The News Boy George Fabulous

Peter Hackney speaks with Boy George,ahead of his trip to Sydney for the Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras.


Once upon a time there was a boy...

Born in 1961 in Eltham, a rather bland slice of English suburbia, he was fey child who was regularly taunted; called a “poof” from the age of six. He was a plucky kid, however, with big dreams and the mettle to reach them. Not for him the pedestrian life of commuting or shop-keeping or dole-collecting that seemed pre-ordained for everyone in Eltham.

By the late 1970s, he was a fixture on the London club scene, his androgynous style and theatrical flair catching the eye of music svengali Malcolm McLaren (of Sex Pistols fame) who, in 1980, cast him in new wave band Bow Wow Wow. Such was his popularity that the other members got jealous, and he left to form his own group, Culture Club. In 1982, they released their debut album, and within months our boy was flying in the pop stratosphere, breathing the rarefied air shared by Madonna, Michael Jackson and Prince.

The hero of our fairy story (pun definitely intended) is, of course, none other than Boy George.

And while we recall that George spiralled to Earth in 1986, in a vortex of drug addiction and scandal, there's no denying that he's since earned lasting respect and is now a genuine queer icon: singer, songwriter, author, actor, newspaper columnist, queer rights activist, fashion designer, photographer, radio presenter and DJ, Boy George is a creative powerhouse. And come March 3, Sydney will get a taste of this unique star (its first in 8 years) when he jets into town for the queerest spectacle of all, the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.

“Someone once said to me, ‘Like prostitutes or monuments, if you stay around long enough, you'll eventually get respect',” says George, speaking to SX from Paris, where he's shooting a Hugo Boss campaign.

“I think that you just have to be a bit bloody-minded about things, because whatever I've done – and I've done lots of things in my life – I'm not frightened to do new things if I think I can do them well.”

George's incarnation as DJ, one of the many things he does well, is the premise for his forthcoming trip to Sydney. The star will be spinning around (as a particular friend of his might say – or sing) at the Mardi Gras Party on Saturday, March 3 – George's second Mardi Gras, the first being in 1995, when he sang live.

Reminded of the snootiness that surrounded his first forays into DJ-ing, George recalls, “It was the same thing when I started singing!” The detractors have had to eat their words, however, and watch him become a ‘superstar DJ', one of a handful who can headline virtually any party they want, anywhere they want, anytime they like.

So how does George describe his style as a DJ? “I would say that I have no style,” he laughs. “Someone in America once said about my DJ-ing, ‘Oh, you know, Boy George has no style.' It was meant as an insult, but it's actually true. I'm not a sort of DJ who plays a certain type of music. I'm not a trance DJ, I like to mix things about, because I got into dance music around the time of acid house when you could be in clubs in Ibiza and hear things like Phil Collins, and all sorts of mad things in the middle of a dance floor. You could be at a foam party and suddenly ‘You Can't Hurry Love' would come on, or some old northern soul record.”

Despite persistent debate in Sydney over the continuing relevance of Mardi Gras, George is firmly of the opinion that it still has a place, and he waxes lyrical with his Mardi Gras memories: “I think it's important for us to have a day where we can come and scream and dress up and act silly”, he says, “I really do ... Last time I was there it was raining, which was a bit of a shame because obviously everyone got their costumes destroyed, but what struck me was that it was so well organised. I was very impressed by the attention to detail, the fact that they made a real effort. It wasn't just me on a stage singing – they built this fantastic set and made costumes for me. It was really, really impressive.”

George has made numerous visits here over the years, and recently, fans were treated to a portrait of his first Australian sojourn with the release of the Culture Club Live in Sydney DVD. As George tells it, his notorious '80s cohort Marilyn smoothed the way for that first tour, albeit unintentionally.

“Marilyn went ahead of me,” he recalls, “and proceeded to make himself extremely unpopular. What happened was that people were expecting me to be equally obnoxious, so he did me a huge favour.”

George confirms queer legend which maintains that Marilyn was given a black eye on Oxford Street by a disgruntled fan (“Yes, he was kicked in the face”) and dismisses rumours that bruising in question was the product of make-up.

“Where that idea came from was that obviously the black eye went down, and when Marilyn flew back, he got my friend Kim Bowen to ‘touch it up' to make it look quite bad again. But he was hit, you know. And I don't agree with that. I remember there were bumper stickers saying ‘I kicked Marilyn', which I didn't think was all that impressive.”

In fact, despite their seemingly ‘Blanche & Baby Jane' relationship, George in 2007 seems nothing but magnanimous towards Marilyn, whom he's still close to. Discussing a recent SX interview, in which Marilyn referred to the heroin overdose death of a musician at George's home in 1986 (“It was George whose career should have been ruined by heroin, not mine!”), George comes across as tolerance personified.

“I don't know what to say about that really,” he sighs. “It's not a very intelligent thing to say. But I don't really care. I've known Marilyn a long, long time. There's been plenty of things that I've read like that and in a way, I kind of understand. I know it's his insecurity, you know? We're sisters under the skin. Whenever I confront him about these things he says (adopts hurt, indignant tone), ‘No, no, I never said that!' You know, what can you do?

“I try not to say nasty things about him because he is quite fragile at times,” he continues. “I think those sort of comments are a way of making himself feel better, I suppose.”

But one person George has nothing kind to say about is Madonna (or McDonna, as he likes to call her). George, who has a long history of sniping at the Kabbalah devotee, says he's mystified by the gay community's continuing reverence for her and speculates that the singer is still popular with gays “because we're taught to hate ourselves”.

“It's such a strange thing,” he opines. “I mean, I understand the adoration of strong women because I saw my own mother pushed around by my father. Growing up, I loved the likes of Joan Collins, Shirley Bassey. I loved divas, I loved these strong women, and I think when Madonna first appeared that's what she was. In her early days, she was quite spectacular – there was something more real about her then. With songs like ‘Papa Don't Preach', there was a certain kind of knowingness to what she did. But at a certain point she became bourgeoisie. Now, I just think she's a complete phony.”

George's stance on Madonna is understandable. While Madonna has sustained her commercial success, George's recorded music has been relegated to a cult following – despite the fact that in recent years, he's recorded some of the best material of his career, including the hypnotic ‘Song For a Boy' in 2005, and this year's brilliant ‘Time Machine'. It seems unfair that Madonna's botoxed parody of herself is continually rewarded, while a genuine musician, who actually writes his own songs (not ‘change a word, take a third' writing) has his music sidelined.

Not that George necessarily harbours sour grapes against people who are more commercially successful: while he's cheekily bitched about her in years gone by, he's now close friends with Kylie Minogue, even designing the trousers she wore on her recent Showgirl Homecoming tour. “I sat up for two nights making those trousers,” he reports.

George's friendship with Kylie dates back to 1999, when La Minogue approached him to make a contribution to her coffee-table book, Kylie. “I wrote back and jokingly said, ‘Kylie unlikely', and she actually put that in as my contribution. And at that point I thought, ‘I quite like her, actually',” he laughs. “She has a sense of humour.”

But it's not all frothy anecdotes with George. The performer has a more serious side, and in Britain he's a regular commentator on queer issues; a respected ‘talking head' on subjects like gay marriage, equality and cottaging (or ‘doing beats', as we say here). He's also a committed vegetarian, whose animal rights sensibilities means that his fashion label, B-Rude, is fur and leather-free.

On gay marriage, he tells SX: “The issue of gay marriage seems ludicrous when we still live in a society that refuses to even accept that kids are born gay! But I do think that it's a civil rights issue and that if you pay your taxes and contribute, you should be entitled to the same rights as everybody else, including marriage. My problem with gay marriage is that a lot of the thinking behind it is that if we act more like straight people, they'll tolerate us more. And I don't see why we should!”

On cottaging: “Obviously, for some people, it's fascinating and exciting, but I don't think, with the internet, there's any need for it any more. I'm more of a cotton sheets queen myself,” he quips. He can't resist adding: “I must admit, I get a bit of a giggle over my coffee and morning papers seeing the latest pics of [George Michael] stumbling out of a bush.”

As for the gay community itself, a celebration of which he's about to take part in, George says: “I don't really fit into the stereotypes of the gay community. I don't have a square jaw or a perfectly gym-toned body. You know, I'm a bit of a sort of oddity. I exist in a sexual no-man's land. I'm one of those homosexuals who's always felt slightly on the outside.”
For what it's worth, George, we love you just as you are.

Boy George will appear at the 2007 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Party as headline DJ in the Hordern Pavilion on Saturday, March 3. Visit www.mardigras.org.au for tickets.

http://www.evolutionpublishing.com.au/sxnews/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1587&Itemid=40

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