Quentin Crisp, a life in film

July 28, 2023 10:22 AM

It's hard to believe, perhaps even astonishing, that The Naked Civil Servant [1h17m] was shown on British television in 1975. John Hurt's brilliant portrayal of Quentin Crisp in an unflinching film about being nonbinary homosexual in Britain, based on Crisp's 1968 autobiography, propelled both men into immediate fame. Hurt revisited the role 34 years later in 2009 , after Crisp's 1999 death, for An Englishman In New York [1h14m], based on the broad sweep of Crisp's later life in America.

And here is An Evening With Quentin Crisp [1h30m, 1980, less than ideal audio], the man himself in Los Angeles four years after The Naked Civil Servant debuted on US television, basically at the beginning of the second film.

Quentin said a lot that resonated with the Radical Faeries, who have influenced my life greatly. And he has a lot to say about finding your own identity in society and making it the way you live in the world. It's a message that I think resonates with anyone looking for authenticity in daily life and presentation.

posted by hippybear (15 comments total)

A friend of mine hosted Quentin in San Francisco for his job in the late Nineties, and during their time together they stopped to pick up a friend who lived in a bit of a tough neighborhood with gates on the windows and entrance, and Quentin's comment was "Oh look, you keep him in a cage". Admittedly, the friend of my friend was a bit of rough trade.
posted by hippybear at 10:22 AM on July 28, 2023 [8 favorites]

"Though intelligence is powerless to modify character, it is a dab hand at finding euphemisms for its weaknesses" - QC
posted by lalochezia at 10:43 AM on July 28, 2023 [6 favorites]

Crisp meant a lot to me in my early 20s, looking for queer role models. I've never seen the film but the book is excellent reading.

I'm struck by the use of the term "nonbinary" to describe Crisp, I don't think that term was in common usage when they were alive. The term I would have picked would be "genderqueer" but that's an anachronism too. Either way I was sure they definitely enjoyed not only being homosexual but also a man but being not a proper man, bending gender in various provocative ways. I took that as inspiration, emulated it for a bit myself.

But while looking at Internet sources for this comment I found something new-to-me, an autobiography written at age 90 with Crisp's evolving description of their own identity. There's a summary online, here's a bit direct from the book.

Had I been born a woman, none of my life would have happened and I could have been happy. ...

At the age of ninety, it has finally been explained to me that I am not really homosexual, I’m transgender. I now accept that. All my life, I have wanted to be part of society without having to alter my daydream, my own reality. When it comes to sex, these days I’m asexual. Nevertheless, I’m now convinced that it has been my view of myself and not my view of men that has been my trouble.

I no longer see myself as homosexual, though it is a word I have used to describe myself and which others have understandably used to describe me. I don’t actually see myself as a man though, of course, I know I’m not physically a woman. ...

The only thing in my life I have wanted and didn’t get was to be a woman. It will be my life’s biggest regret. If the operation had been available and cheap when I was young, say when I was twenty-five or twenty-six, I would have jumped at the chance. My life would have been much simpler as a result.

I have to say this has made me really reconsider Crisp and what they mean to me. I'm curious now to read the whole autobiography.
posted by Nelson at 10:55 AM on July 28, 2023 [19 favorites]

I saw The Naked Civil Servant probably late 70’s when it was shown on TV, PBS, I think. About twenty years later, after I moved to San Francisco, I got to meet QC at a book reading at a bookstore in the Castro. I sat there wondering if people there were wondering who this straight guy is sitting there, me. After seeing the movie, over the years, I read his books, and fell in love with their wit and their heroic effort to just be who they were, no matter what. He started to talk and immediately began speaking about some of their controversial comments about AIDS and the reactions that came from them. Given the time, place, and audience, this struck me as a pretty brave thing to do, and given the audience reactions and questions and comments, it seemed like everything was ok. They then went into to just talking about stuff with lots of questions from the audience. A really good time. And funny as hell. Pointedly funny. I got him to sign my books. I was happy. And all the people there seemed really happy. For me, a lifelong alienated individual, Crisp is a hero in just living their life as they chose to live it. Too bad that they didn’t get to go all the way and make that transition to actually living that daydream as real life.
posted by njohnson23 at 12:17 PM on July 28, 2023 [9 favorites]

About twenty years later, after I moved to San Francisco, I got to meet QC at a book reading at a bookstore in the Castro.

That's probably the book reading my friend was hosting Crisp for in SF for in the late Nineties. There can't be too many times Crisp was in SF at that very late point in his life.
posted by hippybear at 12:27 PM on July 28, 2023 [3 favorites]

Quentin Crisp deserves to be honoured as the author of the most English name ever.
posted by flabdablet at 1:21 PM on July 28, 2023 [3 favorites]

I remember seeing him on TV in the late '70s. I was just a kid, probably 9 years old. He described himself (and I swear I remember the actual words!) as "One of England's stately homos." And even though I had no idea what he meant, his mannerisms and voice and looks were just fascinating to me.
posted by SoberHighland at 2:45 PM on July 28, 2023

Something to watch later!
posted by Going To Maine at 3:14 PM on July 28, 2023

I'm struck by the use of the term "nonbinary" to describe Crisp

I wavered back and forth about using that word. In the end, I felt it would be useful to use a modern word to describe how he presented, even if the language for exactly what he was being in the world was not something accounted for back then.

I don't see anything wrong with using modern descriptors for people from the past if it helps draw a connection between the then and the now. And certainly, as you mention in your comment, Crisp himself was seeing beyond the gender binary in his much later years.

Honestly, there are a lot of statements by Crisp in his talk linked under the fold that are going to feel problematic on their surface. But he develops his ideas enough that he often moves beyond the problem and into something deeper. And really, looking at a talk given by a then quite elderly queen in the Eighties is always going to contain language and symbols that modern day interprets differently.

Like with all things Crisp, I think, it's important to dwell with the subject matter at hand, not the specific language, and to let those ideas sink into you. He's saying very deep things about claiming identity that is against the mainstream and causing the mainstream to bend to your will if your claim to identity is strong enough. There is powerful magic there, and even if his expression feels clumsy and outdated to modern sensibilities, his ideas can be transporting if you take them into your soul.
posted by hippybear at 3:22 PM on July 28, 2023 [11 favorites]

I'm convinced that a looooooooot of people who were canonized as gay or lesbian elders would have had that operation and not just because of societal pressure to be "straight." Society isn't ready to know!
posted by kingdead at 4:42 PM on July 28, 2023 [1 favorite]

I don't see anything wrong with using modern descriptors for people from the past if it helps draw a connection between the then and the now. And certainly, as you mention in your comment, Crisp himself was seeing beyond the gender binary in his much later years.

I'm not going to litigate the gender identity of someone who is dead, but someone who identifies themselves as trans does not become non-binary by dint of not having socially transitioned. Likewise, gender non-conformity does not automatically equal non-binary identity.
posted by hoyland at 6:33 PM on July 28, 2023 [2 favorites]

hoyland, I'm not going to argue against any of that, and I mean no disrespect to anyone. I merely was using the word based on how he presented to the world and the things he himself had to say about how he felt about how he fit into the world. I certainly would not use that word lightly. And again, I mean no disrespect to anyone.
posted by hippybear at 7:17 PM on July 28, 2023

I have to save the videos for later on wifi but it’s interesting the words. At this stage in my life I usually use words like “non-binary” and “genderqueer” to describe myself depending on context and people I’m taking to. To be honest I don’t get fussed if someone says “woman” or “she” — to be fair I called myself that most of my life. But it got increasingly ridiculous feeling to limit myself to that given some stuff I don’t want to detail in. But oddly it wasn’t till this thread — and this is seriously no shade or criticism on anyone here commenting — I hadn’t realized I absolutely do not like “gender non-conforming” except maybe as an ironic or aggressive claim. ”Gender non-conforming” as a descriptor or identity just feels not good to me like there’s a right way to do gender. I admit it has likely very useful descriptive value in analysis and academia and of course societally encouraged norms exist (which differ by place and time and are enforced with variable strictness by sex). But it’s something I can’t imagine myself describing myself except, as noted, a joke or farce or maybe I might even call it a demand.

What a weird thing to realize about what’s in my own mind while going through the comments about videos about and writing by someone who sounds very interesting and themselves went through a lot of thinking over time. It maybe metaphorically whacking me on the side of the head to again realize how complicated this stuff really can be. So anyway thanks for the thread! And now I have yet more videos in my watch later list. 😂
posted by R343L at 11:17 PM on July 28, 2023 [3 favorites]

John Hurt as Crisp in the courtroom scene in "Naked civil servant," is so powerful, so plain and clear in its indictment of the bullshit Crisp faced, that I can still see it, decades later.

Have to mention Crisp's portrayal of Queen Elizabeth I in Sally Potter's "Orlando."

Also, I think it was Crisp who was quoted re his housekeeping, "After 35 years, the dirt doesn't get any worse."
posted by goofyfoot at 7:33 PM on August 1, 2023

Crisp as Elizabeth is a whole section of the second film.
posted by hippybear at 9:00 PM on August 1, 2023