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Why women are crazy for hot gay romance on screen · The Front

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  Speaker 1: From The Australian. This is the weekend edition of The Front.
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  Speaker 1: I'm Claire Harvey. Romance is in. Specifically, gay romance is in,
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  Speaker 1: and it's replacing, or at least complimenting, the kind of
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  Speaker 1: queer love stories we're used to seeing on the screen
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  Speaker 1: where there's a lot of crying and anguish. Even more intriguing,
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  Speaker 1: the audience for hot gay romance is women, including a
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  Speaker 1: whole lot of heterosexual ladies, who, it turns out, have
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  Speaker 1: been waiting for some dudes to rip their clothes off
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  Speaker 1: and get steamy together, no girls involved. My guest today
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  Speaker 1: is The Australian's Culture content director Bianca far Marcus. She
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  Speaker 1: interviewed Alexander Skarsgard about his latest role as a hot
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  Speaker 1: gay biker in a new movie Pillion. What am I
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  Speaker 1: going to do with you? Whatever you want? Any First
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  Speaker 1: things first? How was Alexander Scarsgard.
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  Speaker 2: The hottest person I've ever seen?
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  Speaker 1: But he was lovely? The hotness is, of course, by design,
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  Speaker 1: a necessary factor to draw in audiences. But there's more
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  Speaker 1: to the character of Ray.
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  Speaker 2: Than the stealthily sexy, dripping in testosterone, hyper masculine, obvious
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  Speaker 2: heart throb. There's also leather head to toe and let
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  Speaker 2: me tell you the white leather evolution of that community.
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  Speaker 1: Beautiful. That community in Pillion is dudes who ride motorbikes,
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  Speaker 1: tough guys, loud engines, clubhouses. It's also people who are
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  Speaker 1: into kinky sadomasochisms. You never have been of a biker,
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  Speaker 1: then biker bianker tells me. Pillion has been.
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  Speaker 2: Marketed as the greatest romance of the year, quite cleverly
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  Speaker 2: since it's coming up against Wuthering Heights. Basically a story
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  Speaker 2: about two men who fall in love, and part of
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  Speaker 2: the relationship dynamic is that it is a subdom relationship.
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  Speaker 2: So throw away everything fifty Shades of Gray taught you
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  Speaker 2: about it and step into the gay biker community. One
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  Speaker 2: character played by Harry Melling, who everyone will know of
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  Speaker 2: Harry Potter fame playing Dudley do for playing sorry of
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  Speaker 2: Harry Potter, fame for playing Dudley Bursley, the beloved obnoxious cousin.
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  Speaker 2: He is the kind of younger, more innocent counterpart in
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  Speaker 2: the relationship.
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  Speaker 1: How do you get a man like that? I have
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  Speaker 1: an aptitude for devotion.
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  Speaker 2: He works as a parking ticket officer, so obviously his
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  Speaker 2: life sucks because everyone universally hates him, has these gorgeous,
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  Speaker 2: doting parents that are so beyond accepting the fact that
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  Speaker 2: he's gay. They're like, we don't care about your sexuality.
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  Speaker 2: We care about the fact that you still don't have
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  Speaker 2: a boyfriend and you're becoming boring to us. And then
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  Speaker 2: he bumps into Ray, who's played by Skarsguard, and from
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  Speaker 2: there it kind of explodes into this tale both of
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  Speaker 2: how they test each other, how they fall in love
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  Speaker 2: with one another, but also how they fall in love
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  Speaker 2: with themselves or what they come to understand about who
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  Speaker 2: they want to be, whether they're in that relationship or not.
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  Speaker 1: Listen, Joe, Yeah, would you like to have a drink
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  Speaker 1: with me? I just finished a game and I could
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  Speaker 1: use a beer. You know, Oh no, I can' You're
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  Speaker 1: not my wife. This is Denzel Washington in Philadelphia. It
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  Speaker 1: was a groundbreaking nineteen ninety three film where a massive
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  Speaker 1: start Tom Hanks played a man dying of AIDS and
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  Speaker 1: Washington played a reflexively homophobic lawyer who came to be
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  Speaker 1: Hanks's greatest ally, I don't pick up people in drug
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  Speaker 1: stories every day? What do you think I'm gay? Aren't you?
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  Speaker 1: You know? That is exactly the kind of bullshit that
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  Speaker 1: makes people hate you a little from Philadelphia to call
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  Speaker 1: me by your name. Hollywood has historically depicted homosexual relationships
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  Speaker 1: as doomed. There's struggle, there's death, there are tears. These
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  Speaker 1: stories are told from an empathetic point of view, exploring
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  Speaker 1: the idea of a marginalized community struggling in an unsympathetic society.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds as though we're having a different moment now
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  Speaker 1: where we're seeing homosexuality on screen in ways that is
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  Speaker 1: not about them being doomed.
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  Speaker 2: There are a lot of stories that sort of center
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  Speaker 2: on the fact that this character has to come out,
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  Speaker 2: they have to conceal it from someone, or they have
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  Speaker 2: to come to terms with something that they've never expected
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  Speaker 2: within themselves, whereas with kind of this new iteration, it's
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  Speaker 2: like that is the baseline. Then we go through what
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  Speaker 2: we would call kind of a normal romantic arc that
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  Speaker 2: we've seen a million times before, only this time a
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  Speaker 2: lot of the history has been so rooted in this
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  Speaker 2: strum narrative or this didactic approach to the relationship. Now
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  Speaker 2: it's like, well, we are fundamentally happy people, and this
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  Speaker 2: is how we express love. And I think It's coming
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  Speaker 2: also at a really interesting time in cinema, where there
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  Speaker 2: aren't many love stories that are joyous, and a lot
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  Speaker 2: of them are kind of always depressing, whereas now you
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  Speaker 2: have this whole evolution of queer cinema that is just
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  Speaker 2: happy to express itself and be proud of what it is.
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  Speaker 1: Every middle aged woman I know is either reading hot
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  Speaker 1: romances about dragons and elves on their kindle or they're
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  Speaker 1: watching Heated Rivalry, the biggest TV show of the moment, about,
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  Speaker 1: of all things, a couple of gay ice hockey players
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  Speaker 1: who fall in love.
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  Speaker 3: What do you want, Hollander, I think I'm gay?
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  Speaker 1: Hmm? Oh yeah, what makes you think that you?
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  Speaker 3: You're not gay?
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  Speaker 1: No? Not completely?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah? Well I think I am completely.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, so you're gay?
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  Speaker 2: So what?
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  Speaker 3: Well it's kind of a big deal.
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  Speaker 1: Where does a heated Rivalry fit into this idea that
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  Speaker 1: we're talking about of gay romance being portrayed on screen
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  Speaker 1: in a way where nobody has to be punished? I
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  Speaker 1: think he did.
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  Speaker 2: Rivalry has come as sort of an emblem for this
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  Speaker 2: shift that is also a very happy story, Like there
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  Speaker 2: is so much tenderness and so much sweetness. There's also
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  Speaker 2: a lot of very very flond depictions of sex. But
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  Speaker 2: I think in terms of what it offers is that
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  Speaker 2: it has a beauty to it and a tenderness. The
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  Speaker 2: other thing is that it's two very traditionally masculine kinds
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  Speaker 2: of characters, so there's no imbalance. There's not one weak
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  Speaker 2: partner and then one strong partner that has to save them.
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  Speaker 2: And I think that's what's kind of making it so
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  Speaker 2: broadly appealing.
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  Speaker 1: So women are the audience for these shows, at least
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  Speaker 1: in a large part, both straight and queer women. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: what is it about seeing to super hot dudes? And
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  Speaker 1: even as I asked this question, I could feel like
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  Speaker 1: I could answer it. What is it about seeing two
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  Speaker 1: super hot dudes rip each other's clothes off that is
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  Speaker 1: appealing to women?
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  Speaker 2: I mean, we've got the answer straight away, But I
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  Speaker 2: think if we want to be less surface level about it,
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  Speaker 2: violent images against women, particularly in heterosexual circumstances, are prolific.
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  Speaker 2: Consent is very much conversation. Sexual violence is very much
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  Speaker 2: part of the conversation now, and I think a lot
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  Speaker 2: of that has contributed to this idea of like, okay,
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  Speaker 2: where is the fantasy for us? And we get things
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  Speaker 2: like very Smart and dragons and everything in terms of
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  Speaker 2: romance novels. But then men loving men has also become
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  Speaker 2: an object of desire for women. This is actually not
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  Speaker 2: as new as I think heated rivalry in films like
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  Speaker 2: Pillion would suggest. It started way back when in the
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  Speaker 2: fifties sixties, with the emergence of slash fiction, which was
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  Speaker 2: predominantly penned by women taking common characters on TV. At
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  Speaker 2: the moment, my personal favorite is Spock and Captain Kirk
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  Speaker 2: and rewriting the stories into homosexual love fantasies.
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  Speaker 3: I assume you're complimenting mister Spark on his ability to decode.
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  Speaker 1: I'm not sure, sir.
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  Speaker 3: Well, here's one thing you can be sure of, mister.
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  Speaker 3: Leave any bigotry in your quarters. There's no room for
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  Speaker 3: it on the bridge. Do I make myself clear? You
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  Speaker 3: do so.
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  Speaker 2: It obviously transfer formed and grew with the ages. Nineteen eighties,
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  Speaker 2: Japan started falling in love with this kind of concept of.
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  Speaker 1: Boys love or yahweh.
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  Speaker 2: Which was also depicting just homosexual characters falling in love
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  Speaker 2: with each other, and it was something that was really
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  Speaker 2: popularized by women. Now a lot of women have been
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  Speaker 2: the authors behind gay love stories that have just become
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  Speaker 2: massive hits. We've seen a seven hundred and forty percent
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  Speaker 2: increase in people wanting LGBT love stories, particularly with men
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  Speaker 2: loving men. A lot of the reason it's a phrase
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  Speaker 2: that was coined in twenty nineteen called heteropessimism, where it's
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  Speaker 2: basically like between an acute awareness of misogyny growing spaces
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  Speaker 2: like the manisphere, online, constant misogynistic rhetoric everywhere the hell
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  Speaker 2: that is online. Dating women were basically like, you know what,
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  Speaker 2: I'm kind of over having a male partner. Let's go
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  Speaker 2: fantasize about something else. And it's like, yes, you're still
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  Speaker 2: attracted to men. Here's two hot ones going at it
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  Speaker 2: and kind of express seeing a form of love where
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  Speaker 2: you don't look at that and see yourself at a loss.
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  Speaker 2: You're not looking at and thinking like that's the man
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  Speaker 2: that could harm me, or that's the man that's presenting
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  Speaker 2: a threat to me. That is just two men falling
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  Speaker 2: in love or something like it, and it's more enjoyable.
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  Speaker 1: It shakes up one of the ideas underlying both sex
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  Speaker 1: on screen in mainstream entertainment and porn, which is that
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  Speaker 1: the consumer of it needs to be able to visualize
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  Speaker 1: themselves in that encounter. Yes, I can't enjoy a sort
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  Speaker 1: of sexual encounter on screen unless I can imagine myself
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  Speaker 1: being one of the participants. This makes it clear that
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  Speaker 1: actually the audience doesn't need to be able to see
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  Speaker 1: themselves in there. That's really really interesting and it's a
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  Speaker 1: change in the way women are thinking about eroticism, isn't it,
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  Speaker 1: Particularly at a time when there's so much concern about
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  Speaker 1: the violence in poem like women talking about normal sexual
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  Speaker 1: encounters suddenly turning into choking because some dude has watched
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  Speaker 1: a lot of choking videos and thinks that that's normal.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely, what have we been visualizing ourselves in people who
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  Speaker 2: don't have cellulite stretch marks, any of the things that
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  Speaker 2: are normal acts of sexuality that are never messy or
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  Speaker 2: have awkward moments in it. And what I finds are
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  Speaker 2: fascinating in this shift, it's really come down to the
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  Speaker 2: emotional side of it. There is that saying men have
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  Speaker 2: sex with the body women have sex with the mind.
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  Speaker 2: I think it does tap into this psychology, whether it's
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  Speaker 2: intentional or not. A lot of these queer narratives kind
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  Speaker 2: of lean more into the deep affection or the kind
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  Speaker 2: of yearning and the longing for it, and that's something
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  Speaker 2: that has possibly been lost with heteronormative tails. There is
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  Speaker 2: that gap in the market where a lot of female
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  Speaker 2: spectators looking at this and being like, you know what,
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  Speaker 2: I'm enjoying watching this incredible process and this incredibly sexy process.
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  Speaker 2: I mean they're always hot, that's the thing we keep
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  Speaker 2: dancing around. These scenes are amazing to look at, and
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  Speaker 2: it just makes me feel good about myself. It's like
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  Speaker 2: filling this need.
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  Speaker 1: So should gay roles be reserved for gay actors or
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  Speaker 1: does it just not matter? That's after the break. We've
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  Speaker 1: been through a big moment where identity politics seem to
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  Speaker 1: take overcasting. You had to be of a certain community
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  Speaker 1: to be allowed to portray that community on stage or
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  Speaker 1: on scramp. That seems to be going away.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, even just with the two films that we've mentioned,
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  Speaker 2: all the main characters are straight, like all the protagonists
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  Speaker 2: are straight in real life, and there's really been no
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  Speaker 2: kind of conversation or backlash around it. I mean there's
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  Speaker 2: always one or two cries saying, couldn't a gay actor
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  Speaker 2: have played this role? We look back in history, Tom
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  Speaker 2: Hanks says, looking back now, he would never have played
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  Speaker 2: the role in Philadelphi. And while I don't agree with
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  Speaker 2: him because he was amazing.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and nobody would have watched it if it had
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  Speaker 1: been two unknown actors. The fact that it was Tom
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  Speaker 1: Hanks and Denzel Washington they made it a blockbuster. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: and that's a massive part of it.
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  Speaker 2: Like you tell someone, go watch Pillion, it's a gay
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  Speaker 2: bdsm rom dom com of what they're calling it. The
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  Speaker 2: average person might not be into that. You tell them
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  Speaker 2: Alexander Skausguard's taken on this role, they'd probably be like, well,
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  Speaker 2: why has he done that? Like surely, okay, there's there's
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  Speaker 2: clearly something else in it. We look back at, like
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  Speaker 2: Sean Penn's Milk, his portrayal of Harvey Milk.
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  Speaker 1: He deserved to play that role.
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  Speaker 2: My name is Harvey Milk and I'm here, any Crays,
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  Speaker 2: you must come out. That was an iconic gay activist figure.
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  Speaker 2: If there was a gay actor in that role, would
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  Speaker 2: it have meant something more to the entire production? I
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  Speaker 2: don't know. I mean, this is the thing. At the
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  Speaker 2: end of the day, it's called acting.
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  Speaker 1: Biancher far Marcus, thank you very much, Thank you, Pillion,
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  Speaker 1: is in cinemas now. Biancher Fhi Marcus is the Content
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  Speaker 1: director of Culture at The Australian. You can read her
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: work anytime at the Australian dot com dot au slash culture.
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  Speaker 1: This episode of the Front was hosted by me Claire
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  Speaker 1: Harvey and produced by Jasper Leek. Thanks for joining us
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: on the Front this week. Our team also includes Kristin
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  Speaker 1: Amyot Lee at Sammaglu, Tiffanydimac and Joshua Burton.