Travolta: 'Hairspray' Not Gay?

Hairspray's not a gay movie?

That's what John Travolta told the London Times this past week in response to criticism in the gay press that he should not be in the film version of the Broadway hit adapted from John Waters' cult classic.

"Those comments were from just one guy, and John Waters blew them right out of the water. There is nothing gay in this movie. I'm not playing a gay man," he told the Times reporter.

In the film Travolta doesn't play a man at all - rather a hefty, middle-aged mother in 1960s Baltimore with a teenage daughter (named Tracy) with an insatiable urge to dance and mile-high hair.

The woman - named Edna Turnblad - was immortalized by Divine (in her last film role) in the 1988 film, then played by Harvey Fierstein when the stage musical came to Broadway in 2002.

Travolta is correct in one respect - on the surface there is nothing gay in the musical. No teenager on the Corny Collins Show comes out, Penny Pingleton doesn't have a crush on her best friend Tracy, and the theme is about racial equality not gay rights. But as a work created by a number of gay men (Waters, who advised the creators; Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who composed the score, and Mark O'Donnell who co-wrote the book,) it possesses what has to be considered gay sensibility. It is a parody of the 1960s teen flick as seen through the eyes of some very clever gay men, which was re-enforced when Shaiman and Wittman gave America an on-screen kiss when they won a Tony Award for Best Score.

A friend put it succinctly when told of Travolta's comments: "Saying Hairspray is not a gay movie is like saying Roots isn't a black movie."

Whether this gay sensibility translates to film version - due out on July 20 - remains to be seen. But there has been grumblings for months about the casting of Travolta in the role that broke to the surface when Kevin Naff, the editor of the Washington Blade, took the 53-year old actor to task for playing a role long associated with such gay idols as Divine and Fierstein.

"As a devoted Waters and Divine fan since the mid-'80s," Naff wrote in the Blade on May 18, "I find the new film a lame waste of time. The original is cinematic perfection, an engaging blend of Waters-esque gross-out humor and a socially conscious message told through music, dance and teen angst. It wasn't self-aware, pretentious or sanctimonious.

"And Travolta has no business reprising an iconic gay role, given his cult's stance on gay issues. It's well known that Scientology has claimed to 'cure' homosexuality via reparative therapy. Travolta's role in the film is even more galling given all the gay rumors that have followed him for years."

Those rumors were reinforced recently when a photo of Travolta kissing a companion goodbye on the steps of an airplane in Canada while filming Hairspray was published in the National Enquirer. Rumors of Travolta being gay first hit the press 15 years ago when the Enquirer published that the actor had a two-year affair with the porn actor/director Paul Barresi. Barresi later retracted his claim after a discussion with Travolta's lawyer, only to retract his retraction. "I just wanted it to be over," he later said. "But when the dust settled, I regretted the retraction a lot more than I regretted that initial call to the Enquirer."

Soon after Barresi's allegation, Travolta married fellow Scientologist and actress Kelly Preston. The couple has two children: Jett, 14, and Ella Bleu, 6.

But the rumors extended beyond the tabloids: A report last summer in Canada's Daily Post found that in a 1991 Time Magazine story about Scientology former Scientology security head Richard Aznaran said Church leader David Miscavige repeatedly joked about Travolta's alleged "promiscuous homosexual behavior."

And, the piece went on, "Only five years ago, a business executive alleged in Globe that Travolta made a pass at him in the sauna of Spectrum Club, a fitness gym in Valencia, California. (Travolta made several visits to the club while filming Swordfish nearby, it was independent confirmed.) Mark claimed he rebuffed the actor's alleged advances because he was chubby and 'really hairy on his back, upper arms and chest.'"

At the center of the controversy, though, is the question of Scientology's stance towards gays. Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote in his 1950 best seller, 'Dianetics,' that gays were 'sexual perverts' and 'very ill physically.' He was later said to have rebuffed this opinion, and Scientology claims that there are openly gay members currently in the organization. John Carmichael, president of the New York branch of the Church of Scientology, recently explained that 'Scientology doesn't try to tell people what their sexual orientation should be. The emphasis is on helping people survive better in the world. If a person comes into Scientology and they are involved in doing anything that they consider detrimental to their survival, then they can change that compulsion."

But after Naff published a tongue-in-cheek blog entry suggesting readers boycott the Travolta film, he found himself at the center of a controversy with Scientologists.

"Following that blog post, I received angry e-mails from purported gay Scientologists, claiming that the church is welcoming and supportive. One gay Scientologist even contacted the president of the Blade's parent company in New York, telling him that my post was "...an all-out slander of a perfectly upstanding religion. ... You should be ashamed that [Naff] works for your publication." Others wrote that Scientology has never tried to "cure" gay members.

"More false claims. Michael Pattinson, a gay former Scientologist, sued the church in 1998, claiming that it lied to him about its ability to "cure" him of his homosexuality.

"Scientology considers being gay as an 'aberration' that needs to be erased," he wrote in an essay that has been widely circulated online. "However, they don't erase it and are in actual practice anti-gay (as I and others got sent to 'ethics' correction for such behavior).

"According to Wikipedia's entry on Scientology, "The lawsuit also argued that the Church of Scientology had often told Pattinson that actor John Travolta was proof that Scientology can transform a homosexual into a happy heterosexual. Travolta's lawyer asserted that his client was not gay, and is happily married to a woman."

When asked by the London Times reporter about Scientology's views on homosexuality, Travolta replied. "Scientology is not homophobic in any way, in fact it's one of the more tolerant faiths. Anyone's accepted."

Waters offered his opinion on the controversy to the New York Daily News: "If [Travolta] was homophobic ... dancing in that fat suit with as many gay people as are working on this film, he would have had a heart attack and been dead."

What of Travolta's performance in the film? Advance word has been largely positive. Waters has said he loves the film and the actor's performance. Roger Friedman in Fox News wrote ".. you really have to see Travolta to believe him, especially toward the end of "Hairspray" when he finally lets loose - dressed in a fat suit as a woman in a red tutu and high heels - and dances up a storm in the film's finale. He's remarkable.

"I don't know if it's an Oscar performance, but I do know that when "Hairspray" is shown in big theaters (I saw it in a screening room, still a little unfinished), audiences are going to go wild with cheers and whistles."

And Ross von Metzke writing in his Gaywired Hollywood Celebrity Buzz column said: "I attended a sneak preview of Hairspray this week, and I've got to admit-it's a hell of a lot better than I thought it was going to be. In fact, dare I say, it's good.

"You can't blame me for being skeptical-director Adam Shankman's last movie was Cheaper by the Dozen 2.

"But his version of Hairspray, albeit more family friendly than either John Waters' version or the Broadway musical, is an admirable interpretation, and while John Travolta's take on Edna Turnblad is a 180 from Harvey Fierstein's Tony winning work, he's a hoot-and man, can he still dance."