Reverend's Movie Memories of 2025

Politics, Horror, Political Horror…and Jonathan Bailey 

Last year’s movies were a mixed bag at the box office. There were blockbusters, notably the latest Jurassic World adventure, a revamped Superman, and several Disney sequels/reboots. But there were also some big-budget flops: Mickey 17, Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere and Disney’s less successful Snow White and Tron: Ares. In hindsight, such unpredictability seems reflective of our national political and economic uncertainty these past 12 months. I was hoping/praying for a more stable 2026...and then the USA attacked Venezuela and kidnapped its president! God help us.

Despite an increase in anti-DEI and anti-LGBTQ sentiment in the US, we can take some comfort in the fact that two out entertainers went down in history by the end of 2025. That both are alumna of the hit Wicked movies seems purely coincidental.

Jonathan Bailey, who played the ultimately heroic Fiyero in the two-part musical adaptation, was named 2025’s highest-grossing actor thanks to his roles in Wicked: For Good and Jurassic World: Rebirth. He is the first openly gay actor ever to top the box office charts in a given year. Bailey was also the first openly gay contender to be named “Sexiest Man Alive” by People magazine in 2025. 

Meanwhile, queer actor-comedian Bowen Yang not only reprised his supporting role as Pfannee in Wicked: For Good but played one of the lead roles in last year’s excellent reimagining of 1993’s The Wedding Banquet. Yang made Emmy Award history in 2025 by becoming the awards’ most-nominated Asian male performer to date, thanks to his work on Saturday Night Live. He surprised everyone when he resigned from SNL after six years shortly before Christmas. I’m sure--to paraphrase Yang’s hero, Cher—we haven’t seen the last of him.

There has been more consensus than usual regarding the best films of 2025 among critics and critic groups. Several of them deal with timely political themes, and an unusually high number of selections sit squarely in the horror genre.

Here are my personal choices. As is my custom, I have joined together movies of equal quality that also share themes, genres and/or talent. And, as usual, there were a few end-of-the-year releases I wasn’t able to watch before my deadline. Chief among these are the acclaimed Marty Supreme and James Cameron’s latest, Avatar: Fire and Ash.

1. One Battle After Another (Warner Bros). Uber timely and bracingly topical, Paul Thomas Anderson’s dramedy follows a group of revolutionaries, led by a terrific Leonardo DiCaprio, over two decades as they confront corruption in the upper echelons of our good ol’ US of A. Watch out for the evil Christmas Adventurers Club! This political yet personal epic is deservedly sweeping critic groups’ awards. 

2. Eddington (A24). Dark auteur Ari Aster’s latest garnered as many detractors as admirers, and possibly more detractors. Similar in some ways to One Battle After Another, this is an even more satirical depiction of COVID-era divisions in our country. I greatly appreciated how Aster succeeds in making both far right and far left extremists look equally insane.

3. Hamnet (Focus Features). I’ve never seen a movie reduce an audience to sobs, myself included, as this lovely exploration of loss and grief did. Inspired by an incident in the lives of William Shakespeare and his wife, it is ultimately a cathartic take on how we all strive to find meaning in the wake of death. Jessie Buckley is exquisite in what I consider the year’s best female performance as Agnes, with queer-friendly Paul Mescal playing opposite her as Will.

4. Sinners (Warner Bros). While this is best or most simply defined as a vampire-filled horror movie, there is a lot more going on beneath its surface. Written and directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan in dual roles, it also deals with racism, enculturation, sibling love, and the enduring power of music. 

5. A House of Dynamite (Netflix). Arguably the most intense 112 cinematic minutes of last year. Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow and an impressive all-star cast count down to an anticipated nuclear attack on Chicago from different perspectives. Something of a pre-disaster disaster movie, one can’t help but think “What would I do?” in such a frightening scenario.

6. The History of Sound (MUBI) and On Swift Horses (Sony Pictures Classics). The two best gay-themed movies of 2025. These sexy, achingly beautiful tales of gay longing are set in different time periods but share several dramatic similarities. They also boast gorgeous leading men Jacob Elordi, Will Poulter, Diego Calva, Josh O’Connor and Paul Mescal (again), all of whom are beautifully photographed.

7. Companion (Warner Bros), Good Boy (IFC & Shudder) and Weapons (Warner Bros).  After Sinners, these are the next best out of a very strong year for horror films. Each has a unique premise and is told from an unusual perspective, with a dog playing the lead in Good Boy! While they have necessary unsettling moments, these movies are cleverly written and completely engrossing. And all hail the big- screen return of Amy Madigan as instant camp icon Aunt Gladys!

8. I Was Born This Way (Jungefilm & W/Love Productions). The best documentary I saw last year celebrates the life, music and ministry of Bishop Carl Bean. He journeyed from disco-era singer of the title song to founder of both the Minority AIDS Project in LA and the Unity Fellowship Church. Revealing and inspiring.

9. The Life of Chuck (NEON). 2025 was a big year for Stephen King stories on the big screen. We got The Last Walk, The Monkey and a new version of The Running Man, as well as TV’s It-inspired series Welcome to Derry. The best of them all--and one of the best Stephen King adaptations ever--was this metaphysical, mathematical, and genuinely moving tale illustrating how each of our lives “contain multitudes,” to quote the movie’s potent citation of queer poet Walt Whitman.

10. Blue Moon (Sony Pictures Classics) and Nouvelle Vague (Netflix). Has director Richard Linklater made a bad movie yet? He turned out not just one but two great period pieces/character studies last year alone. Linklater’s longtime muse Ethan Hawke is astonishing and currently my pick for best male performance of 2025 as the real life, sexually conflicted composer Lorenz Hart in Blue Moon. In his Nouvelle Vague, Linklater playfully recreates the filmmaking architects of the French “new wave” of the 1950s-60s, and appropriately does so in both French and black & white.

Honorable mentions, in alphabetical order: Aichaku, Chainsaws Were Singing, Dust Bunny, Frankenstein, Griffin in Summer, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Roofman, Train Dreams, 28 Years Later, The Wedding Banquet and Wicked: For Good. 

At the bottom of my list are these 2025 movies that, even if they aren’t absolutely awful, nonetheless fell short of expectations:

1. The Conjuring: Last Rites (Warner Bros). This spooky franchise hit its artistic bottom here, but inexplicably became its most financially successful entry. I doubt it will be the last in the series as intended, which is truly scary.

2. Night Always Comes (Netflix). I love actress Vanessa Kirby, and she made a fine Sue Storm in last year’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps. While she’s typically good in this, the plot is a dreary exercise in self-perpetuating dysfunction with Kirby’s character making one frustratingly bad decision after another.

3. Wolf Man (Universal Pictures). The title character has long been my favorite old-school movie monster so I was really looking forward to a modern-day take on him/it. Needless to say I was disappointed. Not only does the creature bear little resemblance to the original, the movie is just plain boring.

4. Mission: Impossible-The Final Reckoning (Paramount Pictures). I was also looking forward to this closing chapter of the Tom Cruise-led series since the last film, 2023’s Mission: Impossible-Dead Reckoning, was thrilling. While not without some exciting set pieces, this was essentially a 3-hour vanity project for Cruise. I won’t complain about the two extended sequences in which the admittedly in-shape star is clad only in boxer briefs (one of which I've lovingly featured above) but it all seemed narcissistic.

5. Captain America: Brave New World (Disney/Marvel Studios). Marvel did well artistically with the aforementioned Fantastic Four: First Steps as well as Thunderbolts*. However, this was a strange entry in the Captain America canon because it served more as an overdue sequel to 2008’s largely forgotten The Incredible Hulk. And not to sound ageist, but Harrison Ford came across as too old and feeble to play the Commander in Chief. Yes, even older and more feeble—but at least saner—than his real-life counterpart.

Happy New Year!

The Most Reverend Chris Carpenter is editor of Movie Dearest and chief contributor. He has been reviewing movies and theatre since 1996 and also contributes to Rage Monthly magazine (ragemonthly.com). He is a founding member and former Vice President of GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Critics (galeca.com) and currently serves as a nominating/voting member of its New York-based Theatre Wing. Reverend Carpenter has been an ordained minister since 1995.

Reverend's Interview: Bryan Fuller is Giving Us a Dust Bunny for the Holidays

Santa Claus isn’t the only one coming to town this month.  You’d better watch out for a very large, very hungry, very scary Dust Bunny!

Out TV series creator/writer/showrunner Bryan Fuller is making his feature film debut on December 12^th with the nationwide release of Dust Bunny.  Set in a decaying apartment complex on the edge of New York City’s Chinatown, it is a dark, surreal, yet fun fable told through the eyes of 10-year-old Aurora. She is convinced there’s a monster living under her bed, one that devoured her foster parents in the middle of the night. 

Isolated and frightened, Aurora becomes fixated on her reclusive neighbor, a wounded hitman she secretly follows through the city.  After witnessing him kill a dragon-like creature on a rooftop, she decides he might be the only one capable of saving her. As the two form an unlikely bond, her neighbor--who is himself being hunted by professional killers tied to his past—uncovers a chilling pattern: Aurora’s previous foster families have all mysteriously vanished. But when one of the neighbor’s wannabe assassins is swallowed whole by something beneath Aurora’s bed, he realizes her fears may be grounded in something very real…and very dangerous.

Dust Bunny boasts a fantastic cast led by Mads Mikkelsen as “The Intriguing Neighbor” and amazing newcomer Sophie Sloan as Aurora, with Sigourney Weaver, David Dastmalchian and Rebecca Henderson in wild supporting roles.

Bryan Fuller, the film’s writer-director, got his start in the entertainment industry as a writer on TV’s legendary Star Trek series Voyager and Deep Space Nine. He next created or co-created such memorably offbeat shows as Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies (which won multiple Emmy Awards), Hannibal (which also starred Mikkelsen) and American Gods. Fuller is openly gay and most of his work features a notably queer sensibility.

In the movie’s press notes, Fuller shares the very personal motivation behind Dust Bunny: 

“Our heroine, Aurora, wished for the monster under her bed to eat her parents. ‘They weren’t very nice to me’ is all the explanation we get as to why Aurora wished her wish. A little background: I grew up with an abusive father, and I would have been content to have him eaten by a monster. There are all sorts of reasons your average child might, in a blaze of anger (or less), wish their parents dead. From no cha-cha heels at Christmas to curfews to things less common and cruel. I want the viewer to have their own take on why Aurora did it. Or more specifically, why they would do it. I know I had my reasons.”

Reverend recently spoke with the very thoughtful, very funny Fuller via Zoom. Note: Some questions and responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.

Bryan, I’m truly honored to have this opportunity to speak with the creator of what I feel are several of the best, if sadly short-lived, TV series of the 21^st century so far.

Oh, thank you! 

Absolutely. Can you tell me a little bit about what’s your method or your sensibility when it comes to choosing or developing projects?

I love storytelling and I love characters and I love thematics. There’s something about if a story or a narrative has the opportunity for me to break off a bit of my soul, and put a horcrux into it, to give me a barometer of what an audience would want from that story. I definitely have to be the first person in the audience that wants to see this story, so I can’t imagine working on something that I wouldn’t watch. There’s plenty of movies where I’m like “I don’t know if I’m the audience for this; I may enjoy the experience but I also don’t necessarily know how to steer something like that.”

I’m primarily a genre storyteller because I like those extra colors in my Crayola crayon box to color with. I think that there’s something about horror, science fiction, fantasy that gives you an opportunity for an analysis of certain thematics that do feel distinctively queer. The things that I’m attracted to have a queer sensibility to them. How I like to tell stories and the aesthetics and the way that I enjoy telling a story feel very queer to me. For things like Dust Bunny or Pushing Daisies that may not have queer narratives, they are certainly queer in design and characterizations that feel like that part of my psyche is being serviced in a way.

I would say the easiest answer (to your question), particularly for this publication, is “What is the inherent queerness of this story and what is my relationship to the perception of that queerness?” Sometimes that queerness is asexual and sometimes it is sexual. There’s something about the asexual romance of Pushing Daisies, or the blossoming of an asexuality into a sexual romance of Hannibal, or the explicit sexuality of something like American Gods, where I got to do barebacking, flaming ejaculation kind of sex scenes--that you’d be hard pressed to find anywhere else—but in a fantasy story of sorts. I do think my guiding principle for a lot of my taste is rooted in my queerness.

Thank you, that’s an excellent response and helpful. It’s funny, just thinking about and reflecting on Dust Bunny I wrote “fairy tale meets anime meets horror movie meets survivor story, with a musical number thrown in”! I loved the dancing nuns.

(Laughs) Do you remember that song from the 70’s? I know you grew up Catholic. I was raised very Catholic so I’ve been fantasizing about robbing a church (which Aurora does in the film) for most of my life.

Of course! (laugh) Congratulations on Dust Bunny.  I thoroughly enjoyed it and found it visually stunning, as well as so compelling and interesting. I’m so happy that it is an original story of yours that you got to direct, because I had read that you were working on adapting a novel or doing a remake or something. I’m so glad that this is the film for your first feature on the big screen. How does that strike you or how does that feel?

Thank you, thank you. You know, we were developing this story for (the TV series) Amazing Stories and we were having trouble pushing it through the process. It had so many of the things that I loved growing up and watching the (Steven Spielberg) Amblin’ brand in the 80’s, whether it was Poltergeist or Gremlins or The Goonies or E.T.  All of them had a sense of someone who didn’t feel like they belonged in the world in which they were living, and a guest from another world coming into theirs and showing them how they belonged. Not necessarily in the world that they’re struggling to belong in but what other worlds and relationships they can belong in. That also feels distinctively queer. 

I also loved fairy tales growing up. I love the Disney extrapolations of the fairy tales. I loved Ichabod Crane and the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and that there were these gateway horror stories being sold to children that were scary and thrilling. Now we are so sensitive to traumatizing children but I do think there’s a lot of fun in scaring kids. I did it a lot when I was a kid. We would always ambush people in cemeteries in cloaks. The kids I was babysitting when I was like 12 years old, we would design haunted houses for their friends that would come in. I would leap through a window and grab the kid and pull them out screaming into the yard. (laugh) I love that kind of fun of telling a spooky story, and it is fun first for me. Even when Hannibal got very dark, I saw it as a black comedy and there was something about those storylines and the extremities that I just innately found a sense of humor in. Also, I think cannibalism is hilarious. As a pescatarian, people being served up in a way that they would serve others up, I find delightful. (Both of us laugh)

The idea of this being my first movie and also something that feels like the movies that I enjoyed as a kid, and wanting to share that experience with both younger audiences and the adults who are taking those kids to those movies, was really exciting. I think that was kind of the impetus for me, to bring the joy of the audience experience that I remember to modern audiences who may not have been around in the 1980’s to see all these fantastic films in the theater.

Talk to me about working with Mads Mikkelsen, who you’ve worked with a few times now on different projects. What’s your working relationship or your friendship like? Is he kind of your muse?

Mads is so cool. When I met him, I was like “Oh, I get it; he’s a movie star.” He’s like Danish George Clooney and he’s got the rizz, as they say, for days. But so many of his characters that we see him play in American movies are villains, whether it’s a James Bond villain (Casino Royale) or an Indiana Jones villain (Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny) or a Marvel villain (Doctor Strange). In Star Wars: Rogue One, you assume he’s a villain but he ends up being the greatest hero of the rebellion. So, there is a contained quality to a lot of his American performances that are directly in contrast to some of his Danish roles, where he plays more of a fool or is a very stoic hero.

I wanted the (Dust Bunny) audience to see just a little bit more of my friend, who has a charismatic personality, is a family man, who doesn’t have all the gravitas of all these weighty, villainous roles that populist audiences associate him with. I wanted everybody to see more of the guy I know as my friend but also just realizing, with his professionalism and his dedication and how good he is at his job, that it was undeniable that he was the guy. I pitched him the story at the premiere of Rogue One (in 2016) and he was like “Great, I’m in.” And then the movie lived and died at various studios who wanted various kinds of actors in the role. We finally found a studio (Lionsgate) that would make the movie with Mads. 

About Mads’ character, Resident 5B or “The Intriguing Neighbor,” what can gay viewers deduce or conclude about his character? Is he gay? Is he queer? Is he open to interpretation?

What I love about queer analysis of movies is that if you give us an inch, we’ll take a mile. And if there are no indicators of sexual desire or opposite sex attraction, we plant a flag and claim that character as our own.  You certainly can--because there is no real romance in (Dust Bunny)--project that onto Mads’ character.

This is not necessarily a queer narrative, although it did recently screen at Outfest. I would say if politics are proceeding along the line that some would hope that they would proceed and it becomes illegal to be gay again, the smoking guns of my homosexuality will be Dust Bunny and Pushing Daisies. Despite not having actively queer characters in them, they are distinctively queer worlds from a queer person. That’s the immersive experience or the aesthetic that also invites the audience to project themselves onto the characters. If you want to project a queerness onto Mads, it’s there. If you want to project a queerness or outsider-ness to little Aurora, for all of us queer kids who grew up in tricky households, you can. I say if you see queerness it’s there, it’s yours. Claim it!

The Most Reverend Chris Carpenter is editor of Movie Dearest and chief contributor. He has been reviewing movies and theatre since 1996 and also contributes to Rage Monthly magazine (ragemonthly.com). He is a founding member and former Vice President of GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Critics (galeca.com) and currently serves as a nominating/voting member of its New York-based Theatre Wing. Reverend Carpenter has been an ordained minister since 1995.

Thank Goodness for (Most) New Screen & Stage Musicals

On this Thanksgiving Day when those of us in the United States traditionally count our communal and personal blessings, Reverend remains ever grateful for—in addition to many other things--the opportunities God continues to provide me in reviewing new movies and NYC stage productions. God knows they aren’t all perfect artistic creations, but I will always respect the effort (not to mention the money) it takes to bring a film, play or musical to life today.

Here are my mostly positive reviews of several works I’ve seen this past week: 

Wicked: For Good (Now playing in movie theaters)

AKA Wicked: The Movie Part 2, this is the cinematic second act of Jon M. Chu’s pretty darn overall masterful adaptation of the long-playing/-touring stage musical. The first act of both renditions, with their fundamental world-building and central-character development, is stronger than the second. Act II is also necessarily darker and the tone more solemn, with songs that are decidedly less bubbly than Act 1’s. That being said, Wicked: FG makes some definite improvements/needed expansions on the source material (noting the initial contributions of authors/creators L. Frank Baum and Gregory Maguire).

I am noting I’ve already used the forward slash / above much more than I usually do. But this seems unavoidable when one is dealing with a generations-spanning literary and pop culture phenomenon like The Wizard of Oz. Some “purists” who have responded negatively to Wicked in its various forms have done so because of perceived deviations specifically from the classic 1939 movie. I don’t disagree with some of these criticisms, but I am also apparently more willing to suspend disbelief that the Wickeds exist in an alternate storytelling timeline/universe. (Darn, there’s another / !)

Chu, the newer films’ director, is clearly conscious of these criticisms and tries mightily to reconcile them. Is he wholly successful? No. The most glaring and downright confusing discrepancy in Wicked: For Good regards the motive and process by which Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh, who has a few amusing moments with Ariana Grande’s Glinda but is pretty much one-note evil in Part 2) conjures the cyclone that brings Kansas’s Dorothy Gale to the Land of Oz. And the fact that Cho refuses to show the latest Dorothy’s face becomes irritating, simplistic political “pawn” though she may be in this telling.

Despite all of this, there is still plenty to recommend Wicked: FG. Grande and Cynthia Erivo as “wicked witch” Elphaba cement themselves in these roles for this and perhaps future generations. It was most telling—and accurate--during the screening I attended that a young boy seated nearby loudly declared “That was awesome!” at the end of the song “No Good Deed,” performed by Erivo with spectacular visual support from Elphaba’s flying monkeys.

I wasn’t thrillified—to utilize the movies’ vernacular—by Jeff Goldblum’s turn as The Wizard in Part 1, but he redeems himself in Part 2 with his visual gag-infused number “Wonderful.” His performance also makes a stronger dramatic impact here. Similarly impressive and even hotter than he was in the first half is out dreamboat Jonathan Bailey, recently christened “The Sexiest Man Alive” by People magazine, as conflicted hetero love interest Fiyero.

Visually, musically and dramatically—not to mention financially-- Wicked: For Good is a success. Even if it isn’t as strong an achievement as Wicked, I fully expect both chapters together will prove over time to be a cinematic classic.

Reverend’s Ratings: B+

Two Strangers Carry a Cake Across New York (Now playing at Broadway’s Longacre Theatre)

I wasn’t planning on seeing this new musical I knew nothing about when I did on November 19th, but another show I was committed to that day cancelled on me somewhat last minute. At the time, I was complaining privately but now I’m raving publicly about the multiple benefits of this fabulous London to NYC transfer!

A charming plot by co-writers Jim Barne and Kit Buchan focuses on two young antagonists turned protagonists who are thrown together by unlikely circumstances. The British Dougal flies to New York for the wedding of his father, who he has never met, only to fall in love with Robin, the sister of his father’s much younger fiancée (i.e. Dougal’s step-aunt-to-be). What starts as potentially creepy turns into a genuinely moving romance between two lost Generation Y-Z souls.

Two Strangers features only two actors: Sam Tutty (making his Broadway debut) and Christiani Pitts. Tutty is adorable as Dougal, although he initially risks wearing the audience down with his overly enthusiastic attitude. One can sympathize with Pitts’ Robin and her aversion to having much to do with him. However, with further character development, some great songs and a genuine chemistry between the two performers, Tutty wins over all but the hardest hearts.

I was very happy to see Pitts perform once again. The first Broadway production Reverend saw in 10 years after relocating to the northeast was 2018’s flop King Kong musical, in which Pitts played the classic Fay Wray role. She was very impressive acting alongside a massive gorilla puppet, and she gives another tough yet ultimately compassionate performance here.

I also have to give a shout out to the musical’s superb scenic design by Soutra Gilmour. It consists of two towers of luggage, with various suitcases ingeniously utilized at times as tables, chairs, a wet bar, beds, and more. The stage’s turntable is also used brilliantly by the designer, actors, and director-choreographer Tim Jackson.

There is no shortage of bigger, better-known shows now on Broadway clamoring for patronage. I encourage everyone to hear the call of this new, small-scale but big-hearted production.

Reverend’s Rating: A-

Chess (Now playing at Broadway’s Imperial Theatre)

Full disclosure for anyone born after the year 2000: this is not a new musical but rather the show’s first major revival since 1988. This allegorical tale depicting a chess match between the USA and the then-Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War (one can definitely argue whether we are in a new Cold War with Russia today) has had a checkered history. At the time, Chess’s greatest claim to fame was the song “One Night in Bangkok” that became a pop top 40 hit. The initial Broadway production closed after only two months and 68 regular performances. 

In the 37 years since, Chess has become a frequently re-worked cult classic subject to numerous video renditions and community theater mountings. I attended a quite good “theater in the round” production in my native Arizona approximately 25 years ago. Die-hard fans have been clamoring for a true Broadway revival all along and have finally gotten their wish. Too bad it isn’t much of an improvement on the original, especially according to a personal friend who saw both the original production and this one.

It didn’t take long for me to figure out that the musical’s current incarnation is a glorified concert staging. There is one set throughout with the band prominently displayed, a required chorus that incorporates occasional cheerleader-esque choreography, and the lead characters migrating downstage for their over-amplified soliloquies.

These lead characters are Soviet competitor Anatoly (Nicholas Christopher), his American rival Freddie Trumper (Aaron Tveit, a Tony Award winner for Moulin Rouge!) and Florence, the woman who comes between them played by Lea Michele of Glee, Spring Awakening fame. While they and the chorus members provide impressive vocals throughout, only Tveit gives a truly layered performance. Christopher and Michele are bland when they aren’t singing. Hannah Cruz (Suffs) makes more of an impression than the latter two in the supporting role of Anatoly’s wife, Svetlana.

I thoroughly enjoyed Tony nominee Bryce Pinkham (A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder) in this production as the all-seeing Arbiter, a role which seems to have been expanded and modernized here. Though amusing, the character’s commentary on current political figures—much is made of Freddie’s unfortunate last name--and issues as well as Chess itself tends to undercut the show’s seriousness. Perhaps the musical’s ultimate rendition is yet to come? Or maybe they should quit while they are at least financially ahead, since this Broadway revival is proving to be a hit.

Reverend’s Rating: C 

Wishing all my dear readers/followers a happy and blessed Thanksgiving! I give thanks for all of YOU.

The Most Reverend Chris Carpenter is editor of Movie Dearest and chief contributor. He has been reviewing movies and theatre since 1996 and also contributes to Rage Monthly magazine (ragemonthly.com). He is a founding member and former Vice President of GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Critics (galeca.com) and currently serves as a nominating/voting member of its New York-based Theatre Wing. Reverend Carpenter has been an ordained minister since 1995.

Reverend's Interview: I Was Born This Way

I was unfamiliar with the late Carl Bean until approximately 5 years ago. I had bought a new car that included Sirius XM satellite radio and I often listened to their Studio 54 channel. One day, they played a remarkably progressive, LGBTQ-positive disco era song I had never heard called “I Was Born This Way.” I subsequently researched it and Bean, who sang it.

He ultimately became Archbishop Carl Bean and founded the Unity Fellowship Church, the first large-scale LGBTQ+ ministry in the USA.  Having survived racism, homophobia and childhood trauma, Bean initially found his voice through song – first as a gospel singer in Harlem’s Christian Tabernacle Choir and later performing with his group, Carl Bean and Universal Love, on their 1974 album Universal Love. But it was his recording of the 1977 Motown hit “I Was Born This Way” that would earn him fame. The song was celebrated as the world’s first gay anthem. 

However, Bean eschewed a mainstream music career and instead chose a vocation in activism. He started the Minority AIDS Project in Los Angeles, serving a vital role for underserved populations at the height of the AIDS crisis. Established 40 years ago, it is still in existence and serving those in need today.

A fabulous new documentary, I Was Born This Way, celebrates the life and legacy of this unapologetic gay Black trailblazer. It is currently playing at the Laemmle North Hollywood Cinemas and will expand to additional cities/theaters soon. The film utilizes innovative rotoscope animation and features appearances by Lady Gaga, Questlove, Billy Porter, California state representative Maxine Waters, and the legendary Dionne Warwick.

Lead producer Wellington Love and co-director Daniel (Dan) Junge recently spoke with Reverend about the process of making their revealing, engrossing documentary. Note: Some questions and comments have been edited for space and/or clarity.

 Thank you both for your time! It’s a great film, so congratulations on it and the awards it has won at film festivals thus far. Let’s start with a question for each of you: How or when did you first become aware of Archbishop Bean?

DJ: I was researching a television series on social action and music, protest music essentially, and one of the episodes was going to be on sex. That made me think immediately of Lady Gaga and her anthem Born This Way, so in researching that I found out that her song was an homage to this earlier song and the man who sang it. I was enthralled and thought that would be an incredible part of the episode. Well, the series—like so many—didn’t happen but that story stuck with me. When I initially researched him I for some reason thought he was in the Midwest, but then I dug in and realized his church was in L.A., probably 2 or 3 miles from where I lived at the time. I thought this could be an amazing standalone film, so I reached out to him and was shooting within a month.

WL: I’m embarrassed to say I really didn’t know much of anything about him until 4 ½ years ago when I got a call from executive producer Josh Green while I was on vacation in Amsterdam. He called me and says “Hey Love, I’ve got this project about this guy named Carl Bean and we’re looking for a little money and maybe you can make a couple calls.” So Josh sent me an interview of Carl who, as you see in the film, was this incredibly charismatic, magnetic figure. It was 45 minutes of him telling his story and (afterward) I couldn’t call Josh back quickly enough to say “How can I help? What can I do to move this along?”

Daniel, in terms of interviewing him—and I don’t want to be morbid or anything—but how long after you interviewed him did Carl pass away?  

DJ: About a year later (in 2021) but he was already immobile and that’s why we’re playing a little trickery there in the film with the background. He was in his home, which was a mobile home near Compton, living in very humble circumstances, and he hadn’t moved from that chair (seen in the film). He was being assisted by members of his congregation. We didn’t want to place him in that world for the film, and that’s why we shot on bluescreen and put him in his church where we felt he belonged. He was as vibrant as ever at that point, you can hear how strong his voice is, but from the waist down he was unable to move. For the sake of the film it really works well because he seems as healthy as ever, but we knew that he was unwell and was very unwell within a few months of shooting that.

Well, that just tells me how providential the timing was that this project came together when it did and you were actually able to get him instead of it being all archival footage or retrospective. That’s great.

DJ: Yeah, I don’t believe in angels but if ever there were, there was one on our shoulder. Or maybe it was providential for him as well because he got a chance to use us as a microphone to amplify his message right at the end of his life.

Yeah, he got to tell his story firsthand. That’s awesome. Love, as the producer can you talk about your role in wrangling or supporting this project?

WL: Initially I came on to help raise much needed funds and when the film was meant to be a 40-minute short. Soon after I came on board, we realized that we couldn’t do Carl’s story justice in that time so we had to recalibrate, open up the film, bring in more talent, raise more money, and think about what other elements we could include in order to really do justice to his life. As a producer, part of your job is to keep it moving, not only the money side but the spirit or the morale so we could keep going. Thankfully, Dan is a real force and we made a good team in terms of making sure, even in the low moments, how important it was to get this right not only to help bring in talent like Questlove and Billy Porter and Lady Gaga, but also to be responsive and responsible to the community whether it be the LGBT community, AIDS activists or the black community. So part of my role was being there to support everything that Dan and (co-director Sam Pollard) needed to do to make sure that this got done as best we could make it.

Who was responsible for reaching out to the talent involved, like Billy Porter?

DJ: We both did but Wellington was really the primary impetus for reaching out to Billy and working with Billy. Wellington, you can fill in more there but I think that’s a critical element for the film.

WL: Obviously, one of the things that we wanted to do in the film was to bring Carl’s story forward, to make it relevant to what’s going on now, and Billy was the perfect sort of ambassador or advocate or embodiment of that in so many ways: being an out, black person of faith; he’s been very open about his HIV status; his musicality and how important that was to embrace that as part of your art. I think that was something that Carl was so adamant about since he was a kid. He was unapologetic about being this gay kid who had this voice, and so Billy was a critical part of that and then obviously—without revealing too much of the film—the recreation of the Liberation song and to make that a point of continuity and moving things forward. Certainly, when Dan started this and I came on board, we had no idea that the film would arrive at this moment when we need these messages more than ever.

DJ: Chris, it’s worth mentioning because of your background (as an out gay clergyperson) that in the Venn diagram where black civil rights and LGBTQ rights overlap, we can probably name a lot of people there and we know there’s a strong history there. Also, there’s some conflict there as well. But in the Venn diagram where you bring Christianity into that, that’s a very small sliver—I won’t say it’s a miniscule sliver—but it’s unknown and not often spoken of.

Yes indeed. Jamie Lee Curtis is listed as one of the film’s executive producers. How did she get involved?

DJ: Thankfully, I had made an earlier documentary with her called Hondros, about a war photographer, so I knew her through that and had an immediate point of contact with her. Also, she has a trans daughter and has been a very strong advocate for LGBTQ+ rights. 

WL: To add to that, one of the things we want to highlight with the film is how much we need allies, and Jamie has been so supportive of the film in many respects and also just in terms of promoting it. As Dan said, she has a trans daughter so she has a vested interest in making sure that this work lives and can get out into the world.

There are so many messages, so many inspirations that people can get out of your film and out of Carl’s story. If there is one thing that each of you most hope or want people to take away from viewing this film, what would that one thing be?

WL: You know, Carl talks about God is love; love is for everyone. Love is for everyone! I think that is an increasingly hard thing to remember and to embrace. We need to be compassionate. We need to think about other people, remember to love other people. That would be it for me.

DJ: I would only add that, in times like these, we have to remain hopeful. Carl had an indomitable spirit and was always hopeful. We hope the film sees a wide audience and that his spirit gives people some hope in this era. It’s just dark days, as you know.

Amen to that!

For more information, visit iwasbornthiswayfilm.com.

The Most Reverend Chris Carpenter is editor of Movie Dearest and chief contributor. He has been reviewing movies and theatre since 1996 and also contributes to Rage Monthly magazine (ragemonthly.com). He is a founding member and former Vice President of GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Critics (galeca.com) and currently serves as a nominating/voting member of its New York-based Theatre Wing. Reverend Carpenter has been an ordained minister since 1995.