Crisp Showers L.A. With Bons Mots

Quentin Crisp, the writer and raconteur, came to Highways in Santa Monica on Monday night and sat on a humble chair telling stories like a prince on a throne.

His principality is a dignified but idiosyncratic domain, full of observations that are droll and wise as well as unpopular, outre and stubborn--at 89, he’s not about to start toeing a party line, particularly since he’s had no practice at it. “An Evening With Quentin Crisp” will have one more performance, tonight at 8:30.

Crisp wore his signature ascot, eyeliner and hat with a gently curving brim, setting off a noble forehead and elegant nose. His cheekbones were highlighted with a brush of color. An effeminate man who eschews sex (“Sex is a waste of time. . . . If we stopped talking about it, it would go away.”), a British subject happily transplanted in the personality cult of downtown Manhattan, Crisp makes his way in the world via delicately phrased bons mots, many of which he has repeated dozens of times before but still delivers with his heart.

He has been called an icon of the gay community but has refused to be defined by its agendas. He is opposed to activism; he finds it shrill. On Monday, he apologized for having once said that AIDS is a fad. And then he repeated that opinion, in different words.

For Crisp, AIDS doesn’t exist; he lives on a plane of his own making and he has managed it in a way that is graceful and even touching. It helps that he is witty. His favorite subject is style, which he has defined many times as being yourself, only on purpose.

He painted an amusing picture of Evita Peron, raising her arms to the people, embracing her “shirtless ones” while her diamond bracelets made an “expensive clatter” as they traveled down her arms. “What a triumph of style that would have been!” he crowed happily, in his nasal, raspy voice.

He had no sympathy for Princess Diana. (“She knew the racket. Royal marriages have nothing to do with love.”) Still he admired Garbo and Bette Davis and the women who imitated them, “women who thought it was possible to rule the world with the skillful use of cosmetics alone.” He describes feminism as the movement in which women decided to become people, “and that was such a mistake.”

It would be foolish to find such comments offensive; these are the beliefs of a man nostalgic for manners and magic. In the second half of the short evening, Crisp took written questions from the audience, deftly making each one of them a platform for more of his well-phrased philosophy.

Beyond his eccentric opinions, his musing on life seemed structurally sound. “Never compare yourself favorably to other people,” he advised, and “you don’t have to win.” Our job as humans, he said, is to “reconcile the glowing opinion we have of ourselves with the terrible things other people say about us.” An original creation, Crisp sets a shining example of how that is done.

* “An Evening With Quentin Crisp,” Highways, 1651 18th St., Santa Monica, (213) 660-8587. Wednesday, 8:30 p.m. $15. Running time: 90 minutes.