Bros & Fire Island

The Rom Com Rewrite

This November, the gays get their say.

Bros

Year: 2022

Written by: Billy Eichner, Nicholas Stoller

Director: Nicholas Stoller

Stars: Billy Eichner, Luke Macfarlane

Fire Island

Year: 2022

Written by: Joel Kim Booster

Director: Andrew Ahn

Stars: Joel Kim Booster, Bowen Yang, Margaret Cho, Conrad Ricamora, James Scully

Show notes:

“Happy ending… rom com… but also we’re gay and we do things a little differently.”

In this episode Lisa and Charles Adrian dig into this year’s big gay rom coms, one of which was released in cinemas and one of which was not.

We reference both the 2005 (not 2007) film adaptation (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0414387/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0) and the 1995 BBC TV adaptation (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112130/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3) of Jane Austin’s novel Pride And Prejudice, which you can read about here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride_and_Prejudice. Charles Adrian also mentions her novel Persuasion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persuasion_(novel)) and Lisa mentions the film When Harry Met Sally (1989) (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098635/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1).

You can find out more about the British band Bros here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bros_(British_band). Debra Messing, for those who do not know, played the eponymous Grace in the series Will And Grace (1998-2006 and 2017-2020), which you can read about here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_%26_Grace.

With regard to LGBTQ+ museum spaces in the US and the UK: there are LGBTQ+ objects and archival materials at the National Museum of American History in Washington DC (https://americanhistory.si.edu/topics/lgbtq-history) and an aspiration to create a separate LGBTQ+ museum within the Smithsonian Institution at some point in the future (https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/10/05/smithsonian-lgbtq-museum-bills-introduced-mark-pocan). In London, meanwhile, there is now a dedicated LGBTQ+ museum called Queer Britain (https://queerbritain.org.uk/).

Next month, much to Lisa’s disgust, we will watch The Holiday (2006) (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0457939/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0).

We record these episodes over the internet. Sometimes the audio is not perfect. We apologise for that.

Music in this episode is by Martin Zaltz Austwick (martinzaltzaustwick.com). Artwork is by Lisa Findley.

Thank you for listening!