Original subtitles

[wine pours]

[clink]

[ethereal music]

- I, Donald John Trump will preserve, protect and defend,

the Constitution of the United States.

- So help me, God. - So help me, God.

- Congratulations, Mr. President.

[cheering] - Yeah!

[triumphant music]

- You know, everybody came to me and said,

"Man, Lynn, you run a gay bar in Mississippi."

You know?

"Geez, aren't you scared shitless?"

- This actually shows where America's at.

And it's not together.

Had nothing to do with Trump,

he just pushed the right buttons within ourselves.

America needs one huge fucking mirror.

- It's gonna be 20 minutes before I'm serving again.

I was gonna buy mayonnaise.

I don't know what to say about,

I'm sorry I didn't buy mayonnaise.

Where's the pepper, pepper, pepper, pepper?

Cheeseburger.

There you go, and thank y'all for shopping at the Just Us.

No, no, I was telling you to pick that up.

- She wound up giving me a bartending job here,

and she was my boss for several months

before we started dating.

October made a year that we've been legally married,

but we had a commitment ceremony almost 13 years ago.

- [Woman] Put it on the bottom--

- [Lynn] Close it up, close it up.

- My name is Lisa Brucehard.

I am straight.

I am the infamous twin of Lynn Covalt.

At times, I don't feel I exist.

You know, I've been called Lynn

many times in my life.

It's frustrating at times.

We're both Capricorns.

She wants to be right, I wanna be right.

So, you know, we have that issue sometimes.

- I was very lucky to be accepted into this family.

15 years before I started working behind the bar,

I was always doing shows and production numbers,

and doing the group thing with everybody.

Spent way too many Wednesday, Friday, Saturdays in here.

- We do some weird stuff down at that little building.

Straight people call us JU

so they don't have to say Just Us.

[laughs]

Because Biloxi's a small town,

but we're open 24/7.

We have a lot of people that don't get off

until 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning.

So when they get off,

they wanna eat and have a few drinks.

Biloxi's very small.

It's literally an eight block down,

eight block across.

It's a little square.

Kind of on a little island.

There's a bridge right there.

Biloxi's its own little town.

The Gulf Coast is definitely,

you have Gulf Port, Biloxi,

Ocean Springs, Bay St. Louis.

It's a 20 minute ride from each one,

but every little town's different.

[soft music]

New Orleans right down the road.

- They're family and they all take care of each other.

They fight like family,

but they always come back together.

My name is Janna Riley.

I'm from Vicksburg, Mississippi.

I moved here in January.

Met Steph at the bar.

We started dating at that point.

[seagulls calling]

- We don't always get right to the point,

sometimes we wanna talk about grandma,

and Uncle Ed, and Bobbie Sue,

before we get to, and so you got my daughter pregnant.

[soft music]

- Anybody that owns a gay bar,

they need to spiritually think about what they're doing.

'Cause the moment you open your doors,

there is an immediate need.

And if you're not gonna cater to the community

to which you serve,

then understand that it's more than a bar,

you've missed the mark.

We're the only gay bar for many years.

Back in '96 it raised some eyebrows.

There was some push back.

Back then, the issues were staying safe,

and being together.

We forged the friendships.

We came out to our neighbors,

and we mend the fence.

We did the random acts of kindness.

We showed them who we were.

They need help with rent,

or they need medication,

or they need a doctor's appointment.

There's no telling what the need is,

and they've always come to us.

- My wife and I come here all the time.

And we get treated here so good.

Miss Lynn, she's got a heart of gold.

- It's always been a place we could come.

We've never had any issues

with being able to express ourselves.

- Everyone was very accepting.

And I've had more fun at this place

than I've ever had at any other bar.

- This is the gays of our lives.

[laughs]

And it is all fun and festive.

We are like the true housewives of Southern Mississippi.

- It just progressed into what it is now,

because now it's all welcoming.

We're very welcomed in the community.

The bar cleaned the area up.

A prostitute would be standing out there,

and they were doing drug deals,

breaking into the cars.

But once Lynn had been out in this parking lot long enough,

the people that lived in this area

knew that she wasn't playing around,

then they kinda quit a lot of it.

You know, for many, many years,

we did one benefit after another.

Some of them raising as much as $20,000.

Very proud of my sister.

- She's the mom.

She takes care of everyone.

She shoulders everyone's problems.

- She wears many hats,

and sometimes I have to reel her in,

I guess you could say.

- I ended up meeting Lynn because

I was bored at home after Katrina.

And all these years later--

She's always been there for me.

- Lynn is my boss. [laughs]

I love her to death.

Sometimes it's like a family member that you love,

and you still wanna shake the shit out of them,

but you still love them, no matter what.

- I've hired people for many different reasons.

Like Danielle, you know.

Danielle has blossomed into a great little bartender for me.

But she didn't come this way.

Danielle was one of the drag queens that took my stage,

and she's phenomenal with it,

but she is also transgender,

trying to live a life on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

And it was increasingly hard for her

to do that and stay employed.

- They asked me if I'm afraid

to be in here by myself,

or if I ever think of it.

And I don't, until certain events happened,

and I really questioned whether or not

I should stay here.

Because, in my daily life,

I pretty much avoid any kind of conflict

or contact with people I don't know.

Just because,

I don't know if it's because I'm afraid,

or if it's just because

I'm terrified.

Three transgendered murders this year alone.

And were just now getting well into March.

- Tonight we're talking about two

high profile murders

Both of the victims were transgender

and performers in this community.

Both very well known.

Chyna Gibson was shot and killed one week ago.

Daphne Dupree, and activist in the transgender community

says, even though police are not linking the deaths,

both are concerning.

- Chyna was in the theater that night.

[somber music]

She was, other than her being beautiful,

she was very beautiful inside and out.

She always loved to smile.

I've never actually seen her upset.

Even when she was upset, she was laughing about it.

[somber music]

That happened to Chyna, then just days,

or maybe a week later, that happened to Ciara.

Then once that popped up,

somebody in Shreveport, Louisiana.

It was just getting to be too much.

- A transgender woman has been killed in Louisiana.

The third such case in one month.

Jaquarrius Holland was killed

in Monroe, Louisiana on Feb. 19th.

Police responded to reports of a shooting,

and found Holland unconscious

with a gunshot wound to the head.

- I felt like a little bit of my

reality bubble had been pierced.

- What keeps me staying is the people

that I most care about,

and that I feel most care about me,

are in here all the time to support me,

and I feel like if they're here to support me,

and my bar, and my community,

I can't just run away from them.

- They have people that don't really have their families.

I mean, if you don't have other people to turn to

and you can't turn to your family,

where else do you go?

It's like that's it.

You know?

So I'm kinda, oh, it's bothering me.

[somber music]

Chyna, she turned out to be a very positive

role model for young girls herself,

because she did a lot of positive things

with her transition, and moves she was making,

name changing, and being on her hormones,

and really just working all her feminine.

She was very, a lot of people looked up to her for that.

[somber music]

- [Interviewer] When you were in part of your transitioning,

did you have to deal a lot with the black market?

- Yes.

Even like my first time having black market silicone,

I just thank God that everything happened all right,

but I had so many things done at one time,

I know I wasn't supposed to do that.

Because you put in an illegal foreign substance

in your body, your body has to--

yeah, just get adjusted to that.

And there are several of my friends that

have died because of it.

It's basically like you're dying just trying to live.

Does that make sense?

- [Interviewer] Makes perfect sense.

- Oh wow, I just thought about that.

[soft music]

- The transgender community don't want to be

viewed as, you know, second class woman.

I'm a woman, no matter how people view me,

or how science deemed me.

[soft music]

I grew up, I was born here right on Mississippi Gulf Coast,

wearing my sister's clothes, playing with dolls.

At church, when I was a kid growing up,

we did Sunday School.

I found out that my aunt,

who came out as a lesbian,

was going to hell because she was gay.

And that's when I realized that

I too was gonna be going to hell,

because I was gay.

Or at least at the time what I thought was gay.

As long as I faked it in front of

my family and my church,

then everything would be okay.

But,

that wasn't a very healthy time for me.

- It's neat to see how far Danielle has come.

She could live her life the way she wanted to.

- It felt great to have a place where I could come to,

and family that was more accepting

than I've every been accepted, ever.

I was able to dress the way I wanted to,

I could act the way I wanted to,

I could be my open, free self even.

Pretty much the main factor in letting me be me.

I know it's not as PC, but I didn't even know tranny

was a bad word to say.

I've only ever been offended once by the term tranny.

And that's because I was in a mechanic shop,

and someone turned to the lady behind me and said,

"Oh I'm sorry, but that tranny is busted."

And I was almost offended 'cause I thought they meant me,

but then I realized, you know, it's a mechanic shop,

and they were not talking about me. [laughing]

- Many years ago, I chose to invest

in people and not things.

So I definitely don't have things,

and I have been, over the last few years,

dealt with a lot of heartbreak.

- I've watched her lose everything,

and still give, and give, and give.

If you walk in the door and you need

$60.00 for your prescription,

and we might need to pay the water bill,

but you're gonna get the $60.00 for your prescription.

- I do take a lot of it on.

But it's just because I see a vision,

and it's my passion.

It is the vessel to which I work my convictions out.

It is the vessel, it's the only vessel I have.

It's the only vessel the community has.

I'm very proud of the gay community on this coast.

I'm proud of the community period.

If you ask someone what pride means,

they'll tell you,

rising about the physical altercation,

the assault of it all.

So for a minority community that allowed

a gentleman to take the presidency

that has enabled an open season

type of mentality on aggression,

it's time, it's time to have a Gay Pride.

I need it.

This is gonna be our first Gay Pride.

It's just never been done.

And it's a huge undertaking.

We have six months to pull it off, and it's exciting.

[laughing]

Mississippi don't know what's coming.

- I think a Pride would be great.

I think it's great for the youth.

It's the only reason I'm involved.

Show them that we always stand together.

When I went to Washington for my first Pride,

there was hundreds of thousands of people like me,

not just the 30 people I knew.

And ever since then, Pride's been a meaningful thing for me.

- In this country, all of a sudden, it's okay.

It's okay to hate someone for whatever they're doing

that you don't agree with.

So for me, that's why it's important this year.

- We've never actually had one right here

for our Coastal community.

- It's imperative that we have it this year.

So we're working quickly on it,

and it will culminate in a big meeting tonight.

When you think about what we're gonna name this,

I want you to think about the politics of this year.

- I'm not saying that it has to not say gay,

but does it have to include it in the title,

can it have a name, and then underneath it put,

yes, it's our Gay Pride?

- Oh by the way, we're gay.

I mean.

- [Man] On a rainbow flag, it's going to be gay.

- I think we've blended in enough.

- [Man] I think it's too soon.

- I think the pressured, blended in lifestyle

that we have had to have, and live, is enough.

It's time to come out of the damn closet.

We are gay.

- We can't you have this organized event

and very quietly say, oh this is the Gay Pride.

We're either gonna do it, or we're not.

They're feeling threatened now.

Things, gay rights have come a long way,

and now it seems like we're gonna go backwards, you know.

And I can't even say that's because of the South.

That's politics today.

They're very scary.

- A lot of years went into obtaining the right

for me to have, and to call Tammy my wife,

and it be a legal, binding situation.

To think that all of that could be erased by a pen

is worrisome, beyond worrisome.

But it goes bigger than that.

- [Man] Well when are we going to the other people,

when are we gonna know by then?

Who will take care of each task?

[various chatter]

Within an hour, you're gonna name something

that's so important to us?

- I'll tell you this.

Me and the crew of Just Us,

will be beyond nervous if at the end

of the next big meeting,

we're not ready to embark on the journey.

It was driving me nuts

'cause it was all over the place.

- I don't know what the first one was.

We need to focus.

We need to focus.

- Does anybody have anything they wanna say?

- I do.

My name's Jeffrey Mayou.

I don't know if you all realize as a first year event,

you have banners that are to be made,

y'all having events, y'all having taxes,

y'all have insurance that needs to be paid.

Y'all have to secure the location.

I would definitely suggest that y'all

find an organization, or we find an organization,

if you can carry under someone else's non-profit,

you would actually be very beneficial.

- I don't understand all this technical red tape.

Guys,

if you threw a party at your house,

would it have all of this, really?

- Those first two meetings that we had

were a little all over the place,

and I was like oh, I got nervous.

And I kinda even left during

the middle of the second one.

- We bit off a little bit more than we could chew.

- It has been frustrating.

It was very chaotic.

- After the second one, me and Janna kinda

put our heads together and was like,

well, let's try to change the direction of this.

[upbeat music]

- I love Mardi Gras.

Anything goes.

This is the biggest Coast party.

[upbeat jazz music]

[police sirens]

I haven't attended a parade in

I couldn't tell you how many years,

but I still love Mardi Gras.

It's a night parade, and the floats will be lit.

Right up until the parade passes,

Toni Dee and friends take the stage,

so it's gonna be a blast.

Anyway, happy Mardi Gras, guys!

- [Announcer] Now Toni Dee is officially ready

for his next number, so take it away.

[cheering]

[techno music]

- Is that your perfume,

or did you have a dog in this car?

- It's--

Mine's Chanel.

- I had my dog in the car,

rushing him to the emergency vet.

Now what road are you wanting to get down, guys?

- [Woman] Raynar, right here.

- [Woman] As close to the Saenger Theater as possible.

- To the what?

- [Woman] Saenger, if you turn here.

- I gotcha, I gotcha.

- [Woman] Thank you, Lynn.

- It's fun because it turns you into a little star.

[yells] Filming!

The children here is the best part of it,

because it's a magic thing for them.

So we take pictures with them,

and hug them and give them beads,

and have a good time.

- Mississippi gets a really bad rap.

When you're below I-10,

it's a completely different world.

- I had never really experienced

north Mississippi before.

I've driven through it plenty of times,

but I was born and raised on the Gulf Coast.

- I go there and eat, and come right back.

- You hear about all the conservative Christians.

- I have never worked above I-10,

because I don't travel.

[upbeat music, cheering]

[blues music]

[techno music]

- People feel uncomfortable when they go somewhere that,

it's just not their race.

For example, there was an older white guy,

and a younger guy,

they were just in town working.

They saw it was a bar,

so they just stopped, you know, get a beer.

And so the guy come up to me, "Yo, come here."

He was like, "Is my kind welcome here?"

First thing popped in my mind was, straight.

But he was actually talking about his color.

And you know, I've never been the type to

discriminate against anything,

'cause I wasn't raised that way.

You know what I'm saying?

And so he came in and, got him a couple a beers.

The other guy went outside and he told me,

"I don't think it's his type of party."

He said, "But babe, I had me a good time."

[techno music]

- People ask me, what is the Exclusive?

Well it's a gay club.

'Cause I don't like to point out race.

And I mean, yeah, the majority of the people are black,

but I don't like to point that out.

- Black gay bar.

Yeah.

[light music]

- Everyone that I know, respects Shawn.

Respects what Shawn does, respects Shawn's business.

- A role model.

A leader, innovator.

Someone who just comes along and inspires

most of everything that goes on around in this community.

- That's my dude, man.

[laughs]

That's my dude.

That's my buddy, man.

We've been riding for a minute.

- Jasmine, they call me DJ Lady J,

which was given to me by Shawn.

She a really sweet person,

and I don't see how nobody can love her.

This is my first go around,

being a lesbian with Shawn.

She did something to me,

and I'm stuck.

[slow music]

Me coming out didn't matter.

I was scared.

But she taught me to not worry about

what nobody has to say.

We're all equal.

[slow music]

- I never wanted to be a club owner.

That wasn't never in my plan.

But you know, when the opportunity came,

I'm like, okay I need to make a change.

Because you know, back in 2005,

I got into a little trouble with the police.

You know, I had a clean record.

Never been in trouble.

I probably had maybe one traffic ticket, I don't know,

but it was paid, I had already paid it.

You know, this little weed that

really should've been just a misdemeanor,

but it was in the county that it was in.

I gotta go to the state pen,

for this little bit of marijuana that I had.

I feel like it was a racist deal.

And that kinda did something to me.

I like my freedom.

And I don't like being told when to go to bed,

when I can go outside.

We're not gonna take a bail.

None of that, you know what I'm saying,

and that's what goes on there.

I mean, you get used to it.

You can't get out until your time is up,

you know what I'm saying?

I had good days, I had bad days.

It just, you know bad days was around holiday times.

I had never been in trouble before,

and those are the people they give a chance

to go up for parole.

It's like you're in court all over again.

You gotta convince these people

that you changed, and what your plans are

when you get out, you know what I'm saying?

So I went before them people again, parole board,

and a week later, they told me I got approved.

And that's how it was.

And I was just counting those,

I was counting those weeks down then

until it was time.

I knew I had to do something legal.

[light music]

- Club Exclusive is the only LGBT club/bar in Hattiesburg.

Hattiesburg is located in the Bible Belt.

The people are kinda religious.

- Small towns don't have these kind of clubs.

- Everything I do, I try to do for the LGBT.

You know what I'm saying?

And we are actually in the process of

getting ready for a Pride.

- She really, like deep down in her heart,

wants the community to come together,

the whites and the blacks.

- If we do it together,

we gonna have a mixture.

Whether it's the people you know,

and the people I know,

so now we got a mixture of people,

and then more people are seeing that.

That would have changed the whole scene

here in this town.

But it's not that way.

Am I gonna keep pushing for it to be that way?

Maybe.

Maybe not.

You know, it just all depends on

how things go.

- Right now, race is a big thing.

- I have seen race.

But I haven't seen it this bad in a while.

And I have been experiencing it

for the last three months now.

- USA, USA!

- You wanna fuck with us.

[yelling]

Calling me all kind of niggers,

and flipping me off.

- It's been in these people,

but now they're just not afraid.

It's everywhere, I see it.

My job, what ever else.

USA! USA! USA!

Donald Trump brought a lot of that out, man,

out of a lot of people.

- I feel like I have to watch my back here,

watch my back there.

Look out, make sure no one's gonna attack me.

- The least you wanna do when you go out and enjoy yourself,

is to have a safe environment to be around,

and Shawn keeps that safe with security

at the door before you walk in.

- We need those safe places,

'cause a lot of people don't feel safe.

When I met her, she was carrying a knife.

I mean--

- I was scared of everything.

- I said, look, you don't have to do that with me.

I got you.

- I just pray that my people be careful.

Always be aware of your surroundings.

You gotta be, so you know how to react

when it's time to act.

[radio static]

[peaceful music]

- You know, I never thought that the possibility

could be that I could be sitting next

to a die hard Trump voter in my bar.

But I can be.

- [Interviewer] You voted for Trump, right?

- Hoo. [sighs]

I did.

I did.

Not gonna lie.

I would not say that in the bar.

- We don't talk politics with Lisa.

- I don't, I tried to talk politics with Lisa one time,

a very long time ago.

It just doesn't work out.

- She's a die hard Republican.

- I've been looked at and said,

"Don't you tell me you're voting for Trump."

And I just looked at them and said, okay.

And I let it go.

They said that things got better

a couple of years ago.

I don't know where they got better,

but it wasn't here.

And so, you know, that was my frustration.

And so that was made me make that decision.

- It's just kind of ironic

that the reason why I'm even in this place,

I saw this really cool thing

called the revitalization of downtown Biloxi,

and I said, I gotta get in the ground floor of this.

And that revitalization of downtown Biloxi

has yet to occur, it never happened.

What we did get was Katrina.

[somber music]

I've only closed twice, both times was due to hurricanes.

I have been locked since.

We opened up after Katrina.

- Even if a hurricane's coming here, you know,

they usually come in and out,

nothing serious, and it just happens.

And Katrina just happened.

It's a [sighs],

it's the biggest wake up call,

and the biggest eye opening experience of my life.

[somber music, heart beating]

- We got hit with a 30 foot surge.

The Back Bay met the Gulf.

- The water came up,

and it got pushed up into the bay.

So it was just one big push of water,

just come in.

It came back.

It sucked most of it back into the ocean.

The beach was covered with

anything you could possibly imagine.

It smelled really bad, it was hot, it was August.

It was crazy after Katrina.

People, a lot of people lost their damn minds.

They just went crazy.

A lot of people left.

I got really depressed after Katrina.

I didn't realize I was really depressed,

but I left for like two days,

and I came back, I couldn't get to the house

I was living in at the time.

The house that was three houses up from me

was in my front yard.

You couldn't find any place to live

because everything was wiped out.

So rent shot up.

So we were all living together.

- There had to have been at least 12, 13 people

that came and stayed at the house, at my house.

As soon as the winds died down, we got down here.

Come off the interstate, and the building looked intact.

Got to the front door and I saw the pool table

dislodged into the front door.

Everything was just turned upside down.

It was a wash.

Shocking.

- [Interviewer] Is that the hardest thing

I guess the bar has had to endure?

[somber music]

- I think as a community, yes, yes,

because of the things and atrocities

we had to see afterwards.

- Everything was destroyed.

There was just slabs where homes used to be.

There was still dead bodies in the ditches.

[somber music]

We got, we kinda got forgotten.

You wake up one morning from being able to go to McDonald's,

and the next morning you wake up and nothing's open.

Unless you prepared and you've got food,

you have no food.

You have no toilet tissue,

you have no running water.

We got wiped out.

Wiped out.

- The worst part of it for me was the silence.

The very loud silence.

How everything can just turn upside down

and never be the same again in just a day or two.

It was only about a mile to my parent's house,

but that mile seemed like forever.

As I'm climbing through the trees,

I couldn't think of anything but,

what am I gonna see when I walk around the corner?

And when I did, of course, I saw my mother in a tube top,

and my dad was grilling outside. [laughs]

And, you know, they acted like nothing had happened,

other than our roof was gone.

And I cried like an idiot,

with my little mother holding me.

- The most incredible thing that I've experienced is,

after the storm, the community came together.

And this became the point,

everybody came to the building.

We had a big old sign out front,

everybody'd mark their names off

if they were alive or dead.

We were looking for people,

trying to bring us all back together.

- Some of the best people I know came and rescued,

and gave everything they had,

just to make sure that little piece of community

got put back together.

- We all came together in this community

and started cleaning up the trash.

The customers, the employees, they all came together.

- That was more important to them,

to put us back together,

than it was to put themselves back together.

This is part of the crew.

This is us taking a break

from gutting it.

[triumphant music]

[intense music]

We are at the Point Cadet,

we're out on the Point on the water, in Biloxi,

and we are at the staging area

for the first Gay Pride event.

I think the location is great.

It has a pavilion, it has kitchens, it has bathrooms.

We wouldn't have to rent porta-lets.

What I need the group to do

is to concentrate on fundraisers

that involve the utilization of this bar,

and/or its property.

Okay?

Look guys,

I have to run a bar, okay?

And I have kept my calendar literally opened.

I'm not comfortable with that.

I usually book three and four months in advance.

You know, my summer months are coming.

I'm looking at bands, I'm looking at comedians,

I'm looking at shows, I've gotta get those booked.

[upbeat music]

- [Interviewer] What do you wanna achieve here today?

- Awareness.

- [Interviewer] Awareness to what?

- To Gay Pride in June, and the Pride event,

the first one ever on the Mississippi Gulf Coast,

and just promote the community in a positive way,

and I suspect that in introducing ourselves

to some people throughout the day

that we may even change opinions.

Are you nervous?

- No, I'm not nervous.

I'm hanging the fucking flag in North Biloxi.

- I'm a little confused, are you joking with me?

Are you honestly leery of hanging up a flag out here?

Be honest with me.

- Pardon my proper upbringing, but--

- [Lynn] [laughing] Shit.

- [Woman] He said the flag's hanging the wrong way.

- You know, I kept looking at that,

but we were so miserable this morning

when we put it up, and the wind was blowing.

We were just trying to get it up.

But you know, you're right.

And wow, I can't believe we didn't nail that.

- You know what, no worries, no worries.

- We're throwing the first outdoor Pride event.

What's your name sir?

- Matthew.

- My name is Lynn, nice to meet you, baby.

- Nice to meet you too.

- I'm with Just Us, and I'm part of

throwing the first Pride event.

- [Matthew] Cool.

- It's gonna be great, honey.

Be looking for us.

- [Matthew] I'm looking forward to it, thank you.

- Please do.

That was a big one.

I think we left them with more questions,

but excited that it's coming so,

I'm off to the sunset.

Steph didn't wanna work my barbecue.

The only thing I can say about that is

I opened 21 years ago, and invited the community

to work out their convictions.

She should've played a role in it,

and to make damn sure it was a positive role.

- [Interviewer] You didn't feel completely

100% behind coming here and doing this today.

- I did not, I didn't.

- [Interviewer] Why not?

- I was afraid there would be a lot of folks

that some issues would come up.

There'd be a little bit of resistance or something.

But there wasn't, I was completely wrong.

- Part of the reason that Lynn felt

like everything was on her,

was that she wanted every update

on every detail that everybody was doing.

So I just kinda stepped back.

Lynn has this huge sense of responsibility,

along with just a control,

a need to control everything.

If something happens the wrong way,

she's the face of it.

[airy music]

- Today's the benefit, well one of the benefits.

What we're doing is we're gonna sell plates of crawfish.

That's the way to do it.

Crawfish.

Got it?

I don't know if I should start drinking now or,

now.

[light music]

Where are the potatoes gonna go?

- I don't know, ask Gene?

- Gene, I don't know why he needs his bag back,

but he doesn't know what you

wanna do with these potatoes?

- Where's the trays?

- Lisa, trays!

- The hardest thing about begin Lynn's sister,

is to be standing there and watching her

twirling around and trying to say,

please stop, please stop.

- I should get painted

so it encourages everybody else to get painted.

So let's do it, get it done.

All right, yeah.

- So if I put a flag in his hand--

- Try a spicy one out.

[suspenseful music]

[coughing]

Thank you, thank you.

If you feel like, I don't know,

working social media, trying to get people down here,

that would be great.

So we only need to sell what,

20 plates for me to break even?

Is there a place where they're all conjugating today?

It's Black Spring Break.

Where is everybody right now?

It's Black Spring Break, where is everybody?

Where are the Black Spring Breakers?

- Down on the beach.

[dance music]

- Black Beach is Spring Break for all black colleges.

- It is called Black Spring Break, it is, I know,

it's a little shocking to me.

It's all over the radio, it's in the newspaper.

It's like a big deal.

- People tell me that this is the newest destination

for Spring Break because this just keeps on

getting better and better.

- Black Spring Break, this is what it's all about,

baby, we're out here having fun.

[dance music]

- There are locals that are totally against it,

don't want it, because they leave a mess behind,

and the put the city in gridlock.

- The traffic, you just, I mean, it's unbelievable.

[honking]

[slow music]

- This shit ain't, it's not spicy, Lisa,

it's so salty it's not even funny.

- The last one?

- Fuck, yeah.

They're so salty, Lisa, that.

- [Lisa] I didn't find them to be salty.

- I found them to be extremely salty.

Not spicy, extremely salty.

And it worried me.

To the point where, [gags] it choked me, you know?

That's how much salt was in them.

And I sucked the head, so I know.

What the fuck?

Aw, shit, Lisa I, beer.

It's all in your backseat.

Do you have anything that can soak up,

anything in your trunk?

I dropped my beer.

Hi guys.

I have 20 boxes of crawfish, $10.00 a box.

- [Man] Make it $5.00, we're gonna buy them all.

- Oh, we're doing a benefit at the bar down the street.

This is for a benefit.

- [Man] $5.00.

- Nah.

We're doing a benefit, we got $8.00 a box.

$8.00 a box.

Did you get that?

I let them try one of these,

and the woman said, immediately, too fucking salty.

I'm doing $8.00 a box, we don't got no ones, do we?

Fuck me.

We didn't bring change.

You got any dollars?

We're gonna have to go back to the bar and get change,

we're gonna have to get ones and everything,

so that we can sell all this shit.

Hey guys, $5.00 a box.

$5.00 a box.

$5.00 a box.

Is it just me?

- [Lisa] This is why I wanna be aggressive.

- Well, then go at them, Lisa.

They obviously could give a fuck,

because none of them can.

They're the most rudest, fucking,

you know, they wanna know why,

you know, we're not happy about all this?

'Cause they're rude, they're fucking rude.

I'm sure there's people that like to make it

a black thing, but it's not.

I'm just breaking even, you know.

I'm just trying to get my money back

so I don't bounce checks first thing in the morning.

So every bit of this was for naught.

We didn't make a dollar.

And guess what's gonna happen?

I'm gonna have to choke out the thousand, $1500.00,

whatever the city wants this week.

'Cause it didn't happen.

- She can be, even to a fault,

she will do her damnedest to make everyone else happy.

Even if it screws her over in the end.

- I have spent 20 years doing nothing

but looking at the gay and lesbian community,

and never saying no.

Working under the idea that I don't

need to know what you need,

I just need to know that you need.

So yeah, it's going audacity.

To think that I can't get support.

This is where we stand.

I am about $80.00 in the negative

from trying to get the word out

from the free booth that we got.

Hadn't put the numbers to it,

but not all the investment came back

on the crawfish boil,

and we did not make one dollar.

I could blame it on a lot of things.

I did wish I had foreseen and thought to see

that it was going to be Spring Break,

and that could've been a deterrent.

But I don't know.

[static]

- Mississippi Gulf Coast Spring Break weekend backlash.

- And I want some protection,

'cause I can't go through this every year.

I'm not going through it every year.

- A little racist that they take and make

a Spring Break just for black people.

I'm not against it, but then again,

I think it should be a Spring Break for everybody.

- They think we owe them something.

I owe them shit.

- [Interviewer] Okay.

- I don't owe nobody nothing.

- From what I see in the news,

there has been a negative connotation

put on it from some locals.

But I think you could say the same for

Cruisin' the Coast, all of those other

celebrations that bring revenue to the Coast.

It depends on who you ask.

- Put me in something for me.

It's in there.

I don't even go to Black Beach.

I don't go.

I could.

You know, but if I went,

I would be going to set up a tent

and stuff for the gays.

- Like I said, with that Black Beach,

I don't even see why they give them nice folks they money.

Me personally, especially somebody

that doesn't appreciate you.

- Some people have signs on they bathrooms

where they say no blacks.

Now this is what they told me this morning,

I said I didn't go,

but if I woulda seen that,

you know what I'm saying?

Man, they said they had signs up

saying no blacks, like no blacks can use this restroom.

Man, you think I'm lying.

- [Newscaster] Crews continue to sweep

and clean up the roadways and beaches in Biloxi

after the large turn out for Spring Break weekend.

- They wanna put out pitches on social media

like how the beach look,

it always look like that after something.

This goes on every year.

Be prepared for it.

You have a lot of people

that come from everywhere to come here.

You know what I'm saying?

And I feel like, if you're gonna feel,

if you feel some type of way about it,

beef up on your security,

but not treat them like animals.

There's a way to say stuff to people,

you don't have to come at people wrong.

That's just like if somebody come at you

in a way that you don't like,

you're gonna retaliate.

That's another reason why we need to do this,

as far as the Pride, and Black Gay Pride.

You know what I'm saying?

- [Woman] It goes beyond LGBT.

- Yeah, black period.

[upbeat music]

It's the Unapologetic Black Pride, Black Gay Pride.

Well you know, of course I had seen earlier that,

we used to do it together.

So I just feel like it's something that we need to do,

because we always against each other, the blacks.

[light music]

[dance music]

- Well thanks to everyone here,

and our special Easter Bunny,

would you please come out Mr. Easter Bunny?

Mr. Easter Bunny.

[laughs]

- I'm not gonna sit here and say

that the fundraiser was successful

by any stretch of the imagination.

Certainly not compared to what I know

we have done and achieved.

- I have been a little

set back at the lack of participation

by a good portion of the community

that I really expected to

step up and join in.

- The last time I heard from Janna,

they, I, look, I can show you messages.

Hello, what's going on?

And she never called me, never picked up the phone,

never answered my call.

I sent them both messages.

This lasted for over a week.

- Everybody got really

disheartened really quickly.

[light music]

No progress was being made.

So at that point, it was just kinda natural

for me to take the things that I knew

I was ultimately responsible for

away from the group.

- [sighs]

I started this trying to shine a light

on something that felt good.

You know, I had, we had done it for so long

that I was actually at a place where I turned around and,

and I stopped for a moment in life,

and I looked back,

and I was proud.

You know, the community grew old together.

And I say old, I'm have the same people

around me for 20 plus years.

In some instances, we grew apart,

and I'm still on the same track.

And a few of them left the track,

chose another direction.

And that's heartbreaking.

[soft music]

- Machetta, Mississippi, home of where, well,

what used to be Rumors.

My name is Rick Gladdish.

I owned the place from 1998-2005.

Now it's a church.

It's a Baptist Church.

I would actually like to come down for a service

just to see what the building looks like on the inside.

Sit there and think about what all went on

in different places and different areas

inside that bar while it was a gay bar.

[soft music]

- There's two great days,

like a shrimp boat in a bar owner's life, you know.

And then don't even add the gay bar,

but in a bar owners life.

That's the day they buy it

and the day they sell it, right.

What is the most compelling,

most successful day you ever had?

- My last night there, and I was like,

it'll just be a normal night, people coming in.

No, there was probably, I think we had to

turn people away, there was 200 people that showed up,

that were just like, this bar has been our life.

You've been part of our life for 10 years.

Bartending, running, owning this bar.

I sat there, it was amazing to see that.

- So you had an overwhelming day,

you had 200 plus people show up for you.

- To show up for me.

- Wow.

- I cannot believe people actually

felt this way and thought this.

I want a bar, I wanna do a bar again.

- I have a fear of being where you are.

I'm not gonna say I'm there, okay, because--

It's such a life thing with me.

- [Rick] It is.

- I never thought past it.

That is what it was going to be.

- When the bar closed, it was always there going,

someone needs to step in, somebody needs to do something.

That's the thing, Tupelo has Missy.

And I said Tupelo has no gay bar,

has no gay community center.

- So you're telling me there's no gay bars in Tupelo.

- No.

- That's interesting.

I mean, I'm just now realizing that

unless there's a bar that I just don't know of,

and you might, but I'm open 20 plus years now,

so I am now the oldest running gay bar in the entire state.

- Yeah.

As far as I know, there was for years,

there was the bar in Shannon,

and there was the bar in Meridian,

there were the bars on the coast,

that was it, that's all Mississippi had.

- I had heard that there was something going on

up in Hattiesburg, but it's been brought to my attention

very recently that it's been open for nine years.

[blues music]

- I'm focused on the blacks,

but I never wanna see it

that you can't come and support.

If I'm trying to run an Unapologetic Black Gay Pride,

I need to keep everything in the black community.

So if you want to come support,

you can come to us sometime and support us.

We come all the time to y'all

to support whatever you do.

I had a guy, he put the question of like,

why put black in it, take that out.

You know, he was a black guy.

And I was like, what's wrong with the word black?

You don't know what we go through in my city.

You in another town.

So if I'm trying to pull my city together

to where we can be, have unity with us,

and stop all the fighting with each other,

stop all the, we need to start doing stuff together,

and uplifting each other instead of all the time

slapping each other in the face, it don't make sense.

This is my first time doing this like this.

You know what I'm saying?

It's nothing to have a little Pride party,

I can have a little Pride party next month,

just call it a Pride party.

No, this is bigger than that.

'Cause not only do the,

we don't have unity in LGBT,

the blacks don't have unity period.

If a lot of the older ones like me will step up,

everything will be fine.

Because you got younger ones coming up out of school,

If you don't teach them how it's supposed to be,

that's where it's coming from.

They start cliquing up in small groups,

hanging out, doing this and that, people gonna talk.

It's a lot of he said she said,

and now you ready to fight.

You go, go, Mike!

Come on, go, Mike! Go, go, Mike!

- I don't do violence.

I may look like it, but I don't.

You know what I'm saying,

but I don't get with that.

If I see somebody arguing in my club

and I know them, you best believe I'm in their

inbox contacting them, they gonna come here,

and we gonna talk about the problem.

We talk about the problem,

and see how can we fix the problem,

and then we move on.

Life is too short for all that.

That may be why we've been around as long as we have.

During the week, I'm mostly either promoting,

doing flyers, or stuff like that.

- [Interviewer] Do you get stressed?

- Sometimes, 'cause I'm constantly going.

You know, sometimes if you stressed and tired,

your body will shut down.

You just gotta sleep.

I never get a break.

That's why, like maybe it'll change

when I hire somebody to be here everyday working for me.

And I won't have to open every night.

For the last 10 years, that's what I did.

It was fun at first, but I'm older now.

I look at it a whole 'nother way.

Because I see how everybody is,

and so that's when I start

involving myself with the community.

[slow music]

Here in Hattiesburg,

why we can't get along and get stuff together?

I'm just trying to bring unity with us first.

'Cause if I bring unity with us first,

then we can go unify with somebody else.

We can't go unify with somebody else

if we ain't got unity.

That don't work.

'Cause I see a lot of stuff.

I see a lot of things that go on,

that the other races may not see

that goes on with my people.

You see what I'm saying?

So if I could reach out to them,

and get them to see there's another way,

we don't have to be this way.

You see what I'm saying?

That's my only goal.

[intense music]

- Now we have HB1523.

It sounds like some type of disease, and it is.

- It is somebody's lawful right now,

if I go with my girlfriend out to eat,

and let's say the owner doesn't agree with my lifestyle.

They do not have to serve me at all.

I will be put out.

- [Newscaster] On Thursday, a US Appeals Court

lifted an injunction that blocked a Mississippi law

allowing businesses and government employees

to deny services to lesbian, gay,

bisexual and transgender people by citing religious beliefs.

- It's not right, period, it's not right,

that you can do that to me.

- This bill brings up a whole nother set of issues,

and it brings out division.

And Pride is one of the mechanisms

that we as a community are gonna use to eradicate it.

- The representatives of the LGBT community say

they're not giving up.

- [All] [chanting] No hate in our state!

No hate in our state!

[crowd yelling] Jesus loves everybody!

We are ready to start more of a media campaign.

[static]

- Joining me now in studio to talk about

a National Pride Day are Janna and Lynn.

So can you guys just tell me

a little bit about this event?

How did it come together?

- To be honest, when Trump made office,

we just found it was imperative for this year.

- Our event starts at noon at Point Cadet.

We have Gia Gunn, from RuPaul's Drag Race

to start our drag show.

We hope that that's gonna draw interest from

some of the surrounding areas, not just Gulf Coast.

- We're fixing to, I've called,

tried to get ahold of the beer company,

the guy's mailbox is not set up so,

I can't leave a message.

So I'm gonna continue to try.

So it may be, it may end up being this.

We're gonna have to prioritize it.

And, hold on.

- I have a massive amount of people

that are gonna be here Saturday night.

All points of entry--

- They'll be opened up for you.

- If you can kinda clean it up around the area,

and present it the best you can for me,

then that's all I can ask at this point and time, you know.

I still have not started my day,

and a deposit needs to be made,

and stuff needs to be picked up.

And I'm tired, you know.

Tired.

I just wanna stay on task.

- Do you want me to go ahead

and make the deposit and pick the permit up,

or do you want me to stay here.

- No, go make the deposit real quick.

And then get back.

And screw the permit for now,

I'll get it picked up later.

But it's the deposit that--

maybe it's me, I'm losing my fucking mind.

Wow.

Lisa, give me the money, please.

Give me the money.

I gotta go.

- [Lisa] All right, be careful.

[upbeat music]

- Son of a bitch.

Is Max around?

Let me ask you something.

Are y'all tearing it all up?

Give me the inside scoop,

when are they gonna tear this road up, do you know?

Now they've come to me and told me

that it's gonna get worse,

they're fixing to take the street out,

because it's a major line they gotta do in here,

and it's gonna be out front for six to eight months.

While this is still going on.

So literally what they're doing,

is they're cutting me off, my entire business.

- [Interviewer] How do you get into this bar at this point?

- You're not gonna be able to.

Five days.

Five days from now,

this place is gonna be mercifully packed out.

This field is gonna be full,

that parking lot's gonna be full,

it's gonna be full, they're gonna be down the street.

And all I've got to say is

they better put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

Make it a smooth ride for me.

I'm so pissed, I can't even talk right now.

I'm, I'm--

I can't take this shit no more.

They're killing me.

Fucking killing me.

Y'all had a rough night?

- We would've been here at 10:00.

We would've been here at 10:00.

- I thought we agreed on 10:00.

- We just, I think we misunderstood.

- So we've got it 10:00,

and you were rushing out the door,

the dog was jumping up around,

so I can see where it got missed.

I got confused that y'all might've thought it was 11:00.

I just had no idea that y'all didn't know

it was today period.

- It has not been easy at all.

It has been stressful,

and I don't deal with stress very well.

And sometimes I just have to pull back,

and get stuff done behind the scenes.

And that's what I felt like I had to do at the moment,

was just, I had to get some shit done.

And the best way to do that was on my own,

making decisions by myself.

I'd run it by her, or she'd run it by me.

- I will tell you that yeah, it frustrated me, you know.

Can I be difficult to work with?

Of course I can be.

Yeah, I can be a raving lunatic at times.

- I've wanted to strangle her through this process,

but there have been so many moments that

I was so proud of her for having my back,

or for just saying, okay, I trust you, Steph.

That meant a lot for me,

for my friend that I know is a control freak

to look at me and say, I trust you.

- I think we developed, and we are going to show

just an incredible product come Saturday.

- [Interviewer] Has anybody looked at the weather?

- Rain or shine.

- I give it to God, or my higher,

I give it to my higher power.

The day is going to be what the day needs to be.

[thunder rolls]

Well everybody else is freaked out about it.

I refuse to look at it.

I haven't looked at one weather report,

nor one projection.

- [Newscaster] Overnight, Tropical Storm Cindy moving in,

and dumping heavy rain along the Gulf Coast.

Flooding concerns prompting the Governor of Alabama

to declare a state of emergency.

[thundering]

- Where is just starts moving west,

it just needs to start moving.

It really is stationary, it has to start moving soon.

- Yeah, 'cause if it just hangs around out there over the water

it gets stronger.

- Tropical Storm Cindy has winds of up to

45 miles per hour, but it is nearly stationary

over the Gulf of Mexico right now.

In Mississippi, they're expecting up to 12 inches

of rainfall over the next 48 hours in Biloxi.

[raining, thundering]

[soft music plays]

- I've been out in it for the last two days.

I have been in every store on this coast

checking the list off.

I've been put in charge of all the small details.

It's so unpredictable.

I'm hoping today was the worst of it,

but you know, some people are asking lots of questions.

What if it rains, and what if this, what if that.

I'm like pavilion, pavilion, pavilion.

We have, I think a 90% chance tomorrow.

- It's blowing bad out here.

- [Reporter] Oil companies quick to get

workers off those rigs.

The big fear, flooding.

People racing to protect homes.

[raining, suspenseful music]

- Tell me.

- I'm telling you, by Friday morning 8:00 am,

the shit hits the fan in Memphis, and we're drying out.

- You know how much I trust you, do not.

- You should, I know what I'm talking about.

I know what I'm talking about.

- Oh, Jesus.

[suspenseful music]

- Yeah, it's tomorrow.

It started two and a half months ago.

- It's a--

- This is the rat race.

- It's the dreaded countdown.

I wanna throw up.

[intense music]

[inspiring music plays]

[lovely music]

- Somebody's gotta pay for it.

- The rain finally stopped.

- [Interviewer] Can you believe it?

- I know.

- [Interviewer] Happy Pride!

- Happy Pride!

- [Interviewer] What are you doing for pride?

- I'm working.

[light music]

- What y'all want?

Coffee, tea, or meat?

[light music]

- How y'all doing?

[cheering]

Oh yes, I am feeling the love, my friends.

[light music]

- We have several campaigns that we're working on.

Of course, against HB1523.

- We work for social justice and racial equality,

and equality for LGBT people in the community.

[light music]

- We come to support.

Come to support the Pride.

You know, they trying to reach out.

So you know.

I come down to support that.

And also to promote my Pride that's coming up.

[blues music]

- [Interviewer] This is Shawn.

- Hey Shawn, how you doing, Baby.

It's finally good to, I recognize you from somewhere, Boo.

Do you wanna beer?

I'm gonna drink one too.

I don't know what this day's gonna bring,

but we gonna do it together, baby.

- It's good.

- I think it's the most ingenious Pride

that you came up with.

- Vendors and basketball children did.

- I'm coming.

We're coming, we're coming.

- I'm gonna need you to come now.

- We coming.

- From my understanding,

we're trying to diverse things.

Right?

- Yeah. - Diversity.

- It's all inclusive, it always has been for me.

- But you got to have the right people to do that.

It gonna have to be blacks and whites

putting it together.

- Right.

- You see what I'm saying?

- Exactly. - Yeah.

- Especially here in the South,

we need to make that other line go away,

which is a line that you can't see,

but everybody assumes,

and puts it there between she and I.

Puts that line there.

We gotta work to make that line go away.

- Mm-hmm.

- Don't you agree?

- Yeah.

And I'm all for it.

How you doing?

I got a Pride going on in July.

We are in search for vendors.

You can email us, saying Exclusive,

and I will gladly email you

all the information that you need.

I met a lot of great people,

and a lot of people that understands,

and you know, basically telling me

it's a good thing that I'm doing.

I thought they were gonna look at it like

she's being racist, no.

No.

This Pride here motivated me.

My Pride is not called anything about

diversity or anything, we will get up to that.

Then we can unify with this.

I gotta link up with these people.

I feel like I gotta get a good, strong committee board,

but it gotta be equal.

- [Interviewer] Absolutely.

- It gotta be equal to make it work.

[blues music]

[upbeat music]

[cheering]

[upbeat music]

- Here we go, I'm headed to the main stage

for the very first Pride here in Mississippi.

Can't wait to see you guys.

[kisses]

Perfect.

Momma Rue has opened so many doors

and really opened up their minds to accept

that drag is an art form, and this is for everyone.

[static]

[techno music]

The South, you hear all these stories and things,

so I was a little bit nervous, as I am.

I like it, the food is great,

the people are really sweet,

and it's really hot, but that's why we have AC.

[cheering, applause]

[light upbeat music]

- One thing that I noticed,

definitely was the outstanding amount of children

that were there, as well as their parents,

and that's definitely something that is

a big inspiration for me.

[light upbeat music]

The young people are the ones that boost us up,

and I can only hope to open more doors

for younger people to continue this legacy,

and to continue to break down these doors,

and make it as accepted as we can as a community,

and as a whole world, really.

- I think it's great that the young'uns,

all the kids I'm seeing.

Kids out here playing in the water.

You know.

Kids.

Families.

Whew, what an incredible day.

[group chatter]

- The kids that showed up today,

the whole reason I wanted to be a part of it,

they were here.

All this work, and everything that's happened,

when the protesters showed up,

they has their signs, they were ready for it,

and they ran out there,

and they were just so peaceful about it.

And that one little girl,

she stood next to the protester for like

two hours in this heat, with her little flag.

- God loves everybody,

you ain't going to hell, you ain't going to hell.

- It gave me hope.

The fact that I didn't have to preempt.

The fact that someone made signs,

and it just, you know,

my world just got huge today.

I came out of my little world today.

- It was a good Pride.

It was a good turn out.

- Now we have a whole younger generation

that is ready to start fighting the fight with us.

- That might have got a little bit on confidence today,

outside there, 'cause they all come

in a little circle of friends,

they're four or five little friends.

And now they know,

there's a community here.

[music plays]

- We are done until next year.

[music fades]

- Pride is going great.

Everybody been working hard, my team been working hard.

Staying up late, not only getting the event together,

I'm talking to people every day,

you do the canned good drive and stuff like that.

Back to school drives together.

So with this situation, and this Pride,

I feel like I'm doing what's right.

Now if somebody have a problem with it,

I can explain to them, I'm not,

this is not about racism.

It's not about the white people.

It's not about the Mexicans,

or any other race.

It's about my people, because I am black, and I'm proud.

- Black Pride is just so, so, so, so important,

just because we're already so divided as a people.

It gives this marginalized community an opportunity

to come together and do something positive.

- Black Pride is important to me because

I think it expresses freedom in every sexuality.

I feel like everybody should be able to express they self,

in whatever color, whatever way they want to.

- Events like this which brings

the LGBT community closer, just spreads the love,

not only within the LGBT community,

but the black community as a whole.

It shows that we all can come together and have a good time

without there being any drama, or any mess involved.

- It don't stop at the Pride,

it's not gonna stop with me.

'Cause you know what, it gonna be up to me

to bring us and and them together.

They're not gonna come to me.

[light fun music]

[indistinct chatter]

[indistinct chatter]

[cheers]

[music continues]

[music plays]