The Life of Schmitt 289

As part of your account, you’ll receive occasional updates and offers from New York, which you can opt out of anytime. As Cassie flits through the streets of Berlin on an assignment for the CIA in the premiere, the gorgeous garment is a glaring symbol of her flighty thought patterns and egocentric attitude. She’s a lovable moppet, to be sure, but she’s still living her life on tilt and seeking out thrills in places other than the bottom of a bottle. She’s basically just treating her new gig as a replacement addiction. As the second season ofThe Flight Attendantopens, we find Cassie in a better place. After the tumultuous events of the previous season, she has moved to sunny Los Angeles and settled down in a cute bungalow, and she’s even regularly attending AA meetings.
Riverside County moved to the orange level of California’s four-tiered, color-coded reopening framework in April, meaning bars that don’t serve food can now be open outside with modifications. Establishments that serve meals can open indoors with a capacity limit of 50% or 200 people, whichever is less. The state plans to get rid of its tier system all together on June 15, given the vaccine supply is adequate and hospitalizations remain low.



In Los Angeles alone there are 17 “houses” which provide a safe support system for drag queens and transgender youth of color who are exploring their sexuality and identity. A main activity of each house is to compete in local “ball” events, where members are recognized for dance, modeling, and fashion artistry. Today, the Black Cat, too, displays these photographs of the protest, amid walls crowded with art. The images demand we think more deeply about what the struggle for gay bars was actually about, and what the struggle to preserve them means.
The decline of gay bars started well before the pandemic, in part because increased acceptance of queer people has lessened the need for bars as places of refuge. Another bar that’s more “neighborhood watering hole” than fog-filled nightclub, Akbar has long been a refuge for the city’s queer community who seek nothing more than stiff drinks and a jukebox. The bar’s backroom gets a bit more inventive, hosting events that span karaoke, craft nights, live comedy, and of course, lots of dancing with DJs. This makes it all the more disheartening that so many LGBTQ bars have closed in recent years, and in particular spaces that cater to lesbians, trans women, and other queer identities. Before Covid, gay bars were already disappearing in LA and other US cities due to rising rents and gentrification, and as online queer dating and hookup apps grew in popularity.

As for whether the bars are worth saving, most agree they are. But Nestle insists it’s up to younger women, who make up a major swath of the bars’ clientele, to decide. The Lexington Club, San Francisco’s cherished lesbian/queer bar closed in 2015 after nearly two decades due to the changing landscape of the city’s Mission District.
Rechy himself had been arrested in Griffith Park and faced a five-year prison sentence for soliciting sex, as he told the Los Angeles Review of Books. As president of the Los Angeles chapter, Sandoz was influential in making lesbians comfortable with participating in public meetings with heterosexual men, gay men, and representatives from the scientific and medical communities. Celebration was founded in 1982 by gay rights pioneer and co-founder of the Mattachine Society, Chuck Rowland, when he leased a storefront in Silver lake to start a community theatre dedicated to producing gay-themed material.
Hollywood Center Theatre became Theatre VII in 1969 with the tagline 'Where friendliness is Contagious.' Acts such a