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28
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Screening of documentary about female impersonators
in Havana will benefit Cascade AIDS Project
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n 1961, diplomatic relations between the
United States and Cuba came to an end.
Since then, the island nation and the U.S.
embargo intended to isolate its communist
government have largely been out of sight
and out of mind.
Elizabeth Atly, a representative of the orga
nization Campaign for Peace with Cuba, hopes
to change that. One of the first steps involves
the Cascade A ID S Project: The Campaign for
Peace with Cuba and Speak to Your Brothers, a
project of CAP, are cosponsoring a benefit
Portland premiere of the film M ariposas en el
Andamio (Butterflies on the Scaffold), a docu
mentary about a troupe of gay female imper
sonators who win the support of their Havana
neighborhood com
munity center,
allowing them to
hold cabaret perfor
mances.
I
OFFICE
(503) 281-4040
Prudential
C hristopher M c Q uain
( 503 ) 494-6300
The film, direct
ed by Margaret
Gilpin and Luis
Phillipe Bemaza, is
dedicated to Cuba’s
efforts to find a cure for AIDS.
Though Atly says the Campaign for Peace
with Cuba “doesn’t toe any party lines,” its
main objective is to maintain Cuba’s sovereign
ty while lifting the embargo imposed upon
Cuba by the United States during John F.
Kennedy’s presidency. The Campaign for Peace
with Cuba, says Atly, holds that the embargo
subverts its own purpose of economic salvation
for Cuba by causing undue economic hardship
for the Cuban people.
“That Cuba even has running automobiles
is due to Cuban ingenuity,” says Atly.
Despite the campaign’s seemingly good
intentions, the topic of Cuba still raises ques
tions and doubts about civil rights, free speech
and repression, particularly for people in the
queer community and other oppressed ethnic
and/or religious communities.
Juan Carlos Espinosa, a gay activist and
director of Cuban studies at the University of
Miami, for example, finds it ironic that U.S.
queers might be supportive of Castro’s govern
ment— although he’s a fan of Mariposas en el
Andamio.
“There are different ways of reading the
film,” Espinosa admits. “I suppose you could
read it to be some sort of celebration of Cuban
tolerance.” He adds, however, “It was filmed in
a country where there’s a military dictatorship
and almost no individual expression.”
Espinosa, who considers himself a progres
sive, also says it’s absurd that any AIDS relief
organizations might look kindly on Castro’s
government in light of the forced HIV testing
and quarantine that ended in 1993— a course
of action he insists “not even [North Carolina’s
Republican Sen.] Jesse Helms could’ve
dreamed of.”
Alan Rose, C A P’s manager of HIV preven
tion education programs, says C A P doesn’t
regard the screening as a political event.
“We’re supportive of anything that increases
knowledge of HIV infection among the people
living in Cuba— not only gay/bisexual people,
but all people,” says Rose.
While Espinosa shares Atly’s view that the
embargo is counterproductive and inflicts the
greatest hardships on the poorest Cubans, he
says that groups like Seattle’s Queers for Cuba
“seem to be something that’s very West Coast,”
adding that more people who’ve left Cuba—
especially gay men and lesbians— now live on
the U.S. East Coast, providing “communities of
victims who can challenge this discourse.”
Though Castro’s revolution of the late
1950s allegedly broke down much of Cuba’s
oppression based on race and gender, the influ
ence of the traditional Latin American culture
of that time, complete with its focus on tradi
tional gender roles, remained dominant in
Cuba. During the
mid-1970s the
A scene from
the film Mariposas
en el Andamio
notion of homo-
sexual-as-pariah
may have begun to
lose its credence in
most Western
Hemisphere met
ropolitan areas,
but Cuba’s policies remained rigid far into the
1980s.
Atly acknowledges that “things weren’t
always so great for homosexuals in Cuba.” In
fact, in the early days after the 1959 Cuban
revolution, gays and others who were deemed
“anti-social” elements were forced into notori
ous work camps.
However, recent Cuban history indicates
the extent to which things have improved on
the civil rights front: the 1986 re-evaluation of
national sex education policies; the halt in
1993 of mandatory quarantine for A ID S
patients; and the queer-positive film Strawberry
and Chocolate, which was made in Cuba in
1993 under the auspices of the government
cultural agency, ICAIC, and became a major
event not just in Cuban popular culture but in
Cuban society.
Espinosa counters that Cuba may not be as
oppressive toward the queer community as it
once was, but warns, “In Cuba there is no rule
of law— there are privileges that are granted by
the regime and just as easily taken away.” What
progress the Cuban government has made in
its treatment of queer Cubans, says Espinosa,
are “small, little gasps of air and pretty mean
ingless.... The people who committed those
crimes in the past are still in power.”
Atly’s view, relative to Espinosa’s, seems
either more optimistic or naive, depending
upon an observer’s perspective.
“The Cuban revolution isn’t static," says
Atly. “ It’s not considered to be a fait accompli; if
something’s not working, they want to make it
work."
■ M ariposas en el A nd a m io will be shown at
5th Ave. Cinema, 510 S.W. Hall St., on Thiers -
day, Jan. 21, at 7 p.m. There is a suggested dona'
non of $5, with proceeds to benefit the Cascade
AIDS Project.
W ill O ’B ryan contributed to this report.