Andrew Worsdale TELEVISION
I was there. At Granny Lee’s funeral in the Anglican Cathedral in downtown Johannesburg in 1989. As someone remarks in the upcoming documentary Metamorphosis: The Remarkable Journey of Granny Lee, “It was a de luxe state funeral.” I’d met him some years earlier when I used to hang out with friends at gay venues in the city; and Lee was always there propping up the bar, an institution in Johannesburg’s nightlife. Lee him/herself said in an audio interview with photographer Herb Klein (who supplied 70% of the still photographs for the film): “I am not one of those people who want to shine like common brass in sunlight … The reason why I will never have a sex change is for the simple reason that I’m a very holy type of person. “People may not think so, but I’ve been brought up that way. I don’t think I will be accepted with a plastic body in the new hemisphere, wherever it is. That’s why I keep my body as I was born. The other reason is this. If a man wanted a fish, he’d go to real fish.” Lee was born Leonard du Plooy in Kimberley on March 18 1919, the youngest son of a dysfunctional coloured family. His father left home when he was eight years old. Leonard went to the Perseverance Practice School and trained there as a teacher. He then went on to become a nursery school teacher and tennis coach, at one point even playing professionally for Griqwa. After resigning from his job he moved to Durban, where he also taught and become actively involved in nightlife and the gay scene. In his late twenties he made a very handsome young man: director Luiz DeBarros, who scripted and directed the documentary, says he thinks Lee looked a lot like Laurence Fishburne. In his fifties, Leonard moved to Johannesburg and proceeded to become the city’s most famous club-goer and drag queen – by 1972 he’d become Granny Lee. “I have never yet been called mister in 20 years in this city,” Lee told Herb Klein. Lee’s late night-socialising and heavy drinking (evidently her favourite was a double brandy and coke with lemonade) led to a liver problem that caused her pigment to fade: aided by an overdose of medication and excessive alcohol abuse Lee literally turned white overnight.
Granny Lee died in a car accident on a highway to Durban after she and a couple of friends decided to travel down there on a whim early one morning. When her body was discovered Inspector Mostert of the Vrede police station reported the body of an elderly white woman: only later did the policeman – much to his astonishment – learn that the corpse was not that of a white person nor of a woman. Before her death she claimed she was 81 years old, when in reality she was 71 – part of her ongoing “created identity”.
The documentary Metamorphosis was conceived when DeBarros was developing another doccie called Skin. He recalled the story of Lee and went to research it at the Gay and Lesbian Archives at Wits University. He travelled to Kimberley, speaking to Lee’s friends, placing ads in the gay press for info and chatting to club owners. Eventually he and producer Marc Schwinges pitched the idea to Eddie Masingana of SABC3 and the film was given the go-ahead. DeBarros says: “It’s mainly a documentary about memory, there’s not much known about Lee’s life prior to 1948 – also gay life at the time was pretty much underground so the movie plays like a collage of people’s memories.” DeBarros also realised that he had to use authentic disco music from the 1970s and 1980s for the film. This proved a bit of a nightmare for Schwinges because of cost, but the enterprising producer managed to cut a deal with Universal/Value music in which they are releasing a double CD compilation which includes Donna Summer’s Hot Stuff and Alicia Bridges’s I Love the Nightlife. “Evidently I Will Survive was Granny Lee’s favourite song,” says DeBarros, “but I couldn’t bear the thought of it being featured in yet another gay movie.” In one more bold marketing move the film-makers have set up a website – www.grannylee.co.za – where web- surfers can get outrageous advice on love and life from beyond the grave. DeBarros and Schwinges, who are partners in Underdog productions, have made several cutting- edge movies and are renegades in very much the same style as Lee, although they are too young to have met her. “I only started going to clubs the year she died, but I do think I know her vicariously after this film,” says DeBarros, who decided he wanted to make movies after seeing Star Wars at the age of 7. The iconoclastic Schwinges and DeBarros admit that they are fascinated by identity, decadence and hard living, a trait that Granny Lee shared. She must be smiling from the next hemisphere. Metamorphosis screens on SABC3 on July 30 at 9pm. Underdog’s website is at www.underdog.co.za