Parting Glances

Parting Glances

(1986)

Directed by: Bill Sherwood
Writer: Bill Sherwood
Genre: Drama

Synopsis:

As Michael and Robert, a gay couple in New York, prepare for Robert's departure for a two-year work assignment in Africa, Michael must face Robert's true motives for leaving while dealing with their circle of eccentric friends, including Nick, who is living with AIDS.

Widely regarded the best "gay film" ever made, Parting Glances holds up almost 20 years after its release thanks to the inscrutably accurate vision suggested by its title. Writer/directed Bill Sherwood died of AIDS at 37 in 1990. This was his only film credit, thus serving as a parting glance at his own uncanny ear for dialogue, eye for social constructs and skill as a filmmaker.

The story revolves around a gay male couple, Robert and Michael, who are in their late twenties and live in New York City. Robert (John Bolger) is about to leave on a months-long work assignment in Africa while his partner Michael (Richard Ganoung) stays behind. Michael's longtime friend Nick (Steve Buscemi), for whom Michael cooks meals, looks after, and has been secretly in love with, has AIDS.

Parting Glances takes place during a two-day period, with many of the scenes at a farewell party for Robert hosted by the couple's friend Joan (Kathy Kinney) and at a dinner party hosted by Robert's employer Cecil (Patrick Tull) and his wife Betty (Yolande Bavan); the two have an unconventional marriage.

While classified as a drama, the film also contains many comedic moments. Critics have praised the movie's witty, realistic dialogue and detailed evocation of gay and gay-friendly urbanites in 1980s Manhattan. Parting Glances was also one of the first motion pictures to deal frankly and realistically with the subject of AIDS and the impact of the then relatively-new disease on the gay community. The film takes place in New York at a time when AIDS was in its infancy, but not so early on that it had not already created a new language and a new social order where monogamous gay couples were neither merely admirably proper nor charmingly old-fashioned, but also damn lucky.

The role of Nick in Parting Glances was Steve Buscemi's first major movie role in a relatively widely-released film.

Cast:

Richard Ganoung .... Michael
John Bolger ........ Robert
Steve Buscemi ...... Nick
Adam Nathan ........ Peter
Kathy Kinney ....... Joan
Patrick Tull ....... Cecil
Yolande Bavan ...... Betty
AndrÈ E. Morgan .... Terry
Richard Wall ....... Douglas
Jim Selfe .......... Douglas's sidekick
Kristin Moneagle ... Sarah
John Siemens ....... Dave
Bob Koherr ......... Sam (as Bob Kohrherr)
Theodore Ganger .... Klaus
Nada ............... Liselotte

Runtime: 90 min
Country: USA
Language: English
Color: Color
Sound Mix: Mono

Steve Buscemi

One of the most important character actors of the 1990s, Steve Buscemi is unmatched in his ability to combine lowlife posturing with weasely charisma. Although active in the cinema since the mid-'80s, it was not until Quentin Tarantino cast Buscemi as Mr. Pink in the 1992 Reservoir Dogs that the actor became known to most audience members. He would subsequently appear to great effect in other Tarantino films, as well as those of the Coen Brothers, where his attributes blended perfectly into the off-kilter landscape.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, on December 13, 1957, Buscemi was raised on Long Island. He gained an interest in acting while a senior in high school, but he had no idea of how to pursue a professional career in the field. Working as a fireman for four years, he began to perform stand-up comedy, but he eventually realized that he wanted to do more dramatic theatrical work. After moving to Manhattan's East Village, he studied drama at the Lee Strasberg Institute, and he also began writing and performing skits in various parts of the city. His talents were eventually noticed by filmmaker Bill Sherwood, who was casting his film Parting Glances. The 1986 drama was one of the first feature films to be made about AIDS (Sherwood himself died from AIDS in 1990), and it starred Buscemi as Nick, a sardonic rock singer suffering from the disease. The film, which was a critical success on the independent circuit, essentially began Buscemi's career as a respected independent actor.



Buscemi's resume was given a further boost that same year by his recurring role as a serial killer on the popular TV drama L.A. Law; he subsequently began finding steady work in such films as New York Stories and Mystery Train (both 1989). In 1990, he had another career breakthrough with his role in Miller's Crossing, which began his longtime collaboration with the Coen brothers. The Coens went on to cast Buscemi in nearly all of their films, featuring him to particularly memorable effect in Barton Fink (1991), in which he played a bell boy; Fargo (1996), which featured him as an ill-fated kidnapper; and The Big Lebowski (1998), which saw him portray a laid-back ex-surfer.

Although Buscemi has done his best work outside of the mainstream, turning in other sterling performances in Alexandre Rockwell's In the Soup (1992) and Tom Di Cillo's Living in Oblivion (1995), he has occasionally appeared in such Hollywood megaplex fare as Con Air (1997), Armageddon (1998), Big Daddy (1999), and 28 Days (2000), the last of which cast him against type as Sandra Bullock's rehab counselor. Back in indieville, Buscemi would next utilize his homely persona in a more sympathetic manner as a soulful loner with a penchant for collecting old records in director Terry Zwigoff's (Crumb) Ghost World. Despite all indicators pointing to mainstream prolifieration in the new millennium, Buscemi continued to display his dedication to independent film projects with roles in such efforts as Alaxandre Rockwell's 13 Moons and Peter Mattei's Love in the Time of Money (both 2002). Of course there are exceptions to every rule, and Buscemi's memorable appearances in such big budget efforts as Mr Deeds and both Spy Kids 2 and Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over served to remind audiences that Buscemi was still indeed at the top of his game, perhaps now more than ever.

In 1996, Buscemi made his screenwriting and directorial debut with Trees Lounge, a well-received comedy drama in which he played a down-on-his-luck auto mechanic shuffling through life on Long Island. He followed up his directorial debut in 2000 with Animal Factory, a subdued prison drama starring Edward Furlong as a young inmate who finds protection from his fellow prisoners in the form of an older convict (Willem Dafoe). Moving to the small screen, Buscemi would next helm an episode of the acclaimed HBO mob drama The Sopranos. Called Pine Barrens, the episode instantly became a fan-favorite.

In 2004, Buscemi moved out from behind the camera to join the cast of The Sopranos, costarring as Tony Blundetto, a recently paroled mafioso struggling to stay straight in the face of temptation to revert back to his old ways. Rebecca Flint, All Movie Guide






John Bolger

John grew up in Jamaica, Queens and went on to play middle linebacker for Bucknell University's football team. After graduating with a fine arts degree, John headed to New York University's drama school. He pursued postgraduate work in stagecraft, leaving to build and paint scenery at off-Broadway's Hudson Guild Theater, before entering architectural school at Cooper Union.

John, however, could not ignore his dream of acting, and entered a two-year program at New York's Circle in the Square. In 1988, he co-founded the Willow Cabin Theatre Company, which produces several plays each year, such as Thornton Wilder's The Ages of Man and Lucrece. John not only performs, but is involved in every aspect of production,including set design and costume.

Daytime fans remember John from his roles as John Sykes on One Life to Live, Gabe McNamara on Another World and Phillip Spaulding on Guiding Light. He also starred in the primetime series, Everything's Relative, with Jason Alexander, and guest starred on shows such as NYPD Blue and New York Undercover, as well as the Lifetime television movie, Almost Golden: The Jessica Savich Story.

John is married to Christine Radman, who is an actress and singer as well as a lawyer. The couple resides in a suburb of Manhattan with their three children, Maria, Laura and John Michael.










Richard Ganoung

Parting Glances
Small, tidy, independent first film by Bill Sherwood, on gay life in New York City, and in a rather arty and intellectual circle to boot. Michael, a would-be writer and reluctant editor, has a thriving relationship with Robert (tickling one another's ribs, fencing with umbrellas). But Robert has arranged a job transfer to Africa, in order to escape the swan song of Nick, a rock musician, who has AIDS, and who was Michael's first love. Peter, a record-store clerk, already has Michael in his sights. The action takes place in only a day and a half (the half starts to drag a little), and the milieu is well filled in. Of course, the arty New York part means that the smart talk must be fast and furious -- a little too much so for its own good -- and the low-grade sound quality means that it will often be unintelligible as well. Steve Buscemi, as the unselfpitying AIDS sufferer, and looking like a cross between Keith Carradine and Klaus Kinski, steals anything worth stealing from the rest of the cast. With Richard Ganoung, John Bolger, and Adam Nathan. 1986.