#ReclaimingTheTombstone
Every week I look forward to tuning into an HIV podcast, aptly titled ‘The HIV Podcast’. Where the host’s Sarah & Jess witter on, sorry [think I can just about get away with that], ‘discuss and explore’ the effects of HIV. Investigating and dispelling myths one at a time, looking at the disease's history, and celebrating some of its history’s heroes. The fact is the duo is highly experienced in all things HIV with 40 years between them working at Thames Valley Positive Support (TVPS), an HIV support charity in Berkshire.
In late October the pair aired an episode titled ‘Don’t Die of Ignorance’ where they explored the hard-hitting UK government ‘AIDS’ tombstone [monolith] TV advert from the 1980s. A decade usually loved by 80s fanatic Sarah; in this episode, she shares her loathing of the 80s AIDS TV campaign.
After listening to the episode, where the pair discuss ideas of a possible updated remake, I felt like I’d been given a challenge. Even on my walks to work my mind was sketching out ideas and how to make and source props. There are two things from my childhood that scarred me for life, the first was my mother buying a Kirby hoover in the 80s. This big metal beast from America had this massive headlamp on the front meaning noisy hoovers spooked me right into my adulthood. The second is the UK ‘AIDS’ tombstone advert. Being only 6 years old in 1988 I didn’t appreciate ‘what’ the advert was referring but like the film Watership down, its dark sinister images and sounds stuck with me for life.
HIV Podcast Hosts: Jess & Sarah
LISTEN HERE
The duo then aired an episode on the leaflet: ‘Don’t Die of Ignorance’. And as I listened, I wondered what the leaflet would look like today in light of HIV and medical advances. A quick ten minutes on photoshop, viola! I posted my handywork on my social media and after a few likes, I heard from Jess from the HIV podcast at TVPS. A few messages later and I’d seemingly talked myself into making an attempt at an alternative advert to reflect HIV despite not knowing the first thing about filmmaking. Where do I start? Eek!
The ideas I’d sketched in my head were associated with the original advert. I felt sharing the U=U message alongside, and in the style of the tombstone would be a great way to highlight how far we have come and for viewers to associate the U=U message with the old AIDS campaign.
MONOLITH: My photoshop update
Despite not having a £5m (£13.2m today) budget nor movie-making credentials I set about trying to find a tombstone. I initially thought I’d go small-scale as I had some plywood lying around but felt it would be too tricky to work in miniature. Then I spotted a 4ftx2ft sheet of MDF hanging on my wall. Just before my HIV diagnosis and with news of the first-ever covid-10 national lockdown approaching I had a sheet of this MDF left over from a headboard I had made. I thought I’d try my hand at sign-writing before the attack that led to my HIV diagnosis. As I tried to preoccupy myself after the attack I noticed when hand painting the gold letters, I had all of a sudden developed a tremor, which is not ideal when trying to paint a straight line on a letter. It was only days later when I was diagnosed with HIV that I said to the doctor “that explains the recent tremor when trying to paint” as I assume the seroconversion had given me this tremor.
Down it came and I covered the back in some black gloss sticky back plastic from my craft box. The only cost I incurred was some sheets of the white card add a glue stick for the ‘HIV’ lettering. Ok, so I had something that resembled a tombstone, from the right angle. I was then literally on a mission around my home to find additional props to try and set the scene. Logs from the log basket, soil from indoor plants (no plants were harmed), and my faux trailing greenery.
I needed more if I am to at least pull this off even at an amateur level. I browsed amazon for fog/smoke machines but wondered what use I’d get out of it after as I am known more for my ‘candlelight suppers with the hand-painted periwinkles’ than I am hosting 70s disco nights! Could I call one of my contacts at a pub and borrow one? Indoor ice fountains, you know the ones that you’re supposed to stick in a birthday cake that fire sparks 3ft into the air taking off the recipients’ eyebrows! Or is that a little too much? I have 9 pots of fondue gel for an Armageddon shot so let’s go with that and I’ll source some special effect fog as these mobile 'app’s are pretty good these days.
Ok now what? So, the narrative (I say loosely) was finding the fallen tombstone that we see fall in the 1980’s advert. I find it in the undergrowth and reveal like in the movie ‘Back to the Future’ the carving has changed from ‘AIDS’ to ‘HIV’ given with time; the disease, the diagnosis, the outlook has changed. As though we are looking back retrospectively. The aim is to see the ‘HIV’ stone rise again and stand tall which I felt was symbolic of how I view my HIV status. Not that I am “proud” of my status, but I will stand tall and speak about it and not merely ‘lie down’ and be consumed by the undergrowth of society. Again, this was tricky, but I filmed the MDF board falling and put the footage in reverse when editing to give the appearance of it rising unaided. I don’t have the expertise or knowledge of green screens and given space is at a premium, the lounge of my Islington home. You do get a glimpse of my Venetian blinds, but I’m not worried as I am not going for an Oscar or a Bafta. The messaging is the important aspect of my video.
Then I pull out the initial medication I received on diagnosis, which was opened and now out of date, so unusable. One is termed in the catalogue of HIV medication as a “nuke” so I felt it was fitting for it to appear at the base of the tombstone. I initially sat the HIV medication in artificial snow to try and soften the video but instantly saw this didn’t work. It needed to be gritty, dark, and almost armageddon-like, just like the original. So, I threw down more soil and lit a fondue gel behind it.
As HIV is not a death sentence, I laid down in place of a bouquet of funeral lilies the very ‘hero’ of U=U, the medication. I initially had an idea to record in slow motion by capturing the medication raining from the sky with the pills bouncing off the tombstone having more of a visual impact. But as I watched the original advert and the lilies being flung onto the fallen monolith with a degree of disdain. I felt treating medication, in the same way, would be somehow disrespectful. This is the medication that allows me and other PLWHIV [People Living with HIV] to be U=U and live a normal life. I then questioned if having the medication on display was appropriate. But as I say it is the ‘hero’ of U=U and the fight against HIV/AIDS.
I then dropped in my version of the ‘AIDS’ Don’t Die of Ignorance’ leaflet substituting the word ‘die’ for “live”, in the same way as the original video. The sound of the leaflet landing was the actual sound and not an added effect. The original campaign was targeting people to protect themselves against ‘AIDS’ [HIV/AIDS] and not “die in ignorance”. My take on the leaflet was to highlight advances in science and U=U (Undetectable = Untransmittable), which has been around for years now. To be unaware of U=U or still believe in the stigma generated from the original video is too ‘live’ in ignorance. Given U=U there is no argument nor legitimate ‘fear’ of HIV/AIDS anymore, yet HIV stigma still exists.
Editing the video took me longer than the filming itself as I maneuverer different filters and special effects. The video starts with the TV that was in the background of a photo of me as a toddler and which was the TV I remember so vividly seeing the AIDS advert on a few years later. Moving from colour to black and white as we enter the world of ‘that’ AIDS advert. Again, my editing skills are very much at an amateur level, I felt adding the colour red was to add both a macabre and empowering element to the video. Macabre as it perhaps hints to the lives lost, very much a government with blood on its hands given its slow reaction to the AIDS pandemic. And ‘empowering’ as the colour red represents the Red Ribbon which is a symbol of HIV/AIDS and is frequently worn on World Aids Day every 1st December. A time to reflect on the lives lost to AIDS which is not confined to a single day for many families, loved ones nor specific communities. Including PLWHIV that like me, often live with HIV and U=U with a degree of survivor’s guilt.
I have access to many voiceover artists but felt my video didn’t need someone to lecture the viewer and that the message of U=U was simple to read and absorb. When deciding what music to overlay, there was only one track I felt fitted the bill. Conchita Wurst - Rise like a Phoenix with Weiner Symphoniker. Just as John Hurt, the voice of the original declares “…it is a disease and there is no known cure”. The vocals of Conchita kick in with “…how you deserve it, baby you own it”. I felt these lyrics were reminiscent of the stigma faced at the time of the AIDS pandemic and still exist today. As the tombstone rises to “rise like a phoenix” very much symbolic of the meaning of the phrase, ‘to emerge from a catastrophe stronger, smarter and more powerful. And it was poignant that Conchita who also lives with HIV, like me, had to share her status after it was weaponised with threats of being ‘outed’ as living with HIV.
Conchita Wurst: Rise Like A Phoenix
Do I feel I was the right person to do it? Not really. This is long overdue and is the responsibility of the UK government which has failed to see this campaign through. If I went to work and did only half my job, then no doubt my employer would be dissatisfied as I am of the UK government elected to represent me. The government or at least those whom it appointed to make the ‘AIDS Monolith’ advert admit, deliberately set out to scare the shit out of the nation in order to grasp the severity of the disease. It is only right that the government now, 35 years on since the advert ‘inters’, ‘lays to rest’ the stigma that its campaign helped create/fuel. Inform those that still ‘weaponise’ HIV/AIDS with stigma and/or still live in the era of the ‘AIDS Monolith’ advert that with U=U there is no death sentence with HIV. It cost them £5m (£13.2m in today’s money) I spent £3.25p on some card and glue and chucked in a whole host of special effects ‘free’ from a mobile video editing software. It’s clearly not impossible.
The government today talks about the importance of “mental health”, ‘wellbeing’ and more recently the acts of coercive behaviour, where, if you hear something enough you start to believe it and HIV stigma is no different. HIV/AIDS is controlled with antiviral treatments today, but HIV/AIDS stigma is still endemic and should very much be treated as a disease in its own right.
I understand campaigns cost money, but any advert on U=U does not require big movie directors to create sinister scenes of armageddon. I am sure there would be many living with HIV that would gladly volunteer to explain U=U a word/phrase at a time in a simply framed headshot. I am also sure the nation would appreciate the update on how the amazing talents of this country have worked alongside talent across the world to collectively come together to bring about U=U and the work that is still ongoing with vaccination treatments and even a cure.
For now, it is HIV charities like TVPS and the ever-engaging Sarah & Jess of ‘The HIV Podcast’ who continue to keep HIV engaging and thought-provoking. Reaching an audience beyond their own county, inspiring me here in Islington and I know, many others across the globe. Thank you, ladies! [curtsies]
The Video: #ReclaimingTheTombstone
