ah, pride: á la riviére, the qafeteria is closing, and other fun stuff
Tuesday, June 19, 2001

In celebration of Gay Pride Month, Bravo TV has once again produced a "reality" series, this time called "Gay Riviera". Thus far, it is somewhat of an improvement over last year's Fire Island: The Pines.

Somewhat.

Thus far it does seem to include a broader ethnic range of people than last year's series, although the age range is, again, quite narrow. That said, they do have a fair number of people at the younger end, just coming out, dealing with their parents and family. (Some of that must be truly fascinating. Two of the parents are in complete denial about their chidren being gay, yet they're cooperating with these filmmakers running around making a documentary about their children's lives, focusing on their gayness; a documentary which is going to be televised for a solid week. Now that is some epic denial.) Another man (Mark Nelson) when he was younger decided that, in order to get attention, he was going to become whatever the A-Gays wanted to see. Having become that, he suddenly realized that wasn't what he wanted, but he doesn't seem to know how to stop. There's a lesbian (Reesa) who was given into foster care by her mother when she was young, only to be sexually abused by her foster brother in an attempt to keep him from abusing her younger sisters. There's also an HIV-positive man (Gregory) who has just been tossed out of where he was living (he had sex on his friend/landlord's bed [Sabrina], and she was quite pissed off about that), a very brief segment with a seriously fierce drag queen (who says, and I quote: "Was that racist? You know what? I don't give a damn. I'm black and I'm a drag queen. What the hell you gonna do?"), and others.

That said ... already, there is a disturbing focus on the yupwardly mobile, as they head on the Gay Riviera circuit from New York to South Beach. Parts of it just make my teeth grind, frankly. However, unlike "Fire Island: The Pines", this one might actually be worth sticking with. It's hard to tell; they're headed into a season of Miami circuit parties, from the looks of it, and that may yet be enough to make me flee.

If "Gay Riviera" isn't your cup of tea, Bravo is doing all sorts of other things this month as part of their "Out of the Closet" festival. (Thankfully, the intensely annoying interstitials seem to have disappeared this year.) So far, it includes Wilde, The Opposite of Sex, Love! Valour! Compassion! and several other films and shows.

Elsewhere:

Showtime is finishing up with "Queer as Folk", which is winding itself down to an excruciating conclusion in a veritable cascade of bad writing and sleep-acting. (And a phone-sex incident that I will never get out of my mind, no matter how hard I try.) They've also been replaying the entire Tales of the City sequence (Tales, More Tales, and Further Tales) as a sort of Midnight Tuesday festival. HBO is making a passing nod with its regular series "Sex in the City", where Samantha is having a lesbian fit, and the new series "Six Feet Under". PBS is showing a new episode of POV entitled "Scout's Honor", about Steven Cozza and his attempt not to be thrown out of the Scouts when he acknowledged that he was gay.

[Previous entry: "power, ants and scarves"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "sadness in the mists ....."]