Conversion Therapy: Making movies into books and back again.
Dirty Looks assembles the contributors and subjects from our fourth installment in the printed Volume series to discuss the language of filmmaking and how it relates to underground publishing. Panelists include Brontez Purnell,Rick Castro,Mariah Garnett, William E. Jones and Nguyen Tan Hoang.
Tony Ward and Ruby Love Sato Ward wear all clothing and accessories Rick Owens Photography Rick Castro
Tony talks: the original male supermodel opens up to Rick Castro about life then as Madonna’s toy boy and life now as a dad of three – plus, he discusses the role that made him a gay pin-up: playing ‘Monty’ Ward in Hustler White
A combination of Joe Dallesandro, Alain Delon, Jeff Stryker, Cary Grant, and Rasputin, Tony Ward has worked with nearly every major photographer from the late 20th and early 21st century; numerous brands, big-name designers and models, pop stars, living legends, gay icons, and two cult filmmakers.
I have known him for a very long time. We have a history, a karma, and have shared both good and bad times together – from my first obsession, when he modelled for my first ever photo, to being house model for my men’s clothing line (for Michèle Lamy). Together, Tony and I have been panned by the New York fashion press – once we were denounced, “Too California; a male Frederick’s of Hollywood.” Tony starred in my first film Hustler White (1996) and we toured the world together with the movie; he also featured in my two photography books, Castro (1990) and 13 Years of Bondage (2004).
Way back in 1996, I photographed and interviewed Tony for my self-published zine, The Bondage Book. The photos and interview were very revealing – I asked probing questions and Tony answered all. Now, 22 years later I am photographing and interviewing him again; this time as mature men, with his two daughters – Lilli Sato Ward and Ruby Love Sato Ward. This is what went down...
Tony Ward: I was at college in San Jose, California and I met this guy on campus, Joe House. We ended up doing my first shoot: Joe met me at a mall parking lot, walked into a sporting goods shop, bought some dolphin shorts and a tank top, and shot me right there under a tree on a patch of grass, and gave me $75... Joe went on to teach me about art, show me art and photography books... One time I went to his house. He had wood panel on cinderblocks as a backdrop for our shoot and used a crummy little flash camera... He talked me into taking my clothes off, and being friendly... He put his arm on my shoulder... I complained about being sore from a workout and he massaged me. That was my first time with a man...
Rick Castro: Did you feel you were violated?
Tony Ward: No, I was curious. I wanted it. I’d been with girls... I had a girlfriend... No girl had ever told me I was good-looking. I didn’t see myself like that. Joe showed me how desirable I was.
Rick Castro: What’s your heritage?
Tony Ward: Half-Portuguese, the rest Scottish, Irish, English and Swedish.
Rick Castro: Has this impacted your cultural interactions?
Tony Ward: Yeah, in a big way. When I was young, all the Americana nationalism – I didn’t get, it wasn’t me. People assumed I was Italian. I would respond with, ‘No I’m half-Portuguese, the rest Scottish, Irish, English and Swedish.’ I didn’t consider myself American.
Rick Castro: What’s your mother’s maiden name?
Tony Ward: Castro.
Rick Castro: Does that make us related?
Tony Ward: Uh huh... you’re my sister.
Rick Castro: Fuck you.
Tony Ward: You’re my daddy, my brother, my master!
Tony Ward and Ruby Love Sato Ward wear all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroTony Ward, Ruby Love Sato Ward and Lilli Sato Ward wear all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: Where and how did you and I meet?
Tony Ward: At an Albert Sanchez shoot?
Rick Castro: Are you asking or telling me?
Tony Ward: My memory is fadey... It had to have been with Bob Stickle, my manager. Bob was an advertising guy. He promoted me...
Rick Castro: He went by ‘blue leader’. I only ever talked to him on the phone.
Tony Ward: I remember staying with you downtown in a loft?
Rick Castro: That was the brewery building circa 1986.
Tony Ward: Wow!
[Through ‘blue leader’, I booked ‘Anthony Borden Ward’ for our shoot. I was working as a stylist for Albert Sanchez (West Coast photographer for Interview) and was creating an editorial based on Paul Cadmus for InStyle. I thought Tony would be perfect for our sailor. I picked him up from Union Station and he was so innocent and so beautiful... Like everyone before me, I was smitten. He really had an allure all his own. We went to dinner and I did most of the talking. He was very shy. He stayed the night at my loft at the Brewery Building, (now an overpriced artist complex). Once in bed, I made a play for Tony, to which he responded with the immortal line, ‘No thank you please.’ I used that line in the Hustler White script.]
Rick Castro: Did you know my shot of you in leather gear (1986) was my very first photo?
Tony Ward: You told me! I was mildly blown away.
Rick Castro: Thanks...
Tony Ward: I didn’t mean like disparagingly, I had no idea... What a fab pic. If I remember correctly I was probably 23... I was a pup.
Rick Castro: Did you know I hooked you up with Herb Ritts?
Tony Ward: Um... I thought it was through Bob, who took me to meet my first agent Dennis Vaughn... Bob said Dennis went to Herb’s studio and there was my Polaroid.
Rick Castro: That Polaroid was from me... Michi (my business partner at the time) and I took it to show Herb. We were working with him as wardrobe stylists.
Tony Ward: Herb fell for me eventually, but I digress...
[After my first shoot with Tony I was eager to present him to Herb Ritts. Herb wasn’t as open at the time and responded to my Polaroid, ‘I don’t know Rick... he’s like... I don’t know what... I don’t like his nose.’ ‘His nose is amazing!’ I replied, ‘It’s romanesque! It’s like a second dick!’ Herb made a face... ‘He’s just not my type.’ ‘What do you mean?!’ I exploded, ‘He’s the world’s type!’ Herb eventually used Tony for the first Calvin Klein Underwear box, numerous nude shoots, books, editorials, and then took him to Madonna’s birthday party.]
Tony Ward, Ruby Love Sato Ward and Lilli Sato Ward wear all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroRuby Love Sato Ward and Lilli Sato Ward wear all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: What does Montgomery Ward mean to you?
Tony Ward: It’s the place my mom took me shopping and I hated it... My body didn’t match my age range. I was so tiny... I wore little boys’ clothes well into middle school. Also, that’s my character in Hustler White... I love the connection and the history to that name. I haven’t watched the film in a very long time... I’m remembering coming off dorky and nerdy... I don’t remember.
Rick Castro: We asked you to be that way. The character was supposed to be sexy and dyslexic.
[I was writing a script with Bruce LaBruce based on my hustler photos and interviews from Santa Monica Boulevard. I had cast a real hustler as the lead but after getting a girl pregnant and stealing a car, he dropped out of the production a few days before the shoot. I originally wanted Tony as the lead, but didn’t think he would do it. Post-Madonna he was very famous. I called asking him to please just read the script. He called me three hours later and said, ‘I definitely want to do this movie!’]
Tony Ward: It was my first film. I was nervous all the time when we were making it. My ego was a mess... I had self doubt. When you met me I was clueless about this town and the industry... I was taking it so seriously, I wanted to do it right. And Hustler White did affect my career, as did my relationship with Madonna. At that time models were not respected... Especially if you wanted to segway into an acting career.
Rick Castro: Which was worst for your acting career, Hustler White or Madonna?
Tony Ward: I would saying being with Madonna... I was a ‘boy toy’... All the press and tabloids... In a heartbeat you would be trashed. Ultimately it was my own fault that my acting didn’t take off... I wasn’t good at the politics but there was also a bit of self-preservation of not getting sucked into the Hollywood madness.
Rick Castro: What reactions have you received from being the star of Hustler White?
Tony Ward: People contacted me saying ‘I’ve watched Hustler White 100 times,’ and, ‘I used to fuck my boyfriend while watching you in Hustler White’ and of course ‘Watching Hustler White changed my life.’
Tony Ward wears all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroTony Ward wears all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: Who has most influenced you as a model?
Tony Ward: Rick Castro… I love Ricky.
Rick Castro: You’re a kiss ass.
[In the late 70s, early 80s I had a clothing line called I Love Ricky with my then business partner Michi. We transitioned into wardrobe styling and kept the name, so Tony first knew me as, I Love Ricky.]
Tony Ward: No one photographer... I get energy from all I’ve worked with, but it comes from inside of me... What I think is cool. As a model I see myself from the photographer’s perspective. I know every inch of my body when I’m modelling. The position of my fingers, my nose, my ass. I understand photographers. OK, I’ll give props to Joe House, the first guy that ever shot me. That was a turning point for how I viewed myself... ‘I’m something someone wants to look at?’ I didn’t know that.
Rick Castro: What are most famous for?
Tony Ward: My ass... I lost it... I want it back.
Rick Castro: What are you most infamous for?
Tony Ward: There’s a lot of fantasy around me... My affair with Madonna...
Rick Castro: Are you the longest-working male model?
Tony Ward: Yes... To be certain I don’t know... In my own mind, yes... I still do it.
Rick Castro: Will you ever retire from modelling?
Tony Ward: There’s no need to... I won’t give up on my end. That’s up to other folks.
Rick Castro: Shoulda-coulda-woulda – do you have any regrets?
Tony Ward: Yeah, hurting people that meant something in my life. For many years I put myself before everybody else. I regret that. But I get to be different now and that’s inspiring.
Tony Ward wears all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroTony Ward wears all clothing and accessories Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: Where will you spend your golden years?
Tony Ward: Hopefully in nature on a piece of land with people I love. Sometimes not with anybody. To have a place where people can come stay with me, or on their own. Creating with me, and on their own.
I have memories of my past golden years, like working with Colt Studios. Jim French was a sweet man. He flew me to Los Angeles for our shoot. He was always very respectful of me... When Colt came out I had a lot of men liking me... I began to question my sexuality, but I decided I’m not a sexuality... I’m me.
I met Madonna through Herb Ritts... I did the Cherish video and we hooked up in 1990? My world changed quite a bit once I met her. With Herb I worked a ton. The other guys fizzled out quicker. I didn’t do the big campaigns. I was an ‘acquired taste’ and people liked me as an anomaly. Who was I without my connection to her? Me as an object rebooted me in the industry. In some ways good, some ways not so good.
The editor of Italian Vogue called my agent and said ‘Don’t ever send that disgusting person again! He looks like a rapist,’ because I had a few tattoos and piercings. At the time it was just too much. That went on for a while until it became a fad.
Then there was all the stylists, the gay contingency, ‘Oh we know you!’ It was after Hustler White – you’re a hustler, you did porno and prostitution! I was like, ‘No I didn’t.’ They were like, ‘Yes you did!’
Rick Castro: They considered Hustler White a porno.
Tony Ward: Yeah, this showed me the truth didn’t matter... they want their fantasy. ‘You’re not anything like you said you were?’ ‘Well I didn’t tell you what your fantasy was of me... you got what you wanted.’
Rick Castro: That’s a great answer...
Tony Ward: I thought for sure you would ask about the time we had sex?
Rick Castro: That’s not so interesting.
[The ‘no thank you please’ became ‘yes please’.]
Rick Castro is a photographer/filmmaker, writer & blogger living in Los Angeles his entire life.
Tony Ward’s clothing can be found on his Instagram page. His website will launch in February, 2019.
Speaking to Rick Castro, Ron Athey opens up about his subversive performance art, his relationship with goth pioneer Rozz Williams, life as a person with AIDS, and more
Once an obscure practice by underground artists presented to other underground artists in backrooms and dingy lofts, performance art is finally having its time in the limelight.
I had the pleasure of witnessing the first performances by Los Angeles legends Johanna Went and Priscilla B at Vinyl Fetish Record Shop way back in 1978. Fast on the heels of these performance divas was Ron Athey, who brought his personal experience of holy rolling, BDSM, blood, splatter, piercings, homages to classic gay icons, and many forms of penetration.
There’s a group of one-of-a-kind personalities that was ground zero of creative Los Angeles during the late 70s, early 80s who have influenced the world with an aesthetic, that in my opinion, is uniquely LA. I’m referring to people like Rick Owens, Vaginal Davis, Catherine Opie, Alice Bag, Rhonda Saboff and Gai Gherardi (LA Eyeworks), models Jenny Shimizu and Tony Ward, Durk Dehner (Tom of Finland Foundation), Glen Meadmore, Joseph Brooks and Henry Peck (RIP), creators of Vinyl Fetish Record Shop, numerous nightclubs including The Veil and Fetish, me, (if I may be so bold), Rozz Williams (RIP), and Ron Athey.
Athey’s early performance received minor funding by the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. The Human Printing Press (1994) featured Ron Athey making cuts in co-performer Divinity Fudge’s back, placing strips of absorbent paper towel on the cuts and then, using a pulley, hoisting the blood-stained cloths above the audience. The then-widespread anxiety about AIDS, unawareness and fear with S&M-related art, garnered the ire of right-wing alarmist Jesse Helms, who falsely described Athey’s performances as exposing audience members to HIV-infected blood. Senator Helms denounced Athey by name on the senate floor, thus sealing his infamy.
I’ve known Ron Athey since the 1980s! We got together at his home in Silverlake for a shoot and a chat.
Ron Athey: Michael Morrison parties with Beverly Klein and Lisa Teasley? Earlier at an Afro Sisters do? Ladies of the 80s.
Rick Castro: I remember you at Michael Morrison’s jewellery atelier on Hollywood Boulevard circa 1985... You were the first person I met who had face tattoos, who wasn’t in prison. When I look back now, you actually didn’t have that many, but at the time it seemed very extreme.
Ron Athey: There was a higher price for it then, everyone suspicious, always getting held in customs. Confrontation on the RTD!
Rick Castro: What was growing up in Pomona like?
Ron Athey: South Pomona. Gang bang-y, angel dust, broken glass. But also rural, it borders pre-trackhouse Chino when there were small ranches and drive-thru dairies.
Rick Castro: Is this where you learned the high art of holy rolling?
Ron Athey: We chased evangelists around from deep in the Inland Empire, to storefront churches in Rosemead, the only contact to LA proper was going to see Miss Velma’s illustrated sermons a few times a year. It was strange for me when she announced the unveiling of the Golden Revelation Tree of Life and all the Cacophony Society people were there undercover. Now there’s a bit in a Frank Zappa collection where he recounts going into Miss Velma’s church!
Rick Castro: Tell me about your relationship with Rozz Williams. Was he good in bed?
[In my opinion, Rozz Williams single-handedly invented American goth music in 1978 – so goth was invented in Pomona, CA!]
Ron Athey: Rozz was the door to more culture than punk rock! We had a love and art relationship, and took a lot of acid. I met him in a garage in Claremont, Christian Death were rehearsing/developing material, they hadn’t played in LA. yet.
Rick Castro: You didn’t respond to the ‘was he good in bed question’... Too garish?
Ron Athey: Too corny! He was 16 and I was 18, very experimental and crazy. I have diary pages he wrote about the time we tried to hitch-hike to San Diego on acid, followed by his dream that I was kept in a box dismembered and my liver kept falling out! He was a good time Sally and gender-fluid. We were together, then Eva O became a part of our world (we slept in a small bed in a walk-in closet in Long Beach!
Rick Castro: What and where was your first performance art?
Ron Athey:Premature Ejaculation. Me and Rozz were hugely inspired by Johanna Went, directly, and the grislier Viennese Actionist spreads from High Performance Magazine. We were a noise/action unit, otherwise known as PE. It was at Arts Building Jr at the Pomona Mall, two performances both in 1981.
Ron Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroRon Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Ron Athey: Yes! Being a go-go dancer from 1990-1993 was therapy on the deepest level! And the mod-mod moment coming to a peak and then eating itself up. The foundation of all the performance I did in the 90s, any relationship to activism and real scenes, came from that moment. Also working with people for years from that scene, Divinity (Fudge), Pigpen, Sheree Rose.
[Club Fuck! was the premiere fetish nightclub in los angeles, featuring modern primitives, tattoo and piercings, all genders, sexualities and anything in-between, early industrial and hard house music, live bands like P.M.E. & kinky performance art. I remember being with Miguel Beristain and Cliff Diller in San Francisco during Gay Pride 1989. They were so inspired by the one-off club scene, they hurried back to LA, and a few months later Club Fuck! Was born. The scene was hot from 1989-1993, then morphed into something else.]
Rick Castro: What did Seymore Kasabian mean to you?
Ron Athey: I have belief that you can enter through your idea of a character, but it’s where it lands that’s profound. Seymore’s alter ego Wynonna Judd came about by trying an Ann-Margret look, but instead of being fat Ann I was the embodiment of Wynonna. Seymour’s masculinity just came out shy and greasy, creepy… But I keep forgetting he was a serial killer!
[By the way dear readers, I cast Ron Athey as Seymore Kasabian; mortician, cross-dresser and serial killer in my first feature film Hustler White (1996) co-directed and wrote with Bruce LaBruce. The character name is based on gonzo porn star/director Seymore Butts and Manson family member Linda Kasabian.]
Rick Castro: Did leaving LA help your career?
Ron Athey: Maybe it gave me perspective? I worked in the UK since the early 90s, moving to London in 2009, to get married! Wasn’t a huge stretch, it was somewhere I have a lot of deep connections, and the love obsession was the final push. I didn’t find myself working more in Europe than I do here, actually! And the bad Brexit feelings, to be pressed between that and this Trump nightmare. Career? Performance Art is a strange hustle.
Rick Castro: How about coming back?
Ron Athey: But six years of British misery... I’m glad to be back in California. Even before I came back the blacklist ended and I started doing things in museums again. Sebastiane at the Hammer, group show at MOCA, I’ve been produced and programmed workout at The Broad. LA has grown up into a monster in the meantime, some things brilliant, but New York shrill pace and newly priced out status isn’t cute. Artists are always driven out by money pigs.
Rick Castro: What was the reaction to your performances from the UK and Euro compared to AmeriKKKa?
Ron Athey: I’ve done more pieces in the UK than in the US! I have 25-year relationships with a lot of venues, in Birmingham, in Ljubljana, that I return to when I have new work. Western world engagement. The only sharp differences have been some former East Bloc countries. Warsaw was AIDS-phobic even in 2010, doing a show with anal penetration in Zagreb a year after the war was also pushing it! Just depends on the context of who’s presenting you, and if any conservative groups know how to use you as a weapon.
Ron Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroRon Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: Has performance art finally come into its own?
Ron Athey: Yes, for better or worse, it’s taught at all art schools, so the work has become more academic and refers to itself. But the cheesy flirtation by celebrities has made some general public look deeper. I was visiting artist at a Methodist College in Shreveport Louisiana a few years ago and one of the drama students asked me if what I did was like Shia LaBeouf. I said totes.
Rick Castro: Will performance art become mainstream?
Ron Athey: Yes, for about as long as a Lady Gaga look. I think interest in it is in line with the reality show mentality.
Rick Castro: Please talk about your performance at PSNY.
Ron Athey: After making a 35-person opera earlier this year, I thought it was time for a solo! Acephalous Monster starts with Georges Batailles’ secret society that used magic to try to unseat fascism in 1939. I’m interacting with video projections and trying to illustrate Dionysus vs. the Crucified One. It’s a text and person heavy direction for me! It's amazing to go back to that space, the last performance was October 1994 under a lot of Jesse Helms heat!
Rick Castro: Please talk about your performance at Oracle, AZ.
Ron Athey: MOCA Tucson curated a season called Blessed Be around spirituality and the occult in culture. Cassils, Arshia Fatima Haq and myself are creating an experience in the once utopian/now dystopian Biosphere 2, in the North Lung which isn’t on the tour. Weird science, creating new rituals and celebrations for the apocalypse, and also bringing out something seriously retro for World AIDS Day, The Human Printing Press. We’re also using local performers for a processional choir and other actions. The acoustics are INSANE, musical but unintelligible. We’ve been working with a sound guy trying to harness some of the reverb! December 1 at two in the afternoon!
Rick Castro: What’s up for 2019?
Ron Athey: Latvia and Macedonia in the late Spring, 5 city UK tour in the fall. Both of Acephalous Monster and a new collaboration with Hermes Pittakos. Possibly Dark MOFO, to be announced! It’s still filling in but also is the drum roll to a massive archive survey show of my work the art historian Amelia Jones is curating. For L.A. (probably ICA LA) and NYC (Participant Inc.).
Rick Castro: What’s the deal with ketamine?
Ron Athey: Technically, it’s a dissociative. I call it a drug of logic. Interesting it’s being used in depression treatment.
Rick Castro: Is sobriety overrated?
Ron Athey: I’ve lived through too many drug deaths and drug messes to say that! It’s a personal situation, but as our lady friend Judy LaBruce says, ‘What’s she clinging so dearly to life for?’
Ron Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick CastroRon Athey wears all clothes Rick OwensPhotography Rick Castro
Rick Castro: Who do you miss the most?
Ron Athey: Missing is like a haunting, and you can’t carry them all at once. I miss the late great Lawrence Steger, who was a Chicago-based artist who touched me and my work deeply. My partner in crime, Mark Haggard, we would go to the grizzliest sex parties in far away ranch houses in central California, or the sauna in Wilmington, and if it got tragic, we laughed it off. It’s rare to have a truly no-shame relationship!
Rick Castro: How do you like being old?
Ron Athey: It’s a mixed bag. Sometimes I pull it off, sometimes I’m plucked.
Rick Castro: I would be amiss if I didn’t ask you about being a longtime PWA [person with AIDS]. What has that been like to witness AIDS history, and to go from once believing your days were numbered, to having all the time in the world?
Ron Athey: Yes! I tested HIV+ in 1986, 25 years old and trying to get it together, off the drugs and then I get the test result. I lived in both gay and IV drug user worlds, and then support group world, so it properly felt apocalyptic, and would be ten ugly years before the three therapy ended a-funeral-a-week times. I still have to get my perception together, why didn’t I ever go to school or figure out how to make money doing something? I was talking with someone older last night who couldn’t get his head around PrEP, and the protest against the Whitney for the Wojnarowicz show not being AIDS-y enough. It’s hard to understand what it did, even this far afterwards. And it cheapens it for it to be a vague memory. Obviously all of the 90s work I made reflected on these issue, the nature of how we perceive healing. The Trickster. And even in the 00s, displaying the old AIDS body on the cusp of 50 years old. You’d think we could fetishise older trippy people that happened to survive! Through hepatitis C into that mix for an even longer run, it was only last year after the second treatment that I cleared that. Keep on keeping on.
Rick Castro: Do you agree with that infamous Bette Davis quote: ‘Old age ain’t no place for sissies’?
Ron Athey: Sissies are going to fold up and crybaby. Yes, you have to belly the fuck up and get on with it. Also make decisions, unlike Bette, I quit smoking cigarettes about four years ago.
Rick Castro: Where will you spend your golden years?
Ron Athey: I always thought I’d disappear into the desert but I’ve tried six months at a time and got too squirrels. Cathedral City? It’s good to be somewhere where there’s people even older than you!
Rick Castro: Do you mean you got too squirrely?
Ron Athey: Totes.
Ron Athey will present Acephalous Monster at PSNY on November 14-17, 2018.
