Gore Vidal

  The writer I've admired most in my life, one of the first who made me want to become a writer myself, is gone. Gore Vidal died yesterday evening at his home in California, aged 86.

  I know that Gore himself didn't believe there was any kind of afterlife, but in my mind's eye today I'm seeing him as he was back in the prime of his life, bounding up the steps at his beloved La Rondinaia in Ravello to find Howard Austen, Tennessee Williams (the Glorious Bird), Paul Newman, and, yes, Jimmy Trimble, all lounging on the terrace, drinks in hand, awaiting his arrival.

  Thank you, Gore Vidal, for the impact you had on my life. Rest in peace.

Just Married

  How amazing is it that for the first time in the history of the United States we have someone serving in Congress who is not only openly gay, but legally married to their partner? Congratulations to Congressman Barney Frank and his new husband, Jim Ready, who got married yesterday.

Changing Times

  This wonderful book trailer pays homage to many bookstores and publishers we've lost over the last decade. It certainly brought a tear to my eye and I'll definitely be checking out Dale Peck's novel this August. 

Will's Story: Just Curious

 Will Horton has been onscreen several times since I last wrote about him just over a week ago, but most of those scenes have involved his working for/being blackmailed by EJ DiMera, a story I'm less interested in writing about than Will's coming out. There have, however, been two episodes that I do want to highlight.

  The first is the January 25th episode. Will was having lunch with his grandmother at the Brady Pub and Dr. Evans took the opportunity to tell Will that, no matter the choices he makes in his life, she will always love him. The context was his seemingly inexplicable decision to work for EJ, but the subtext was perfectly clear, at least to me since I'm convinced that Marlena knows exactly what's troubling her grandson.

  If by some chance she hadn't already guessed that Will was struggling with his sexuality, I think she would have figured it out after the way Will reacted when Sonny showed up at the pub and came over to their table to say hello. Will was visibly uncomfortable from the moment Sonny arrived.

  Sonny wanted Will to look at a potential logo that Kareem had drawn up for Common Grounds and told Will that he was going to be meeting up with Dustin and Kareem later to work on it some more if Will was free. Will claimed to be too busy that day, but when Sonny pressed him to name a time when they could get together to work, Will pulled Sonny aside and told him that he was just too busy with his job on the campaign to help out with the coffee house at all. When Sonny offered to work around Will's schedule or even hold off until after the election, Will told Sonny not to wait for him. Sonny wondered if Will had a problem with his friends, but Will insisted that he was just too busy. Sonny told Will to call him when he was less busy and then added that he wasn't trying to pressure Will, adding the key words "about anything."

  I think it was perfectly natural for someone as frightened by his own sexuality as Will is to push Sonny away, especially after Sonny's friends had begun to assume that Will himself was out. It's exactly the reaction you'd expect from a guy so filled with self loathing that he'd spit on his own reflection, isn't it? I loved that Sonny knew exactly what Will was trying to do, though, and let him know that he was there whenever Will was ready.

   Marlena, meanwhile, had been watching from across the pub and after Will came back to their table she reminded him that if he needed someone to talk to, someone he could trust, she was always there. Will thanked her and then practically ran from the pub.

   The next episode that I want to write about was from this past Wednesday. Will had apparently reached out to Sonny, because the episode began with him showing up at Will's place so they could see a movie together. Sonny asked what film Will wanted to see and our Mr. Horton suggested that they take in the final film of a Meryl Streep retrospective playing nearby: The Devil Wears Prada. Really? You'd almost expect someone trying so hard to be straight to suggest an action film, though probably one with some really hot guys in it!

  Sonny said that he loved that film, but that he had a date coming up and the guy (Dustin? Someone else? Offscreen romances suck!) was going to want to see that with him. Instead Sonny suggested that they just hang out at Will's place and download a movie.

   Will seemed a bit unnerved by the idea and Sonny half jokingly asked if Will was uncomfortable being alone with him. Will pointed out that Sonny's friends had been assuming things about him lately and then wondered how, exactly, someone knew when they were gay? How, for instance, did Sonny himself know? Will quickly added that he was just curious about Sonny because they were friends.

   Sonny told Will how he'd always liked comic book superheros and cute guys on TV without ever quite knowing why or even what gay was, but that it wasn't until he was a freshman in high school that he really started noticing guys. He'd even dated girls just so he could hang out with the other guys, who all had girlfriends.

   Will asked how that had worked out for him and Sonny said that he'd fooled them, but he couldn't fool himself and that he'd hated lying to the girls he dated and leading them on. He'd hated the lie he was living so much that every time he made a birthday wish during high school, it was always for gay Sonny to just disappear so that he could be like everyone else.

   Will asked Sonny what he'd been afraid of the most. Sonny replied that he'd been most afraid of not being able to live the life he'd wanted for himself: a wife, kids, a house with a picket fence. Will agreed that he'd be afraid of that, too, and Sonny told him that the very worst part of the whole thing had been not having someone he could talk to about what he was feeling. He hated to think that there were people out there now going through the same thing.

    Will pointed out that not all families would be as accepting as Sonny's had been. Sonny agreed that it wasn't always easy and told Will that his parents, though accepting, had also been sad that he wasn't going to live the life they'd dreamed of for him and worried that he'd never find love. Sonny's brother Alex had a problem with it at first, too, but got over it. Sonny also mentioned his friend Tyler, who hadn't spoken to his Dad for a long time after coming out, but said that they were good now.

   Sonny: All I'm trying to say is for me, coming out meant being free. All right man? I mean, no more hiding, no more lying, and no more shame. Once you accept who you are, things just get better.

  Will said that Sonny made it all sound as if coming out fixes everything and that he didn't believe that. Sonny agreed that coming out didn't guarantee you a happily ever after, but pointed out that being straight didn't guarantee that either. People have a better chance at being happy if they don't keep secrets.

   Will thanked Sonny for sharing and hoped he hadn't minded his curiosity. Sonny replied that Will was his friend and that he could ask- or tell- him anything. There was a pregnant pause as Will seemed to hesitate and Sonny seemed to be expecting Will to come out to him, but then Will tried to change the subject, asking if Sonny was ready to see the movie.

   Sonny: There's just one more thing. I wasted so much time being afraid of who I really am. You know, what my parents and my friends would think if they knew the truth. I felt alone. I was afraid and I was alone and I don't want anyone to ever have to feel that, especially a friend. Because I wasn't alone, I'm not alone, and being afraid was a lot worse than being honest.

  Excellent scenes. Chandler Massey was right on target with portraying Will's pain and his desperate need to talk about all of this while still trying to maintain that it was all just 'curiosity' about his gay friend. Freddie Smith, meanwhile, was perfect as Sonny tried to let Will know in every possible way that he was there for him and that coming out wouldn't be the end of the world. I was impressed with both of them.

   I keep swinging back and forth on whether I want Sonny and Will (already dubbed WilSon by fans) to be a couple (there was real chemistry last week) or just friends. Will certainly needs a gay friend right now more than he needs a boyfriend, and yet if they don't pair these two with each other, will we ever see either of them in a real onscreen relationship? Plus, they'd be pretty damn cute together:

 I guess only time will tell. For now, I'm incredibly impressed with the way Days of Our Lives is handling this story, even if it has been a lot slower in unfolding than I would have preferred!

Will's Story: All In

  Things are really starting to heat up on Days of Our Lives in terms of Will Horton's coming out storyline and it's high time that I started blogging about it. Let me begin with a recap recent events before I focus on yesterday's episode.

  As I mentioned before, Will was dating Gabi, his stepfather's younger sister (it's a soap, remember?), and they did lose their virginity together. After that first time Gabi couldn't seem to get Will anywhere near the bedroom again. In fact, any time they were even close to becoming intimate, Will would suddenly become very interested in playing a video game or claim to be worried about someone walking in on them.

 Things finally came to a head after Will saw his mother, Sami, having sex with his ex-stepfather, all around town villain and Mayoral candidate EJ DiMera. EJ and Sami didn't know that Will had seen them, but afterward Will couldn't bear to be around his mother and tried to convince Gabi to get an apartment with him. Gabi was all for the idea until she realized that Will still didn't want to be intimate with her and that his promises that things would change once they moved in together weren't likely.

 Gabi broke up with Will, which caused a kitchen smashing meltdown in front of all his friends from the normally mild mannered Mr. Horton. In the weeks that have followed, Will has remained tormented both by what he saw between his mother and EJ and by his own personal identity struggle. He's largely dealt with this by being nasty to his still clueless mother at every opportunity, including sneaking a few drinks (shades of Luke Snyder!) at Christmas time before calling her a hypocrite in front of the whole family.

 What I've truly been blown away by during all of this is the barely contained raw pain Chandler Massey manages to convey with Will's (often tear filled) eyes. Will isn't the sort who'd normally be nasty to anyone, let alone his own mother, but the guy is being torn up inside by these secrets and Massey has impressed the hell out of me by being able to convey that with body language or just by the look in his eyes.

 Will has been able to talk with his grandmother, Dr. Marlena Evans, who also happens to be a psychiatrist. Marlena could tell that something was eating away at Will (and I suspect that she even knows just what it really is) but rather than coming out to her, Will blurted out his other secret, that he'd seen his mother cheating on her husband.

 While all of this has been going on, Will has remained good friends with the openly gay Sonny Kiriakis. In fact, the two partnered in a failed college sports website along with Will's best friend Chad (the less said about that ridiculous storyline the better), and are now at work together on turning The Cheatin' Heart, a dive bar Sonny's parents just signed over to him, into a hot new coffee shop to be called Common Grounds.

 It was Sonny, a former world traveller in spite of his young age, whom Will talked to about possibly leaving town. Sonny, speaking from experience, cautioned that you can't really run away from your troubles, but seeing just how much pain Will was in, Sonny agreed that it might be a good idea for Will to leave town and figure out just who he is.

 Unfortunately for our Mr. Horton, he's not exactly as rich as his friend Sonny. To get the money to fund his escape, Will did something else that was very unlike him: he attempted to blackmail EJ DiMera, saying that he'd tell EJ's wife and the voters of Salem all about what he'd seen if EJ didn't give him the money to leave town.

 If you're going to try your hand at blackmail, you should probably start small and not with the son of a legendary crime boss who has his own long history of evil deeds. Will found this out the hard way when EJ turned the tables on him, letting Will know that not only had EJ figured out Will's secret by merely observing a few telling moments (though he never explicitly said "I know you're gay"), but that he also had a much, much bigger card to play.

 Years ago, EJ was shot in a typical soap whodunit storyline that included several gloved hands aiming guns at him at the same time.Will's father Lucas eventually confessed to the crime, right around the time that Will left town to go live in Switzerland with his aunt and uncle.

 I did wonder at the time if they were setting up a story about Lucas confessing just to protect Will, but since the storyline wrapped up and they never mentioned it again, I'd mostly forgotten all about it (especially since EJ has been shot again in the meantime, by Will's mother on what would have been their second wedding day!).

 Well, it turns out that EJ has been patiently sitting on the knowledge that Will was the one who shot him, saving it up for a spot of blackmail on a rainy day. The end result is that not only is Will staying in Salem, he's also being forced to work on EJ's campaign and  pretty much do anything that DiMera tells him to do.

 Meanwhile, Sonny has introduced Will to more gay men in the last few weeks than Salem has ever seen onscreen in all forty-six years of Days of Our Lives combined, though that's not really saying much. Will seemed to be connecting with one of them recently over a shared loved of certain bands, but when the guy (forgive me for not remembering the character's name) suggested that they meet up the next day so that he could give Will some music from a new band, Will shut down and quickly made an excuse to leave.

 When Sonny's friend wondered what had just happened, Sonny told him that Will "just isn't there yet", letting we the viewers know for the first time that Sonny himself knows exactly what's going on with his friend Will. The fact that Sonny is being so patient and supportive makes me like the character even more.

 That just about brings us up to speed for yesterday's episode. The Sonny & Will scenes started with the two of them hanging out with two more of Sonny's gay friends at the Brady Pub. The two friends, Dustin and Kareem, were working on a marketing campaign for Common Grounds and mentioned to Will that they'd done the same thing for Unicorn Highway. When Will clearly had no idea what they were talking about, they told him that it was the hot new gay club near campus and offered to get him on the VIP list.

 Will deflected the offer, nervously telling them that he had a paper to write, and after the two of them went to get a drink at the bar, Sonny asked Will what he thought of Dustin. Will, looking a bit like a deer caught in the headlights, stammered out "Are you asking if I'm interested in him?" Sonny explained that he was thinking of Dustin for himself, that they'd hung out together that weekend and he was thinking he might want to again.

 A relieved Will quickly agreed that he could see Sonny and Dustin together and then turned playful, suggesting that if Sonny did go out with Dustin, he not try and be funny since he really isn't. It was a very sweet moment between the two of them and for the first time I saw some real chemistry between them as a potential couple rather than just as good friends.

 After Dustin and Kareem came back to the table, they took turns telling their amusing coming out stories and then asked Will to share his. Will once again developed that deer in the headlights look but Sonny quickly came to his rescue just before Dustin and Kareem had to leave. Once Will and Sonny were alone again, Sonny apologized, but a still flustered Will said that it was okay that they'd assumed he was gay. My heart broke for Will in this scene, and I'm sure Sonny's must have, too. The pain he's carrying around is so obvious and that's thanks to what a fantastic actor Chandler Massey has turned out to be.

 The scene that really, truly blew me away and had me taking to the old blog to begin writing about this story in earnest, was what happened after Will Horton went home. Will walked into an empty apartment, his eyes once again practically blazing with pain, and then stopped, having caught sight of his face in a mirror. After staring at his reflection for a few moments, Will spit on the mirror with disgust and self loathing and then turned away. It was one of the most powerful moments I've seen on daytime TV in a long time, an emotional gut punch that I'll never forget. Chandler Massey played it perfectly, and I find that in spite of how dangerous investing emotionally in a gay soap character has proved to be in the past, I'm now all in.