Giving head(lines): Bourgeois & Maurice tackle equal marriage and the RVT

We’re Bourgeois & Maurice and we are the media. Read your news.

Gay-Merica

The U.S of A, land of the free, home of the brave, finally made gay marriage legal under federal law. This means the 13 bonehead states who previously refused to recognise homolove as having equal status to heterolove are now legally obliged to pull their heads out of their arses and get with the programme. Some ‘people’, such as this lovely lady (doing her best David Hoyle impersonation), took a religious and moral stance against such this flagrant disregard for age-old laws. Don’t worry love, the law still says you can legally fuck a horse in Alabama, Arkansas, Washington D.C, Guam (where?!), Hawaii, Kentucky, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

 

Strike a Pose

“What do you fancy doing today mon cheri?”

“Well my petite poisson, I feel like a nice slow cafe au lait followed by a lovely long strike that will bring the country to a standstill.”

This is the exact conversation many French ferry workers had this week as they prepared to strike over job cuts in Calais, resulting in 3,000 lorry drivers being stuck on the M20 on the hottest day of the year.

Did you ever see that dogging documentary on channel 4 last year? It featured some lorry drivers who loved to watch couples have sex. They might have been in that M20 traffic jam. Just a thought.

Wimbledon

Yellow ball. Green grass. Cliff Richard. Strawberries and cream.

We don’t understand, don’t ask us.

Money Talks

Europe’s biggest ever mathletes conference has been continuing this week, with Alexis Tsipras taking over the role from Lindsay Lohan – sexy, rebellious, desperate to be popular. However, despite the glossy, front page coverage on this whole Euro Crisis thing, we’re still very confused by the “numbers”. Apparently Greece needs £1.2bn to bail itself out from the claws of the rich baddies and keep being able to pay for stuff, like human beings.

On the other side of the crackpot coin this week, BP have reached a settlement with the US Department of Justice to pay £12bn in compensation for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. BP said the settlement is a “realistic outcome” that will “enable BP to focus on safely delivering the energy the world needs”. BP’s share price also rose 4.6% following the announcement of the deal. So… a corporation needs to pay a bill that is TEN TIMES more than a developed country’s next bankrupt-inducing-debt payment and it’s just no biggy for them? Well, we guess if BP keep the receipt they can write it off against tax.

Heatwave

God, summers just aren’t what they used to be. Remember the grey sky and rain? The long, drizzly days spent inside waiting for Kids TV to start? Well, those good old days are over. Spray deodorants in the 80s have a LOT to answer for.

Vaux-hell

If you’re a bit of a fruit who has ever been touched by the soot-stained hand of a Londoner, there’s a fair chance you’ll have seen something about protecting the legendary Royal Vauxhall Tavern in London’s Vauxhall in your Facebook feed over the last couple of months. Maybe quite a few things. Maybe quite confusing, almost contradictory things. That’s because the RVT, one of London’s oldest, most iconic homohaunts, has found its pretty little face caught up in a bitter fight between good and… well, possibly evil but no one’s really sure.

In 2014 it was bought by an Austrian property company called Immovate, and people started to ask questions about their intentions. Unfortunately, Immovate seem shrouded in so much shady, shady secrecy they make Dracula look like one of those friendly tanned hippies who like to strike up conversations with you on public transport. Long story short, a campaign group was formed called RVT Future, which is fighting to make sure the RVT maintains its status as a vital part of London’s queer life. One of its goals is for the pub to become registered as an English Heritage site, which would recognise its important showbiz history (as a place that launched the career of major people including Lily Savage blah blah blah, but mainly us obvs) and prevent it from being turned into, say, a knock-off Yates’ wine lodge for people in caramel loafers to eat penne arrabiata and talk about cricket.

This week Boris Johnson, Ian McKellen and other slebradee types gave their support to the proposal to make the RVT the nation’s first building to be listed in recognition of its importance to LGBTQ community history.

HOWEVER. There’s another campaign. This one set up by the RVT and the fingers of Immovate themselves. This one says that a Heritage status will destroy the RVT because it will make the business too expensive to run. They don’t really say how but we do understand their fear – ‘Heritage’ sounds pretty heavy. Maybe they’ll be forced to use only Farrow and Ball paint and replace the urinals with solid gold buckets or something. Anyway, they say it’ll force the RVT to close. Which is a shitter.

RVT Future say this argument is bollocks and that there are plenty of Heritage pubs operating successfully in the UK. The group’s application to English Heritage has now gone through and they await a decision… and Immovate’s response.

So, that’s that. Everyone just has to wait now. Or, better still, go to the RVT and get absolutely whacked off your big plump, square mantits on sambuca because the best way to ensure the RVT’s future is just by going there.

So, that’s all the news. Except… We’re doing a show at East London’s sweatiest new basement The Glory on July 24th. Tickets on sale now. Get in quick you sexy little slimebags.

Spot a headline we should cover next week? Tweet us @bourgmaurice and we’ll happily steal your idea and claim it as our own.