Die, Mommie, Die!

Outfest members receive free admission at the box office!

We are honored to host guest curator Jeffrey Schwarz, an Emmy Award-winning producer, director and editor based in Los Angeles. His latest documentary is The Fabulous Allan Carr, which premiered at the 2017 Seattle International Film Festival. Previous work includes the 2015 SXSW premiere Tab Hunter Confidential, the Emmy Award-winning HBO Documentary Films’ Vito (2011), I Am Divine (2013), Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon (2008), and the 2007 AFI Fest Documentary Audience Award winner Spine Tingler! The William Castle Story.

Joan Crawford: Portrait of a Movie Star  (1980)

Director Phillip R. Ford orchestrates a montage of classic stills and vintage voice recordings to create this heady homage to Joan Crawford and the ever evolving phases of her screen image from “The Jazz Baby” to “The Martyred Bitch.”

16mm, b/w, 10 min. Director: Phillip R. Ford.

Die, Mommie, Die!  (2003)

In this adaptation of his successful stage play, screenwriter Charles Busch also stars—in drag—as Angela Arden, the surviving twin of a wholesome sister act. Washed up and reclusive in a Beverly Hills mansion, she longs to resuscitate her floundering singing career with a don’t-call-it-a-comeback return to the lounge circuit. Family secrets refuse to stay buried when her husband, a past-his-prime producer of social message films, is found dead—leading closeted son Lance and icy daddy’s girl Bootsie to suspect Angela. Melding Confidential-style tabloid noir, the Hollywood tell-all, and the joyous arch-camp of queer cinephilia, Busch’s loving tribute is an uproariously raunchy booze-and-pills soaked satire of Grand Dame Guignol, channeling Joan Crawford and Bette Davis at their most frenzied.

35mm, color, 90 min. Director: Mark Rucker. Screenwriter: Charles Busch. Cast: Charles Busch, Angela Paton, Jason Priestley.