Mike Stark is at it again. The UVA law student by day and GOP-stalker by night helped sink George Allen’s foundering re-election campaign in 2006 by getting dragged out of the Omni Hotel in Charlottesville and has since been fighting the Bill O’Reillys of the world. With less than three weeks until the November 4 election, this morning, Stark called a press conference to reveal the results of his latest investigation, this time into Fifth District Congressman Virgil Goode, who is fighting an increasingly close race for re-election against Albemarle Democrat Tom Perriello.
What dirt does Stark have on Goode? Turns out, a few crumbs from garden-variety district earmarking.
Goode’s press secretary, Linwood Duncan, had a bit part in a 2003 movie, Eden’s Curve, that was filmed in Danville and written and produced by Jerry Meadors. The film is about a gay student’s sexual awakening at an all-male Southern private school. Duncan appeared briefly as the dean of students, expelling a student for his homosexual behavior. In the credits, Goode and his wife, Lucy, are thanked by the producer.
Part of what Stark is peddling is Goode-as-big-hypocrite for fighting gay marriage while receiving props at the end of a movie depicting the struggles of gay men in the South. “I’d like to know what other gay-themed movies Virgil Goode has been involved in,” said Stark. “Virgil Goode has projected an image of wholesomeness that does not include the, quote-unquote, gay lifestyle.”
But did Goode know what the film was about when his name was put on the credits? Considering that Goode, by his own admission, doesn’t even know what a rapper is, it’s hard to imagine that he saw this movie before it was released—or even that he saw it afterward. Heck, if he did, Goode is cooler than any of us thought. Who knew that he was such a supporter of the arts, much less art that depicts two men kissing?
Turns out, Goode can’t claim the cool points, or the hypocrisy points either.
“Unequivocally, [Goode] had nothing to do with the film,” says Meadors, who is incensed about an article in today’s Danville Register & Bee that raises similar points. “He was thanked because he is my friend and he has been supportive of me as an artist and of my artistic endeavors to bring greater cultural activity to this region. The mayor of the city called me and thanked me for reigniting the economy of southern Virginia with my little film. Virgil Goode had nothing to do with the film.”
Meadors also points out that this isn’t a celebration of gay life as much as a tragedy. “If you watched it and were thinking about having a gay life, you might reconsider it after seeing my film and realizing just what you would be up against in this homophobic society.”
But Stark is trying to push more than hypocrisy. Meadors is artistic and managing director of Danville’s North Theatre, where Duncan is on the Board of Directors. In 2003, the year the film was released, Goode got a $150,000 earmark for the theater’s renovation. At the time, Lucy Goode was on the board, and her husband was criticized for the earmark by the Register & Bee.
Stark took that a step further and questioned whether there was a quid pro quo connecting the film to the earmark—that Meadors (who Stark hadn’t spoken to) weaseled an earmark out of Goode in exchange for giving Duncan “his big Hollywood acting break.”
“This film was reviewed in the New York Times,” said Stark. “This wasn’t a backyard movie production.”
For the record, Duncan has never acted in another movie, according to IMDB.com. Rather than the ambitious actor using his political influence to advance his career, Duncan, an aging man who used a cane to get around at the Danville debate in September, seems to be an arts supporter and small town actor who helped a friend by appearing in his movie.
“I’ve been friends with Linwood Duncan all my life,” says Meadors. “We acted together years ago. I asked him because he was perfect for the role.”
It is not exactly news that a congressman would procure earmarks for projects in his district. If this is the worst that Stark could come up, it shows how difficult it is to burn Goode.
While it might disappoint the most rabidly homophobic in the district, Stark’s investigation certainly doesn’t carry the kind of shit-stink that wafted from the MZM debacle, still Goode’s closest brush with indictment.