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A newcomer moves to the big city with stars in their eyes and dreams of better things, sex work their preferred easy avenue for success. So famously starts Midnight Cowboy, and in its footsteps The Foxy Merkins now follows, the former’s male hustlers and dramatic thrust substituted by the latter for lesbian hookers and a tone of comedy. It’s a switch that is as unlikely as it is inspired, but one that works from start to finish. That the film hails from the creative forces behind the similarly offbeat and endearing Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same helps establish and explain its charms and absurdity.
Margaret (Lisa Haas) arrives in New York alone, homeless, and with only her new trade as a prostitute as a means of support. Floundering in her first encounters in Manhattan neighbourhoods, she meets the experienced Jo (Jackie Monahan), who shows her the ways of the street from her base of the Port Authority Bus Terminal bathrooms. Their friendship flourishes, their exploits becoming adventures through comic skits and clear subversion of all expectations. Finding clients and indulging fetishes go hand in hand with accepting choices and forging a path for the future, as underscored by to-camera interview segments with other same-sex-servicing ladies of the night.
That The Foxy Merkins is a team effort between writer/director Madeleine Olnek and co-writers/actors Haas and Monahan is evident, the improvisational script playing to the strengths of both leads. From the first glimpse of Margaret looking far removed from the typical movie image of someone in the skin trade, to her deadpan manner in even the most outlandish – and exposed – of circumstances, Haas perfects the combination of an innocent and an incredulous figure. As the assured, opportunistic mentor Jo, Monahan is gifted many of the best lines as well as the showier portrayal; however it is the central chemistry that turns the film into the best kind of bizarre buddy comedy. That this is an effort built on complementary characters and correspondingly harmonising performances is never in doubt, nor is their contribution to much of the film’s humour.
Taking its name from a pubic wig – here hawked in a cemetery by a trenchcoat-clad salesman (Girls’ Alex Karpovsky, another Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same alum) – gives an indication of the style of jesting in play, much of it observational and satirical. Parodying stereotypes comprises the majority of the jokes, with everyone a target from wealthy housewives to struggling arts students, and warmth never absent. Each gag straddles the line between the inspired and the ridiculous, always self-aware and affectionate. Indeed, so too does the film’s entire concept and execution.
The Foxy Merkins was shot as Olnek and her cast toured the festival circuit, and while the piecemeal nature of its production shows in its low-fi, hand-held visuals, it also suits an effort repetitive in expressing its silliness but still having fun in the process. Aping its inspiration alongside others in the male hustler genre where it needs to, as well as finding its own points of hilarity and insight, results in a comedy fondly familiar, welcomely unexpected, and always entertaining.
Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5
The Foxy Merkins
Director: Madeleine Olnek
US, 2013, 81 mins
Brisbane Queer Film Festival
February 6 – 15
http://brisbanepowerhouse.org/events/2015/02/13/the-foxy-merkins/
Perth Underground Film Festival
February 12 – 21
http://www.puffpuffpass.com.au/
Melbourne Queer Film Festival
March 19 – 30
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