Ask the Flying Monkey: Is It Okay to a Ask a Straight Guy, “Who Would You Go Gay For?”

This week! Is it okay to ask a straight guy, “Who would you go gay for?” How “real” is The Fabulous Beekman Boys? What’s up with the gay blood ban? How do you talk to conservatives about same-sex marriage?

Q: Here Down Under, we had a great TV personality Rove McManus who frequently asked the question “Who would you turn gay for?” to the celebrities like Matt Damon, Hugh Jackman, Will Smith, and Anne Hathaway. But something didn’t quite sit 100% right about it with me. Is this type of question a further extension of the whole “bromance” phenomenon? Doesn’t this demean and trivialize the issue of gay identity? So I’m putting it to you O Great Winged One: how do you feel about the question? -- Papermoon a.k.a. Ste, Melbourne, Australia

A: On one hand, I see where you’re coming from. It’s all very jokey, and there’s a vague implication that being gay is some kind of choice.

On the other hand, you say “trivialize,” but maybe this is also normalizing gay identity. All my life, being gay, and gay sex in particular, has been this big scary taboo. But this question implodes all that, making it this casual, breezy, and decidedly non-scary thing.

Depending on exactly how the question is asked (like Rove, without a horrified or mocking tone), I actually think it’s quite subversive.

It’s also damn interesting. Watching the clip above, it seems like it really does give great insight into the actual mindset of the various celebrities – a faaaaaaar cry from typical celebrity interviews which couldn’t be more canned if they came from a tuna factory. Witness Anne Hathaway’s funny, eloquent response versus Will Smith’s awkward refusal to even answer the question, and don’t tell me that doesn’t say something very interesting and very significant about both of them.

Q: I just recently discovered this bizarre show, The Fabulous Beekman Boys, about two gay exurbanites "roughing it” on what looks to me to be a multi-million dollar farm. I saw an episode today where Farmer John, their gay farmhand, had hip replacement surgery and after a week is on his hands and knees in the barn birthing goats. This is obviously completely fake. Did he even have a hip replacement? He's never limped or struggled and suddenly he has major surgery, then has a day or two with a walker and then is fine. So now I'm questioning everything about this show. Is anything for real? – Joe, Illinois

The Fabulous Beekman Boys

A: How much of any reality show is “real?” You’re right to ask, since a good portion of all of it is staged and/or heavily edited to make it more “entertaining.”

I asked the producers, but unfortunately, they didn’t answer that question directly.

They did tell me that the first ten-episode season of The Fabulous Beekman Boys was shot from August 2009 to April 2010 with a schedule of roughly two weeks on and three weeks off.

“We have to condense weeks of shooting into one episode,” says Lynn Sadofsky, an executive producer on the show.

As for the episode where Farmer John had surgery, “That actual episode was shot over a period of weeks,” Lynn says. “After the surgery it took Farmer John one week of recovery for his type of surgery to be able to walk out to visit the goats. At the end of that episode, he is on his hands and knees pulling out a baby goat, but that was weeks after his surgery.”

Next page! Where are we with the gay blood ban, and how'd they come up with "Plato's Closet?"