everyone can enjoy.”
In the late 1990s, Sedaris’ radio role
expanded when he joined Ira Glass’ lit
erary show, “This American Life.”
“This American Life” is described by
creators as a bunch of stories.
“Its mission is to document the every
day life of this country,” wrote Glass,
Turn to Sedaris, page 10
| ■ Author Michael Moore speaks
in the EMU Ballroom Sunday
to promote ‘Stupid White Men’
By Jen West
Oregon Daily Emerald
Michael Moore’s controversial
book, “Stupid White Men,”
probes into the corporate and
government agendas of Ameri
ca’s most powerful people and expos
es them with political satire.
Moore, an author and film produc
er, will appear for a lecture and book
signing at 5 p.m. Sunday in the EMU
Ballroom. A live video feed will also
be available in the EMU Ben Linder
Room and 180 PLC free of charge.
“Stupid White Men” discusses is
! sues from politics to the environment
to race and gender in “down-to-earth
language,” UO Cultural Forum Con
temporary Issues Coordinator Geoff
Hoffa said. Moore’s uncensored dis
cussion of the current Bush adminis
tration has made the book controver
sial in a nation where Hoffa said recent
polls have indicated most Americans
approve of George W. Bush.
“Stupid White Men” takes a comi
cal approach to explaining the state of
the nation and the general power
structure, said Tsunami Books owner
Scott Landfield. He said humor is a
great way to reach people about these
uncomfortable issues.
“It’s best to do it behind the guise of
humor,” he said, because the cold,
hard truth is often difficult to accept.
Moore does not exactly speak the
truth, but presents his take on the
truth, Landfield said, and it is “closer
(to the truth) probably than what
we’re being fed.”
He said Moore’s choice to use hu
mor to reach his audience was a smart
one, because if he had taken a more se
rious tone, he probably would have
been in danger of assassination.
Moore does not just take “pot shots”
at powerful American men; he proves
his statements with facts, said Cheri
Smith, president of SEIU local 503, Ore
gon Public Employee Union Local 085.
She said in his book, Moore brings to
light many facts the public may not be
aware of, such as exactly how intercon
nected the Bush family is and how that
affected the 2000 presidential elections.
The book tells the reader, “You need
to take a closer look at your govern
ment,” she said.
But taking a closer look at the gov
ernment nearly kept the book from be
ing published.
After the events of Sept. 11, pub
lisher Harper Collins labeled “Stupid
White Men” as “too offensive” and
halted its distribution before it ever
reached the bookshelves, according to
a message Moore posted to his Web
site, www.michaelmoore.com. At
first, Moore agreed to postpone the re
lease date for the book, he wrote, but
Harper Collins requested he tone
down the scathing commentary on the
Bush administration and other power
entities in the United States. Fifty
thousand copies had already been
printed and sat in a warehouse await
ing their execution by shredder.
Then, a group of librarians discov
ered the book ban and organized a let
ter-writing campaign that eventually
led to the salvation of “Stupid White
Men,” which appeared unchanged and
uncensored in bookstores Feb. 19, ac
Turn to Moore, page 10
Life’s not a drag: Queens, kings strut their stuff in EMU fishbowl
LGBTQA will
sponsora drag
show to
promote queer
visibility on
campus and to
have some fun
ByAlix Kerl
Oregon Daily Emerald
Sarah Bluestein says dressing in drag
is “gender fucking.”
“It means playing with your gender,”
she said.
“It’s playing with people’s perception
of your gender,” interrupted Mary
Bankhead.
“It’s blurring the line,” continued
Bluestein.
“It’s not a freak show,” added
Bankhead.
Bluestein added, “It’s a chance for
people who are safe in their own social
ly prescribed gender to play with it.”
“It” is drag. Only a half-century ago
cross-dressing was punishable by arrest,
and police raids of gay bars incited riots
such as the historic riot at the Stonewall
Bar in New York City. Now many per
formers dress in drag as a proclamation
of freedom. A drag show is an imperson
ation festival where performers become
the opposite gender onstage.
The “Fish Bowl” Drag Show will be
from 9:30 to 11:30 p.m. Friday in the
EMU Fishbowl. The drag show, spon
sored by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
Transgender, Queer Alliance, will fea
ture both drag queens (biological men
that dress as women) and drag kings (bi
ological women that dress as men).
The feature queen is Patti O’Dora, a
former Miss Gay Oregon who has been
playing in and around Portland for 18
years. She is the founder of the produc
tion company “House of the Goddess.”
She is also the hostess for the Saturday
night drag shows at The Embers Av
enue, a primarily gay male bar in Port
land. Other “House of the Goddess”
performers include Mr. Ty O’Dora, Peb
bles Campbell Star, Ephiphany BeY
once, DeLana O’Dora, Joey De ValMont
and The “Butch Boy” TYoy.
Turn to Drag, page 8