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The threat of death has hung over the characters on Pose from the beginning. Not only are they dealing with almost daily losses of people in their communtiy to the exploding AIDS crisis of the late 1980s, but two of the main characters — Blanca and Pray Tell — are both HIV+. This season, Blanca learned that she’s advanced into full-blown AIDS and had, until recently, refused to take the new AZT medication to help keep her illness under control. And Pray Tell has also refused, relying instead on holisitic methods like eating a pound of butter a day and he feels completely cornered when Blanca and Judy stage a sort of intervention to convince him to take the pills. They’ve improved Blanca’s T-cell count, so he needs to get on board so they have more time to spend with him.
But time is not guaranteed to anyone, and we all learned that tragic fact on this week’s episode in the most shocking of ways. Up until this point, Pose has been firmly grounded in the era, introducing newcomers to the ball culture, reminding us of the health crisis faced mostly by LGBTQ people due to the Reagan administration’s failure to address what many simply called ‘The Gay Plague’. What did straight people care if homosexuals were dying? As long as it didn’t affect them, then it wasn’t a problem (and the Reagans may never have gotten involved if Nancy’s personal hairdresser hadn’t fallen ill). So we’ve almost been expecting someone in a major role on the show to succumb to the disease. But last season also gave fans of the show some cause for concern with Angel’s relationship with the married ‘straight’ Stan. As the series seemed to be following the events depicted in the documentary Paris is Burning, we all feared that Stan would eventually crack and the season would end with Angel’s death. It got to a point where the producers had to issue a statement that Angel was not going to die.
But in Paris is Burning, one of the subjects of the film Venus Extravaganza, it was learned with a coda at the end of the movie, had been murdered, her body found under a bed in a seedy hotel. Sadly in that era, violence against trans people was rampant and, as has already been pointed out several times this season in what can now be called foreshadowing, no one cares about these women. Their families, for the most part, don’t because they don’t accept them and the authorities certainly don’t give two shits about a trans woman found dead. And until recently, no one but immediate family members could claim the body so the deceased often ended up in unmarked graves (as we saw in the season premiere), an issue that was dealt with in this episode. Sadly, this ‘trend’ continues to this day with, to date, 13 trans women, a majority of them Black trans women, have been murdered this year, four of them in June … Pride Month: Dana Martin, Jazzaline Ware, Ashanti Carmon, Claire Legato, Muhlaysia Booker, Michelle ‘Tamika’ Washington, Paris Cameron, Chynal Lindsey, Chanel Scurlock, Zoe Spears, Johana ‘Joa’ Medina Leon, Layleen Polanco, Brooklyn Lindsey.
And this week Pose used its cable network platform to shine a light on this ongoing crisis by killing off one of its main characters, Candy Ferocity. To say that her death came as a shock it putting it mildly, and it still resonates with me as I write this, but at the same time it seemed that this is what the season had been leading up to. Candy has not been an easy character to root for, but at the same time you did want to get in her corner because she was simply fighting to be seen. Everyone likes the sassiness that comes from Pray Tell at the balls, but the last few episodes he’s practically been bullying Candy, constantly putting her down, telling her she’s not good enough to win a trophy in his ballroom (despite the fact that she snatches trophies left and right in other ballrooms). For her part, Candy was almost asking to be shot down by imposing herself into categories she had no business walking in, like this week’s category for actual dancers. Her stunt of strutting in dressed as Madonna from the ‘Vogue’ video did her no favors, especially when she insisted that Pray add a new lip sync category to the ball. She got a firm no on that, but she persisted when she learned the MCs were having a meeting and, once again, pulled a (butter) knife on Pray in the diner. That’s our Candy. Luckily she didn’t have her hammer or it could have ended with Pray much more worse for the wear.
But when Candy didn’t show up at her house or an event, her ‘sister’ Lulu panicked and asked Blanca to go with her to the hotel she’d been using to turn tricks to make some extra money to keep the House of Ferocity up and running. Facing little assistance from the desk clerk, Blanca calmly asked him to call her if he had any information but she and Lulu noticed that Candy’s usual room key was not on the hook. After they left, the housekeeper made the horrible discovery of Candy’s dead body stashed in the closet, her assailant unknown. Today, as back then, there are no employment protections for trans people and many of them turn to sex work to make ends meet. Sadly, that often spells the end for someone who is either already targeted or is the victim of an unsuspecting customer who becomes enraged when they discover the woman they’re with hasn’t been completely honest with them.
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We don’t know what happened with Candy, and we probably never will. And for all the difficulties Candy brought with her, her death united the communtiy which has already had to deal with so much death from AIDS. And in this extended episode, we the viewers got to share in the grief of the characters on screen (and the actors who were also being forced to say goodbye to someone they’re worked with for the last year or so, someone who is part of their TV family). It wasn’t all sorrow though. There was a bit of comic relief when Angel, Blanca and Elektra first saw Candy in the casket, horrified by the makeup job (however good intentioned it may have been) and the auntie wig. Unloading their purses, they gave Candy a makeover so she could spend eternity looking as she wanted to look. It was a nice breather between the tragedy and the funeral that was to come.
For the characters, and Candy, they got to do something those of us in reality don’t get to do after a sudden death — make amends. And while it was pure fantasy, it certain hit home that we should all be kind and honest with each other because we don’t know what tomorrow may bring. None of us are guaranteed a tomorrow, so if you have something to say to someone … SAY IT!. Here, Candy got to ‘haunt’ several of her friends and frenemies, most notably Pray Tell who really seemed to be hit the hardest by her death (well, after Lulu who couldn’t even bring herself to go into the room until Angel helped her). Candy got to ask Pray why he’d been so hard on her, and he gave her an honest answer: he was jealous of her, her strength, being femme, all the things he couldn’t be outside of the ballroom. Being able to say that to her lifted a burden from his shoulders and granted him her forgiveness (and perhaps was the thing that finally pushed him to acccepting Judy’s assistance and taking the AZT at episode’s end).
Candy was able to tell a distraught Angel that she is forging a future for herself and her community with her modeling career. With Blanca she silently sat with her, humming a hymn, her hand on top of Blanca’s. Lulu was a different story because when she saw her brooch and gloves on Candy in the casket, she started tearing them off of her. Outside the parlor, Candy and Lulu talked about their complicated relationship. While they were always side-by-side, they never really liked each other. But deep down they did, they were sisters, and moving forward Lulu was going to miss not having Candy by her side to share in whatever experiences come her way. Candy’s death has hit everyone hard, but Lulu may have the hardest time dealing with it at least for the time being.
The surprise of the episode came when Elektra told Blanca about two people ‘looking like George and Weezy helping themselves to our refreshments’ who turned out to be Candy’s estranged parents. Angel was able to reach out to them with the news, and it was a surprise that they actually showed up. Candy’s mother was hostile, insisting on calling Candy her son, but dad seemed a bit more understanding. As the two finally girded themselves to approach the casket, Candy was able to address each one of them as well. For her mom, seeing Candy as Candy finally helped her understand their complicated past when she would catch her little boy trying on her clothes and wigs. Candy always thought they were sympatico back then but being pushed away hurt. But the one thing Candy did get from her mother was her strength. When Candy was a child, she was the apple of her dad’s eye, and it was he who finally gave in and bought that dollhouse that had been requested for ‘two birthdays, Christmas and Kwanzaa.’ Candy revealed how she had pretended to be asleep but watched with love as her dad built that dollhouse so it would be ready in the morning. In real life, it seems it’s always the father that has more of a hard time seeing a son transition, but this dad was always supportive and loved Candy unconditionally. Even mom finally admitted that the outside was different but the inside was still her child (cue the sobbing). If only parents and families of trans people today could understand that. Perhaps this episode will really have an impact on people.
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The funeral did end on a soaring note, something cathartic for Candy and for the viewers. Pray and the MCs announced that they were introducing a lip sync category at each and every ball in Candy’s honor, and the pallbearers wheeled the casket … into the ballroom where the newly reborn Candy took to the floor and flawlessly slayed the classic ‘Never Knew Love Like This Before’, a song which perfectly summed up what Candy experienced in death. If she’d only been shown all of that love in life. So take this as a lesson — be kind to one another, speak the truth without malice, watch out for your brothers and sisters of the human race regardless of who they are, regardless of their skin color, regardless of who they love or what they worship, or how much money they have or don’t have. We’re all in this together. Let’s do something to put an end to the hatred and violence that LGBTQ people still face today, especially in the trans community.
Everybody say LOVE.
What did you think of this episode? Give us your thoughts in the comments section below.
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