Pierre Perrier: Bisexual Nudity a la Francais

Pierre Perrier (great name!) has made a career of playing guys involved with men and women.

Beginning with Douches froids (Cold Showers, 2005), about a tragic three-way romance between teenagers (Pierre, Johan Libéreau, Salomé Stévenin).

And Chacun sa nuit (One to Another, 2006), about a small-town teenage musician (Arthur Dupont) who is having affairs with just about everyone, from his sister to Sébastien (Pierre).  A definite disadvantage in tracking down his killer when he ends up dead.

He has only a small part in Le héros de la famille (Family Hero, 2006), about a drag performer/night club owner who dies, leaving coworkers, friends, and family scrambling to take over.  Maybe that's why there's no bisexual love triangle.

But he's back to the boy-boy-girl machinations with Plein sud (Going South, 2009).

In American Translation (2011), a guy (Pierre) has a girlfriend (Lizzie Brocheré), but also enjoys having sex with gay men and then strangling them (here Arthur Harel).

Chroniques sexuelles d'une famille d'aujourd'hui (Sexual Chronicles of a French Family, 2012) reveals the sexual pecadillos of three generations of horny Frenchmen after young Romain (Mathias Melloul) is caught masturbating in class.  There are gay and straight liaisons, prostitution, three-ways of various sorts, and lots of heterosexual machinations.

In the tv series Les revenants (The Returned, 2012), several people who died years ago return to a small French community, with no memory of their deaths or the passage of time.  Simon (Pierre) returns to find that his fiance is engaged to someone else.  She says that he committed suicide, but he believes that he was murdered.  No gay content.

Still, that's quite a lot of same-sex romance and sexual machinations.  And when you consider that most of Pierre's movies feature frontal nudity, sometimes even with arousal, it makes his career well worth following.

Spring 2004: The Worst Date in Florida History

My day with Ryan in the spring of 1992 has won awards as the Worst Date in West Hollywood History because everything that could go wrong, did.  But 12 years later, when I was living in Florida, I had the Worst Date in New York History.  Before the evening was over, I hated the guy.   And his house. And his crazy housemates.

I should have known Andre would be a problem, when we met at the Filling Station: he was wearing a leather vest and a t-shirt that said "Flowah Powah."  Dropping the r's?  Really?

But he was hot, with 3 of the 5 characteristics that I find attractive: dark-skinned, shorter than me, and muscular running to husky. Most likely he also had #4, gifted beneath the belt (when I visited South Africa, I met someone with all 5).

We exchanged email addresses, and a few days later he invited me to dinner at his house on Saturday night.

Things went downhill from there.

1. He lived a 45-minute drive away. In West Hollywood we wouldn't date anyone who lived more than 10 minutes away.

2. In a swamp.  To get to his house, you had to walk across a bridge over a muddy moat occupied by an alligator.  

3. His house was in the midst of a major renovation.  The living room and kitchen had a floor, but you had to walk on bare boards across mud to get to the bedrooms and bathrooms.  I saw mice, frogs, and a garter snake.  Probably food for the alligators.

4. No one understand the phrase "I don't drink," so when I'm invited to dinner, I always bring 2 cans of Diet Coke.  This time I forgot. Andre had only beer, wine, and whiskey.  I had to drink brackish, bad-tasting tap water.

5. He said "I'm quite a cook.  I love experimenting with new dishes."  And indeed, he had a whole bookcase full of cookbooks.  But he served some tasteless lentil-squash horror over brown rice.  And no dessert.

By this point, I was thinking "You'd better be spectacular beneath the belt!"

6. One of his housemates joined us for dinner: a tall, thin, swishy queen from Alabama named Beau.  Not a problem per se, except in Florida it was customary to invite your roommate to "share" your date, and impolite for the date to say "no."  

7. During dinner, they both drank quite a lot and got very tipsy.  Drinking is one of my Top 10 Turn-Offs.

8. While we listened to slow, lugubrious, depressing torch songs.  One after the other. Like Judy Garland:

The night is bitter, 

The stars have lost their glitter, 

The winds grow colder 

And suddenly you're older, 

And all because of the man that got away. 

"Do you have anything lively?"  I asked.  "Energetic, upbeat, non funereal, from this century?"

Andre frowned.  "I don't know -- I'll check."  He sifted through his voluminous collection of CDs, and finally came up with one lively track.  Barbra Streisand singing "Lucky."  Beau lip-synched and acted out the moves.

9. After dinner, we sat on the couch, with more torch songs playing in the background.  Beau put on a drag outfit and lip-synched to Avril Lavigne's "Happy Ending" (which isn't about a happy ending), before saying "Sorry, can't stick around to play, girls.  The night awaits!" and flouncing out.

10. "Want to do some crystal?"  Andre asked.

No!  

"Coke?"

I hate drugs even more than drinking!  You'd better be phenomenal beneath the belt!

11. Finally Andre led me back across the bare boards to his bedroom.  At that moment we heard a door slam.  "Oh, that's my other housemate, Ricky.  He's still in high school, but he stays here sometimes."

"High school?" I repeated in surprise.  "How old is he?"

"Eighteen -- he just had his birthday.  We gave him a spanking.  You should have seen him when he was sixteen, though.  The cutest little hustler you'd ever want to meet.  High all the time, though."

Suddenly the teenager was at the door.  He was Hispanic, light skinned, with three earrings in one ear and none in the other.  Wearing a Flowah Powah t-shirt.

"Whew, Daddy got it going on!" Ricky exclaimed. Hey, how you like these guns?"  He ripped off his t-shirt and flexed.

"Very impressive," I admitted.

"You can touch them if you want.  Or touch something else, even better."

12.  "Hey, Jeff's with me!" Andre exclaimed.  "Go to your room!"

"This is my room, Papi." He flounced onto the bed.  "Got any crystal?"

"In the chest in the living room.  And turn on some Judy while you're out there."

That was the last straw.  I had to get out of this mad house!

I made an excuse, pieced my way past the mud, mice, alligators, torch songs, drag queens, underaged hustlers, and miscellaneous drugs, and zoomed as fast as I could back to the normalcy of Wilton Manors.

13. I left my wallet in Andre's house.

Spring 1992: The Worst Date in West Hollywood History

I have always been attracted to guys who are shorter, the shorter the better.  And muscular.  So in the spring of 1992, when I got the number of the muscular, 4'0" Ryan at the Faultline, it was a major triumph!

Ryan was 26 years old, new in town, and newly out -- he had never been on a gay date before.  So I arranged the most spectacular date in West Hollywood history.

1. Brunch at Geoffrey's in Malibu, where my celebrity boyfriend took me on our first date.
2. Down to the Del Rey Yacht Club, to go sailing with my celebrity friend Edson Stroll.
3. Meet Raul for the tea dance at Mickey's in West Hollywood
4. Dinner at the French Quarter
5. Meet Lee for an outdoor jazz concert at the L.A. County Museum of Art
6. Back home for physical activity (Lee and I had an agreement: we could "date" other guys, but all physical activity had to occur at home, with the other partner present)


Things started going wrong from the beginning:

1. It is raining, so brunch at Geoffrey's is cold and uncomfortable.

2. It is still raining, so instead of sailing, we go to Fisherman's Village in Marina Del Rey, a tacky tourist trap.  Where I trip over something -- I don't know what -- and twist my ankle, making walking difficult.

"Maybe a nice safe movie instead of the tea dance?"  I suggest.

"No, I need to be around other gay guys!"  Ryan insists.  "You can sit down, no problem."

3. Off to Mickey's.  It's nearly empty, due to the rain.  Ryan has 3 beers.  He weighs 100 pounds, so he's buzzed.  He starts making the rounds of the dance floor, cruising every Cute Young Thing in sight, while Raul keeps me company at a little table.  I fume with jealousy.


4. The French Quarter is packed.  There's a 45 minute wait for a table.  I suggest we go somewhere else, but Ryan insists "No, this is Gay Central!  I need to be here!"

He then insists that we have champagne.  I don't drink, so one glass is enough to get me buzzed.

The concert is cancelled due to the rain.  I try to contact Lee to make alternative plans.  No answer (this was before cell phones).

"Let's go to the Toy Tiger instead," Ryan suggests. "Lee will catch up to us eventually."

5.  It's a piano bar in Silverlake where they sing show tunes and torch songs.  I hate show tunes and torch songs, but Ryan loves them.  He sings along to "The Man I Love," "You Can't Get a Man with a Gun," "Strangers in the Dark."

He's 26 years old.  Where did he learn all of these old chestnuts?

He has a Mai Tai, whatever that is.  His voice get slurry.

I try Lee again.  No answer.

 After two hours of show tunes and torch songs, I drag Ryan out onto the street.  We can't find the car.  Has it been stolen?  Has it been towed?  It's too much trouble to deal with tonight.  I call a friend to pick us up.

6.  We finally get back to the house.  I'm exhausted, in pain, worried about my car, in no mood for physical activity, and besides, we have to wait for Lee.

But Ryan starts kissing and undressing me.  Maybe something will go right on this date!  We go into the bedroom

Where I promptly fall asleep.

It's official: the Worst Date in West Hollywood History!

By the way, Lee had been waiting for us at the Faultline, my car had been towed, and I didn't see Ryan again.