Know Your LGBT History - Car Wash

The motion picture Car Wash (1976), which tells the story of a day at a car wash populated with oddball characters, is memorable for two reasons.

One is because of its slamming, Grammy-award winning soundtrack.

And the other is because of the gay character, Lindy.

Now Lindy was apparently meant to be cheap comic relief, but he ends up being much more.

The actor who portrayed him, Antonio Fargas, created a three-dimensional character who holds up as a gay role model decades later.

At first, one could see Lindy as a stereotypical effeminate gay man. He is first seen doing his hair and then heading towards the ladies room.

And throughout the movie, he is the victim of various snide comments.

However, Lindy takes it all in stride because he knows who he is and is not ashamed of it.

This is evident in the scene in which everyone remembers - him confronting another employee of the car wash, Abdullah (Bill Duke), for his surly attitude:



There was a part of me which thought this scene was awesome. But then another part of me thought that the scene was terrible.

Duke's character is cast as the heavy, i.e. the villain, but he really isn't. If anything, he and Lindy are similar in that they are both men which society looks down upon.

Where they should be recognizing this and teaming together, they are at each other's throats.

The thing is that Lindy doesn't care about what people thing. Abdullah, on the other hand, is the conscience of the movie. He feels trapped with no other place to go, but has no way of getting.

Lindy will survive what the world throws his way because he is used to the slings which come from being an openly gay black man.

Abdullah's character is like a babe in the woods. Without proper guidance - which he gets at the end of the movie - he will end up either dead or in prison.

Still though, Lindy's character can teach us all about self-love and not giving a damn about what petty people think.

Incidentally, when Car Wash premiered on television, Lindy's character was conveniently excised out. On some cable showings, you will never see him.

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