OUR FEATURED STORYTELLERS
from public performances, 1998-2006:

ANDY BAKER ("Speed Cleaning," "Things That pinch")
Andy comes from a long line of story-telling Texans. After completing a career in art therapy in July, 2003, he has spent the last eight months traveling, writing, and desperately trying to keep in touch with his muse. He will soon be starting a career in the business world using his recently acquired MBA. But nothing too businessy, something fun, something that involves a lot of talking and coffee breaks.

JAMES CAMPBELL("God's Secret Agent," "Hubba-Bubba, Hubba-Bubba, Espanol," "Miss Betty")
James spent a large portion of his adult life denying his hillbilly, fundamentalist Christian roots, only to move to New York and find that it was this very thing that made him "fascinating" at sleek Manhattan Cocktail parties. A storyteller from way back, James has co-authored two plays and compiled a book of poetry.

PAUL ERIK DAVIS("Step Together, Step Punch")
Paul hails from San Diego but moved to NYC 12 years ago after a six-month stint as a “Love Boat Dancer” aboard Princess Cruises. He has worked as a Guy Friday for a merchant banking firm (i.e. permanent temp), a personal assistant to a celebrity couple (buy him a drink and he’ll happily violate his confidentiality agreement), Story Editor and Acquisitions Coordinator (USA Films/Focus Features), and currently, as an Associate with Calleri Casting. Paul lives in the Village with his partner Bixby, their two cats, and little old dog, Cujo.

BRENT NICHOLSON EARLE ("Epiphanies")
Over the last 35 years, Brent  has been a contributing member of the artistic community in New York City as an actor, writer, stage manager, lecturer, archivist, photographer, optical designer, curator and art gallery administrator. He is better  known, however, as an athlete, orator and activist.  From his ultra-marathons to his many arrests with ACT UP, he's been on the front lines of the battle against AIDS since the early 80's.  He was also a charter Director for 13 years and is now an Honorary Life Member of the Federation of Gay Games. He is thrilled to be adding a tale to the Queer Stories collective oral history.

TED FREED ("Behavioral Therapy")
Ted grew up in Parsippany, New Jersey.  Formerly a professional French horn player, he was a soloist with the Guadalajara Symphony in Mexico for several years as well as playing in Europe, South America, and all corners of the continental United States.  A published poet, Ted has also been employed, at various times, as an arts administrator, ice cream salesman, legal assistant, housepainter, and credit manager.  He is currently a member of the Board of Directors of Men of All Colors Together/NY and a singing member of the St. George’s Choral Society. 

DAN GARVIN ("From Cummings to 42nd")
Danny was born and raised in Manhattan to Irish Immigrants.  He has been a sailor, a road manager for a rock group, a TV cameraman, a recreational therapist, and a Franciscan Friar, arranging housing and daycare for homeless families. He founded the first AIDS drop-in support group in the City of Yonkers. Danny is a Stonewall Veteran and has been written about in David Carter’s best-selling book Stonewall—The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution.  Danny now works for Columbia University and lives with his loving partner of 14 years, Rick Kaufmann.

RONALD GOLD ("Three Stories of Gay Liberation," "Six-Day War")
Ronald Gold was born in Brooklyn in 1930, entered Brooklyn College at fifteen, and took twelve years to get a degree. By that time, he’d been a junkie in San Francisco and had his head shrunk in Topeka, Kansas. After a career writing for various publications, including Variety, he became a full-time gay liberationist at the age of forty-one. He was one of the founders of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and is remembered for his role in persuading the American Psychiatric Association to take homosexuality off its sick list. In the early l980s he quit activism to "learn how not to have to be effective," which he learned so well that he hasn't had a full-time job since. He's had four live-in lovers since 1959 (he prefers to call them "mates"): a Cuban, two Puerto Ricans, and a Bangladeshi. It was while he was living in Bangladesh that he wrote his as-yet-unpublished book, Polarity: the Psychology of Paul Rosenfels.

ROBIN GOLDFIN ("The Hug," "My Mother Fed the Birds")
Robin Goldfin is a writer, teacher and dancer. He holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing and currently teaches writing in New York University's General Studies Program. In the spring of 2001 he was the winner of a writing award through In Our Own Write at the Lesbain and Gay Community Center in Manhattan. His play, “It’s Not Magic!” was presented at the Strawberry One Act Festival of the Riant Theatre in New York in July of 2002. Robin is a member of The Dramatists Guild.

BRAD GRETTER ("Partners in Crime," "Despair in Ladies Swimwear," "Fire In The Hole," and "Best Foot Forward," "Running On Ice")
A member of Queer Stories since early 2000, Brad has been telling his tales ever since he learned to speak. After finishing his BA in international relations at American University in Washington DC, Brad followed his first boyfriend to NYC, where he ended up with a broken heart and a marketing MBA from NYU. When not balancing budgets or writing business plans for his day job, Brad can be found dancing with the Times Square Dance Club and running with his Front Runner buddies in Central Park. Currently, Brad is working on a collection of short stories recounting his adventures running the NYC marathon.

OLIVER HUMMEL ("Christmas Magic")
In 1976, Oliver came to NYC to study at F.I.T.  He found his fashion niche in making patterns for clothes.  When offshore manufacturing gobbled up the market in 1991, he took a job checking coats in a small museum.   To this day, Oliver wonders how that turned into a management position lasting 14 years.  At a bereavement group he met his partner, Stanley Reed., and in 1995 they had a commitment  ceremony —an intimate affair for 109 people.

NEIL JAMES("Teddy")
Neil James lives in Jersey City, utterly alone. He's a contributing essayist for David Magazine, and The New York Blade, and is co-founder of Fink Tank 3000 (finktank3000.com), the web's angriest, liberal parody site. A true Southern boy, Neil enjoys bingo and scouring Manhattan for the perfect biscuit. Fuck bagels.

RICH KIAMCO ("Orange Juice")
Rich was a featured expert on "Queer Eye For The Straight Guy" as Kyan Douglas' Thai massage instructor. Rich has performed with comedian Judy Tenuta in Las Vegas, on The Howard Stern Show, and nationwide as her love slave/go-go dancer/drag sidekick. His solo show, UNACCESSORIZED, has appeared in the New York International Fringe Festival, the Seattle Fringe Festival and the True Colors Conference at Central Connecticut State University. He has also performed and facilitated workshops with Peeling, an Asian American performance collective based in New York City. An excerpt of his writing can be found in TAKE OUT: Queer Writing From Asian Pacific America, Temple University Press. Go to: www.RichKiamco.com

MATTHEW KILKELLY (What a Fuckin' Queer")
Matt has been a teacher for 14 years.  He began his career in education working for the Jesuit Volunteer Corps in Brooklyn, and has also worked in Mexico and Peru.   He was recently the recipient of a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and spent the summer in San Diego studying the works of Hannah Arendt.

DOUGLAS MCKEOWN ("Indian Guides," "Mother of Frankenstein," "Personal Reasons," "The Hunchback," "Children of the Night," "Liza With a Kiss")
Doug has worked as a teacher, actor, writer, scenic designer, and a director of stage and screen (his low-budget sci-fi/horror movie, "The Deadly Spawn" [1983], has been restored and released on DVD [2004]). He is the facilitator of the Queer Stories workshop.

FRED NELSON ("Girls Camp," "The First Vision," "Hunter’s Safety," "Remission of Sins")
A native of Cache Valley, Utah, Fred studied music at the University of Utah and moved to New York City to pursue an operatic career.  He is at work on his first novel.  Fred has been, at various times, a fork lift operator, a seller of auto parts, antique china and lumber, a quality control inspector at a sausage factory, a trainer of chariot teams (for real), a pourer of cement, a one-man show (for five months in a hotel lobby), and a Mormon missionary.  Fred is a hiker and a fan of Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, Sr., and the Blackeyed Susans.

GEORGE PFIFFNER ("The Man in the Stall," "The Letter")
George studied theatre at London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and at the Ben Bard Playhouse in Hollywood. He worked in early television with director Sam Peckinpah, as a designer and craftsman, later earning his living variously as a hospital attendant, health department inspector, telephone lineman, and editor at Woman’s Day Magazine. In New York, he is currently an honorary Snark (a women’s amateur theatre club) and a member of the Instant Shakespeare Company. George is eighty years old.

ALLEN SCHELER ("1231 Bourbon - the Queer and the Quirky")
Allen, a native of Louisville, Kentucky, moved to NYC in 1989 as a counter manager for Aramis Fragrances. No Really. He has one other contribution to the fine arts. In 1991, while having a drink with fellow Center Dance volunteers, he and 3 other friends were "dared" to perform in drag at a Center Dance. This dare created "The Kay Sisters,” K-Mart, K-Lua, K-Pasa and K-Y.  Allen performed as K-Mart at several Center Dances until he fell off the stage a few months later.

HARRY SCHULZ ("What I do Best," "Mary," "Obstacle Course")
Born 1960's or 1970's depending on screen name. Raised suburban New York, school musicals, philosophy major, HB Studios, close encounter with EST actors, acting class with Marisa Tomei, lived in /wk SRO, numerous obsessive crushes that came to nothing, 12-step programs, Gay and Lesbian Center, cheap Brooklyn apartment, diet and exercise after turning 30, jazz studies, internet chat rooms, finally a boyfriend, a vocal cd, a full-time job and a decent apartment. Ready to chuck it all and start over. Thanks to all the "Marys" out there.

GEORGE STYLIANS ("Hard To Get," "Bus Stop")
George is a married truck driver with no children who likes to play the piano (a little) and draw.

Some Queer Stories excerpts:

' ...When I told my mother I was going to spend a week volunteering at a camp for children with HIV/AIDS and their families she replied, "You must have a strong stomach." Which she knows I don't. To this day--and I'm 35 years old--my mother still sends me stomach remedies in the mail...'

Links to Other Queer Sites
Dixon Place

The NYC Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Community Center