In an attempt to push through an entirely evil mood*, I'm going to post something that may sway me towards some much needed lightness and levity. For

HR Pufnstuf.
It must have been the hair and the sharp lapels. This was perhaps the start of my fascination for older, more sophisticated men.


3. But I was a fickle lass, and as I reached the age of 7, I had a revelation of sorts.


Jimmy Stewart


For a girl-child of 7 JS presented a very non-threatening brand of male sexuality. Not too hairy, endearingly diffident, and non-dominating. A bit of a duffer and the nicest bloke. I was indeed smitten.


Further context for this is that all through my childhood, (and currently come to think of it), I was a huge fan of old movies - particularly from the 1940s and 1950s. I used to sit myself down at every opportunity, (usually Sunday afternoons), and be glued to the tv for a couple hours, getting my fix of these old flicks, and finding myself besotted with a number of leading males, including Gregory Peck, (particularly in The Guns of Navarone), and Cary Grant. I liked these rather upright chaps who were good sports and honourable souls, and handy to have around in a fix. 


These films also fascinated me with their female characters who I also got a little obsessed with, and would bemuse my parents and teachers with precocious 7 year-old impersonations of the likes of Mae West (who I adored and wanted to be like) and Veronica Lake, all peek-a-boo curls and dark little Noir quips. I wanted to be by turns Rita Hayworth, (wow - a red-head on purpose who didn't get called 'pumpkin head'), Katherine Hepburn, Lauren Bacall...it may also explain my, at times, old-fashioned demeanour, and my inability to buy practical clothes. 


Every once in a while I go shopping determined to purchase something sensible such as a jumper, or pants, and instead return home with a 'gown' of some description. I can't resist 1940s and '50s-style concoctions, and feel that life should really offer as many opportunities to rock up looking like Veronica Lake in The Blue Dahlia or Rita Hayworth in The Lady in Question, (Grace Kelly was never my deal though. Too sleek, and ladylike, and not bawdy enough. Butter wouldn't melt).


I digress.


4. By the age of 8 I had a serious hankering after Allan Breck as played by David McCallum in R.L Stevenson's Kidnapped (the tv series from 1978). He ran around a lot with a sense of great urgency through the Scottish Highlands. Then he hid a bit, and ran around some more. It was very exciting. There was even the odd swordfight which made my 8-year old self go a bit weak at the knees, and my tummy would do flips at the sight of McCallum and his general swash-buckling demeanour and the romance of it all. 


Kidnapped. Image from Amazon.com
Whoar. Hmm.


5. My next crush was Latka Gravis from Taxi as played by Andy Kaufman. I was about 9 or 10 years old.


Andy Kaufman


Nothing I can say could possibly make this better could it?


The next couple of years are a bit of a blur. I stewed over my Noir heroes for quite some time, with the odd obscure fixation I can no longer recall. Then came adolescence. However, far from increasing my rate of crushes, adolescence seemed to trigger a horror of this kind of thing. All around me my peers were going ga-ga over the likes of Ah-Ha and Duran Duran (this was the mid-80s after all).


 I recoiled a bit from it all, and felt a bit deflated by the pressure of adolescent expectation. Posters on walls and all that. Nah thanks. Actual boys just seemed gauche and ungainly and not at all people who would have any idea about what a girl would actually like, let alone know what to do with one. I have to confess to a certain amount of chaste repugnance rather than fascination, which perhaps was a perverse kind of snobbery. I don't know. And so the years passed, waiting to grow up, and waiting for real boys to grow up.


My twenties and thirties have still seen me focus my odd little crushes on 'characters', rather than any real men. That would be way too complicated, and ultimately an...anti-climax perhaps. Less convenient in terms of projecting on to others too. Heh.


6. One of my longer standing adult crushes has been, and continues to be, Javier Bardem. I first came over all stunned mullet-like when I saw him in a MIFF film Before Night Falls (2000) a biopic about Cuban poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas. Bardem is so sexy it hurts. 


His roles (including the Almodovar film Live Flesh), have done nothing to deter me, rather they have only increased his allure. Even his playing a truly heinous creature with bad hair in No Country for Old Men, (Cohen Bros) I am still convinced that he is a glorious example of manhood. Hot damn.


Javier Bardem (sorry - can't find photo credit).


I just would like to reassure Penelope that she has nothing to worry about. I would not be interested in pursuing an actual relationship with Javier, and would actively discourage him from leaving her for me.


Latin gentlemen are an emerging theme aren't they?


7. Let's take a u-turn then. Another emerging theme? How about men with the name of Kaufman?


Charlie Kaufman. Actually, I have hardly laid eyes on him. I just have a crush on him through his writing. Being John Malkovitch, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind...to name a few.


8. Dylan Moran. Although not necessarily as his character Bernard Black who I think has an alarming resemblance to myself (as discussed in a previous post, but I am mercifully less drunken). I do have a weakness for funny men.


That really is probably enough of a glimpse into the mildly disturbing little recesses of my mind isn't it? Feel free to point and cackle.



So, who are your crushes - past and/or present? (If is this not far too juvenile a preoccupation to entertain. I do understand).






*Won't elaborate - too tedious, and I think my tendency to break blogging cardinal rules: BUI, talking about work, swearing (all apparently all a little 'not done'?), then I am in danger of being uber indiscreet if I get started. Oh who the fuck cares? Rules suck. See?Evil mood.