No Strings Attached

Posted By Kathleen David on June 27, 2017

Mr. McEnroe was asked if Serena Williams was one of the greatest of all time. He responded that she was one of the greatest female players but if she had to play the men’s circuit then it would be a different story. He said that maybe at some point a female tennis player could be better than anybody.

He went onto to say, “I just haven’t seen it (a woman going up against the men) in any other sport, and I haven’t seen it in tennis. I suppose anything’s possible at some stage.”

It already has Mr. McEnroe.

The sport was bowling and the woman is Kelly Kulick who has a PBA title and a major title at that. She won the 2010 PBA Tournament of Champions defeating two of the top male players in the sport on TV after having gone through the field of players who had all won titles that year and won a two year exemption on the PBA tour.

So that’s a woman at the top of her game against a group of men who are at the top of their game and winning.

The sad thing is that this sort of assumption is made all the time.

Women can’t write comic books as the same level as the guys and then go and sweep the Eisner for writing.

Wonder Woman is another example. Girl Superhero films don’t sell is the attitude in Hollywood, but a woman directed the current Wonder Woman and it is doing very well in the box office in both the domestic and foreign markets. It is a film that everyone can enjoy.

Years ago a friend of mine, who is still a friend even though occasionally they will say something asinine, said that men can play women but women can’t play men. He was well known for his cross-dressing of female superheroes in the South-east and he could pull it off to the point that he had to inform people of his gender when they were next to him and hitting on him.

Challenge accepted, said I and I recruited my buddies Jeff and Angelo for the scheme.

That year there was a new television show on the air called “Beauty and the Beast” with Linda Hamilton and Ron Perlman. We decided that I would be Vincent at a convention that George R R Martin was attending since he was working on the show.

In those days you didn’t have the Internet to find out what the costume really looked like. You had a couple of out of focus photos in magazines and the video tapes you made of the TV show. From that you had to extrapolate what the costume was.

Which we did and we put it together and I wore it and no one knew it was me as I entered the contest as Calvin Hobbs. Jeff and Angelo made sure that I looked the part as a male between the make-up and the costume. And we succeeded. I got hit on so many times by both genders who assumed that I was male.

The icing on the cake was the next day where we were part of a panel about the winning costumes. I had a box under my arm that contained my life mask and the Vincent face. Sheila had played Catherine at the last minute so she was standing next to me while we watched the Mighty Rassilon Art Players do a series of Doctor Who and fannish related sketches including a couple I had directed.

“That was fun last night,” said Sheila as they were setting up for the next sketch, “And no one knew that you were Vincent.”

The gentleman standing next to us looked at me and said, “What?”

“I was the Vincent in the costume contest,” I said.

He looked at me and I opened the box showing him the face and then the life cast.

“You? But he…He…it was…I could swear….”

I smiled and introduced myself to Richard Pini. Point, set, and match to us.

I am grateful for all the women who prove that they can do whatever they put their minds to.

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