Birdcage

The Birdcage, as best I can remember, was a pretty good movie. I enjoyed it, anyway. Robin Williams and Nathan Lane play a cabaret owner and his trans-woman starlet who live together as a married couple. They have an adopted son, and the movie is about them dealing with this adult son getting married to a Catholic girl who's parents would never approve of their religion (Jewish), lifestyle, or sexuality.

They first attempt to deal with this by trying to pretend that Nathan Lane's character is biologically a woman, and that they are a good Christian family. But as she hasn't been through the surgery (and seems to have no interest? I don't know. It's been a really long time, and I was like 14.), her makeup job goes awry after a series of wacky misfortunes, and the jig is up.

Somehow, both families work through this and decide to tolerate one another for the sake of their children, and the movie ends on an adorable half Jewish, half Catholic wedding because tolerance of our differences is what's really important.

So I really liked it. I thought it was funny. I liked the message. Maybe I wouldn't agree now (like I said, been a long time, and I'm a little scared to rewatch it. I'm kind of worried that it will turn out to have been problematic, or even offensive, in ways I don't remember.), but at the time, it was like a breath of fresh air. It was a sort of validation that it's OK to be different. I would later go on to realize that I'm pansexual, and I've always kept this movie in the back of my mind.

I saw the Birdcage with my grandmother. I don't remember why or who's idea it was to see it. I seem to recall that she disapproved and wanted to...kind of be a watch dog, I guess? Like when parents want to make sure their kids aren't watching something they shouldn't be exposed to. Not a problem, is what I'm trying to say. It's annoying in retrospect because I was 14, but it was an R rated movie. It doesn't really matter. The important part is what comes after.

There's a scene in the movie where the son tells his father that he's getting married to a girl. Armand (Williams' character) goes to Albert (Lane's character) to commiserate that they're son is getting married, and to a girl, no less. This was treated with sadness, but acceptance. Their son was different, but in the end, that's OK.

After the movie, my grandmother was troubled. Surely, they couldn't want their son to be like them? They were homosexuals. That's like a disease or something.

I can't remember what I said, some vague toeing the line thing that I felt was acceptable while registering my discomfort with her sentiment. What I do remember was hearing her say that, then crinkling my nose, drawing my eyebrows together. It wasn't right, what she said. Then a tiny bit of nausea in my stomach and my mind. All this in a moment that's as crystal clear now as when it happened, and then my murmured response.

My grandmother confuses me, looking back. That she could honestly believe that, not only is there something wrong with homosexuality, but that they must know that and hate themselves for it. But then, a few years later, she expressed the sentiment that the hot girls calendar my grandfather kept in his workshop was not only acceptable but desirable because the female body is beautiful, and there's nothing wrong with that. She could say and believe such an awful thing about homosexuality, and then be the inspiration for me accepting that I'm not heterosexual.

Sometimes, I love her. And then I remember something else she said or did or didn't do, and I remember why I couldn't, and still can't, love her. I used to hate her. Now, I just feel tired.