As Nancy Novak Returns for a Final Farewell, One Writer Seeks to Understand her Polarizing Legacy Less than a week after I signed up to profile Nancy Novak, I realized it would be anything but reporting as usual. For starters, there’s absolutely no need to dig for dirt or persuade sources to talk. Even five…
Black Tulip Chorale closes its second season with a performance celebrating more than 500 years of music from LGBTQIA2+ artists, ranging from art songs and arias to 21st century pop music. Featured artists for the “Our Song” concert include Grammy award winner Christine Brewer and members of the St. Louis Wind Symphony. Production manager Ken…
Twenty years ago pediatrician and cabaret favorite Ken Haller started a special fund for a yet-to-be-determined retirement passion. Although he has no plans to retire at the moment, when producer and entrepreneur Jim Dolan invited him to invest in a Central West End cabaret venue this past March, Haller basically said, “Take my money!” See…
Hundreds of rooms are booked at the host hotel, and guests from as far away as Australia are making their way to St. Louis for one of the world’s largest bear gatherings: HiBearNation 25. This will be the 25th year the Show Me Bears have put on this major event, and HiBearNation 25 Chairman D.…
Opal M. Jones, president and CEO of DOORWAYS, received one of the 2019 Spirit of Justice awards at the 2019 Spirit of Justice Celebration held Friday, October 4, at the St. Louis Club. Allison Price of Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner nominated Jones for the award, explaining “Opal is a dynamic leader and a compassionate person.…
Yoga has come a long way from its origins in centuries-ago India. No longer solely the purview of impossibly twisty young boys bound for the meditative life, it’s moved into something else, and that something — skinny cisgender white ladies in $90 pants, for instance — may not be an improvement. But one woman in…
So you want to be queer and weird in Austin, Texas? The progressive blue bubble nestled on the eastern edge of Texas hill country has cultivated many reasons for queer travelers from all sides of the rainbow to visit. Much like our beloved river city, Austin is a vibrant intersection of roots and blues music,…
Rugby involves a lot of whoring. In fact, the whoring is one reason there’s such a brotherhood between players across the sport. As if that weren’t intriguing enough, they even have hookers on the field (for real!), and all of this goes on under the watchful eye of “the Sir.” OK, I may have inadvertently…
On a rain-threatening Wednesday night in August, the Crack Fox downtown has a few indicators that something unusual is happening inside. A hand-lettered sign bears the quote people posted in the ’70s supporting Angela Davis: “Sister, you are welcome in this house.” Another right by the door handle is less subtle: “No Men.” Inside, past…
If you’ve been around the St. Louis scene a while, what I’m about to say might make you feel really old: Many LGBTQ twenty-somethings don’t know who Nancy Novak is. The five years she’s been in exile (or retirement) is a lifetime in the bar scene where Novak reigned. But for those of us who…
