Lesbian News - July 2004 - Lucy Lawless is at Home in the LGBT Community

 

Lesbian News Magazine

July 2004 Issue

Transcript and Scan by Ann
 

Lucy Lawless is at Home in the LGBT Community

By T.A. Gilmartin

Lucy Lawless is back with a full dance card of benefit performances. She served as the celebrity race starter for the 23 Annual L.A. Frontrunners Run/Walk for Gay and Lesbian Pride Fun Run. The Fun Run co-sponsored by the City of West Hollywood and Christopher Street West has made a small tradition of inviting gay-community icons to drop the go flag on the race. Upcoming is her participation in the 10 annual Help Is On The Way X: Broadway And All That Jazz on Aug. 2 at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre in San Francisco. Lawless, who studied opera in college, will get to use her skills when she performs with the all-star cast that includes Mrs. Brady, Florence Henderson and Tyne Daly of "Cagney and Lacey" fame.

"All my good friends are gay. It is a great way to show them how much I love and support them," Lawless said during an interview with the Lesbian News. LA Frontrunners, a running and walking club for gay men and lesbians, sponsored the pre-parade run steering the proceeds to special community groups. This year Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Social Services (GLASS), an organization dedicated to addressing the needs of at-risk gay and lesbian youth and Project Angel Food, a daily meal delivery program for people homebound by HI V/AIDS, will be the beneficiaries from the run.

For those who remember Lawless as the buffed and toned actress, she says that being a mother to three children has limited her workout time. "I do what I can when I can," she said. Her commitment to fitness and healthy living is what inspired Lawless to be a part of the Fun Run, despite the fact she does not enjoy running much. And while she does enjoy walking, her new passion is dancing. Lawless said she has been trying to find more time in her schedule to "boogie more."

"It is about creating connections that we’re all craving and basic human decency and communication in a fragmented world," Lawless said. Her charitable involvement aside, Lawless is eager to get back into performing. She has received many offers to work in her native New Zealand.

While New Zealand is beckoning, it has only been recently that Lawless has felt the urge to return to performing. Her youngest child recently turned two and Lawless said she has felt the desire to resume her career. "I have to stop thinking of myself as a housewife. It’s my own internal dialogue—"this is what I do."

Now that she is not as consumed by motherhood as she has been for the last few years, Lawless is itching to get back on the theatre stage. She had recently taken in a revival performance of"Trojan Women" and "Medea" in New York at the LaMaMa theatre. Seeing the Ellen Stewart-directed revival performed as experimental theatre inspired Lawless to want to find her own acting "scary zone."

"It was the single best thing I’ve ever seen on stage in terms of blowing out your concept of theatre," Lawless said of the performance of "Trojan Women." Lawless was inspired by the level of commitment she saw from the revivals actors and likened that experience to working with organizations like L.A. Frontrunner, GLASS, Help Is On The Way and Project Angel Food. "Something that daring, the level of creativity and generosity that is everything I want to do in life."

The hit TV-show, Xena, helped Lawless discover a new avenue she is passionate about: women’s history. She hosted a show about women warriors on the Discovery Channel that was a hit around the world, despite the fact it has never aired in the United States. Lawless calls herself a member of the next wave of neofems, women who see feminism in a larger scope than simple job equality, but in terms of the entire body-politic. She has investigated stories of women in history and is "pissed about the horrible conspiracy to make us ashamed of our bodies," that exists today in mainstream society.

With her passion for signing on to projects with a message, Lawless will not be donning the leather breastplate of Xena: Warrior Princess anytime soon, but the female-positive acting roles that endeared her to millions of lesbians will soon return.

For more information on L.A. Frontrunners please go to www.Lafrontrunners.com  ; for tickets and information on Help Is On The Way go to www.helpisonetheway.org

 

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