I screened Please Hold on Zoom to a small documentary class at Williams College taught by Cecilia Aldarondo on March 3, 2025. We talked about their responses to the video but first we watched a clip of CHRISTEENE’S performance at the premier just the night before.
Hi Alex,
I hope you’re doing well. Below you will find a discussion response to Please Hold. Feel free to share any of it on your website. After our conversation, I’m holding enthusiasm to get involved with AIDS organizing and activism in NYC post-grad by showing up for the communities I care about.
Question #1: I found the choice to juxtapose LES in the present (though now a few years ago) with LES 30-45 years ago very interesting and I read it as a commentary on absence – absence of Jim, mainly, but also of spirit for collectivity. Can you speak more to this decision?
Question #2: I resonated with Marty Fink’s discussion of the generational aspect of AIDS activism insofar as I am interested in oral history and visual art and how they interact with AIDS activism. What would you suggest to someone of my age who wants to further this interest but notably did not live during the AIDS epidemic? (This one was hard to articulate but the general idea is I want to reckon with those who came before me and those who will come after me).
There’s no need to answer these questions. We discussed them in our meeting and they were just what I was thinking about after watching the film.
While watching Alex Juhasz’s Please Hold, I was reminded of a lot of the readings I’ve done for my (now dropped lol) WGSS thesis on AIDS activism and affect theory. One author in particular who came to mind is Ann Cvetkovich and her writing in An Archive of Feelings – especially her chapter titled “AIDS Activism and Public Feelings: Documenting ACT UP’s Lesbians.” In this chapter, Cvetkovich writes a compelling narration of the affective encounters between lesbians and gay men in ACT UP and details how many lesbians acted as caretakers for gay men dying of AIDS. She writes of lesbians’ erasure from ACT UP’s history and how this complicates memorializing AIDS activists and those who died of AIDS by stating the following: “One outcome of AIDS activism for lesbians is that they have a legacy; they have the privilege of moving on because they have remained alive. What does this experience of survival reveal about the particular mix of death and burnout that some people cite as ACT UP’s waning?” (Cvetkovich 160). I raise this excerpt from Cvetkovich as complementary to Juhasz’s video because Juhasz similarly complicates what memorial means in Please Hold. I was particularly intrigued by her conversation with Jih-Fei Cheng and the haunting that ensued after he moved to New York. This conversation resonated with me because it ruptures the binary of ‘forgetting’ versus ‘remembering’ deceased people and allows us to carry our deceased loved ones with us. That is, I found immense resonance with Jih-Fei and Ted Kerr’s discussion of ‘carrying’ extremely impactful because it opens a gap in universally felt phenomen to say “Hey, why must I forget someone to move on? Why must my emotions become arrested when I remember someone? Can’t I carry a person’s legacy and love with me?” Juhasz actively carries Jim and Juanita with her and that comes across in Please Hold quite effectively. To me, that is how she memorializes AIDS and its impact.
Thanks again for your time.
All the best,
Pat
Thank you for coming to our class this morning! Attached below is my written response to your film:
In Please Hold, Juhasz memorializes AIDS by bridging the past and present through experimental video techniques. She interweaves archival footage from the height of the AIDS epidemic with present-day reflections, revisiting significant locations and engaging in conversations with AIDS workers. Through this, Juhasz examines how mourning and memory evolve over time and across different technologies.
Two individuals are central to the film: Jim, a gay man who died of AIDS at 29, and Juanita, a Black disabled queer feminist activist who passed away in 2022. Both entrusted Juhasz with the responsibility of recording their final moments, placing her in the unique position of bearing witness across decades of activism. By documenting their lives, Juhasz grapples with the weight of preserving their legacies and sustaining the collective memory of AIDS activism.
Juhasz also considers the role of physical space — particularly the Lower East Side of Manhattan — in shaping the AIDS crisis and activism. She walks through familiar streets, reflecting on their historical significance and personal meaning. By layering personal narratives with historical context, she examines how place serves as a site of memory. Additionally, the film explores how technology can mediate remembrance.
Juhasz uses Zoom interviews to engage with present-day AIDS workers, illustrating how digital spaces serve as platforms for community and activism. Ultimately, Please Hold not only memorializes those lost to AIDS but also examines the ongoing responsibility of activists to honor and uphold their legacy across time and changing forms of media.
~ Sophie