Lady Gaga and the Art of Finding Yourself in a Character: A deep dive into Joe Calderone

Lady Gaga is no secret. She's one of the biggest pop stars of the modern era. But even this colossal of pop culture has her underrated moments…

For your consideration, Lady Gaga’s 2011 VMA performance of You and I. 

This was an interesting year for her. Gaga’s Born This Way era solidified her as a force in the pop industry and as a gay icon! She cemented her character, Lady Gaga, which was built around the shell of real person, Stefani Germanotta. And just as she was securing this Lady Gaga character, she switched it up and gave us… Joe Calderone? 

Joe Calderone is a character created by Lady Gaga and trusted photographer Nick Knight. They worked together for most of the Born This Way imagery. I credit Nick Knight with giving the Born This Way era its unique alien-esque style. 

It appeared Lady Gaga was yearning for a next step in her artistic career. After she had accomplished so much, what was next? In her words, 

 “In a culture that attempts to quantify beauty with a[n] almost mathematical standard, how can we fuck with the malleable minds of onlookers and shift the world’s perspective on what’s beautiful? I asked myself this question. And the answer? Drag.”

Joe Calderone had his first public debut for the Autumn/Winter 2010 issue of Vogue Hommes Japan Magazine. He was the sole star of a men’s editorial shoot doning Armani, Prada and Saint Laurent suits, shot by the alluring Nick Knight. The catch was, Knight nor Gaga disclosed to the public or even to the magazine that Calderone was Lady Gaga in drag. Joe Calderone was simply served as “the next big thing” in modeling. They pushed the narrative that his James Dean, mechanic realness was where the industry was headed. And he was interviewed as such!

Joe Calderone is a proud Sicilian man with a drinking problem that should kill him. He's a flirty greasy mechanic who loves his dad. He's a man’s man. He took up taking photos because he thought it'd help him out with the ladies. For all intents and purposes, he's kind of a jackass. 

He of course, is also a Nebraska native staying true to the backstory of the man of which his character is based. 

“There’s only three men that Imma serve my whole life; It’s my Daddy and Nebraska and Jesus Christ!” 

Lady Gaga’s “cool nebraska guy”, as mentioned in You and I, is based on the real life person Luc Carl. Whom I honestly doubt any of you have heard of. He’s described as a, and this is a direct quote, “nightclub manager, promoter, musician, DJ, author, bartender, certified personal trainer, and semi-pro bowler”.  Certain articles would have you believe he was some kind of musician at his peak but what I found was the highlight of his life and career is this relationship with Lady Gaga. When you google his name he doesn't even have a Wikipedia. It is his Gagapedia page that comes up. Which honestly I kind of pity him for.

He's not even washed up, because to be washed up I think you have to have made it at some point. He's more like someone who was a child of the 80s and has spent the rest of his life thinking that’s the coolest you could possibly be; an 80s rockstar. Yes, I deduced this solely from his shiny animal print leggings and horrendously unoriginal haircut. 

But Lady Gaga saw something in him when they met in 2005 at one of the bars Carl managed. And the two continued to date on and off for 6 years. This was an incredibly influential relationship in her young life and I believe she needed to create Joe Calderone to give herself permission to process this relationship.

The next appearance in the Joe Calderone timeline is August 16, 2011 with the release of the You and I music video. The shot opens with Lady Gaga's bloodied ankles on a dirt country road that spans seemingly forever behind her and infinitely ahead. The video was actually shot in Nebraska.

She is dressed in black with silver futuristic accessories. Gaga describes it as “real New York clothing”. And it serves as a stark contrast to her country surroundings. The premise is she ran all the way across the country for love.

“that when you're away from someone you love, it's torture". She continued, "I knew I wanted the video to be about me sprinting back and walking hundreds of thousands of miles to get him back.”

Her clothing is also reminiscent of funeral attire with the large fascinator and black veil. There's a looming feeling that she's run all this way for a relationship that is already dead. Further asserted by the melting ice cream truck. She later explains the truck was also to represent the destruction of her youth lost to this relationship.

The music video was clearly a deeply personal one to make, emphasized by the fact that the wedding dress she dons was her mother’s. 

How deeply ironic that she would meet her next boyfriend and eventual fiance at this music video shoot, Taylor Kinney.

As Lady Gaga developed the Joe Calderone character, she began to utelize him as tool for criticizing herself, as a means for examining and exploring her own faults as a lover, and as a person.

This leads us into the fateful VMA performance night. It is a cleared black stage. A single spotlight, some low rolling fog. There is a strange, unfamiliar man smoking a cigarette. In only a white t-shirt and casual black blazer. Such a pedestrian outfit feels so out of place at an event as elite and indulgent as this. He introduces himself right away, 

“Hey! My name is Joe Calderone and I was an asshole.”

He then proceeds to feed us the most well written three minutes of spoken word I have ever seen.

Joe doesn’t criticize her art or her career. He acknowledges and actually laudes it! Instead, he gives us insight into Lady Gaga, the person not the character. Joe sheds light onto one of the most intimate and vulnerable situations there is; climaxing with another person and how Gaga finds that uncomfortable.

“When she cums it’s like she covers her face because she doesn't want me to see like she cant stand to have one honest moment where nobody’s watching! I want her to be real.”

She built an impervious character around herself. Lady Gaga is the pearl with which she wraps around the small part of herself she deems unlovable.

“For example, she gets out of bed puts on the heels she goes into the bathroom I hear the water go on she comes out of the bathroom dripping wet she's still got the heels on.”

She is so used to performing she performs for herself. She doesn't know how to turn it off. She has grasped so tightly to this character: who is she in the shower? Who is she when she cums? Who is she in all these small human moments in life that are shared by so few or herself alone?

She had to create new character to step outside of her established “Lady Gaga” role and evaluate what part she directly played in the breakdown of her relationship. 

“During my performance and the three days I spent as him, I felt permission through him to confess things about myself as a woman, things I would normally keep hidden. In a way, it seemed that he could get away with a lot more than I can. He talked about his feelings, wore Brooks Brothers, smoked Marlboro Lights, drank beer on stage, and talked about what I refuse to discuss publicly: my relationships.”

The visual aspect of the performance deliverers a wider commentary on gender roles. 

Gaga chooses to surround herself with only male dancers dressed in the same simple greaser-style tees as Joe. The choreography is hyper macsuline. My personal favorite moment is when Calderone and the dancers simulate jacking off and cumming on the audience. It’s so sexual but it never feels like the purpose is to arouse. It's such an expression of masculinity in its most traditional and aggressive sense.

Gaga stays powerfully in character for the duration of the performance. You can see the intensity in her face, the force with which she kicks out her legs and flings her limbs, trying her best to make herself as large as possible despite looking comparatively small to the (seemingly) cis men dancing behind her.

And just when you thought it could get any better, Calderone introduces Brain Fucking May, of Queen, for the whiny rock guitar solo!

Calderone is back at the piano playing with such force and energy. He pops a beer bottle and flails it like no doubt the fictional Joe Calderone did many a Monday night in a sad bar somewhere in Nebraska thinking about Gaga. 

No matter how much makeup they put on her face she will always have Lady Gaga’s eyes. They pierce through even this rock hard character. 

The song slows down as she sings the final lyrics. But Gaga is so hyped up, she yells “Come on!”, encouraging Brian May to continue to play. She brushes her greased back hair and tugs at the collar of her tee with a very intense expression on her face. It's a bit of a weird note to end on. But it feels like she just had so much adrenaline she didn't know what to do with it.

Applause erupts from the audience as the camera pans over Taylor Lautner, Sammi Sweetheart and Ronnie. Oh how award shows are little time capsules for their respective industries. 

Jim Carrey said in his documentary Jim & Andy, 

“At some point when you create yourself to make it, you're going to have to either let that creation go and take a chance on being loved or hated for who you really are, or you're going to have to kill who you really are and fall into your grave grasping a character you never were.”

And I think it is this decision we see Lady Gaga grappling with. Can I be who I truly am in real life? My character worked so well in winning over the public. It's gotten me all this success. Can I be loved for just who I am? 

Lady Gaga is quoted,

“Raise revolution against what people expect of you, and tell the world this is not a rehearsal. This is the real me. And listen up, ‘cause it could be the most honest incarnation yet.

And I think Joe Calderone was her most honest incarnation yet. Maybe even since.