Zero Patience
Encyclopedia
Zero Patience is a 1993
Canadian musical film
written and directed by John Greyson
. The film examines and refutes the urban legend
of the alleged introduction of HIV
to North America by a single individual, Gaëtan Dugas
. Dugas, better known as Patient Zero
, was tagged in the popular imagination with the blame in large measure because of Randy Shilts
's history of the early days of the AIDS
epidemic, And the Band Played On
. The film tells its story against the backdrop of a romance between a time-displaced Sir Richard Francis Burton
and the ghost of "Zero" (the character is not identified by Dugas' name).
Produced in partnership with the Canadian Film Centre
, the Canada Council
, Telefilm Canada
and the Ontario Film Development Corporation, Zero Patience opened to mixed reviews but went on to win a number of prestigious Canadian film awards. The film has been the subject of critical attention in the context of both film theory and queer theory
and is considered part of the informal New Queer Cinema
movement.
adventurer and sexologist
Sir Richard Francis Burton
(John Robinson
), following an "unfortunate encounter" with the Fountain of Youth
in 1892, is 170 years old and living in Toronto, Canada. Burton, now living and working as the chief taxidermist
at a Museum of Natural History
, is searching for a centerpiece display for an exhibit in his Hall of Contagion. He comes up with the idea of featuring AIDS and the Patient Zero hypothesis. Accepting the popular belief that Zero introduced the virus to North America, Burton sets out to collect video footage from those who knew Zero to support the hypothesis. When Zero's doctor (Brenda Kamino), mother (Charlotte Boisjoli) and former airline colleague Mary (Dianne Heatherington
), who is now with ACT UP, all refuse to demonize Zero, Burton manipulates the footage to make it appear as if they do and includes doctored photographs of Zero showing signs of Kaposi's sarcoma
. He presents this preliminary version to the press.
The ghost of Zero (Normand Fauteux
) materializes at a local gay bathhouse
. No one can see or hear him, until Zero runs into Burton while Burton is spying on Zero's friend George. Zero realizes that Burton can see him, although Zero does not show up on Burton's video camera. The two strike a deal; Zero agrees to help Burton with his Patient Zero exhibit if Burton finds a way to make Zero appear.
The two return to the museum where Burton makes a ridiculous attempt to seduce Zero to ensure his participation. Rejecting his advances, Zero examines some of the other exhibits (including displays on Typhoid Mary and the Tuskegee syphilis study) before finding an African green monkey, another suspected early AIDS vector. The monkey (Marla Lukofsky
) angrily denounces Zero for scapegoating her just as he has been scapegoated. Zero turns to Burton and they make love.
Under pressure from his director and the exhibit's drug manufacturer sponsor, Burton steals Zero's medical records in hopes of discovering new information. Zero and Burton examine an old blood sample of Zero's under a microscope and discover Miss HIV (Michael Callen
), who points out that the original study that was used to label Patient Zero as the first person to bring HIV to North America did not prove any such thing, but instead helped prove that HIV was sexually transmitted, leading to the development of safer sex
practices. Under this interpretation, Zero could be lauded as a hero for his candor in participating in that original study. As Burton ponders this, an unknown fluid squirts from the eye pieces of the microscope, drenching Zero and making him appear on video. He joyously declares his innocence on tape but the effect only lasts five minutes before he fades away again. Zero angrily accuses Burton of not caring for him at all and only wanting to use him for the exhibit, then storms out.
Burton fails to complete the revised Patient Zero exhibit before its scheduled opening date. The museum curator substitutes the original presentation instead over Burton's protests, leading to a renewed rush of press scapegoating Zero. The night after the exhibit opens, Mary and other ACT UP members break into the Hall of Contagion and trash the exhibit. Zero returns and Burton explains that he tried to stop the exhibit. Zero forgives Burton but says he wants to disappear again completely. Zero merges with his disfigured video image and, smoking a cigarette inside the video, sets off the fire alarm. The sprinklers destroy the video player and Zero vanishes.
A major subplot involves George (Richardo Keens-Douglas
), a French teacher and former intimate of Zero's. George is losing his sight to cytomegalovirus
and is taking a drug that is manufactured by a company that, as a member of ACT UP, George is protesting. George struggles through the film to resolve his conflicted feelings over this, his guilt over abandoning Zero during the final days of his illness and his fear that the same thing will happen to him.
Real-life television journalist Ann Medina
has a brief role as a television reporter. Co-producer Louise Garfield makes a cameo appearance playing a virus, co-producer Anna Stratton appears as a drug company executive and composer Glenn Schellenberg
plays a bathhouse attendant.
began entering the public consciousness following the publication of Randy Shilts's book And the Band Played On. The book described the cluster study which led to the popular identification of flight attendant Gaëtan Dugas as the vector through which HIV was first brought to North America. It should be noted, however, that Shilts himself never claimed that Dugas was the first. In early 1991 Greyson was given a development grant for the script from the Canadian Film Centre, of which Greyson is an alumnus. Over the next year Greyson, in collaboration with Film Centre partners Louise Garfield
and Anna Stratton
, continued to develop the script, eventually presenting it with producer Alexandra Raffé
in a workshop
format. During the first half of 1992, the production team secured additional development funding from the Canada Council, Telefilm Canada and the Ontario Film Development Corporation. By June of that year the script and the songs were completed and that autumn, with funds from the Telefilm Canada and OFDC grants along with revenue from the sale of British broadcast rights to Channel 4
, pre-production and casting got underway. Principal photography began in November 1992 and wrapped after five weeks. Sneak previews took place at the Seattle International Film Festival
and a number of LGBT
film festivals across the United States before its official debut in September 1993 at Toronto
's Festival of Festivals
.
In dedicating the film's soundtrack album to performer and AIDS activist Michael Callen
and other friends they had lost to the disease, Greyson, composer Glenn Schellenberg and producers Garfield and Stratton explained their reasons for making the film. "We wanted to explode the opportunistic myth of Patient Zero....More importantly, we wanted to celebrate the courage and sass of an international AIDS activist movement that has tirelessly fought for the rights of people living with AIDS."
cited a "murky plot, frequently weak acting and often mediocre music" while still praising the film's "spunk, humor, enthusiasm and wit." The Washington Post compared Zero Patience unfavorably to Hollywood's big-budget, big-star AIDS-themed film, Philadelphia
, claiming that the latter's protagonist, Andrew Beckett, "looked sick, dealt with his illness and allowed the audience to sympathize," unlike the "healthy hoofers" of the musical who, because they didn't look sick enough, "[seem] to deny some of the grim realities" of the disease. In a contrary favorable opinion, London's Time Out Film Guide praised the film for "slyly inverting popular wisdom" to "offer a sassy commentary on the epidemic of blame" and calling Zero Patience "a film which engages your mind as much as your heart, and leaves you laughing." Similarly, the New York Times lauded the film's "loopy buoyancy," praising the songs as a "bouncy stylistic hybrid of Gilbert and Sullivan
, Ringo Starr
, The Kinks
and the Pet Shop Boys
."
Zero Patience was honored as the Best Canadian Film and Best Ontario Feature at the 1993 Cinéfest
and was awarded a Special Jury Citation as Best Canadian Feature Film at the 1993 Festival of Festivals
. Director Greyson and composer Glenn Schellenberg were nominated for a 1993 Genie Award
for Best Original Song for the film's theme song, "Zero Patience."
(who saw the film when someone very close to him was in the final stages of AIDS) calling the film "misguided on the levels both of conception and execution."
The Zero Patience soundtrack was released in 1994. Produced by John Switzer, it includes all of the songs and several pieces of incidental music, along with two remix
es of the film's title song.
1993 in film
The year 1993 in film involved many significant films, including the blockbuster hits Jurassic Park, The Fugitive and The Firm. -Events:...
Canadian musical film
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
written and directed by John Greyson
John Greyson
John Greyson is a Canadian filmmaker, whose work frequently deals with gay themes. Greyson is also a video artist, writer and activist; he is currently a professor at York University, where he teaches film and video theory and film production and editing.-Background:Greyson was born the son of...
. The film examines and refutes the urban legend
Urban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...
of the alleged introduction of HIV
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus is a lentivirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome , a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive...
to North America by a single individual, Gaëtan Dugas
Gaëtan Dugas
Gaëtan Dugas was a Canadian who worked for Air Canada as a flight attendant. Dugas became notorious as the alleged patient zero for AIDS, though he is now more accurately regarded as one of many highly sexually active men who spread AIDS widely before the disease was identified.-Patient Zero...
. Dugas, better known as Patient Zero
Gaëtan Dugas
Gaëtan Dugas was a Canadian who worked for Air Canada as a flight attendant. Dugas became notorious as the alleged patient zero for AIDS, though he is now more accurately regarded as one of many highly sexually active men who spread AIDS widely before the disease was identified.-Patient Zero...
, was tagged in the popular imagination with the blame in large measure because of Randy Shilts
Randy Shilts
Randy Shilts was a pioneering gay American journalist and author. He worked as a freelance reporter for both The Advocate and the San Francisco Chronicle, as well as for San Francisco Bay Area television stations....
's history of the early days of the AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
epidemic, And the Band Played On
And the Band Played On
And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic is a nonfiction book written by San Francisco Chronicle journalist Randy Shilts, published in 1987...
. The film tells its story against the backdrop of a romance between a time-displaced Sir Richard Francis Burton
Richard Francis Burton
Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS was a British geographer, explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, cartographer, ethnologist, spy, linguist, poet, fencer and diplomat. He was known for his travels and explorations within Asia, Africa and the Americas as well as his...
and the ghost of "Zero" (the character is not identified by Dugas' name).
Produced in partnership with the Canadian Film Centre
Canadian Film Centre
The Canadian Film Centre is an advanced training institution for film, television and new media. Based in Toronto, Canada, CFC offers residents education, industry partnerships and production experience...
, the Canada Council
Canada Council
The Canada Council for the Arts, commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown Corporation established in 1957 to act as an arts council of the government of Canada, created to foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts. It funds Canadian artists and...
, Telefilm Canada
Telefilm Canada
Telefilm Canada or Téléfilm Canada is a Crown corporation owned by the Government of Canada.It is the primary federal cultural agency dedicated to the development and promotion of the Canadian audiovisual industry....
and the Ontario Film Development Corporation, Zero Patience opened to mixed reviews but went on to win a number of prestigious Canadian film awards. The film has been the subject of critical attention in the context of both film theory and queer theory
Queer theory
Queer theory is a field of critical theory that emerged in the early 1990s out of the fields of LGBT studies and feminist studies. Queer theory includes both queer readings of texts and the theorisation of 'queerness' itself...
and is considered part of the informal New Queer Cinema
New Queer Cinema
New Queer Cinema is a term first coined by the academic B. Ruby Rich in Sight & Sound magazine in 1992 to define and describe a movement in queer-themed independent filmmaking in the early 1990s...
movement.
Plot summary
VictorianVictorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
adventurer and sexologist
Sexology
Sexology is the scientific study of human sexuality, including human sexual interests, behavior, and function. The term does not generally refer to the non-scientific study of sex, such as political analysis or social criticism....
Sir Richard Francis Burton
Richard Francis Burton
Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS was a British geographer, explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, cartographer, ethnologist, spy, linguist, poet, fencer and diplomat. He was known for his travels and explorations within Asia, Africa and the Americas as well as his...
(John Robinson
John Robinson (Canadian actor)
John Robinson is a Canadian film and television actor. His roles have included Richard Francis Burton in Zero Patience and Chuck Morgan in MVP.-External links:...
), following an "unfortunate encounter" with the Fountain of Youth
Fountain of Youth
The Fountain of Youth is a legendary spring that reputedly restores the youth of anyone who drinks of its waters. Tales of such a fountain have been recounted across the world for thousands of years, appearing in writings by Herodotus, the Alexander romance, and the stories of Prester John...
in 1892, is 170 years old and living in Toronto, Canada. Burton, now living and working as the chief taxidermist
Taxidermy
Taxidermy is the act of mounting or reproducing dead animals for display or for other sources of study. Taxidermy can be done on all vertebrate species of animals, including mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians...
at a Museum of Natural History
Museum of Natural History
A museum of natural history is a museum with exhibits about natural history, including such topics as animals, plants, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, and climatology. Some museums feature natural-history collections in addition to other collections, such as ones related to history, art and...
, is searching for a centerpiece display for an exhibit in his Hall of Contagion. He comes up with the idea of featuring AIDS and the Patient Zero hypothesis. Accepting the popular belief that Zero introduced the virus to North America, Burton sets out to collect video footage from those who knew Zero to support the hypothesis. When Zero's doctor (Brenda Kamino), mother (Charlotte Boisjoli) and former airline colleague Mary (Dianne Heatherington
Dianne Heatherington
Dianne Mae Heatherington was a Canadian singer of several genres, particularly rock, whose musical career spanned nearly two decades...
), who is now with ACT UP, all refuse to demonize Zero, Burton manipulates the footage to make it appear as if they do and includes doctored photographs of Zero showing signs of Kaposi's sarcoma
Kaposi's sarcoma
Kaposi's sarcoma is a tumor caused by Human herpesvirus 8 , also known as Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus . It was originally described by Moritz Kaposi , a Hungarian dermatologist practicing at the University of Vienna in 1872. It became more widely known as one of the AIDS defining...
. He presents this preliminary version to the press.
The ghost of Zero (Normand Fauteux
Normand Fauteux
Normand Fauteux is a Québécois film and television actor and performance artist, best known for his role as Zero in the film Zero Patience.-External links:...
) materializes at a local gay bathhouse
Gay bathhouse
Gay bathhouses, also known as gay saunas or steam baths, are commercial bathhouses for men to have sex with other men. In gay slang in some regions these venues are also known colloquially as "the baths" or "the tubs," and should not be confused with public bathing.Not all men who visit gay...
. No one can see or hear him, until Zero runs into Burton while Burton is spying on Zero's friend George. Zero realizes that Burton can see him, although Zero does not show up on Burton's video camera. The two strike a deal; Zero agrees to help Burton with his Patient Zero exhibit if Burton finds a way to make Zero appear.
The two return to the museum where Burton makes a ridiculous attempt to seduce Zero to ensure his participation. Rejecting his advances, Zero examines some of the other exhibits (including displays on Typhoid Mary and the Tuskegee syphilis study) before finding an African green monkey, another suspected early AIDS vector. The monkey (Marla Lukofsky
Marla Lukofsky
Marla Lukofsky is a Canadian veteran stand-up comedian. She was one of Canada's stand-up pioneers in the 1970s, the same decade she discovered her talent and was a member of the Yuk Yuk Club....
) angrily denounces Zero for scapegoating her just as he has been scapegoated. Zero turns to Burton and they make love.
Under pressure from his director and the exhibit's drug manufacturer sponsor, Burton steals Zero's medical records in hopes of discovering new information. Zero and Burton examine an old blood sample of Zero's under a microscope and discover Miss HIV (Michael Callen
Michael Callen
Michael Callen was a singer, songwriter, composer, author, and AIDS activist. He was a significant architect of the response to the AIDS crisis in the United States....
), who points out that the original study that was used to label Patient Zero as the first person to bring HIV to North America did not prove any such thing, but instead helped prove that HIV was sexually transmitted, leading to the development of safer sex
Safe sex
Safe sex is sexual activity engaged in by people who have taken precautions to protect themselves against sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS. It is also referred to as safer sex or protected sex, while unsafe or unprotected sex is sexual activity engaged in without precautions...
practices. Under this interpretation, Zero could be lauded as a hero for his candor in participating in that original study. As Burton ponders this, an unknown fluid squirts from the eye pieces of the microscope, drenching Zero and making him appear on video. He joyously declares his innocence on tape but the effect only lasts five minutes before he fades away again. Zero angrily accuses Burton of not caring for him at all and only wanting to use him for the exhibit, then storms out.
Burton fails to complete the revised Patient Zero exhibit before its scheduled opening date. The museum curator substitutes the original presentation instead over Burton's protests, leading to a renewed rush of press scapegoating Zero. The night after the exhibit opens, Mary and other ACT UP members break into the Hall of Contagion and trash the exhibit. Zero returns and Burton explains that he tried to stop the exhibit. Zero forgives Burton but says he wants to disappear again completely. Zero merges with his disfigured video image and, smoking a cigarette inside the video, sets off the fire alarm. The sprinklers destroy the video player and Zero vanishes.
A major subplot involves George (Richardo Keens-Douglas
Richardo Keens-Douglas
-External links: at Internet Movie Database...
), a French teacher and former intimate of Zero's. George is losing his sight to cytomegalovirus
Cytomegalovirus
Cytomegalovirus is a viral genus of the viral group known as Herpesviridae or herpesviruses. It is typically abbreviated as CMV: The species that infects humans is commonly known as human CMV or human herpesvirus-5 , and is the most studied of all cytomegaloviruses...
and is taking a drug that is manufactured by a company that, as a member of ACT UP, George is protesting. George struggles through the film to resolve his conflicted feelings over this, his guilt over abandoning Zero during the final days of his illness and his fear that the same thing will happen to him.
Cast
- John Robinson as Sir Richard Burton
- Normand Fauteux as Zero
- Dianne Heatherington as Mary
- Richardo Keens-Douglas as George
- Charlotte Boisjoli as Maman, Zero's mother
- Brenda Kamino as Dr. Cheng, Zero's doctor
- Michael Callen as Miss HIV
- Marla Lukofsky as African Green Monkey
- Von Flores as Ray (ACT UP member)
- Scott Hurst as Michael (ACT UP member)
- Duncan McIntosh as Ross (ACT UP member)
Real-life television journalist Ann Medina
Ann Medina
Ann Medina is a Canadian television journalist and documentary producer.- Biography :Born and raised in New York City, Medina studied at Wellesley College, Harvard, the University of Edinburgh and the University of Chicago...
has a brief role as a television reporter. Co-producer Louise Garfield makes a cameo appearance playing a virus, co-producer Anna Stratton appears as a drug company executive and composer Glenn Schellenberg
Glenn Schellenberg
Glenn Schellenberg is a Canadian composer. He is a frequent collaborator of director John Greyson, having composed the music for three of Greyson's films. For one of these films, Zero Patience, Schellenberg was nominated, along with Greyson, for a Genie Award for Best Song for the song, "Just...
plays a bathhouse attendant.
Production
John Greyson became interested in offering a counterpoint to the Patient Zero story as early as 1987, when the Patient Zero memeMeme
A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena...
began entering the public consciousness following the publication of Randy Shilts's book And the Band Played On. The book described the cluster study which led to the popular identification of flight attendant Gaëtan Dugas as the vector through which HIV was first brought to North America. It should be noted, however, that Shilts himself never claimed that Dugas was the first. In early 1991 Greyson was given a development grant for the script from the Canadian Film Centre, of which Greyson is an alumnus. Over the next year Greyson, in collaboration with Film Centre partners Louise Garfield
Louise Garfield
Louise Garfield is a Canadian film and television producer. Her works include the films Zero Patience and The Hanging Garden, for which she received a Genie Award nomination for Best Motion Picture....
and Anna Stratton
Anna Stratton
Anna Stratton is an award-winning Canadian film and television producer. Her projects include the feature films Zero Patience , Lilies , and Emotional Arithmetic...
, continued to develop the script, eventually presenting it with producer Alexandra Raffé
Alexandra Raffé
Alexandra Raffé is a Canadian film and television producer. Among her projects are the films Zero Patience and I've Heard the Mermaids Singing, for which she was nominated for a Genie Award in 1987 for Best Picture.-External links:...
in a workshop
Workshop
A workshop is a room or building which provides both the area and tools that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods...
format. During the first half of 1992, the production team secured additional development funding from the Canada Council, Telefilm Canada and the Ontario Film Development Corporation. By June of that year the script and the songs were completed and that autumn, with funds from the Telefilm Canada and OFDC grants along with revenue from the sale of British broadcast rights to Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, pre-production and casting got underway. Principal photography began in November 1992 and wrapped after five weeks. Sneak previews took place at the Seattle International Film Festival
Seattle International Film Festival
The Seattle International Film Festival , held annually in Seattle, Washington since 1976, is among the top film festivals in North America. Audiences have grown steadily; the 2006 festival had 160,000 attendees...
and a number of LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
film festivals across the United States before its official debut in September 1993 at Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
's Festival of Festivals
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...
.
In dedicating the film's soundtrack album to performer and AIDS activist Michael Callen
Michael Callen
Michael Callen was a singer, songwriter, composer, author, and AIDS activist. He was a significant architect of the response to the AIDS crisis in the United States....
and other friends they had lost to the disease, Greyson, composer Glenn Schellenberg and producers Garfield and Stratton explained their reasons for making the film. "We wanted to explode the opportunistic myth of Patient Zero....More importantly, we wanted to celebrate the courage and sass of an international AIDS activist movement that has tirelessly fought for the rights of people living with AIDS."
Critical reception
Zero Patience garnered mixed critical reaction. The mainstream Austin ChronicleAustin Chronicle
The Austin Chronicle is an alternative weekly, tabloid-style newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demographic...
cited a "murky plot, frequently weak acting and often mediocre music" while still praising the film's "spunk, humor, enthusiasm and wit." The Washington Post compared Zero Patience unfavorably to Hollywood's big-budget, big-star AIDS-themed film, Philadelphia
Philadelphia (film)
Philadelphia is a 1993 American drama film that was one of the first mainstream Hollywood films to acknowledge HIV/AIDS, homosexuality and homophobia. It was written by Ron Nyswaner and directed by Jonathan Demme. The film stars Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington...
, claiming that the latter's protagonist, Andrew Beckett, "looked sick, dealt with his illness and allowed the audience to sympathize," unlike the "healthy hoofers" of the musical who, because they didn't look sick enough, "[seem] to deny some of the grim realities" of the disease. In a contrary favorable opinion, London's Time Out Film Guide praised the film for "slyly inverting popular wisdom" to "offer a sassy commentary on the epidemic of blame" and calling Zero Patience "a film which engages your mind as much as your heart, and leaves you laughing." Similarly, the New York Times lauded the film's "loopy buoyancy," praising the songs as a "bouncy stylistic hybrid of Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
, Ringo Starr
Ringo Starr
Richard Starkey, MBE better known by his stage name Ringo Starr, is an English musician and actor who gained worldwide fame as the drummer for The Beatles. When the band formed in 1960, Starr was a member of another Liverpool band, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. He became The Beatles' drummer in...
, The Kinks
The Kinks
The Kinks were an English rock band formed in Muswell Hill, North London, by brothers Ray and Dave Davies in 1964. Categorised in the United States as a British Invasion band, The Kinks are recognised as one of the most important and influential rock acts of the era. Their music was influenced by a...
and the Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys
Pet Shop Boys are an English electronic dance music duo, consisting of Neil Tennant, who provides main vocals, keyboards and occasional guitar, and Chris Lowe on keyboards....
."
Zero Patience was honored as the Best Canadian Film and Best Ontario Feature at the 1993 Cinéfest
Cinéfest
Cinéfest Sudbury International Film Festival, also known as Cinéfest is an annual film festival in Sudbury, Ontario. It is the fourth largest film festival in Canada....
and was awarded a Special Jury Citation as Best Canadian Feature Film at the 1993 Festival of Festivals
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...
. Director Greyson and composer Glenn Schellenberg were nominated for a 1993 Genie Award
Genie Award
Genie Awards are given out to recognize the best of Canadian cinema by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television. From 1949-1979, the awards were named the Canadian Film Awards...
for Best Original Song for the film's theme song, "Zero Patience."
Queer theory
In examining the film from a queer theory perspective, author Michele Aaron cites Zero Patience as definitional of one of the New Queer Cinema's central attitudes, the "def[iance] of cinematic convention in terms of form, content and genre." Aaron goes on to cite the film's musical format as "further subvert[ing] the ways we might expect to be 'entertained' by such serious matters as AIDS, media representation, and the legacy of moralism and sexuality." Feminist academic and AIDS video producer Alexandra Juhasz puts forth the film as "an effective critique of the silly sensationalism used in much reportage of AIDS science [that] fights melodrama and tabloid journalism -- with melodrama and tabloid journalism." Not all such critical commentary has been positive, with openly gay film scholar Robin WoodRobin Wood (critic)
Robert Paul "Robin" Wood was a Canada-based film critic and educator. He wrote books on Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, Ingmar Bergman, and Arthur Penn and was a member, until 2007, of the editorial collective that publishes the magazine CineACTION!, a film theory collective founded by Wood and...
(who saw the film when someone very close to him was in the final stages of AIDS) calling the film "misguided on the levels both of conception and execution."
Soundtrack
The Zero Patience soundtrack was released in 1994. Produced by John Switzer, it includes all of the songs and several pieces of incidental music, along with two remix
Remix
A remix is an alternative version of a recorded song, made from an original version. This term is also used for any alterations of media other than song ....
es of the film's title song.
Track listing
- Zero Patience [Moulton Lava Club Remix]
- Arabian Nights - Instrumental
- Just Like Scheherazade - Zero
- Culture of Certainty - Richard Burton
- Pop-A-Boner - Bathhouse trio
- Control - Mary and ACT UP
- George's Theme - Instrumental
- Pop-A-Boner [Reprise #1] - Bathhouse trio
- Butthole Duet - Richard Burton and Zero
- Positive - George and schoolchildren
- Drowning Sailors' Theme - Instrumental
- Love Theme - Instrumental
- Contagious - African Green Monkey
- Pop-A-Boner [Reprise #2] - Bathhouse trio
- Scheherazade (Miss HIV) - Miss HIV
- Six or Seven Things - Richard Burton and Zero
- Zero Patience - Principal cast
- Scheherazade (Tell a Story) - Principal cast
- Zero Patience [Extended Burn Remix]