q&a about gay male entertainment

From "Ask the Flying Monkey!" (July 29, 2009)

by

Brent Hartinger

Q: Is the opossum couple Crash and Eddie in the Ice Age movies The Meltdown and Dawn of the Dinosaurs gay? I swear they have very, very good chemistry together!

A: Well, Crash and Eddie are fraternal twin brothers, which explains their chemistry. So while one or both might be gay, they’re almost certainly not a couple.

That said, they’re voiced by Seann William Scott and Josh Peck, so I’m sure many readers wish they were a couple!

Josh Peck (left) and Seann William Scott (right) voice Crash & Eddie

Q: I recently heard rumors that NBC is getting ready to debut a spin-off to Will & Grace called Karen & Jack, set to star Megan Mullally and Sean Hayes, in the fall of this year. Is there any truth to this rumor?

A: You know how you can’t believe everything you read on the Internet? You also can’t believe everything you read in The National Enquirer, which is where that rumor comes from, in an article last October (although, to be fair, it was widely repeated online as well).

Megan Mullally recently confirmed that there were no plans for such a show, and that she and Sean got a big laugh about that article. But at the same time, she said they haven’t necessarily ruled the idea out forever.

Megan Mullally and Sean Hayes

Q: Oh Most Revered Heavenly Monkey, I recently watched the original Grease and I wanted to know if Olivia Newton John is seen as a gay icon. She has been a brilliant and loving gay advocate in such gay movies as It's My Party, and, of course, Sordid Lives. Has she ever gone out on a limb and supported our cause?

A: Oh, God yes! Newton John has been a proud and consistent supporter of GLBT rights, singing at pride events, and even recording perhaps the first safe-sex song by a mainstream artist, “Live and Let Live,” back in 1988.

So why haven’t more people called her a gay icon? Well, some people have. Xanadu? Hello!

Olivia Newton-John performing at LA's 2008 Gay Pride Festival

But it’s true that she doesn’t have quite the gay cachet of, say, Cher or Bette Midler, despite having arguably as big a career. Why? It’s always dangerous to speak of such things, for fear of offending devoted fans, but I think it has to do with two factors:

First, her image is the opposite of “larger-than-life.” Even after getting down with “Physical,” her image is wholesome and all-American (or is that all-Australian?), and her stage demeanor is refreshingly modest, almost shy. It just doesn't scream "diva."

Second, unlike Cher and Midler, Newton-John hasn’t really made the jump into timelessness; she’s so associated with Grease and the 70s and 80s that her celebrity image doesn’t really exist apart from that. In short, she’s more retro and camp than iconic.

But she’s absolutely a long-time and passionate supporter of GLBT rights.

Q: Billy Elliot is one of my favorite films, due largely to the endearing friendship between gay Michael and the unspecified Billy. Would you be so kind as to recommend other films and television series depicting close friendships between non-blood-related gay men and heterosexual men? Do you think films like this make a difference?

Michael (left) and Billy in Billy Elliot

A: Wow, great question.

Here are some gay/straight friendship pairings you might consider, and also what I personally think of the project in question: Guy and Lomper and the other strippers in The Full Monty (loved it); Charles and Sebastian in Brideshead Revisited (still haven’t seen it); Calvin and Rusty on Greek (don’t like it); Mouse and Brian in Tales of the City (loved it); episodes of the reality shows 30 Days (Season 1, Episode 4, loved it) and Make Me a Supermodel (Season 1, didn’t watch it); Nick and his band-mates in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist (didn’t like it, but loved the gay-straight thing); Sam and Lafayette in True Blood (still haven’t seen it); and another younger friendship as in Billy Elliot, Toby and Arthur in This Boy’s Life (didn’t like it).

And if I ignore what you said about including friends who are family members, there’s also Six Feet Under (loved it), I Love You, Man (didn’t see it), and The Sum of Us (didn’t like it). Do I think films like these make a difference? Absolutely! Maybe movies and TV don’t “make” us do anything, but they create the sense of what’s “cool” and also what’s not. As a result, I think they influence us far more than most of us are willing to admit.

Incidentally, this question is so wide-open that I feel like I’m missing some obvious choices (worse, I feel like I’m missing some even more obvious jokes!). Readers, can anyone help me out?

Q: John Partridge, Christian Clarke on Eastenders, is really hot. What can you tell us about him?

John Partridge

A: Speaking of Billy Elliot, Partridge was a dance prodigy as a child, winning a place in the Royal Ballet School in London at age ten, despite coming from a very working class background.

“It's pretty much a Billy Elliot story and actually the real-life Billy Elliot, Philip Mosley, was my mentor at school,” Partridge told Britain’s The Paper. “He was great and spoke in the same accent as me, which was good because I couldn't understand what people were saying for a while.”

At age 16, he joined the touring U.K. production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats and played various roles in that show, off and on, for the next 20 years. In 1998, he played Rum Tum Tugger in the video version.

How did he get cast on EastEnders? “I was doing a theatre show and they saw me and thought I would be right,” he says. “When my agent told me I had got it, I felt sick. I thought it must have been a fluke and now I am actually going to have to come up with the goods. I was terrified.”

Partridge is out and lives with his partner Jon Tsouras, also an actor, currently starring in the stage version of Priscilla Queen of the Desert in London’s West End.

Q: Have you seen the new Comcast HD commerical? The one with the man on the exercise bike? His vocal inflections are so freaking gay! And yet there are two beautiful women in the corner of the screen that are there for no real reason. I think it was meant to be very gay but someone added the women. What do you think? And what about that guy doing the Best Buy commercials? He's clearly gay. – William, San Francisco, CA

A: First, can I just ask? Don’t you have a DVR or a VCR? If so, why do you still watch commercials? I understand that sponsors pay for the TV we watch, but I find them so intrusive and annoying that I’m sort of hoping the whole system collapses, and we all move on to some sort of straight subscription TV model.

Incidentally, while researching this question, I looked at a lot of commercials. And I’m thinking to myself, “Wow, commercials have really changed a lot since I stopped watching them – back in ’92 or so.”

I couldn’t find the Comcast commercial you mentioned, but I agree that the Best Buy guy is stereotypically gay. But “gay”? Nah. Just like I call foul whenever a gay guy refers to himself as “straight-acting” – if he’s gay, the way he acts is also “gay,” even if he acts thoroughly masculine. But at the same time, if a guy is effeminate (or whatever you want to call that Best Buy guy), that’s not necessarily “gay.”

Okay, yeah, it’s a picky point. But that, my friends, is the beauty of having your own column!

Q: I have recently watched No Night Is Too Long, and was totally struck by it. It might actually be the second-greatest gay movie of all times (after Brokeback Mountain, of course). I was wondering if actor Lee Williams, who plays bisexual Tim Cornish, is actually gay or bi in real life. I also ran the title through the AfterElton.com search engine and found NOTHING at all about the movie. How come? -- Diana

The elevator kiss scene from No Night Is Too Long

A: Because it isn’t actually a “movie”; it was a BBC production – basically, a TV movie in Britain. It also doesn’t appear to be available in Region 1 (that is, in America) on DVD. But your email makes me wish I could see it!

Lots of people have an opinion on the sexuality of Williams, a former model who made his film debut in the 1998 film The Wolves of Kromer in which he played one half of a gay werewolf couple. But I wasn’t able to confirm one way or the way.

Lee Williams in The Wolves of Kromer

But since Billy Elliot seems to be the theme of this week’s column, I can tell you that Williams played one of Billy’s tutors in the movie.

Q: How come the Battlestar Galactica "Face of the Enemy" webisodes weren't included on the Season 4.5 or the Complete Series DVD? Are there any plans for it to be included on a future DVD? -- Christopher, Boston, Massachusetts

Battlestar's Gaeta and Hoshi in in "Face of the Enemy"

A: We asked the producers of the show, and here’s what they said: “Because Battlestar Galactica has such loyal and passionate fans, we try to include as much Bonus Content as possible to enhance each release. However, sometimes due to legal clearances, timing issues, and/or disc capacity, not every piece of available content can always be included.”

In other words, I wouldn’t be looking for the webisodes on DVD any time soon. But they are still available here.

Comic-Con Roundup: Neil Patrick Harris sings to Batman, plus pics of David Tennant, John Barrowman and Russell Tovey!

Comic-Con 2009 is over and, hopefully my craving for a Cafe 222 waffle will fade away soon. But as usual, the weekend of sensory overload left behind plenty to discuss and anticipate.

If a TV show, film or video game is looking to establish its geek cred, Comic-Con is the destination to accomplish that. And, while it doesn't dominate the event, comic books are still a major part of the weekend. So lets try to work our way through that busy, busy weekend. (Somehow actually being there is not as exhausting as reading about other people being there.)

NPH sings a song of mayhem

Its hard for superhero fans to avoid keeping an eye on what's going on in animation since there's so many solid animated adaptations of superhero titles and at Comic-Con, we learned that two new projects will include out actors in the voice cast.

Io9's Graeme McMillan calls it "better than Dr. Horrible" citing:

it does have a giant telepathic gorilla waltzing with Aquaman, a nefarious plot to become the richest man on Earth by uniting us all in a mind-controlled musical utopia, and more visual in-jokes about both comics and music than you'd think could be fitted into half an hour

There's no word yet on when the episode airs or second season will begin but I'll try to watch for the date and include it in the Queerview.

Meanwhile, the Cartoon Network has another superhero series debuting, one that involves Marvel characters. Not only will Marvel Super Hero Squad feature an star-studded voice cast but it will also offer the kind of mix of A and D-list heroes that has been a successful part of Marvel's team books.

The voice cast has plenty of gay-faves, including Michelle Trachtenberg as Valkyrie, James Marsters as Mr. Fantastic and Taye Diggs as the Black Panther. The most inspired bit of casting, however, sees George Takei as the voice of Galactus.

With the show also including the likes of Ms. Marvel, Hawkeye, Dormammu and The Enchantress, this is sounding like Marvel's version of Justice League Unlimited

And, suddenly, jaw-reattachment surgeries were big business

Easily this year's biggest announcement was the news that Marvel had picked up the rights to Marvelman, a comic that's been on most-wanted reprint list for years.

Marvelman (or Miracleman as it was also known) started in the 60s, but is best remembered for the revamp Alan Moore gave the series in the 80s and Neil Gaiman's follow-up run. However, the rights to the series has been a matter of debate for at least a decade.

So far Marvel hasn't announced their plans for Marvelman, beyond a special-edition t-shirt and poster, but a reprint of the classic Moore and Gaiman stories seems inevitable.

Torchwood/Doctor Who panel featuring John Barrowman, David Tennant and Russell T Davies. Without further ado, here are those pics!

Doctor Who himself aka John Tennant!

John Barrowman flashing his million dollar smile!

Russell T Davies begging the crowd not to retcon him...

From Daisies to the DC Universe?

He's working on a couple pilots for NBC, but since Bryan Fuller is also working on his first comic — an adaptation of the much lamented Pushing Daisies, he was asked if he would be interested in writing superhero comics.

The answer reportedly was an enthusiastic "Yes!" though there's no follow up question about his dream project. Hmm, why do I keep thinking he'd serve the Legion of Substitute-Heroes well?

Nine minutes in The Village

AMC's new version of The Prisoner, with Ian McKellen as Number Two has left TV fans wondering if this remake could even come close to the legendary nature of the original. We might be closer to an answer thanks to a nine-minute preview of the mini-series that premiered at Comic-Con.

What do you think? There are plenty of plenty of visually stunning moments.

Future doubly imperfect

While the elephant in the room at the Futurama panel was that the voice actors were missing, there are some promising plans for the series' return.

The story I'm most interested in seeing involves Amy and Bender falling in love and eventually marrying, leading to a story about marriage equality. The human-robot marriage is controversial and a "Proposition Infinity" gets in the way of it. Hopefully, Futurama will be able to handle the issue with its usual wit and style.

Meanwhile, other stories coming up include a look at the 31st century version of Twitter (which is dominated by Mom) as well as the origins of Dr. Zoidberg's employment and Scruffy's history.

Being Human just made the jump across the Atlantic and started running on BBC America this weekend. To promote the show, the network flew the cast including out actor Russell Tovey, Aidan Turner and Lenora Crichlow to San Diego to the meet the fans.

The adorable Russell Tovey

Lenora Crichlow looking very much alive

Aidan Turner not showing much bite ... at the moment

Blood in the arena

We've been waiting to get a peek at Starz' upcoming Spartacus series ever since we heard that the series would include a gay character. And over the weekend Comic-Con audiences got to see the following trailer:

I have a feeling this one will match Oz in delivering the homoeroticsm while also getting straight men to tune in.

In further news...

• The Friday night timeslot may have worried some fans but worry no further. Eureka, SyFy's dramedy, which has a number of hot nerds has been renewed for a fourth season with either one or two episodes being done as musicals.

• When Scott Pilgrim hits the big screen there will be an "old school" video game adaption to go along with it. The game will be a side-scrolling fighter game. I'll be eager to see if Scott's gay roommate Wallace Wells is a part of the game.

• It's been a few years since Peter Milligan and gave us an issue of X-Statix but that may change soon. At the X-Men panel, plans for X-Statix stories were revealed. I wonder if we'll see dead X-Statix members brought back or a new team.

• While there was plenty discussed at the Caprica panel, it doesn't sound like it included any talk about the gay character that Jane Espenson told us about. I guess we'll have to wait for the series to get going in January.

• Good news for the fans of los bros Winchester. At the Supernatural panel, creator Eric Kripke said that while he originally planned to end the show at the fifth season, solid ratings means there will be more seasons after the fifth. The extra seasons, however, won't mean that Kripke's original five-year plan for Supernatural will get stretched out. Instead, a sixth season will mean a "new chapter" that goes past the planned ending for the series.

• Doctor Who fans may have been disappointed with the news that, contrary to rumor, there was no plans to bring the franchise to the big screen. However, they did get to see David Tennant kiss John Barrowman. They also got to hear (Executive Producer) Julie Gardner joke that "John Barrowman just stole things off the set so he could be strip-searched on the way out."

The week in sports

Ricky Berens' wardrobe malfunction at the World Swimming Championships in Rome (pictured above), but there are a number of other visual delights — including a few pics from the 2009 OUTGAMES in Copenhagen! Enjoy.

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JULY 25: Fuifui Moimoi of the Eels is tackled during the round 20 NRL match between the Bulldogs and the Parramatta Eels at ANZ Stadium on July 25, 2009 in Sydney, Australia.

ROME - JULY 25: Michael Phelps of USA (C) looks on during practice at the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 25, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

COPENHAGEN JULY 28: Training at OUTGAMES 2009. (Photo credit: Martin Kristiansen)

COPENHAGEN: Jack Mackenroth suits up for training at OUTGAMES 2009. (Photo credit: Jack Mackenroth)

COPENHAGEN JULY 28: a Water Polo player stretches prior to an OUTGAMES 2009 match at the Copenhagen Aqua Arena. (Photo credit: Martin Kristiansen)

PHOENIX - JULY 28: Starting pitcher Cole Hamels #35 of the Philadelphia Phillies pitches against the Arizona Diamondbacks during the major league baseball game at Chase Field on July 28, 2009 in Phoenix, Arizona.

ROME - JULY 25: Lewis Smith of Great Britain looks on during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 25, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

ROME - JULY 25: Antonio Jose Oliva Guerra and Jeinkler Manso Aguirre of Cuba compete in the Men's 10m Synchro Platform Final during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 25, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

PHILADELPHIA - JULY 26: First baseman Albert Pujols #5 of the St. Louis Cardinals sets into position during a game against the Philadelphia Phillies at Citizens Bank Park on July 26, 2009 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

PORTLAND,OR - JULY 25: Steve Fletcher #9 of Burnley throws Shaun Higgins #7 of the Portland Timbers to the ground as they get in to a little scrape during the first half of the match at PGE Park on July 25, 2009 in Portland, Oregon.

SINSHEIM, GERMANY - JULY 26: Sejad Salihovic (L) of Hoffenheim jumps for a header with Cosmin Contra of Getafe during the pre season friendly match between 1899 Hoffenheim and FC Getafe at the Rhein-Neckar Arena on July 26, 2009 in Sinsheim, Germany.

ROME - JULY 28: Peter Varellas of the USA tries to block the shot by Soeren Mackeben of Germany in the Men's Water Polo Quarterfinal match between Germany and USA during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio della Pallanuoto on July 28, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

MUNICH, GERMANY - JULY 28: A portrait of Michael Owen of Manchester United taken in the team hotel on July 28, 2009 in Munich, Germany.

LOS ANGELES, CA - JULY 28: Taylor Dent serves against Ryan Sweeting during the LA Tennis Open Day 2 at Los Angeles Tennis Center - UCLA on July 28, 2009 in Los Angeles, California.

PHOENIX - JULY 28: Jimmy Rollins #11 of the Philadelphia Phillies runs the bases during warm ups at Chase Field on July 28, 2009 in Phoenix, Arizona.

BIRMINGHAM, ENGLAND - JULY 29: Andrew Flintoff of England is assisted
with his stretching during nets at Edgbaston on July 29, 2009.

ROME - JULY 29: Cameron Van Der Burgh of South Africa celebrates after breaking the world record, setting a new time of 26.67 seconds in the Men's 50m Breaststroke Final during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 29, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

ROME - JULY 30: Pedro Oliveira of Portugal competes in the Men's 200m Backstroke Heats during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 30, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

LOS ANGELES, CA - JULY 29: Dmitry Tursunov of Russia returns a shot to Carsten Ball of Australia during the LA Tennis Open Day Three at Los Angeles Tennis Center - UCLA on July 29, 2009 in Los Angeles, California.

ROME - JULY 25: Kyungmin Kwon and Kwanhoon Cho of South Korea compete in the Men's 10m Synchro Platform Final during the 13th FINA World Championships at the Stadio del Nuoto on July 25, 2009 in Rome, Italy.

AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND - JULY 23: Benson Stanley of Auckland is upended by Anthony Tuitavake of North Harbour during the Air New Zealand Cup trial match between Auckland and North Harbour at the North Harbour Stadium Outer Oval on July 23, 2009 in Auckland, New Zealand.