Q: Is sexual display in
science fiction always polymorphous?
A: No. It is increasingly
hermaphroditic.
"Ziggy Stardust ... was very much Japanese theatre meets American science fiction"
The Rise and Fall of Ziggy
Stardust and the Spiders From Mars was a record every hip kid had in
1972.
Ziggy (David Bowie in "Martian"
guise) was the personification of glam for a whole generation -- the first
interplanetary pop icon.
| Ziggy Played Guitar |
GLAMOUR: Glam-our n. Orig. Scottish; magic influence; spell; witchery, hence alluring and often illusory charm.
- New Century Diciionary. |
Bowie plans to release a multimedia, multiple-part work, "Ziggy Stardust 2002" for the 30th anniversary of the original Spiders from Mars album. |
Among other manifestations, Ziggy 2002 will come to life as a film, a stage show, and an Internet biography of the rock alien himself. |
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At its height "glam" was
an eclectic, barely-definable amalgam of influences incarnated around 1970
by the New York Dolls, who combined rock-n-roll with the drag theatrics
of Charles Ludlum's Theater of the Ridiculous.
The Dolls wore women's clothes
and lots of makeup, causing music journalists to throw words like "glitter
rock" and "glam" whenever the band took the stage.
Between the Dolls and acts
like them -- Wayne/Jayne County, Iggy and the Stooges, the Velvet Underground
-- the scene offered unparalleled excitement.
Music for the Clockwork
Orange generation
The Dolls' gender shenanigans
must have had some influence on the Ziggy Stardust character, although
David Bowie credits Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange as
well.
By all accounts his wife
Angie -- heavily enchanted with the exploding New York scene -- was a big
help too.
Surrounded by glitterati
and hangers-on from the Warhol Factory, the Bowies went to Max's Kansas
City to see the Dolls play.
The SpaceGlam seed, if there
was one, was planted in two songs from Bowie's record Hunky Dory
(1971). "Queen Bitch" -- a salute to the Velvet Underground -- and "Life
on Mars?" were proof positive that science fiction was invading the glam
world.
From there, Ziggy Stardust
was a natural evolutionary step.
The Man Who Fell
Bowie describes his stage
wear from the early '70s as "intergalactic power dressing" (NY Times
Magazine Spring 2000 Men's Fashion issue), and says that he "pilfered
the entire look of the somnambulist from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,"
adding that "a feather boa will only go so far."
Science fiction wasn't a
conscious part of the New York glam scene. But it always was for Bowie,
who wrote Space Oddity in 1969 after seeing 2001:
A Space Odyssey.
Whatever style he may have
adopted from Max's, he added the Space Man element on his own.
It worked, partially because
he was the only figure in the scene with truly "alien" potential.
For Bowie fans, his role
as the titular bewildered extraterrestrial in The Man Who Fell to Earth
(1976) was entirely believable.
He actually made several
UFO sightings while making that film in New Mexico, and talked about his
favorite SF writers in interviews.
Ultimately, Ziggy brought
many young rock-n-rollers to science fiction -- Bowie devotees took up
reading SF because they knew he liked it.
What do you think? Send your
comments to the editor.
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