From Fagbug to Fagbrew

Erin Davies' 2009 documentary Fagbug, about how she turned the 2006 Albany vandalizing of her VW bug into an odyssey of provocative cross-country dialog, deservedly got loads of attention on the film festival circuit and should rev up anew when it officially hits DVD July 13th. But in some ways, the most interesting part of the story can be found in the burgeoning business empire that is being spun off from the film.


On July 2nd, Davies and her partner Sonya Parrish will take possession of a two-story brick building on the west side of Syracuse, NY. Purchased for a down payment of just $2 thanks to the support of a program aimed at revitalizing this urban tract, it will be the future site of the Fagbug Museum and Brewery.

The 2002 VW bug that was graffiti-ed with the words "fag" and "U R gay" will be on display here, as will a production process and sampling of what Davies and Parrish hope will be a micro brew successfully custom-tailored for a gay consumer audience. Rather comically, the 32-year-old filmmaker told local newspaper the Post-Standard that one of the duo's prospective names for their F-brew is "Homosexual Ale."

Add in the current line of Fagbug T-shirts and bumper stickers, rainbow stripe colored VW bugs that start shipping in September and a persistent demand for the car to be featured in gay pride parades, and it all adds up to one of the gutsiest entrepreneurial tracks around. Few - if any - victims of a hate crime such as the one endured by Davies in Albany have the gumption to turn it into something as wonderful as a 2009 documentary, a 2010 Syracuse real estate purchase and, presumably, a rash of 2011 magazine covers. Bravo!

[Fagbug]