Hold Tight Gently

by Duberman, Martin

  During his reunion with the Flirts, Mike picked up some negative vibes; as he put it, “things are strangely tense. There’s resentment underneath the surface, on my part as well as theirs.” It stayed bottled up during the concerts in Washington, but in mid-June 1993, when Mike and Richard were at Sear Sound in midtown Manhattan, for further work on the Legacy album, the Flirts made it clear that they resented the limited role assigned them for the recording, and in particular the fact that other singers were doing most of the backups. During his time in L.A. Mike had met some of the best pop backup singers around: David Lasley, Arnold McCuller, and Diane Graselli. Lasley and McCuller had sung on hundreds of records, and toured with James Taylor for decades, and Lasley, a much-admired songwriter, had written for, among others, Peter Allen, Anita Baker, and Chaka Khan.

  It irked Richard that the Flirts chose to air their grievances in a recording studio that was costing $150 an hour. Richard had suggested that they record “Two Men Dance the Tango,” but when they refused, he thought they were being willfully uncooperative and got angry; “it’s Mike’s album,” he thought but didn’t say. “He’s asking you to do this; why would you turn down his last request?” It was finally agreed that the Flirts would do a Henry Mancini song—not a capella, but with a piano—a song they’d had in their repertoire for a while. But when it came time to record, Jon Arterton got busy videotaping the group—while the engineer in the control booth, and Richard, stood by and stewed.

  According to Mike, “voices were raised, temper tantrums were thrown”—and a disgusted Richard decided to shut down the session. He told the Flirts, “Look, I’ll work on something else. Why don’t you guys go in the lounge, and talk about things.” And they did, along with Mike. He opened himself up to them completely: “Look, you may not believe it, but I’m dying . . . and I’m trying to make this record. . . . If you guys want to be a part of it, great, let’s go in and sing this song. If you don’t, fine. But I need to get on with what’s remaining of my life.” The Flirts finally did go in and do the recording, but Mike “never had the feeling of closure. . . . I barely survived that weekend. I felt like I was a not yet quite-dead carcass whose bones were being picked by the crows.” It should be said on the Flirts’ behalf that they weren’t alone in their skepticism that Mike was actually dying. He’d survived eleven years since his diagnosis back in 1982, and many people thought that either he didn’t have AIDS or, if he did and had survived this long, he’d continue to survive. Those who loved him had their own reasons for denying how close to death he actually was.

  In New York, Mike suddenly got terribly sick—“I can’t recall ever being more weary—cosmically soul weary and physically weary,” he’d later write—and he had to fly back to L.A. on an emergency basis. Tests showed that he was anemic and had developed “an out of control, painful candida infection of the esophagus and the LARYNX.” He knew that AIDS was “closing in,” that he was “running out of gas.” In the hospital they gave him daily EPO shots and two units of packed red cells to combat the chemo, his only remaining hope of gaining a little more time.7

  When he was able to return to his apartment, Mike wrote a very long letter to the Flirts, in which he tried to resolve the tensions between them. He confessed that he’d “felt ‘guilty’ for some time about not including more of the Flirts, together and/or individually” on Legacy. He realized that Cliff Townsend considered the song “Sometimes a Throwaway”—which Mike had asked them to do—to be indeed a “throwaway,” but Mike didn’t agree. He’d sometimes made fun of the song himself, but he still thought it “an exquisite song” that would be a standout on the album, and he wanted to include it.

  Mike thought the difficulties that had arisen between them had deep roots, and in his letter he expressed his willingness to talk them through. He spelled out by mail his own understanding of the assorted grievances on both sides. He confessed, first of all, to having felt hurt that the Flirts hadn’t asked him to participate more fully on their recent second album, since he’d been a founding member and at that point hadn’t retired. Additionally, he felt that—as with his biological family—he’d learned it was possible to love someone “and at the same time admit that THEY DRIVE YOU NUTS.” He’d gradually learned to ignore his “best-little-boy-in-the-world” tendencies to placate and avoid unpleasantness at all cost, and had learned in its place “that healthy fighting is part of healthy loving.”8

  He felt, too, that all along there’d been some tension and jealousy about his separate identity from the Flirts. Unlike the rest of the group, Mike had never felt that the Flirts was his top priority and commitment. He “LOVED being part of the Flirts,” he wrote them, “and I have loved each of you in my malformed way.” He believed he’d done his best “not to work my divadom—my AIDS notoriety”—and had “RUTHLESSLY fought the tendency,” yet he told them frankly that he believed his renown had helped them in getting gigs and interviews (though feathers would get ruffled when interviewers singled Mike out for special attention, as they often did). He acknowledged that one source of tension within the group was his “impossible demands for perfection,” his cynicism, his “trashing every note and every performance,” his inability to relax and enjoy. Richard, he reported, had “always yelled at me to work my individual career more, which I don’t think I did.”

  With Legacy, though, Mike had finally put the focus on himself, and he’d had to decide how to use his various friends on the album. He’d already gotten considerable flack from one friend for not including her as a backup singer, even though they’d worked together earlier in Mike’s career. In the upshot the Flirts did agree to perform “Sometimes Not Often Enough,” as well as “Two Men Dance the Tango” and “Redesign the Family.” But Mike also insisted on including Cris Williamson, Holly Near, and Tret Fure on the album, all of them dear friends as well as musical partners.

  At one point he spent three days with Williamson and Fure at their house in Oregon, recorded backups on several songs for their forthcoming album, and sang with them—along with Holly Near and her accompanist John Bucchino—at the twentieth-anniversary concert for the feminist Olivia Records. Mike had regarded that day as “perhaps the best day of his life,” and to celebrate, Patrick hired a stretch limo and the whole group dined in style at Alice Waters’ famed restaurant Chez Panisse. The next day they insisted Mike ride on the Olivia float in the San Francisco gay pride parade: “No-one knew,” he later wrote, “what to make of this cadaverous man in a FLIRT jacket, but everyone was lovely to me and I nearly swooned with pleasure to be in such august company.” On the whole, Mike felt he’d done the best he could and had included on the Legacy album as many artist friends as he was able.

  By the end of June 1993, nearly all the basic tracks were done, and Mike completed his own lead vocals by August 19. In sum, he’d recorded fifty-two songs—“3 hours, 20 minutes and 7 seconds worth,” as he put it. Mike had composed about half of them; the other half he’d been singing for years or were songs “by friends I love.” He felt “the only common theme is a celebration of a love of life and a celebration of diversity, especially sexual.” He was “immensely satisfied with what’s been done so far. I think it’s the best singing I’ve ever done in my life. . . . I’m happier than I’ve ever been and more artistically fulfilled.”9

  A large amount of additional work was still left to do on Legacy—backups, replacing instrumental tracks, artwork, printing, mixing, mastering, pressing, distribution, and so on. And they were almost entirely out of money. The pressure was intense, with Mike having a series of anxiety attacks, one of which landed him in the emergency room. He was lucky, though, with his friends. He and Richard had known the performing artist Tim Miller and his lover Doug Sadownick, the writer (and later therapist), when they all still lived in New York. Tim and Doug had moved to the West Coast before Mike, and when he first arrived in L.A. they’d done a lot to help him get settled. And they stuck with him after his health began to slide. Though Tim sometimes
found Mike a little “unforgiving of fools,” Doug became one of his closest friends and, as it would turn out, also his chief caregiver in L.A.

  As Mike’s health began to deteriorate rapidly in early fall 1993, Richard got to L.A. as often as he could manage, but he was also contending with the simultaneous decline of Patrick’s health in New York. For lack of a better word, Mike had again taken to referring to Richard as his “lover”; though they essentially lived on separate coasts, he felt that the love between them had deepened, and Richard felt the same, though he also cared deeply for Patrick. Mike had himself come to like Patrick enormously, and the two of them began fantasizing about buying an apartment in L.A. for the three of them. Patrick had cashed in his life insurance policy and suddenly had a considerable sum of money at hand, and he and Mike actually began apartment hunting when Patrick came out to visit in late September. But it was of course a pipe dream. Mike was soon in the hospital more than he was out of it.

  By September 1993, he’d lost more than 10 percent of his body weight, was sleeping badly, and was constantly nauseated and cramping, alternating between the runs and severe constipation. He also developed acute anemia; at one point he lay for twenty-four hours on the floor, literally unable to move. He became so sick to his stomach that he—the ultimate chatterbox—was unable to stay on the phone with friends for more than ten minutes at a time before abruptly “having to go.” The doctors insisted that he try THC (marijuana) pills to improve his appetite, and when he did, he promptly got the munchies. But though he was on the lowest dosage (2.5 mg.), he got high and paranoid, which he hated; and anyway, no sooner did the THC wear off than he was back to feeling exhausted and crampy. The doctors decided to do a colonoscopy and tried to prepare him for a diagnosis of CMV ulcers or KS of the gut—but to everyone’s surprise he turned out to be “whistle clean up there.”

  While Richard was busy putting together odds and ends for Legacy, Patrick kept Mike company in the hospital. At one point, after the nurse had taken Mike’s temperature, Patrick casually asked her to take his as well. It was 101.3. Patrick knew he was sick; he’d been developing KS lesions, including some on his penis. But he seemed unfazed and preferred talking about his up-and-coming scuba-diving trip with Diving For Life, an organization he’d put together to raise money for AIDS-related causes. When Richard dropped by the hospital room, Patrick was taking a break in the corridor and Mike used the opportunity to tell Richard about Patrick’s temperature reading, to say that he was really worried about him and thought he had TB, or possibly PCP.

  Soon after, Mike was released from the hospital, Patrick returned to New York to get ready for his scuba-diving trip, and Richard had to take off for Europe on one of his band tours. Doug Sadownick picked up the slack and organized a small team to care for Mike during the times when he was home. Doug drew up a list of recommendations to coach the group on how they could best be effective: “Mike is one of the most generous and grateful people I know,” Doug wrote in a group letter to the team, but “he’s not always great at making his needs clear for fear of offending his friends. . . . We all must call before visits and never stop by unannounced. . . . Encourage Mike to rest, rest, rest. He may want to entertain you with his wit when you come over, Diva that he is. . . . I’m getting a cleaning person to come once a week, but no doubt the house will get untidy between then as Mike is not able to vacuum, dust and polish. . . . Never hesitate to call me.”10

  Soon after Richard returned to New York, Patrick had to be hospitalized as well, yet Richard had to fulfill his obligation to perform in Europe. When his band reached Prague, the promoter put up the members in a B and B that lacked phones in the individual rooms. Using the one at the front desk, Richard called Mike and Patrick in their respective sickbeds in L.A. and New York. He thought Patrick sounded despondent, and learned that he’d had to cancel his diving trip. Mike was home, but his building had become filled with druggies, he’d been robbed, and he no longer felt safe. Mike told Doug Sadownick that he wanted “to move into the bowels of West Hollywood,” the center of gay life, to die (and live a while) among “my people.” He was to an extent being campy; he’d sounded a different note much more often in the past: “I honestly don’t believe there is a gay community—as in a monolithic group of people who think alike, work together, and have a common ancestry.”11

  Doug somehow managed to find a two-room apartment in West Hollywood for Mike that was far nicer—it even had a patio—than the dilapidated HUD studio Mike had been living in; the new apartment was mostly paid for by “Section 8” housing—the city of West Hollywood required new developments to have a set-aside (Section 8) for low-income seniors and PWAs. Doug and the O Boys managed the complicated move in late September 1993. True to his role as a “controlling bottom,” Mike sent Doug in advance an elaborate list of precautions and reminders that elevated obsessiveness to a charming new level: along with instructions to sprinkle boric acid in the bottom of each carton to avoid transporting roaches and their eggs, he urged Doug “to give free reign to the Jewish mother side and treat all the packers as I would—in other words, feed them well. . . . Please don’t be stingy. Use some of the cash to order pizza, beer, whatever people want. Reward yourselves each night with a nice dinner at some place of your choosing. Generosity deserves to be rewarded with generosity.”12

  When Richard next phoned Mike from Prague, Judy Peabody happened to be visiting him and was busy following Mike’s directions for making homemade gnocchi. Mike also had a visit from Mary Fisher, the wealthy HIV-positive woman who’d electrified the Republican Convention in 1992; she and Mike immediately hit it off and she told him how much she admired him. By this point, Mike was barely ambulatory, and then only with the help of a cane (Mary Fisher got down on the floor to talk with him). Along with mounting digestive problems, his KS was also continuing to spread; “I’m slowly turning purple,” he told a friend, “the color of gay royalty.” By November, Mike was in what Doug called “soul-sucking pain.”13

  When alone, Mike read and read, mostly books that were gay related. He also talked a great deal with Doug about the gay-affirmative therapy he’d been in for a year with Richard Levin, one of its leading exponents. Doug himself had entered gay-centered therapy three years earlier and later became a leading figure in the movement. Both men felt (as Doug has put it) “deeply moved by the basic principles of what we were learning therein, namely that a crushed gay child lay in tremulous hiding among the foggy recesses of our uncharted unconscious psyches, a sweet fey youngling badly bashed but not really destroyed by foul heterosexist parenting.”14

  Doug found Mike’s “Wildean wit” and his strong androgynous spirit a wondrous combination—“to say nothing of his Martha Stewart panache at orchestrating elaborate, seven-course Marcella Hazan–informed ‘Italian Kitchen’ meals.” Mike could no longer manage the meals, but his wit was intact and the more he read and talked about “gay psychology,” the more he entrusted to Doug his wish to die “in the most gay way possible.” That meant, among other things, nothing that smacked of standard spiritual or religious ritual. Mike held firmly to his atheism and to his skeptical rejection of any “higher power” other than reason itself. Yet he was powerfully moved by his gay-affirmative readings and his talks with Doug.

  What followed was a brief interlude of contentment. Though Mike awoke each day “aware of a decrease in my capacities,” his current strategy, as he wrote his friend Holly Near, “is just to float—let the current take me wherever at whatever pace it decides to.” While the mood lasted, he focused on what “a good, full life” he’d had, the “wonderful things” he’d experienced, the many “truly amazing people” he’d met. He told one visitor, as if summing up, “The next generation is going to have different problems than we did. Our problem was invisibility—the stigma that kills so many of us. We have shattered that problem for all time. Now you can see us everywhere. . . . But homophobia is firmly, firmly entrenched. I believe [this new generation] has been ra
ised to expect instant success because so much progress was made so quickly. They’re going to find a severe backlash that’s waiting in the wings.”

  On December 1, 1993, Mike received the City of Los Angeles Lifetime Achievement Award, and he insisted on being wheeled into the ceremony to accept the honor. He somehow pulled that off, but for the next big event—the premiere of the film Philadelphia, in which he and the Flirtations briefly sang “Mr. Sandman” as background to a party scene—he was far too ill to attend. But a friend reported back that at the premiere she’d told Tom Hanks how ill Mike was and Hanks said the news made him very sad; he asked her to tell Mike that he’d prepared in his trailer by listening to the soundtracks from the Flirts and from Mike’s Purple Heart. She did report all this to Mike, and it did make him happy. Later, when Hanks received the Golden Globe best actor award for his performance in Philadelphia, he mentioned Mike in his acceptance speech, saying “the streets of heaven are too crowded with angels.”