Kelly & Charisse

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Gay Best Friend: Tim in "Frankie & Johnny" (1991)

a series by Christopher James looking at the 'Gay Best Friend' trope   

Even before officially coming out, Nathan Lane (left) wasn't afraid to play gay in "Frankie and Johnny," pictured here with Kate Nelligan and Al Pacino.Especially in the early days, the inauthenticity of the “Gay Best Friend” trope came from straight actors mincing about to sell the part. The role is able to gain a whole lot of authenticity when a queer person is either writing or acting the part. In the case of Frankie and Johnny, both the writer and performer of the 'gay best friend' were gay, though both were not out. Theater legend (and out gay playwright) Terence McNally adapted his Off-Broadway play Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune into a movie in 1991. He was able to get A-List talent to take the titular roles for film, with Michelle Pfeiffer and Al Pacino headlining. However, he also gave Nathan Lane one of his first breakout roles as Tim, the gay best friend and neighbor of Pfeiffer’s Frankie.

The 1991 film did not achieve the level of acclaim that McNally’s play did (thus it was the subject of a great This Had Oscar Buzz episode). Still, there are things to appreciate about this adaptation...

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Links: Irish cacophonies, crowded rooms, and guild prizes

• IndieWire did you see SNL's sketch lampooning Ammonite and Portrait of a Lady on Fire as "Lesbian Period Drama"
• Towleroad Tom Holland to play Billy Milligan the first person to successfully use Dissassociative Identity Disorder as a criminal defense in the series The Crowded Room
• The Guardian asks a very real and interesting question: which films have missed their moment given the pandemic. Lots of films benefit from feeling 'of the moment' and not all of the films coming out in 2021 and 2022 will.

 More after the jump including trouble for film production in Georgia, Bowen Yang's Titanic hilarity, and the Art Directors Guild Awards...

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This post is not an advertisement but also is.

Thirteen days until the Oscars. Are you counting down? Does this insanely stacked list of presenters move your personal excitement needle? 

P.S. Isn't it weirdly embarrassing for the Academy to use a fake non-Oscar statue in an commercial for their own show? I get that they're protective of the statue as a copyright / trademark but this is a commercial for their own show. Why is the "awards show" statue some weird not-the-real-thing cross between an Emmy and an Oscar?

Introducing the Smackdown Panel for '20/'21

Are you ready for the season premiere of what's going to be the final season (at least in its current form) of Supporting Actress Smackdown? The Smackdown and companion podcast arrive this Thursday. We're starting with the current Oscar race honoring the films and performances of 2020 and your votes count so hurry up and get them in.

Let's meet your fellow panelists, shall we?

PLEASE WELCOME...   

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