João Dall'Stella | Stalls / 2019

bravo!

by Douglas Messerli

 

João Dall'Stella (screenwriter and director) Stalls / 2019 [3 minutes]

In this grand opera house, even bathroom glory holes are hidden by gold plated toilet paper dispensers and tinted in gold. But our mid-act gay man, Jonathan (Andrew Abelson), desperately seeking action, is having no luck.

     The first visitor (Matt Gogin) asks for his cock but then promptly farts; not a very promising sexual partner.

      The second bathroom opera patron (Timothy Scott) moves his foot closer to Jonathan’s foot as is toilet etiquette to announce you’re interested; and Jonathan eagerly moves his a few inches over as well, the two beginning the usual “tap” that means I’m available and ready, resulting in this case in a full toilet tap dance. But when the neighbor takes a look under the stall, he apparently doesn’t like what he sees, zips up his pants, and hurries off.

     Jonathan pulls up his pants and leaves the stall, to wash himself at the sink, while in the background the janitor (Matthew Jain) goes merrily about his business of cleaning up. Yet a moment later the janitor’s eyes meet the opera patron’s with approval, and he quickly enters the last stall, Jonathan returning the middle, both kneeling as they pull their pants down. It’s a hit! Bravo!

      Although I attend opera in Los Angeles quite regularly, the city in which this movie was filmed, I’ve never imagined such activities at the Civic Center downtown. I guess at my age, I prefer the opera to bathroom sex activities. And I’ve never visited the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion men’s room bathroom stalls.

 

Los Angeles, October 21, 2022

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (October 2022).