The folks at Saturday Night Live one-upped both Jimmy Kimmel and As the World Turns this week by running a digital short that featured Superbad actor Jonah Hill making out with Andy Samberg's dad (or, at least, an actor playing Andy Samberg's dad). Considering the central bromance of Superbad and Hill's hilarious deleted Brokeback Mountain monologue in Knocked Up, we shouldn't really be surprised to see him dip his bucket in this particular well. No, that's not a euphemism.

It seems that comedy's current white-steeded knight, Judd Apatow, can't make a film without people splitting into teams and debating whether he's a homophobe or the second coming of Phil Donahue (who, granted, is still alive and probably not ready for a second coming anytime soon).

Some people found The 40-Year-Old Virgin homophobic because of the much-quoted "You know why you're gay?" discussion between Paul Rudd and Seth Rogan. Others thought it was refreshingly lighthearted in the way that straight men were joking about gayness clearly without harboring any discomfort with or underlying hatred for it.

Likewise, some people found Knocked Up's gay-playing group of buddies to be insulting and found the film's use of "faggot" to be utterly unacceptable, while others (myself included) thought that the word, while of course horrible and never welcome, was clearly not being endorsed in the context in which it was used, and that the friends' obvious comfort with one another and their own sexualities was refreshing.

Enter Superbad, the next critical and box office darling to come out of this comedy camp, and its murky allusions to homosexuality, which have led to an intriguing variety of responses.

A writer for Seattle's The Stranger notes: "the most effective aspect of the movie, for me at least, is how it digs into the romance of straight-guy friendships." He then points out how shocked he was to see Time critic Richard Corliss' jaw-droppinlgy boneheaded review, which has the audacity to actually gay-bait producer Apatow and writer Seth Rogen: "Why don’t Apatow and Rogen just do the honorable thing and tell the world they’re gay? It would save them a lot of time wasted pretending their movies are about young men growing up and finding the right young woman."

Ah, I see: He didn't like their movie, so they must be gay.

I don't read Time, because ... well, as a friend once said, "Time is for people who don't have much of it left." But I headed over and was appalled at the bile that Corliss is allowed to spew in his reviews. Calling Will Ferrell gay for making Blades of Glory? Actually, calling "Homo!" on any man who has made a movie that challenges the head-butting and towel-snapping school of male bonding by admitting that genuine affection absolutely does exist between straight men? Here's a choice passage:

"Maybe Will Ferrell and Adam Sandler should come out of the closet too. In Ferrell's movies, male merging beats female interest to a pulp, and his latest, Blades of Glory, allows him several opportunities to stick his face in Jon Heder's crotch. Sandler's summer hit, I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry, took guy-guy friendship to its logical conclusion: two firefighters get married."

Actually, the marriage wasn't the conclusion, it was the setup. The conclusion was that friendship is more important than prejudice and that love conquers all ... but apparently sissified sentiments like these went over Corliss' determinedly heterosexual head.

The critic is of course quick to point out in a paragraph likely inserted after the review was written that he is a "liberal New Yorker" and a "card-carrying homophiliac" (which means he either loves gay or ... bleeds gay?) and that of course his gay-baiting of these filmmakers and abject horror at any suggestion of gayness in buddy comedies TOTALLY don't come from a place of squeamishness about male intimacy. Because that wouldn't be "liberal New Yorker" of him, and he'd never get a decent haircut in this city again.

Our own review of Superbad ruminates on the gay-seemingness of the straight relationship of the movie, and there does seem to be evidence that the filmmakers at least wanted to undermine straight buddy movie conventions. (Many viewers see the gay subtext, many don't.) But Corliss' gay witch hunt, launched against these characters and then men who create them, is preposterous: Just because he apparently can't imagine a world where straight men show affection for one another doesn't mean that the rest of the country (judging by the success of these comedies) might not be ready to live in it.

• The trailer for the upcoming teen comedy Superbad looks pretty funny, and it has a very sweet moment about two minutes in between the lead guys (note that Jonah Hill also delivered the hilarious deleted Brokeback monologue in Knocked Up). We have seen the future of comedy, and it's gay-baiting-free.
• This truly bizarre mashup of a Fosse-choreographed Gwen Verdon dance number from the 60s and a hip-hop song is absolutely hypnotic (t/y Popcandy for the tip)

We've been following comments made by critics, stars, and peers alike recently regarding the highly-anticipated comedy Knocked Up and its potentially homophobic humor. Nothing makes me more upset than hearing that a promising project from a group of artists that I respect might be marred by needless homophobia, misogyny, racism, etc. -- it's like that sinking feeling you get when your favorite uncle opens his mouth at Christmas and says something completely unacceptable about "the Jews" or "the blacks" or "the gays" and you know you'll never be able to remember him as fondly again.

Given how much I loved Knocked Up creator Judd Apatow's The 40-Year-Old Virgin and criminally short-lived Freaks and Geeks, I was doubly apprehensive that his latest film (which was already rumored to be a guaranteed smash) might be held up by potentially hateful attitudes. And the starring presence of Katherine Heigl (who vocally defended her friend T. R. Knight from this very kind of abuse) made things even more complicated, particularly when I read of her discomfort over some of the language used in the film. Was this going to be another 300, where my enjoyment of a popcorn movie was needlessly smacked out of my hands by some careless fratboy humor?

So, the advance reviews for Knocked Up, the film from the folks who brought us the 40 Year Old Virgin, which opens nationwide on Friday, have been great, with some critics calling it one of the funniest movies of the last two decades. And you're going, okay, is there really something gay about this movie, which is basically about two heterosexuals having an obviously unprotected sexual encounter during a drunken one night stand, which results in the pregnancy of the female half of the couple?

I don't think the movie itself goes there, but this outtake is really really really gay. So gay I can't even embed the clip, but have to link you to it - which is in fact sort of the point of this scene, which I tragically cannot even quote one single line of, because the dialogue is definitely NSFW.

It's a deleted scene featuring a pregnant Katherine Heigl (Grey's Anatomy) and her friend Jonah (Jonah Hill) who isn't gay, seriously, because he didn't enjoy it at all that time he tried it, watching Brokeback Mountain together. If you haven't seen it, you must watch it immediately. It's also interesting to see this clip hit the 'net in the wake of recent comments that the film contains some homophobic humor.

In anticipation of her new movie Knocked Up, USA Today interviewed Katherine Heigl, and -- unsurprisingly -- her part in the very public tensions on the Grey's Anatomy set and the Isaiah Washington's use of a certain f-word were brought up. Heigl says:

"To me, I wasn't making a political stand ... I was making a stand about hurting people's feelings. It's very simple in my mind. You do not actively seek to hurt other people's feelings. I don't care what their sexual orientation, race or gender. You don't do that. We are all human beings, part of the human race, and we need to be compassionate and giving and kind with one another"

Amongst all the talk of "Who can say what" Heigl brings up a perspective that cuts through the worrying about a double standard -- if you know its a hurtful word why be a jerk and continue to say it?

Heigl seems ready to move on from the incident, however, saying about Washington, "I know that he was very ashamed and that was a necessary emotion to move forward and not backward. His attitude and behavior and thought process needed to change, and the only way to do that is to be self-aware and honest. And I think he was. I have forgiven."

When the interviewer brings up the homophobic humor in Knocked Up, Heigl responds, "We shot that before (the Grey's drama). Personally, I think it is language that needs to become obsolete. I hate to be righteous about it. I would prefer not to (use it)."

This was the first time I've seen Heigl address the complaints about homophobic and sexist humor in Knocked Up. Heigl is in a tough situation: it's her first starring role in a major movie, so it's understandable that she'd want to see it do well. Perhaps she's trying to strike a middle ground by bringing up her distaste for homophobic comments and humor as she promotes her film.

I wonder, too, if her reference to how the film wrapped before the Grey's incident is an admission that she hadn't considered how hurtful the word could be until it was used against someone she knew. You can catch the trailer for the movie after the jump.

Speculation circulated last Friday that Sacha Baron Cohen aka Borat aka Bruno aka Ali G had signed on to play Freddie Mercury in a biopic about the gay singer. A quick check of IMDB and Variety indicated no such thing, so I was pretty skeptical. Turns out skepticism was a good thing as Cohen's publicist released a statement this weekend saying it was "Pure hokum." Now that's short and to the point! Instead, it sounds like Johnny Depp is the front runner for the part--and, frankly, a better choice.

Katharine Heigl of Grey's Anatomy might be T.R.Knight's best friend, but that hasn't kept bisexual film director Mike White (who also wrote and starred in Chuck and Buck) from wondering if Heigl's upcoming relationship comedy Knocked Up isn't playing a little bit to the homophobes in the bleachers. Knocked Up is directed by White's colleague and friend Judd Apatow (The 40 Year Old Virgin) and White sees the "gay" jokes in both Virgin and Judd's latest as being bullying. Says White in a Sunday New York Times article:

To me, I definitely stand in the corner of wanting to give voice to the bullied, and not the bully. Here’s where comedy is catharsis for people who are picked on. There’s a strain in ‘Knocked Up’ where you sort of feel like something’s changed a little bit. My sense of it is that because those guys are idiosyncratic-looking, their perception is that they’re still the underdogs. But there is something about the spirit of the thing, that comes under the guise of comedy, where — it’s weird. At some point it starts feeling like comedy of the bullies, rather than the bullied.

The trailer for the movie (which looks like pretty well-trod ground) is after the jump. As for the potential homophobia, there is one creepy anal sex with a kid joke and a character who reads a little gay and not in a Neil Patrick Harris way.