ADAM: Hello, Earthlings! You are watching Adam the Alien. Today is April 3rd, 2018. That means it is day three of my attempt to vlog every day this April. And it is pretty late right now, but I just got home from being in the arms of Mt. Hood, where I celebrated a friend’s birthday.
FLASHBACK ADAM: It is Dakota’s birthday!
OFF-CAMERA CHATTER 1: I like how spread-out they are.
OFF-CAMERA CHATTER 2: That’s the challenge.
OFF-CAMERA CHATTER 3: It’s an archipelago!
ADAM: The particular group of friends I was hanging out with tend to like to have parties with, ah, themes.
And last night’s theme…was drag.
[BRIEF MUSICAL MONTAGE]
ADAM: Which, you know, for me just meant I had an excuse to go all out. It didn’t really change my wardrobe much.
It was a lot of fun. Everyone had just fantastic outfits, and we danced, and we ate good food. As someone who has trouble sleeping, I always get the best night’s sleep after dancing until I’ve passed out.
One thing that stuck out to me, though, was after breakfast. We watched a movie that, somehow, I had neither seen nor heard of. It’s called, “To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything! Julie Newmar.”
Actually, now that I think of the length and complexity of that title, that might be why I never saw or heard of it in 1995 when it was made. People tend to not dig titles like that NOW, unless they’re of a certain indie movie persuasion.
“To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar” was a movie that fit with the theme, given that it stars Patrick Swayze, Wesley Snipes, and John Leguizamo as drag queens road tripping from New York to LA, who get stuck in a podunk little town in the judgmental part of the country.
This was a film that worked very much on stereotypes, both on the part of the drag queens and on the part of the podunk little town that is expected to be very anti- that kind of thing. And there is a police officer who gets a little obsessed with “findin’ them homos.”
But I digress. The film, while it definitely has its flaws, and some of the comedy hasn’t aged well, I really found myself enjoying it.
It is pure, cheesy schmaltz in so many ways. It is kind of designed to, I think, feel good by the end, and it did. And I gotta say, the movie made me cry more than a few times. And at the end, even though the ending is pretty predictable by the time you get there, it still…it made the tears come. I…I really enjoyed the cheesy, schmaltzy, silly comedy that was this movie. Even if it does have too long of a title for me to remember long enough, without looking at my phone, to say in the video.
“To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything! Julie Newmar.” It’s even one of those rare films wi-with…with punctuation in the title.
The title is a reference to a signed celebrity photo stolen from a restaurant at the very beginning of the movie. And thematically, it does play a role. i don’t really wanna say anything just off the cuff about this movie. I don’t want to say too much, anyway. Because I want people to experience it properly, and since I haven’t jotted down any notes or scripted this, I don’t wa–I don’t wanna give any more spoilers than I already have. But I really…I really enjoyed the movie, and I would recommend it. Again, bearing in mind: comedy does not age well. Comedy, of all the arts, probably has the least lifespan in terms of relevancy and what people will kind of culturally get, on the level that it’s supposed to…be.
Boy, I can word today! Car drives exhaust me. I was all rested, until the frickin’ car drive home!
Well, that’s all for today. I need to get this footage into the computer and edit it so I can upload it before midnight in my time zone. I’m pretty sure midnight’s already passed over on the east coast. But I’m not on the east coast! So suuuck iiiit!
I–I don’t know why I’m telling the east coast to suck it. Other than the fact that the west coast is better, but…y’know. That’s…just…just my opinion. Just my opinion. Okay, I’m rambling. I’m rambling at this point. Until next time, which is tomorrow because I’m doing these things every day, I’m Adam the Alien. Fare thee well.
Writer. Actor. Director. Chalk artist. YouTuber. Nerdfighter. Traveler. Pansexual. Genderfluid. Millennial. Socialist. Living a complex life beyond those words.
