Accustomed to always being just on the periphery of fame, Kathy Griffin perhaps thought on some level that she was still as much of a D-list celebrity as Trump (once was)–after all, the two even appeared on The Celebrity Apprentice together–when she released the image that would, for a moment in time, destroy her career. It was on May 30, 2017 (which feels like so long ago now, considering 2020 has already been three years in six months) that the posting of a Tyler Shields-helmed photo and video of her holding a decapitated (therefore obviously bloodied) head modeled on Trump’s image changed the world in more ways than she bargained for. Yet, more than changing it, the reaction to the display seemed to prove only, despite all its posturing, how very unevolved America still remained (and remains). Constantly touting its superiority as a nation where free speech reigns supreme, what the U.S. always fails to include is the asterisk and footnoted caveat: *for some. Free speech* (*for some), in most instances, only applying to people like Trump–that is to say, rich white males.
But freedom of speech and expression was not something afforded to Ms. Griffin in the weeks of uproar that soon followed her statement on Trump and his status as the ultimate symbol of insurrection in the United States. Indeed, even the sect of the normally persecuted she had always been an ally to–the gays–appeared keen enough to turn on her for her “insolence.” This including, most notably, Anderson Cooper, whom she appeared on CNN with for years for the network’s New Year’s Eve broadcast. Rather than risking his own hide to stand by her and advocate for an America without censorship, Cooper instead publicly stated, “For the record, I am appalled by the photo shoot Kathy Griffin took part in. It is clearly disgusting and completely inappropriate.” Some fuckin’ defender of democracy, only caring about his own well-being in the nexus of political punditry.
Of course, all of Griffin’s jobs were snatched from her in the immediate wake of the photo seen ‘round the world. Even fucking Squatty Potty, the company that perhaps Trump ought to be a spokesperson for instead, was scandalized enough for the CEO to comment in assurance to a public that might suddenly stop buying his product, “Griffin is not, nor ever has been Squatty Potty’s spokesperson. She was hired to make one commercial.” So yes, Griffin was most definitely in the shit, with the majority of the venues she was scheduled to perform at also cancelling her shows to make a grand spectacle of zero tolerance for… for what? Artistically standing up to a tyrant who says such things as, “You know, you could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever. In my opinion, [Megyn Kelly] was off base.” In fact, the title of Griffin’s piece was “There was blood coming out of his eyes, blood coming out of his… wherever.”
It was not received in the spirit of derisive irony with which it ought to have been taken by anyone. Except, that is, Sharon Needles (who still remains the best drag queen to have won the crown on RuPaul’s Drag Race–a show, incidentally, that Griffin once served as a judge on). As one of the only public figures to come out in support of Griffin’s statement on the president by performing in the guise of the redhead (in a Joan Rivers wig and holding an Owen Wilson mask covered in blood–a far too generous aesthetic upgrade for Trump), Needles performed at her usual Pittsburgh haunt on June 5, 2017 while lip-syncing to Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ “Heads Will Roll.”
Fresh from a fourteen-hour flight from Tel Aviv, there was a certain subdued aura to her interpretation–yet one that worked in terms of bereavement for the continued loss of being able to speak without inhibition as an American. And all as a result of the mob mentality behind the cancel culture phenomenon that has only intensified with each passing year (as though to further iterate that George Orwell was a prophet), whether in favor of shaming people for perceived sexual misconduct of any kind or, now, expunging history through the banning of a film like Gone With the Wind. The instant firing of people without so much as a reprimand before the axing also applied to Griffin, shaking her ability to do what she loved most: perform.
Added to Interpol’s and The Five Eyes’ “lists,” as well as the No Fly list in the months that followed, Griffin’s artistic comment on a president worthy of the guillotine made her, all at once, Public Enemy #1. In the company of Al Capone, who, you know, actually killed people as opposed to trying to speak out against political oppression through art.
As we come to the end of Trump’s first term and hopefully his entire presidency (please god please), Griffin’s act of defiance only further holds up against the test of time, which was, for some reason, not on her side at the outset of the display. One supposes Trump still had to do a million other fucked up things for people to see what Griffin (and many others not brave enough to go public with a decapitation fantasy) already did from the get-go. Needles’ allyship during Pride Month at the time also felt like a particular sign of solidarity. For what community has been more disenfranchised during the Trump reign than that of the LGBTQs? Most recently evidenced by Trump enacting yet another piece of legislation reversing health protections for transgender people.
Griffin, who revoked her forced public apology later on in 2017, was willing to take a bold position against the president–and all he threatened to dismantle–through peaceful means (even if the peaceful “execution” was showcased in a violent way). As we’ve seen repeatedly, these are so often the ones condemned, burned at the stake in the pre-embryonic stages of a movement. One that has taken shape in the form of a collective desire to remove Trump from the Oval Office for good. Whether Griffin’s photo turns out to be more premonitory vision than political stance is perhaps dependent on what happens during the election in November.
Whatever the case, let it be known that Sharon Needles (and pretty much everyone else in the gay community except for Anderson Cooper) knew what was up from the start–and took a risk in her own right by choosing to stand in support of the first amendment, as well as the people’s right to express themselves, especially through a creative medium, no matter how controversial that expression.
