Editing Quentin Crisp (section)

===Last years===
Crisp remained fiercely independent and unpredictable into old age. He caused controversy and confusion in the gay community by (perhaps jokingly) calling AIDS "a fad", and homosexuality "a terrible disease".<ref name="Tatchell"/> He was continually in demand from journalists requiring a sound-bite, and throughout the 1990s his commentary was sought on any number of topics.

Crisp was a stern critic of [[Diana, Princess of Wales]], and her attempts to gain public sympathy following her divorce from [[Prince Charles]]. He stated: "I always thought Diana was such trash and got what she deserved. She was Lady Diana before she was Princess Diana, so she knew the racket. She knew that royal marriages have nothing to do with love. You marry a man and you stand beside him on public occasions and you wave and for that you never have a financial worry until the day you die."<ref>{{cite book |last=Fountain |first=Tim |title=Resident Alien: Quentin Crisp Explains It All |year=1999 |publisher=Nick Hern Books |location=London, UK |isbn=1-85459-657-8 |page=20}}</ref> Following [[Death of Diana, Princess of Wales|her death in 1997]], he commented that it was perhaps her "fast and shallow" lifestyle that led to her demise: "She could have been {{sic|Queen of England}} - and she was swanning about Paris with Arabs. What disgraceful behaviour! Going about saying she wanted to be the queen of hearts. The vulgarity of it is so overpowering."<ref>''Atlanta Southern Voice'', 1 July 1999</ref>

In 1995 he was among the many people interviewed for ''[[The Celluloid Closet (film)|The Celluloid Closet]]'', a historical documentary addressing how Hollywood films have depicted homosexuality. In his third volume of memoirs, ''Resident Alien'', published in the same year, Crisp stated that he was close to the end of his life, though he continued to make public appearances, and in June of that year he was one of the guest entertainers at the second [[Pride Scotia#1996|Pride Scotland]] festival in Glasgow.

In 1997 Crisp was crowned king of the [[Beaux-Arts Ball]] run by the Beaux Arts Society. He presided alongside Queen Audrey Kargere, Prince George Bettinger and Princess Annette Hunt.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.beauxartssociety.org/19356.html |title=Archived copy |access-date=24 February 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140102192849/http://beauxartssociety.org/19356.html |archive-date=2 January 2014}}</ref>

In December 1998 he celebrated his ninetieth birthday, performing the opening night of his one-man show, ''An Evening with Quentin Crisp'', at The Intar Theatre on Forty-Second Street in New York City (produced by [[John Glines]] of [[The Glines]] organisation).