The Cockettes

Documentary about a late 1960s-early 1970s San Francisco theatre group called the Cockettes. They all lived together in a commune and were quite a mix...gay, straight, bi, men, women. They all wore incredible, colorful costumes (most of the guys were in drag) and put on musicals that were very mean, vicious, explicitally sexual...and hilarious!

This is a truly incredible movie about an unjustly forgotten group. The movie includes some footage of the actual stage shows they put on along with interviews of the surviving cast members. It gives a view of the 1960s in San Francisco that I've never seen. Just absorbing from the word go. A must see!

Highlight--their parody of Tricia Nixon's wedding is hysterical.

See it!!!!!

I really enjoyed this film. It's odd that I would because I have almost no interest in hippies or drag queens. But, something about their DIY (do it yourself) aesthetic really resonated with me. They wanted to be "stars," so they dressed up in crazy outfits, dropped acid, and put on "shows" consisting of whatever interested them that week. If they wanted to make a film about Trisha Nixon's wedding, they grabbed a camera, dressed up, make makeshift sets, and shot one. This film was really inspiring to me as an artist.

Imagine if people told you about a wonderful party they had... and you said, sure, sounds like you had a great time... and then they handed you a two-hour movie of the highlights. What are the odds you would have as good a time as they did? Not very high, especially if you AREN'T high...

That's the problem with The Cockettes, the story of a once-heralded, now largely forgotten theater troupe in San Francisco whose hippie drag shows were a sensation circa 1970. It's an interesting slice of that era, for a while, but neither the vintage footage (they filmed themselves a lot) nor the modern-day interviews are that much more compelling or moving than what you were up to in 1970, or what you think about it now as a respectable middle- aged person. (It is pretty funny to see a pleasant-looking gay bourgeois in his 50s with a neat haircut and mustache be identified by a name like "Scrumbly" or "Kreemah Ritz." One of them, by the way, is the pianist Peter Mintun, well known in San Francisco for reviving 30s society music in venues like the Fairmont Hotel. Funny, the word "Cockettes" doesn't appear on his own website offering his sophisticated musical services, though it does have a picture of him with the most famous Cockette alumnus, disco-era figure Sylvester.)

To judge by the vintage footage, in fact, their stage parodies of old Hollywood movies were pretty terrible, though they might well have been fun in the right altered state of mind. John Waters recalls the spirit of tolerance that greeted him when he came to San Francisco with his movies and was embraced by The Cockettes, but maybe it's that California laidbackness that was responsible for The Cockettes' work seeming so slapdash and slack next to his own films-- they didn't have the sense of outsider desperation that runs through his films like an exposed nerve (or, similarly, through Rainer Werner Fassbinder's films when he put actresses acting like drag queens through the old Hollywood paces). Nor did they have the classical discipline that Charles Ludlam brought to his brilliantly campy farces at the Theater of the Ridiculous in Greenwich Village. (It was a disastrous trip to New York, facing crowds who expected something cleverer than hippies sashaying in the nude in a bad conga line, that pretty much ended the party.)

Ultimately, for all the talk about them being pioneers in genderbending and transgressive art, it's hard to say that The Cockettes had a real point of view about sexuality-- what they mainly had was a good time, which the audience of a documentary will only share in bits and pieces at this late date.

San Francisco crazies, unbridled idealism, articulate interviewees, and LOTS and LOTS of original footage combine to form a highly entertaining and endearing history of the dance troupe from the late 60s to the early 70s. Great storytelling of a fascinating story.

Perhaps I was expecting more from the documentary. Don't get me wrong, it captures the era and the craziness of the time, but sometimes it goes flat. A little more gay wit should have helped here. The directors have captured the idea behind the Cockettes in their heyday in San Francisco.

Unfortunately, behind the happy facade of the parties, the theatre performances, we never get to really know most of the people who created the scene.

The main character, and the "mother" of the Cockettes, Hibiscus, is an enigma. He's obviously so high on LSD and other drugs of the period to make any sense at all. Hisbiscus did have a vision, but carrying it to the stage was another story. Most of the skits kind of fall flat. I guess that in order to have appreciated the group at the Palace Theatre in San Francisco in its prime would have required tons of acid to view what went onstage as probably Hibiscus conceived it.

The people that survived the Cockettes talk to the camara and tells us what it was like. It's great seeing the survivors as they look now and they looked then. Director John Waters is very effective in telling us his part of the story. The fabulous Devine, who only appears briefly in the film is a welcome distraction since she was the queen of all queens!

The Cockettes were way ahead of their time. When you see today's drag queens, they pale in comparison to that group which were probably the idea for most of the ones around today.

Go see it and enjoy a bygone time that will never be able to capture again.