Recent Feature Story Articles
The Out Scout
Team DC welcomes Pascal Tessier onto Nationals field with its annual Spirit Award
It was always assumed that Pascal Tessier would join the Boy Scouts. His older brother, Lucien, had joined when he was 7 years old. Four years later, when Pascal turned 7, he joined as well. ''They loved being outside, they were very active, and we as a family loved camping and being outside, so it was sort of a natural program for us to get interested in,'' recalls the boys' mother, Tracie Felker. Boy Scout Pascal Tessier (Photo by Todd ...[Read]
Nats Park Pride
Team DC raises LGBT visibility with heavy hitters
When Pascal Tessier, 16, steps out onto the field of Nationals Park Tuesday, June 25, to accept Team DC’s Spirit Award, all eyes will be on the young gay activist who has worked to bring equality to the Boy Scouts of America. And that’s exactly the point, says Team DC Executive Director Brent Minor. “You’re on the ‘Jumbotron,’ full name and affiliation,” Minor points out. “If we can put up there ‘Scouts for Equality,’ it’s great. The visibility of this is ...[Read]
Capital Pride Showcases Community
Annual parade and festival celebrate LGBT people and allies, along with a show-stopping proposal
For the tens of thousands of D.C.-area residents and out-of-town visitors who flocked to Washington over the past weekend, the 38th annual Capital Pride celebration provided multiple opportunities to celebrate LGBT identity. For one lucky couple it also offered the perfect opportunity to affirm a lifelong commitment. Midway through the live musical performances at Sunday's Capital Pride Festival, longtime Capital Pride volunteer Dane Austin proposed to his partner, Joshua David-Giamichael, presenting him with a ring as the crowd went wild ...[Read]
Super Pride
Capital Pride aims to unleash some superheroes -- and some changes to the parade and festival
[Update: Over 1,000 photos posted of the Festival and the Parade. Plus, videos of the Festival and the Parade.] {Pride 2012 (Photo by File photo / Randy Shulman)} It's not often that the Capitol gets mistaken for the Justice League's Hall of Justice. Certainly, the George Washington University campus doesn't look at all like the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters. And even if there may be a bat or two hiding in the remains of the Dupont Underground, it's no ...[Read]
Icona Pride
Icona Pop's Caroline Hjelt and Aino Jawo are ready to give and feel love at Capital Pride
[Update: Watch Icona Pop perform at the Capital Pride Festival at end of this article.] Caroline Hjelt and Aino Jawo sing and shout in unison on ''I Love It,'' their hit punky-pop anthem. It's hard to imagine either of the ladies, known collectively as Icona Pop, singing the song solo. ''That's not an option,'' the 26-year-old Jawo says. ''I'm just so happy that we're doing this together.'' {Icona Pop (Photo by Fredrik Etoall)} ''I could not … imagine doing it ...[Read]
Pride's Wonder Woman
Other superheroes come and go, but Lynda Carter's smile and twirl make her an icon with staying power
[Update: See Lynda Carter in the Capital Pride Parade at the end of this article.] It's not easy to stay an icon. Batmans come and go, Spider-Man gets rebooted, and even Superman is moving on from his big-screen roots from the '70s. But among that upper echelon of all-American superheroes, just one face reigns as the iconic Wonder Woman: the famous smile and Lynda Carter. Decades after her television debut as the Amazonian princess who came to America to fight ...[Read]
Partying with Pride
Capital Pride 2013 offers a full weekend of mirth
''I think this is just a great representation of a lot of the talent that we have in D.C. and in our community,'' says John Marble. Marble could be talking generally about all that's in store during Capital Pride Weekend 2013. Though technically, he's touting Spandex, the official Pride opening party that he's organized with BYT Productions. Queer electro band Glitterlust, drag queens Pussy Noir and Jezibell Jaxknife, and DJs CTRL, Tommy Cornelis and Bil Todd are just a few ...[Read]
Summer Travel Issue 2013
From bears at the beach, to cities and the great outdoors, summer has us looking north
While Montreal is perfectly charming in winter, you can't do better than a summertime trip to Quebec's cosmopolitan cutie. The same holds for the Pacific Northwest and New England's beach resorts. So Metro Weekly is celebrating the approaching summer with daydreams of heading north – as far as Alaska – and to dipping into seashores that would otherwise be seasonally off-limits. Pack you bags and grab your sunscreen as we migrate to some of summer's most inviting destinations. Bear Weeks ...[Read]
Bear Weeks at the Beach
Provincetown prepares for annual offering, as Ogunquit debuts its inaugural week
As local lore has it, the proprietors of Provincetown, Mass., love ''Bear Week.'' These are, after all, men who love to eat, drink and be merry – not tourists who avoid food, bars and everything else that comes with a tourist-town price tag. As Stephen Lambeth puts it: ''Dance, eat, drink, sleep, repeat. It's got everything you need for a vacation: bars, shows, whale watching, boating, beaches, shopping, ice cream, tea dances….'' Lambeth ought to know. The New Jersey-based bear ...[Read]
Full Steam Ahead to Summer
2013 Summer Travel Calendaer
JUNE Palermo Pride 2013Palermo, ItalyJune 14-23palermopride.it/2013/ Shanghai PrideJune 14-22shpride.com Bearcelona Mediterranean CruiseFrance and Italy, via BarcelonaRoyal Caribbean Liberty of the SeasJune 16-23bearcelona.org Gay Pride New OrleansJune 20-23gayprideneworleans.com SouthEast LeatherFest (SELF)AtlantaJune 20-23seleatherfest.com Capital City PrideOlympia, Wash.June 21-22capitalcitypride.net Gay Pride BarcelonaBarcelona, SpainJune ...[Read]
Making Montreal Magic
In summertime, Quebec's urban attraction celebrates the sun and LGBT visitors
When Luc Provost transforms into Mado Lamotte, one of Montreal's most famous drag queens, it's a magical moment. His over-the-top makeup and costumes make Mado edgy, unique, beautiful and welcoming – much like his native city. And like Provost, Montreal undergoes its own transformation every summer. Situated in Canada's Quebec province, Montreal's winter temperatures can be brutal. The average high is just 13 degrees. But for the months of June, July and August, temperatures pleasantly hover in the 70s. ''Everything ...[Read]
Pacific Northwest Playground
Throw in an Alaska cruise and summer in Seattle -- or Portland or Vancouver -- can't be beat
With the past couple centuries of North American ''settlement'' moving east to west, it's no wonder that the great Pacific Northwest might seem somewhat untamed, relative to much of the continent. It's also no wonder that residents, particularly the transplants, continue to be awed by the natural beauty. ''I tell my Midwest relatives that every day I've lived in the Northwest, I've seen something too pretty to be real,'' says former Chicagoan Tim Joyce, who lives in Seattle with his ...[Read]
Plane Queer and the Male Flight Attendant
Phil Tiemeyer's study of the history of men among the cabin crew makes great summer reading
For those looking for a headier sort of beach read this summer, an academic offering may be of particular interest to LGBT audiences. Phil Tiemeyer, a Philadelphia University history professor, has penned Plane Queer: Labor, Sexuality, and AIDS in the History of Male Flight Attendants, published in March by the University of California Press. While Tiemeyer's book might sound a bit too intellectual for passing the hours by the pool, the eye-catching cover – featuring a man decked out in ...[Read]
Broadway's Musical Wizard
In his extensive and varied career, from Broadway to Hollywood, Stephen Schwartz certainly knows about popular
Stephen Schwartz will make what he calls a ''guest appearance'' with the National Symphony Orchestra this weekend. ''I sing a song with the orchestra towards the end, and do another little thing about one of the songs in Wicked,'' Schwartz says, ''and that's kind of it.'' Of course, Schwartz is the man who wrote the music and lyrics for Wicked, the behemoth musical celebrating its first decade on Broadway this October. And while he may just show up at the ...[Read]
Boots Over Broadway
Billy Porter has many people pumped up about his remarkable, Tony-nominated work in ''Kinky Boots''
A couple weeks ago Katy Perry raved to her nearly 37 million followers on Twitter. ''Just saw KINKY BOOTS on Broadway & cried w/joy from it's [sic] powerful, beautiful message,'' the pop star Perry wrote in a tweet maxed out to exactly 140 characters. ''Congrats on every of its deserved 13 Tony nominations!'' But Perry wasn't done. A few seconds later she sent a second shorter, punchier tweet: ''AND if Billy Porter doesn't win the Tony for best actor in ...[Read]
You're the Top!
A roundup of Tony-nominated shows currently on Broadway
The Nance is the gayest play currently running on Broadway -- among other attributes, it features a gay writer (Douglas Carter Beane), a gay lead actor (Nathan Lane) and gay content, focused as it is on a gay burlesque star in the 1930s. The critically heralded show also snagged five Tony nominations, including one for Lane's performance. But alas, The Nance didn't get a nod for Tony's top honor: Best Play. The following is a roundup of the shows that ...[Read]
The 2013 Metro Weekly Next Generation Awards
AJ King, Michael Komo, Joseph Lewis and Je-Shawna Wholley recognized for their leadership in the LGBT community
Life gets better. That's a comforting truism for those of us on the older side of the LGBT community, who've watched as our country has gone from banning openly gay military service and implementing ''no promo homo'' laws undermining HIV-prevention efforts to the repeal of ''Don't Ask, Don't Tell'' and the domino effect for marriage equality through the nation. But none of that means the work is done. We still have ugly reminders of hate in attacks against LGBT people. ...[Read]
AJ King
Next Generation Awards 2013
It hit Alexander AJ King when he was only in high school. ''I was getting calls back to back to back from my friends saying, 'AJ, I just found out I'm positive,''' he says. The calls came from fellow gay, African-American boys in their teens. ''I was like, 'Wow, there's clearly a disparity going on in this community.''' {AJ King (Photo by Julian Vankim)} That disparity helped push King to choose a career focused on HIV prevention and care, particularly ...[Read]
Today's Most Popular Articles
- Icona Pride (Feature Story)
- Lisa Murkowski third Senate Republican to support same-sex marriage (Poliglot)
- John Kerry outlines America's "moral obligation" to advance LGBT equality (Poliglot)
- Warming Trend (Feature Story)
- ORAM Marks World Refugee Day (News)
- Pastor No More (Black Pride Guide)
- Art Imitates Life (Stage)
- Dancing in Tribute to Peter Rauhofer (Soundwaves)
- Coverboy A.J. Williams, 26, Killed in Car Accident (News)
- Pride's Wonder Woman (Feature Story)
