SxSW: Big Joy
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The documentary Big Joy: The Adventures of James Broughton highlights the poetry and films of gay poet, filmmaker, and spiritual visionary James Broughton, one of the defining artistic voices of the ’60s sexual revolution. His encouragement to “follow your own weird” echoed sentiments I heard from my late father. Unlike Broughton, who never lost his childlike glee to change the world, my dad, a hippie Episcopal priest/professor tuned out, courtesy of his encounters with Timothy Leary and Jack Daniels. Unfortunately, the film kind of glosses over the fact that for every free spirit who survived, others in the “me generation” decayed and died. Those in the New York City area can catch this film later this month when it is shown at as part of the Tribeca Film Festival.
Becky Garrison is a satirist/storyteller whose most recent book is Roger Williams’s Little Book of Virtues (Wipf & Stock, March 2020). Also, she edited Love, Always: Partners of Trans People on Intimacy, Challenge and Resilience (Transgress Press, 2015). Her six books include 2006’s Red and Blue God, Black and Blue Church (PW, starred review).