Lettin It All Hang Out: An Autobiography

ArtForum, Summer, 1995 by Michael Musto

Seemingly written as if Ru's the biggest star in the world, the book veers between humility and megalomania - the winning juxtaposition of attitudes Ru's success has always been based on. His forte, after all, is to get an audience chanting "Everybody say love" just before he cuts down some deserving celebrity in the cattiest way possible. The book serves up the expected extremes of warmth and sassiness, but there's a new philosophical side that deepens the sometimes simplistic mottoes he spouts.

Skip the long chapter detailing exactly how Ru pulls off his drag - unless you're the type that read Crossing the Threshold of Hope in order to find out how to become the Pope - and skim the part about the earlier years. (Even to someone like me, who personally knows the people he's talking about, they don't bear massive sociological interest.) But Ru's revelations about his tough-talking but wondrous mama and his evasive father are unexpectedly touching, and his outlooks - on lovelessness, education, trust, fame, and femininity - seem startlingly sincere. When Ru describes looking into the eyes of a Klansman and realizing that deep down they're the same, the image has a moving sweep to it that's more provocative than the mere sight of a guy in heels.

Those who only crave the obligatory gossip won't come away untitillated either. In his upward spiral, Ru lands on the bathroom line on the Concorde with his idol, Diana Ross; emerges in a watermelon outfit on Arsenio Hall's show right after Bill Cosby speaks out against black minstreling (he defends himself and Cosby); and creatively nabs a free ride from a foot-fetishist cab driver.

In his most opinionated mode of all, Ru explains why he was nasty to Milton Berle on the MTV Video Awards - Berle had apparently been groping and demoralizing him backstage. But our glittery star doesn't seem to realize that the audience didn't see what went on backstage, and so understandably surmised that Ru was being excessive. It's a reminder that, even with his book, the savvy may still have room to grow.

Michael Musto's column "La Dolce Musto" appears weekly in The Village Voice, New York. He also contributes regularly to Vanity Fair and is a contributing editor of Spin.