You know those moments when you suddenly understand something about yourself, suddenly recognise something you either couldn’t or wouldn’t accept? Ever had one when watching a movie? Ever had two?? I have. Picture the scene, it’s 1994, i’m 18 years old and head so far up my own arse I could kiss my own colon. My friend and I decide to have a wee sojourn to see a film at the Steps Cinema. Up to this point I knew I was gay, knew fine well I was but also knew that I didn’t really interact all that well with the other kids in the playground. Socialising wasn’t really a strong point, my experience of romance was very much stolen moments or dirty secrets and besides, why the HELL would I want to put myself through the torture of meeting new people, they wouldn’t like me anyway.

Then came The Adventures Of Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert.

It was honestly like someone had flicked on a switch. Suddenly I saw, in utterly glorious technicolour, my tribe. Mine. I instantly recognised the left-of-centre-ness of the characters, the social isolation and feeling of being different. For the first time, here were three people I could identify with, I could see myself in each of them and could see each of them in me: Tick’s determination against all the odds, Bernadette’s impenetrable shell and Felicia’s sharp tongue but mostly I think I was startled by how much their vulnerability struck me. This began a bit of an awakening within me. Not that I could pull off an a-line frock or a platinum blonde wig, but more a feeling that maybe, just maybe I wasn’t that much of a pariah and there might just be people out there like me. Not a Brady or a Walton but a socially unacceptable Bundy.

This kinda bubbled away for about six months, then came another cinema trip and another little gift from Australia just blew me apart and that was the joy that is Muriel’s Wedding. Downtrodden, spineless and utterly miserable, Muriel Heslop was like a mirror image of me. Obviously the boobies and bad hair were differences (play nice….) but the general air of being defeated before you’ve begun was something that I instantly recognised. Here was someone who was so bitterly unhappy, so completely browbeaten she tried to make herself into something she wasn’t and lied through her teeth to make herself even remotely acceptable.

Now, don’t for a single second think that I had a Disney-esque epiphany and realised just how self-abusive and self destructive my life was becoming and managed to put the brakes on, there were a good few years (decades) of partying (substance abuse) and meeting new friends (sleeping around) to come but what I did begin to realise was that I was in no way the only person who was so ball-achingly miserable, I couldn’t be. If I was then why was I seeing my own vulnerabilities up on the silver screen.

Although at the time I didn’t have the strength to begin to address any of the struggles I was having at home, what these movies did was worth much, much more than give me that. They gave me an identity. They gave me permission to be who I was, who I should be and they gave me a small glimpse into who I could be once I mustered the balls of a drag queen.