God Save the Pretty, Vacant, Queens: John Cameron Mitchell

By Paris Pompor

“It wasn’t the easiest shoot for her… sometimes she was being spat on or being hit in the head with a guitar, which she didn’t like.”

Director John Cameron Mitchell is thinking back to being on-set with Nicole Kidman during the filming of his latest feature, How To Talk To Girls At Parties.

“I’m out of my comfort zone!” mimics Mitchell, recalling Kidman’s non-demanding protests on the shoot. He makes her sound more like a droll downtown drag-queen than the ice-queen she’s often portrayed as in the media: “I love it, but I’m not punk – I’m country and western!”

Well, she is hitched to Keith Urban.

But it’s punk that is at the heart of Mitchell’s new film, and Kidman plays the leader of a Croydon gang of studded, safety-pinned students. In it, Kidman looks a little like one of the director’s early heroes, David Bowie, circa-Labyrinth. Mitchell first hooked up with the Australian actor for 2010’s Rabbit Hole, which, compared to the director’s earlier sexuality-fuelled cult-hit romps Hedwig And The Angry Inch (2001) and Shortbus (2006) was a deeply dark drama about dealing with a child’s death.

That’s not to say Rabbit Hole wasn’t excellent. For starters it earned Kidman both Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress, plus a standing ovation at the Toronto Film Festival. It’s just that it wasn’t what Mitchell’s militantly-loyal queer fans were quite expecting. After all, the actor/director had arrived like something of a saviour for those who weren’t happy with Hollywood’s homogenisation of LGTBQI cinema, nor the industry’s claw at the pink box office dollar. Shortbus came (quite literally at points) like a rush at the screen: a thousand middle-fingers to normality and the establishment. Full of bodily fluids and sexual contortions, there were no holds barred. Actually, no holes were barred either.

A first peek at the How To Talk To Girls At Parties’ trailer may have you wondering if Mitchell has now turned his hand to hetero teen romances. That would be a mistake. While early reviews are mixed, maybe this is his queerest – and weirdest – film yet. First up, candy-rubber clad non-binary extraterrestrials arrive in South London from somewhere beyond the liquid sky ready to party with local punks. Aside from a self-confessed Brexit metaphor, a whole lot more goes into Mitchell’s new mash-up, including matriarchy, pansexuality and Tantra.

Did someone say the movie’s aliens are into fisting? Mitchell is playing it polite on that subject.

“There are so many fun characters in this,” he enthuses, not least Kidman’s. “Her character is the loud, bray, haven’t-washed-in-a-week, punk-squat den mother. She’s kind of a Vivienne Westwood rival. She’s [also] a bit of a failure, but lords it over her tiny suburban enclave. She’s not all over the film, but her scenes are very strong. And she’s hilarious… She lurched into [the part] and had a hoot! People don’t always let [Nicole] be as goofy as she is.”

What’s one thing Mitchell likes about working with Kidman?

“I feel like Nicole is a self-directing actor often. You just have to lead her down a path and let her go. She’s not the kind who needs hugs, constant supervision and shoring up: she’s proud. She’s a kind of thoroughbred, but she’s excited about new characters. She loves to be led down a path but then be allowed to roam free down that path.

“My most common direction to her would be: Do you need me right now?”

Hedwig fans will be glad to hear that Mitchell’s new film is rich with song. “There’s tonnes of music and 80% of it is original. Which is, you know, our DIY punk ethos: Don’t throw punk hits in there, make your own punk hits.

“Ironically we couldn’t afford the real punk hits… [like] God Save The Queen. The ultimate anti-establishment song was out of our budget,” Mitchell admits wryly.

That’s a shame given the film is set in 1977, during England’s high-octane 25th anniversary celebrations of Queen Elizabeth II’s accession. If you’re now thinking the director’s giving a nod to Derek Jarman’s Jubilee, it’s interesting to note Mitchell’s costume designer Sandy Powell (Velvet Goldmine, Gangs of New York) studied under Jarman.

“We do have live music and there’s definitely a movie musical moment when people break into song without knowing how. [That’s] also the song where someone gets pregnant from a song.”

A kind of rhythm method in reverse.

“I don’t think it’s ever happened in a film before,” Mitchell suspects.

For How To Talk To Girls At Parties, a fictional punk band called The Dyschords did the deed. Created by Martin Tomlinson (Selfish Cunt) and Bryan Weller, the pair wrote the film’s songs and also took the band off-set for some gigs to hone the sound. Further musical input came from Carl Newman (New Pornographers), Ezra Furman (The Visions), Nico Muhly (Bedroom Community) and electronic duo Matmos.

Mitchell’s connection with music is strong and he visits Australia this June/July to perform some of these new tunes live. He’ll also revisit the now-iconic songs written by Stephen Trask, which Mitchell performed and utterly nailed, as Hedwig.

“It’s not really written, it’s more of a rock concert,” says Mitchell of this Australian tour he’s called The Origin Of Love. “It’s the first time I’ve done my own concert.”

It’s quite a step to make. Presumably there’s also considerable mental and emotional hurdles to clear in resurrecting a complex and energetic character like Hedwig. Especially as Mitchell will let loose on stage for a full, in the moment concert where there isn’t the emergency brake of being able to shout: Cut! Let’s do another take.

“I’m not doing the character,” Mitchell corrects. “What it is, is the songs and stories of Hedwig. It’s really the making-of. I’m singing Stephen Trask’s brilliant songs and doing some of my own songs from… my new musical, Anthem. I’m doing outtakes from Hedwig [and] songs that influenced Hedwig.”

For those who were also hoping to see some of the fantastic Hedwig costumes on this tour, the news is good. “I am going to be in drag and doing a kind of meta-Hedwig look,” Mitchell assures. As for the band he’s using local musicians, “many of whom worked on the original Hedwig production that toured Australia many years ago starring iOTA, which I saw videos of. He was amazing!”

We concur. iOTA really nailed the Hedwig songs and persona, looking utterly spent at the end of performances.

Evolving from the glam of Hedwig to the punk of How To Talk To Girls… is natural for this fluid, multi-faceted creative.

“I lived in the UK during the glam years – so Bowie was my god,” says Mitchell, who spent some formative childhood years in Scotland. “Punk was something that I heard of [later] in high school, but it seemed kind of scary.”

Then Mitchell “came out in the ‘80s and I got more punk!” But the music Mitchell was hearing in typical gay venues held little fascination.

“In some ways, queer and punk have a lot in common, they question the status quo and often times converged. Then there was a queer-punk scene in the ‘80s and ‘90s that I was a part of…  A lot of them had never sung before. They had lip-synced, and then realised: Oh wow, I don’t have to be that good a singer. They found out that they were already punk! There was a great queer club called SqueezeBox in the ‘90s that amazing performers came out of, including Antony – of The Johnsons. The den mother was Jayne County who was the original rock ’n’ roll trans drag queen of the ‘70s. I would see all these amazing performers and learn from them. That’s were I did my first gigs.”

SqueezeBox is also where Stephen Trask performed as part of the house band and anyone from Debbie Harry, Nina Hagen and Joey Ramone through to Mistress Formika, Miss Guy and the Toilet Böys would take to the stage in various degrees of undress.

As Mitchell once told the Red Bull Academy, up until its arrival he could barely tolerate the pretty, vacant music and people in most gay venues: “[SqueezeBox!] was the club that I had always been waiting for my whole life… a place where, you know, you could slam with cute boys without fear of breaking their hair… It was kinda scary. You never knew what was gonna happen…. So it was from heaven.”

Mitchell, whose speech is a hybrid of delightfully charming Englishman and sassy New Yorker, is almost as funny in real life as his scripts.

Who could forget lines like the one where Hedwig introduces a fur coat to the audience: Some bitch stopped me on the way in. ‘What poor and unfortunate creature had to die for you to wear that?’ ‘My Aunt Trudy’, I replied.

 Or explaining how Hedwig was making ends meet post-divorce. I scraped by with baby-sitting gigs and odd jobs – mostly the jobs we call blow. I had lost my job at the base, and I had lost my gag reflex. You do the math.

Did humour come naturally to him, or did he have to work at it?

“My parents were hilarious,” Mitchell offers, suggesting it’s in his DNA. “My mother’s Scottish and Scottish people just are funny. My father was hysterical… a kind of Noel Coward type guy. But he was an American general in the army. Anthem, which is my new musical, has characters somewhat based on them. It’s kind of autobiographical. Denis O’Hare plays my dad, Glenn Close plays my mum.”

Anthem also stars Laurie Anderson, Justin Vivian Bond, Cynthia Erivo and Nakhane.

“The British sense of humour – which Australia’s comes directly from – has a sense of irony, absurdity, wordplay. Americans have a sort of denatured version of that, that’s a little more obvious. I prefer the rarified British and Australian version. Even Canadian comedy is aware of the surreal and sometimes can be a little biting, but it’s always got elegance to it, even when it’s zany. Beautiful words are important with humour, even if they’re absurd words.”

While Mitchell’s father has passed away, his mother is still alive and a major catalyst for the Australian tour.

“She has pretty advanced Alzheimer’s – she’s not suffering, she’s actually quite happy, but it’s one of the reasons I’m in Australia: to help pay for her healthcare because this stupid country won’t take care of its own.

“I’m touring for my mum.”

John Cameron Mitchell performs his Origin of Love shows live at Adelaide Festival Centre June 22,  Canberra Theatre July 4, Sydney Opera House July 6, the Arts Centre Melbourne July 10, and Queensland Performing Arts Centre July 17. How To Talk To Girls At Parties will be in Australian cinemas soon via Transmission Films.