Friday, December 13, 2013

Walk with Tish Gervais in the East Village of the mid-1980s



Here's another slice-of-East-Village life from the 1980s courtesy of downtown filmmaker Nelson Sullivan … (this video isn't newly uploaded, just new to us).

From the YouTube description:

At this time in the mid-1980s, Tish Gervais was the transgendered star of the moment in New York — not only because she was transgendered but also because she was sexy and talented too. Along the way, Tish and Nelson encountered Lady Bunny with DJ Dmitry and Tish found serveral magazines featuring her photograph. Video by Nelson Sullivan.

There's not a whole of lot action… just sit back and take in the scenery and see what you can still recognize… (EVG Facebook friend Michael Paul put the date at June 1986.)

Sullivan's archive is now at the Fales Library at NYU. He died of an apparent heart attack on July 4, 1989.

H/T esquared™

Previously on EV Grieve:
The East Village of Nelson Sullivan

The first nice Sunday of 1987 in the East Village

'The Fabulous Personalities of 1980s New York'

8 comments:

THE NOTORIOUS L.I.B.E.R.A.T.I.O.N. said...

Bring all of these wonderful characters back!

Anonymous said...

Fun to watch. Tish went back to being Brian and wrote a play about his transition back to being a man. It was staged over a decade ago. I would love to see it reworked with other actors playing him through the years and brought back to the stage. It got a good review from the NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/mem/theater/treview.html?pagewanted=print&res=9F05E7DB1530F932A05753C1A9669C8B63&_r=0

Hanke said...

Oh my god, 1980s NYC, what a hell hole of crime. It was like watching Road Warrior or something. Thank god Rudy/Bloomy cleaned it up and made it so much safer and better!

Uncle Waltie said...

In the 43 years I've been living here (EV), I never ever considered NYC to be a hell hole.

Gojira said...

I second Uncle Waltie (even tho I've only been here for 34 years), and Road Warrior was a GREAT movie.

Anonymous said...

So quiet, no texters and walkers, rogue bikers and Citibikers. Everyone seems to be free.

Disagree with Uncle Waltie, during SantaCon, EV is a hellhole.

And Bloomberg and Giuliani cleaned up NYC for the riches and the self-entitled narcissists.

Jill said...

That little newscast from a guy in the street about 1/3 in is, I think, Red Ed https://www.facebook.com/colorsign

VH McKenzie said...

Phone machines - heh.