Sketch comedy shows have long mined current social issues for inspiration. In the 60s, Laugh-In and That Was The Week That Was regularly brought hippie culture and anti-establishment attitudes – progressive concepts for the time – directly into the living rooms of Middle America. When the “Not Ready for Prime Time Players” debuted on Saturday Night Live in 1975, they continued that tradition and carried it through the next three decades, spawning a host of imitators. At its best, sketch comedy became mainstream television’s “town crier,” using humor to defuse otherwise controversial contemporary themes.

As gay issues became increasingly prominent in social discourse, sketch comedy shows began dealing with gay people and themes more frequently. In 1985, Saturday Night Live added its first openly gay cast member, Terry Sweeney, who spent a season impersonating female celebrities and playing the occasional gay character. When the Fox network debuted its Sunday night lineup with The Tracey Ullman Show in 1987, one of Ullman’s recurring characters was Francesca, a teen being raised by her gay father and his boyfriend. Shortly after its debut in 1990, In Living Color introduced the flamboyant hosts of the “Men on…” skits, whose stereotyped characters generated laughter as well as debate as to their relative offensiveness.

Gay topics and characters are even more frequently seen today and, thanks to the popularity of Internet video, some of the more notable examples are readily available for viewing. Here we take a look at some of the highs and lows for gay visibility in sketch comedy, and examine whether, when it comes to the handling of gay themes, mainstream television comedy is laughing with us … or at us.

Sketches that helped raise gay visibility and awareness of gay culture

When Canadian comedy troupe The Kids in the Hall turned their act into a TV show in 1988, American audiences were presented with a gay sensibility entirely new to sketch comedy. The five-man team included Scott Thompson, an openly gay performer who didn’t shy away from bringing up gay issues, and his castmates weren’t afraid of playing gay and even female characters who shared kisses and intimate moments with the other men.

One of the most memorable characters from The Kids in the Hall was Thompson’s Buddy Cole, a flamboyant gay bar owner who told hilarious anecdotes about his colorful circle of friends. Out and proudly effeminate, Buddy expected the people in the audience to accept him and found the ones who didn’t inconsequential. “People make fun of me because I lisp,” he quipped, “Such a fuss over a few extra ‘s’es!” Perhaps more importantly, Buddy was a gay man who entertained us without being the butt of a joke.

In The Kids in the Hall’s five seasons, we saw Buddy coach a lesbian softball team and manage an aspiring pop singer, among other accomplishments. Still, Buddy was at his best when serving martinis and toxic monologues. In the sketch below, Buddy undercuts commonly held misconceptions about gay people by playing them against ridiculous racial stereotypes.

Buddy could have easily been considered just another clichéd queen were it not for the variety of gay characters found in Kids in the Hall sketches. While other television shows were still figuring out how to present multidimensional gay characters, The Kids in the Hall were working the diversity within the gay community into their comedy.