Ask the AfterElton Flying Monkey! (June 17, 2008)

Have a question about gay male entertainment? Ask the Monkey!

Q: Do you think reality TV portrays gay men any better — or at least any more accurately — than scripted TV? – Marcia, Marcia, Marcia, Kennebunkport, MN

A: It does seem like gay reality TV participants fall into one of two categories: deliberately, almost defiantly non-stereotypical gay guys (like Reichen Lehmkuhl in The Amazing Race or all the guys on Gay, Straight, or Taken) or guys so light in the loafers they’re practically hanging from the ceiling like possums (like, well, most everyone on Project Runway).

Reichen Lehmkuhl (left) & Christian Siriano

Do producers deliberately choose the extremes — either the butchies and the flamers — so they make good TV? Maybe, but it doesn’t change the fact that these are all real people, with real stories to tell. On the whole, I think they make better, more compelling, and ultimately more accurate representations of gay men than scripted television, which for years presented only gay psychopaths and villains (or flamers as the punchline to a joke), and lately, at least on network television, still seems to present mostly noble, but asexual gay guys who exist to teach the straight characters, and presumably the audience, some great lesson about understanding.

On reality TV, gay guys basically get to speak for themselves — or at least get to create the raw footage which is then edited into an episode-long segment. And that is (almost) always a good thing.

Who didn’t love Dale Levitski on Top Chef? Jack Mackenroth on Project Runway? Todd Herzog on Survivor: China? Marcellas Reynolds on Big Brother?

Clockwise from top left: Jack Mackenroth, Dale Levitski,
Todd Herzog, Marcellas Reynolds

Q: Paul Rudd looks so cute and cuddly and clean-cut. And then you go to a [Judd] Apatow movie and see him scowling and cursing up a storm. Dare I ask: Which is the real Paul? – Rudd Fanatic, Cincinnati, OH

A: It’s a little from column A and a little from column B.

“I'm married and I have a 2 1/2 year old boy,” Rudd told G Wei Gorilla (a German magazine) last year regarding his foul-mouthed character in Knocked Up. “There are things in my own life that are not so far removed from the situations and the characters and the things the character says in the movie.”

As for Judd Apatow, it’s clear there’s a deep affection for the man and his sometimes raunchy movies. “I love being around that company,” Paul says, “and I try and step up to the level of their game.”

So where does Rudd get the reputation of being such a choirboy? Well, mostly from looking like one. Playing the oh-so-sensitive object of every gay guy’s affection in The Object of My Affection didn’t hurt either.

Then there’s his love for the theater, returning to Broadway again and again, even if it’s meant cutting into some movie career momentum. “There's a feeling of enrichment and challenge when it comes to doing a play, and especially doing, you know, a classical play or a tragic play,” Paul says. “In a way, it works a different set of muscles, I guess. But I do love it, and I love great writing, whatever it is, and there are so many great plays, and a lot of the writing in a lot of plays is just stellar, and no one is making movies like that, or if they are, I'm certainly not getting cast in them.”

Paul Rudd

Next Page! A "gay" Brideshead? A good movie about gays and sports?