Billy
Porter,
actor, singer, fashion icon, on his life, good and bad, after arriving at the
Oscars in that custom Christian Siriano tuxedo gown:
“I
thought back to when my friend Idina Menzel was at the Oscars [in 2014] to sing
‘Let It Go,’ from Frozen, and John Travolta mispronounced her name onstage I
literally said out loud, ‘She’s going to be a household name in less than 24
hours.’ And she was. As funny as it may sound, I’m a businessman, and wearing
that [Oscars] dress was a business decision, in a sense. People were like, ‘Oh,
he’s just trying to get attention.’ Well, yeah, I’m in show business! It’s part
of my job. Otherwise, I don’t eat. I used to get frustrated that women could
wear whatever they wanted and men had to show up in the same penguin suit. The
reason why women wearing pants is considered OK by society’s standards is
because it comes from the patriarchy. The patriarchy is male, so suits are
strong, and anything feminine is weak. I was sick of that discussion, and I
knew my platform allowed me to challenge it. [The hate from the right] was
based on this idea that I’m coming to get their children because of the way I
dress. What is that? I’m over here minding my own business. So why is it
triggering you? At that moment, I was grateful that I am a man of a certain
age, because when you become a certain age, zero f—s are given. I don’t now,
nor will I ever, adjudicate my life or my humanity in [other people's] sound
bites or responses on social media. Simultaneously, it still hurts to have
people come after me for nothing. When Lady Gaga dresses up and performs a song
on TV as if she’s a man [Jo Calderone at the 2011 MTV VMAs], no one bats an
eye. They receive her as an artist who’s playing with different silhouettes and
ideas. Same with David Bowie. When white and straight people do it, they’re
considered artists. When I do it, I’m a perversion. The answer to that from me
is no.”
After
the Oscars Porter was invited to appear on Sesame Street in his Siriano gown,
and then Jason Rapert, a Republican Arkansas state senator, slammed PBS for
using taxpayer dollars to promote, ahem, “a radical LGBTQ+ agenda,” adding that
he could pass a bill to “cut off all funding” to the network.
Luckily,
like Porter, Sesame Street has been around a while and they also have zero
fucks to give.
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