AMPERSAND

Gathered on the carpet outside a movie theater are Kristin’s castmates, their bodies stretched out among set-pieces, suitcases full of costumes and props, their language peppered with equal parts exuberance and expletives. This is Kristin’s makeshift dressing room: she balances a lighted, three-paneled mirror on a plastic folding chair, her half-costumed body perched before it. Tonight, she is portraying a corset-and-fishnet-wearing mad scientist called Dr. Frank-N-Furter.

AMPERSAND

Sundance Film Festival attracts critics, distributors, celebrity-sightseers and movie-lovers alike to the snowy locale of Park City, UT for 10 days in January. The films that premiere here often become Oscar winners. “Call Me By Your Name” and “Get Out” were among last year’s programming. But for this year’s festival, which ran from January 18th to 28th, a number stood out: 37% of the films were directed by women – the highest percentage of women-directed films ever to be programmed at Sundance.

AMPERSAND

In the backyard of a Hollywood bungalow sits a garage that’s been converted into a studio. Inside, a revised definition of queer art is tested by way of needle and thread. Beside the workstation sits a vintage triple-cassette boombox that plays mixtapes containing everything from Bat for Lashes to Enya to Animal Collective. Thoughtfully laid out along the opposite side of the raised rectangular table is a makeup wipe bearing the remnants of a drag queen’s face – pink, glitter lipstick and shimmering bronzer – next to a single, claw-like rhinestone-studded press-on nail. Both are love tokens once given to Los Angeles artist Aubrey Longley-Cook courtesy of two Atlanta drag queens, Brigitte Bidet and Biqtch Puddin’, both of whom have made this house their transient home over the past month.

FILM SCHOOL REJECTS

Since the series finale of Gossip Girl in 2012, there’s been a void in the world of teen soaps. Admirers of the genre were at a loss for trendy music and fashion-driven dramas where girls stalk through their high school in heels and short skirts, spitting out somewhat-clever one-liners. In the spring of 2017, The CW answered our prayers with its rendition of the Archie Comics, Riverdale – retooled as though by Alfred Hitchcock’s millennial surrogate. On paper, it doesn’t sound like it would work. But to my surprise, it did.

The tagline might as well have read: Mischief. Murder. Milkshakes.