Gay vito
Vito Russo
Episode Notes
From Eric Marcus: The late author and activist Vito Russo is best known for his 1981 landmark manual, The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies, and for co-founding both GLAAD (originally known as the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation), and ACT UP (the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power).
In my interview with Vito, you’ll hear him trace the start of his activism to a candlelight vigil outside St. Vincent’s Hospital for Diego Vinales, who was arrested on March 8, 1970, in a police raid of the Snake Pit bar (in his Making Gay History interview, Vito mistakenly dates the raid to July 1969). Vinales had jumped from the police station’s second-floor window and was impaled on an iron fence. He was taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital, which was then located on 7th Avenue and 13th Street at the northern edge of Greenwich Village. Vito read a flyer that was being handed out at the vigil and that led him to join the Gay Activists Alliance (GAA).
But Vi
Revisiting the Archive — Vito Russo
Episode Notes
Vito Russo’s legacy—as a film historian, activist, and co-founder of GLAAD and ACT UP—is hard to overstate. In this 1988 interview, legacy was also very much on Vito’s mind: it was the height of the AIDS epidemic, which had claimed Vito’s boyfriend, and now Vito was sick, too. As we remember the people lost to the current pandemic, listen to Vito show on what it means to leave something behind.
Visit our season one episode webpage for background information, archival photos, and other resources.
Episode Transcript
Eric Marcus: Okay, I’ve just pressed “Record.”
Sara Burningham: Okay, so I’ll put myself on mute and then we’ll earn started?
EM: Yep, I’ll just near the closet door.
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Eric Marcus Narration: I’m Eric Marcus and this is Making Gay History.
I’m recording this fifth episode in our “Revisiting the Archive” season on Thursday, April 16, five weeks to the day since my partner Barney and I started sh
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Vito Russo was a gay rights activist, a film historian and an author best known for his book, “The Celluloid Closet,” a groundbreaking chronicle of gays and lesbians in film.
A New York City native, Russo grew up in East Harlem. As a young boy, he would sneak into Manhattan to go to the movies. From an early age, Russo knew he was “different.” A cousin remembers him always talking about Rock Hudson rather than Ava Gardner.
After graduating from New York University, Russo joined the Gay Activists Alliance. In the early 1970s, he started research for “The Celluloid Closet” (1981), which entailed watching hundreds of films that included gay content and stereotypes. What originated as a lecture with film clips became one of the most informative books about gay people and pop culture.
Diagnosed with HIV in 1985, Russo was a frequent protestor with ACT UP. In 1986, Russo lost his longtime partner, Jeffrey Sevcik, to AIDS. Outraged by the media’s inadequate and inaccurate coverage of the pandemic, Russo cofounded GLAAD, an organization that monitors LGBT repre
Taking inspiration from the “Bechdel Test,” which examines the way women characters are portrayed and situated within a narrative, GLAAD developed its own set of criteria to analyze how LGBTQ characters are included within a film. The Vito Russo Test takes its name from celebrated film historian and GLAAD co-founder Vito Russo, whose book The Celluloid Closet remains a foundational analysis of LGBTQ portrayals in Hollywood film. These criteria can help guide filmmakers to create more multidimensional characters while also providing a barometer for representation on a wide scale. This test represents a minimum standard GLAAD expects a greater number of mainstream Hollywood films to reach in the future.
To pass the Vito Russo Test, the following must be true:
- The film contains a character that is identifiably lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer.
- That character must not be solely or predominantly defined by their sexual orientation or gender identity (i.e. they are comprised of the same sort of unique character traits commonly used to differentiate straight/non-tr