FRESH
HECHE
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BY
PETER KURTH (published 10.03.01)
At
a time when all right-thinking people are looking to their souls and comedy is
hard to come by, a press release crosses my desk from the Traditional Values
Coalition (TVC).
Officially,
TVC is "an interdenominational public policy organization" in
Washington, D.C., Truthfully, it’s a Christian fundamentalist libel outfit,
with nothing on its mind but homosexuality ("TVC Applauds Decision
Upholding Homosexual Adoption Ban"), more homosexuality ("Homosexual
Propaganda Campaign Based on Hitler's Big Lie Technique"), still more
homosexuality ("Federal AIDS Dollars Fund Homosexual Proms and Fisting
Seminars") and children’s literature ("Is Harry Potter a
Harmless Fantasy or Wicca Training Program?").
Having
never been to a prom, I can’t contradict the faithful and their pastors when
they say this country is going to hell in a hand-basket. I can, however, give
TVC some urgent advice about its latest and most incongruous poster child, Anne
Heche: "Run away! Run away!"
Yes, Anne Heche, actress and nitwit, late of Ellen
and Anne.
Anne of the Thousand Days, you might say, since that was about as long as her
over-publicized love affair with Ellen Degeneres lasted – just under three
years, a lifetime in lesbian terms, no doubt, but no great shakes to the
God-bound and vow-shackled, for whom Anne has suddenly emerged as an agent of
the Divine.
For
those of you who don’t have this kind of news regularly thrust in your in-box,
an update is in order. When last heard from, just after her break-up with
Ellen, Anne Heche was found wandering the hills around Fresno, "shaken and
confused," talking about "spaceships" and "making strange
statements to homeowners." Soon, she was on "Ally McBeal" and
involved with a "hunky"
Anyhow,
fresh from her "sensual, sexy" nuptials, "newlywed and newly
straight," Anne pops up with a book, Call Me Crazy, an interview
with Barbara Walters – Call Her Connected -- and a pregnancy – Call
the Cops! – leading newswires to hope that "happiness may finally be
on the horizon" for Anne. "I’m not crazy," she explains,
in case her book’s title has confused you. "Because along with the
insanity was my sanity."
How’s
that?
"My
journey of being insane was paralleled with my journey of being sane,"
says Anne.
And
to think – not two years ago, Ellen and Anne were right here in
So,
along comes TVC to beat the news: "Anne Heche Joins Thousands Turning From Homosexuality -- Defies the Claim Homosexuality Is
Genetic." Since Anne also claims to have had multiple personality
disorder, to have been sexually abused by her late father (a church choir
director – go figure), to have visited the fourth dimension, to be both sane
and insane, and to have enjoyed "the best sex [she] ever had!" with
Ellen, pre-Laffoon, TVC’s press release would seem to lack the weight of
Scripture.
Not
only that, but apparently Anne hasn’t turned from homosexuality,
declaring with bitten lip that "you fall in love with a person, not a
sex," and that she "will always be for and about gay rights … because
gay rights are human rights." It’s a stretch to think she knows anything
about genetics. My guess is she’ll go on turning any color Hollywood wants,
that being the nature of the place, and that Barbara Walters, nipped, shriveled
and nearly bald with fame, will go on airing whatever she damn pleases without
regard to taste or truth. Next to this gorgon of public relations and her
promiscuous network, the TVC seems like the DAR.
In
case you’re wondering: Anne’s family isn’t playing along.. "I am trying to
find a place for myself in this writing," says Nancy Heche, "a place
where I as Anne's mother do not feel violated or scandalized. I find no place
among the lies and blasphemies in the pages of this book."
Call
me proud of you, Nancy. Call me a cab. Just don’t bother calling Anne. Ask
Ellen – your daughter flew out of here with aliens a long time ago.
"No
people ever recognize their dictator in advance. He never stands for election
on the platform of dictatorship. He always represents himself as the instrument
[of] the Incorporated National Will. ... When our dictator turns up you can
depend on it that he will be one of the boys, and he will stand for everything
traditionally American. And nobody will ever say `Heil' to him, nor will they
call him `Führer' or `Duce.' But they will greet him with one great big,
universal, democratic, sheeplike bleat of `O.K., Chief! Fix it like you wanna,
Chief! Oh Kaaaay!'" -- Dorothy Thompson,
1935