London’s legendary late 1980s/early 1990s queer club night Kinky Gerlinky is back in the spotlight with the release of a twenty-one-episode set of footage from the infamous club. Film-maker and photographer Dick Jewell, then partner of one of the resident DJs Rachel Auburn, shot over 200 hours of footage at the club during 1990-92. This footage has now been remastered and condensed down to about twenty-five hours in total.
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Kinky Gerlinky was founded by iconic husband and wife duo Michael and Gerlinde Costiff who wanted to bring glamour back into London’s nightlife. London in the late 1980s/early 1990s was in a severe recession, served by a grubby, homophobic Tory government and the queer community was reeling from the AIDS crisis. An antidote to all this was well overdue. The outrageous club, hosted by Michael, Gerlinde and Winn Austin, ran monthly from 1989 until Gerlinde’s sudden death in 1994. It began as a small club night at Legends for their friends which included fashion designer Vivienne Westwood. Each night was themed and most guests dressed up in drag and other extravagant outfits. Word spread and the club quickly became very popular, eventually filling the 2000 capacity Empire Ballroom in Leicester Square with people who travelled there from all over Europe and the USA. The attendees were a heady mix of drag queens, muscle boys, fashion designers, club kids, fetish freaks and celebrities. Well-known attendees included Prince, Sinead O’Connor, Bananarama, Naomi Campbell, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Kate Moss, Leigh Bowery, Alexander McQueen, MC Kinky, John Galliano, Neneh Cherry, Bjork and many more. DJ sets were complemented with live performance, drag shows and fashion shows.
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Over three years Dick filmed each Kinky Gerlinky club night in depth. The films are a rare record of an unselfconscious time, over 30 years ago now, when few people had cameras in nightclubs. It just wasn’t the done thing at the time, particularly in queer clubs. The footage is a time-capsule of music, dance moves, facial expressions, showing-off, drag looks, sex, banter, naughty behaviour and fashion. The sheer variety of looks/people on the dancefloor is what stands out, and compares to the present day when club dancefloors are far more tribal and homogeneous. There’s lots of fun outrageous behaviour, things that never would be caught on camera today. Some of the films are nearly two hours long and include many familiar faces from London’s queer scene back then. Thanks for the record Dick. A glorious trip back to another time.
https://vimeo.com/ondemand/kinkygerlinkyseries https://www.dobedo.com/news/watch-kinky-gerlinky-by-dick-jewell
Queerguru’s Contributing Editor Ris Fatah is a successful fashion/luxury business consultant (when he can be bothered) who divides and wastes his time between London and Ibiza. He is a lover of all things queer, feminist, and human rights in general. @ris.fatah
