One of the last few remaining bastions of homophobia appears to be country music. The few brave souls that find the courage to stick their heads above the parapet take every possibility of just been shot out of the water as they watch their careers either subside or even totally disappear.
Take the case of Chely Wright, one of the best selling country singers who came out in 2010. She knew she was risking her career and it did end up costing her that. She wrote a book and did a documentary called “Wish me away” which dealt with how difficult the process was for her
When Ty Herndon one of the best selling artists of 90’s & 2000’s came out four years later he could not get traction for an album that was designed to crank out radio hits when he released ‘House on Fire‘ in 2016.
On the other hand over the past few years QUEERGURU has profiled Steve Grand, Matt Alber, Tom Goss and Levis Kreis. They are part of a very small clique of openly gay singers who have enjoyed considerable success within the LGBTQ Community but have not been able to make any real impact at all on mainstream country music.
All this was put into our minds by filmmaker Jeremy Leroux who had aspirations to be a singer years ago but he very quickly realised to be a star in Country Music you cannot be openly gay. you need to closeted. So he turned the story of his own life into a very touching short film Dominant Chord that is about to be released on Dekkoo’s queer streaming channel.
It’s the tale of Adam who is a closeted country music star on the verge of being outed and the impossible choice he is being forced to make between his career and the love of his life.
Leroux told Queerguru that his hopes with the film was to show the human cost of that, what a loving relationship looks like under that strain. He added ” Without representation and visibility in Country Music, kids in rural communities are growing up without role models that show them it’s okay to be exactly as they are. Like me many grow up feeling some doors are just closed to them. That is what I want to change. The first step is shining some light on the problem.”
https://www.dekkoo.com/ screening from 5/20
Labels: 2020, homophobia, short
