Outfest ’98 Grows by Leaps and Bounds

Outfest, the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, returns this year bigger than ever with with seven venues presenting 261 features, shorts and videos from Thursday through July 20--that’s 60 more films and videos than last year. It opens Thursday with a gala premiere at the venerable Orpheum with the serious romantic comedy “Relax . . . It’s Just Sex” and closes at the Mann’s Chinese with “Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss,” a contemporary romance, believed to be the first gay film ever to play that landmark theater.

In between, the majority of the films will unspool at the festival’s traditional hub, the Directors Guild of America, with additional screenings nearby at Harmony Gold and the Sunset 5, and also at the L.A. Gay and Lesbian Center’s new Ed Gould Plaza on McCadden Place near Highland Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard. And for the first time, the festival will be part of the John Anson Ford Amphitheater’s “Summer Nights at the Ford,” screening “Edge of Seventeen,” a coming-of-age/coming-out story set in 1984. It will be part of the festival’s awards ceremonies July 19, with Sir Ian McKellen receiving the Outfest Achievement Award. Another first: A selection of the festival films will be presented July 22 and 23 at San Diego’s Ken Theater, 4061 Adams Ave.

“The watchword this year is ‘growth,’ ” said Morgan Rumpf, festival executive director, in an interview last week in West Hollywood with chief programmer John Cooper and board president Stephen Raphael, vice president of publicity and acquisitions for Gramercy Pictures.

“This is our 16th year, and this is our ‘coming-out’ party. We’re coming out all over the place. On Aug. 1 we’re moving our office to the Village at the Ed Gould Plaza and, once we’ve taken a breather after Outfest ‘98, we’ll start year-round programming at its two theaters.”

Raphael, who presides over a board whose members are mainly prominent figures in many areas of the film industry, observes that over the years acquisitions executives from the major studios have made coming to the festival a priority. “Sometimes they have seen the films, and they’ll tell a filmmaker, ‘We really like your film, but we want to see how it plays to a gay audience,”’ added Cooper. “For them it’s like a free [research] screening,” said Raphael.

Raphael points out that such commercially viable films as “Kiss Me Guido” and “Bound” benefited from Outfest exposure. “Outfest is a community event,” added Rumpf.

It’s serious but it’s also for fun--for meeting and greeting, dating and mating.

Understandably thrilled to have his debut feature premiering at Mann’s Chinese, its director, Tommy O’Haver, who joined Rumpf, Cooper and Raphael later on, remarked that he couldn’t have gotten “Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss” made without the festival, which had shown his short films in recent years, which in turn led them to be shown at other festivals.

O’Haver’s work eventually caught the attention of David Moseley, then with Strand Films, who agreed to serve as “Billy’s” producer. Cooper points out that opening night’s “Relax . . . It’s Just Sex,” like “Billy” and “Edge of Seventeen,” deals with relationships between gays and straights.

Rumpf says that this year’s Outfest hopes to overcome chronic complaints of festivals past: many sold-out events and ticketing system difficulties. “We’ve added more repeat screenings, more offerings and have revamped the ticket system--with an operator truly standing by.” According to Cooper, audiences sometimes complain that some films are too difficult, although he always includes a good measure of froth. “Some audiences seem to have lost the ability to respond to film that is not very mainstream. It’s hard to get them into the house for documentaries.”

Yet Outfest ’98 is especially strong in powerful documentaries this year, starting with “The Brandon Teena Story,” which reveals the extremes of homophobia, ignorance and self-hatred in the American heartland; Donna Deitch’s “Angel on My Shoulder,” a portrait of her dying best friend and neighbor, the beautiful and complex actress Gwen Welles; and “The Real Ellen Story,” a harrowing account of Ellen DeGeneres’ personal and professional coming out and its resounding consequences. Rumpf hopes that there will be audiences crossing over between various kinds of films. As for crossing over with the general public, the festival has been attracting an increasing number of straight moviegoers interested in seeing films they’ve heard to be good.

Festival principals are all aware of the need for Outfest to be about more than young gay white males. There are a number of potent lesbian films, and this year Outfest has added “Spotlight,” composed of three programs focusing on short films from Latin American countries, shorts made by African American filmmakers, a selection of Asian American films and videos, and two further programs, one devoted to the experiences of gay youth and another celebrating senior gay and lesbian lives.

“There’s been an enormous growth in international film dealing with gay and lesbian themes,” added Rumpf. “There are so many terrific foreign features, and we’re showing about 21 features from around the world compared to 12 last year.”

Every year Outfest finds it easier to persuade distributors to provide their pictures for the festival, and Cooper believes that once “Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss,” a Trimark release, premieres at Mann’s Chinese, the major studios will come aboard with films of such mainstream appeal as “My Best Friend’s Wedding” and “The Object of My Affection.” “You don’t have to do as much explaining as in the past--until you come up against a new director, a new distributor, a new PR person or an advisor to a new director,” he said. “Last year I had to say to [the distributor] Zeitgeist about showing ‘Fire,’ the lesbian love story from India, ‘You have to trust me that I’m only trying to help you.’ ”

“As we’re moving toward the future,” said Rumpf, “we hope to keep Outfest going through year-round programming in order to build bridges between the entertainment industry, the filmmakers and the audience.”

* Outfest ’98 tickets and information: (213) 782-1135.