May 2012
2 posts
9 tags
TEN MINUTES WITH FILMMAKER BUG DAVIDSON
(Bug Davidson)
bug: Hey hey!
Morty: How are ya!
bug: Very good thanks! A bit sleep deprived but good!
Morty: So, you’re in school now, right?
bug: Yes, I’m doing an MFA at the Museum School in Boston.
Morty: Was filmmaking always what you wanted to do?
bug: I have always wanted to be involved in filmmaking, it always has been the biggest challenge to me. I do mostly work in moving...
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INTERVIEW WITH WRITER TRISH SALAH
(photo of Trish Salah)
Trish: Hey Morty!
Morty: Hi there! Are you ready?
Trish: Sure.
Morty: First, were you always excited about the written word? When did you begin to take your writing seriously?
Trish: I knew I wanted to write when I was a kid, and I was pretty intent, from around the age of 12 or 13 that I wanted to make my life writing. I wrote throughout my teens and when I...
April 2012
3 posts
8 tags
INTERVIEW WITH WRITER/CHEF CEYENNE DOROSHOW
Morty: Hello Ceyenne!
Ceyenne: Hello Morty! How are you?
Morty: I’m wonderful, thank you! I hope you are as well.
Ceyenne: Oh, I am!
Morty: Good! I first wanted to ask where are you from?
Ceyenne: I’m originally from Brooklyn. Well, between my mom and my grandparents I’m from Brooklyn, Bushwick and Park Slope. I now live in Queens, in a quiet area away from all the hustle and...
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TEN MINUTES WITH WRITER EVERETT MAROON
Morty: So, you’ve been a writer for quite some time now. How did you start writing?
Everett: I actually started writing as a kid, banging away on a cast iron Royal typewriter. I don’t have any of those stories anymore, but I’m sure they were funny and awful. I went to writer’s camp in high school and as a solid middle class teen I figured any career needed to be able to...
7 tags
What Femininity Garnered Me by Timea Quon
Disclaimer: The points of view and statements are solely of the writer, Timea Quon. From Timea: “Any semblance of ignorance and what not is part of the act. None of this is meant as a blanket statement.”
I’ve been privy to conversation with other trans and gender variant folk for some time now. And those chats and discussions are nothing but tumultuous I tell you what. It’s either...
March 2012
15 posts
12 tags
INTERVIEW WITH WRITER AND PERFORMER RYKA AOKI
PART ONE OF A TWO PART INTERVIEW
Morty: I wanted to start by asking about the early moments in your life where you came to know how much you loved writing?
Ryka: My first inkling of this was in my childhood. I didnt have a great childhood, and I write about this a lot in my work. Writing became an escape and a place where…you know, there are no scars on the paper. It’s a fresh start,...
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INTERVIEW WITH ACTOR JAMIE BLACK
Morty: Jamie! Ready to chat?
Jamie: Yes!
Morty: How did start your career as an actor?
Jamie: I was living in Louisville, KY and I had applied for a temporary job at NationsBank which is now Bank of America. One of the interests I listed was acting and they had a video job available at the bank, a training video and that’s how I started. Well, that’s how I got back into acting but...
13 tags
INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST/WRITER TOBI HILL-MEYER
(Tobi Hill-Meyer)
Morty: Hi Tobi!
Tobi: Hi!
Morty: My first question is regarding your history as an artist. I know you’re a writer but did you make any video work before shooting sex positive porn?
Tobi: Ha! I took a film class in middle school. We recorded still images and used a pair of VCRs to essentially make a slide show to music. But not really. When I first started (making porn) I...
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TEN MINUTES WITH WRITER OLIVER BENDORF
Morty: The first question is a two-in-one. When did you know you wanted to become a writer? Are you more a writer or poet or do both words appeal to you?
Oliver: “Writer” is functionally correct, of course, but “poet” feels more true to my heart. I worked for a year as a technical writer at a federal agency in Washington,DC. That was writing, sure, but it wasn’t poeming. So I like to...
5 tags
SCHMEKEL 100% TRANS JEWS KICKSTARTER!
15 tags
INTERVIEW WITH DANCER SEAN DORSEY
(Sean Dorsey - Photo by Lydia Daniller)
Sean: Hi Morty!
Morty: Hi Sean! Are you ready?
Sean: I am.
Morty: When were your earliest moments of thinking ‘I’d like to be a professional dancer’?
Sean: I always loved dance with every cell and bone in my body, but did not see myself ever having a career in dance. I performed as an actor and did a lot of theater and music as a kid. It...
13 tags
INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST / SCHOLAR KORTNEY RYAN...
Kortney: Hi.
Morty: Hey!
Kortney: How are you?
Morty: I’m wonderful, and you?
Kortney: Excellent.
Morty: So, I wanted to first ask you about your film, Still Black.
Kortney: Sounds good.
Morty: What got you interested in making Still Black?
Kortney: I wanted to make the film because there was, and continues to be, a dearth of trans representation that deals with black bodies. Still Black...
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INTERVIEW WITH WRITER ARDEN ELI HILL
Morty: Hi Arden. Are you ready to chat?
Arden: Sure!
Morty: My first question has to do with your work…how did you decide writing would be the thing you would dedicate yourself to.
Arden: I fought the idea of being a writer at first. This might have been in part because I thought I was going to be a medical doctor (like a dermatologist or something)
Morty: Really!
Arden: Yup. The gender...
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Ten Minutes With Writer Cooper Lee Bombardier
When did you decide that you would go for it and enter higher education for writing/publishing?
I was a self-taught writer, just making it up as I went, and for several years I had this vague desire to go back to school and get a Masters degree. But like a lot of things in my life prior to transition, I had a hard time making concrete decisions and figuring out how to make it happen. From 2007 to...
1 tag
She Is Gay Rights by Robert Hudson
Brook is stiletto-less in Splash
threw them at the drag queen she is loose asshole! and
fuck you! she is sobbing my stairwell 3 AM
box of goldfish crumbs on a Chanel dress for gay
rights and all y’all want is your rights rolling and sexing she is
the breakbeat Jesus Christ! …I need gum… orange...
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INTERVIEW WITH WRITER JODY ROSE HELFAND
Morty: When did you start your career as a writer and what got you interested in writing?
Jody: I was never interested in writing until my senior year in college. I was a Political Science/Women’s Studies major and I saved all of my electives for my last semester. I was taking two creative writing classes and something just clicked. Before I knew it, I had made up my mind to apply to...
February 2012
20 posts
9 tags
intercept by Rex Leonowicz
i never worry that we don’t deliberate,
arm ourselves with gloves thick
against our elements i don’t think to
put up barriers we’ve convinced
ourselves impervious
even while some of us dodging little futures:
paunch she called baby fat pressed to my back
in sleep. i hated baby fat and
when she said
we have such different bodies.
there have been dangers,
close scrapes ...
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INTERVIEW WITH SASSAFRAS LOWREY
Cover art for Sassfras Lowrey’s new book - ROVING PACK
Morty: Hi Sassafras!
Sassafras: Hey!
Morty: So, first question is about your new book. What type of book is it?
Sassafras: My upcoming novel, Roving Pack, will be released in October. It’s a fictional account of homeless queer teens searching for community and building families in punk houses and queer youth...
10 tags
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The Most Magical Place On Earth
By Wyatt Riot
I thought I was going to piss my self by the time I landed in the airport. As soon as the fasten seat belt sign came on my bladder let me know how full it was. I’m not sure why my bladder couldn’t hold it just a little bit longer. It was almost as if my teeth were floating in my skull. I— was about to explode. If I could have any super power in the world it would be to have a...
5 tags
Poem by Rhenaiya Jesson
when i look at my reflection i see an ugly face
looking back at me with sad eyes
my hairline far too high, my beard shadow and adams apple
very unbecoming of a woman
i look at my hands, large and stronger than they need to be
i don’t want to fight anymore, i can’t bear anymore burdens
i shake too much to do a good job painting my nails
i see the stubble of body hair, breasts too...
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INTERVIEW WITH WRITER MAX WOLF VALERIO
Morty Diamond: Hey Max! Alright, first question. Do you date women primarily?
Max Valerio: Only women.
MD: And you always have?
MV: Yes, however, I did try guys out as a teenager. There was certainly more pressure to be heterosexual when I was growing up in the 60’s and 70’s, and I succumbed to that. However, I am also the type of person who likes to experiment and push my own envelope of...
2 tags
THE SMELL OF MELTING BARBIE FLESH
by Suzi Hayes
The girls are in the end room of the house, the sewing room, but they’re not sewing. They’re huddled beneath the sewing table, a narrow formica bench pushed up hard against the back wall, playing Barbies. She has a lighter and a razor blade. The girls are careful not to make a sound, discovery sure to equal disaster, as they perform the operations. The dirty blonde synthetic hair is...
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A Short Interview With Artist Simon Croft
Simon Croft is a London based trans-man and visual artist with a particular interest in the rapidly evolving artistic expressions of the FtM trans experience and how they contribute to trans community and culture. He has exhibited in LGBT shows both in the UK and US, and also occasionally writes, curates and provides publicity images for other trans events.
NUTS by Simon Croft
What brought you...
Schmekel Interview
Morty: Hey! Okay, my first question is how long have each of you been playing your instruments?
Ricky: I started playing keyboard and piano when I was 12, 13ish. I’m 26.
Simcha: I started playing the drums at age nine, so I’ve played for almost 16 years.
Lucian: I started playing guitar when I was ten. I’m 29.
Nogga: I started playing guitar when I was 8 and then bass when I was 14. Then...
3 tags
The De-Gendered Pleasure Project
by Chase Ryan Joynt
I propose an evolutionary and foundational shift in the way that we are currently thinking and talking about our genitals. My intention in this writing is to explode genital talk out of the many gendered cracks and crevices in which it is currently housed. I want to re-contextualize current musings regarding our parts and in doing so, propose a necessary reclamation of self...
6 tags
With Those Words
By Koomah
WITH THOSE WORDS – (FTM)
Once when she was little, she saw a boy in her own face. She saw him when she stared in the mirror, when she gazed deep into her eyes. She knew he was there, but she didn’t know how or why. Every time she saw him, he was always so happy. She thought he was even a more attractive person than she was. She often wondered if anyone else could see him when they...