Desperate Housewives Outs Gay Teen With a Kiss
by Sarah Warn
February 21, 2005
The fact that Desperate Housewives's 16-year-old Andrew Van de Camp
(Shawn Pyfrom) is gay hasn't exactly been the best-kept secret in
town: the spoiler was all over the news a few weeks ago along with
the rumor that actress Marcia Cross, who plays Andrew's mother Bree,
was going to come out as a lesbian in real life (a rumor eventually
denied by the actress).
But even with advance notice, Andrew's outing on last night's episode
of the hit ABC drama was a welcome development in gay visibility on
primetime network TV. It also made Desperate Housewives one of the
few network TV series ever to air a gay kiss.
In episode 15 ("Impossible"), housewife Susan (Teri Hatcher)
finds Andrew making out in the pool with teen gardener Justin (Ryan
Carnes, who also stars in the new indie gay comedy Eating Out). The
boys, who are naked and kissing in a dark corner of the pool, duck
under the water when Susan initially mistakes them for her daughter
and her boyfriend; when they can't hold their breath any longer and
are forced to surface. Susan realizes her mistake and stares at the
two boys in surprise, while Andrew blurts out "I'm not gay!"
New character Justin is revealed to be gay earlier in the episode,
when he admits to his employer, Gabrielle (Eva Longoria), that he
tried to sleep with her because he's afraid he might be gay.
"I've been fooling around with a buddy," Justin tells
her, which is "no big deal," except lately, he's started
to develop real feelings for his friend. "My buddy and I have
been messing around for awhile, and this whole time I kept telling
myself it didn't really mean anything, you know? Guess I've just
been kidding myself, huh."
Gabrielle responds that "we're all in denial about something,"
but commends him for "finally facing the truth." Then she
kisses him passionately on the way out, and when he admits it didn't
do anything for him, she pats him on the cheek and pronounces,
"Yep, definitely gay!"
While scenes showing two women kissing have slowly gained some
acceptance on network TV, kisses between two men are still very
much taboo. A planned romantic kiss between two men on the FOX
primetime drama Melrose Place in 1994 generated so much backlash
the network ended up cutting away from the actual kiss to show a
straight character's reaction instead.
It wasn't until 2000 that we had the first gay kiss on network TV,
on the NBC sitcom Will and Grace, but that was a "protest
kiss" between two gay male friends, rather than two men in
a romantic relationship. The first romantic kiss on network
television occurred a few months later, on the third-season finale
of the WB teen drama Dawson's Creek. Since then, there have only
been four more gay kisses on network TV: episodes of Dawson's Creek
in 2001 and 2003; a November 2003 episode of FOX's The O.C.; and an
October 2004 episode of Will and Grace (and the latter was unscripted).
With the addition of this scene on Housewives, the total number of
network TV shows airing gay kisses over the last twenty years now
totals four--compared with over 30 network TV shows airing kisses
between women during the same time period.
Which is why this scene on Desperate Housewives, however brief, is
so significant. It isn't nearly as explicit as any randomly chosen
gay scene on premium channel shows like Queer as Folk and Six Feet
Under, but it doesn't have to be explicit to be progressive for
network TV--it simply has to air.
On the surface, a series about suburban housewives may seem an
unlikely candidate to push the envelope on gay visibility. Boycotted
by various conservative groups even before its first episode aired
last fall, Desperate Housewives (whose creator, Marc Cherry, is
openly gay) lost advertisers like KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut--who
pulled their ads from the show because of its racy (heterosexual)
content--and were temporarily the subject of an FCC investigation
for a risque ad that aired during Monday Night Football in the fall.
But the constant controversy has only helped the show's ratings,
and the show doesn't seem to be having much trouble attracting enough
advertisers--which is why it is perfectly positioned to introduce a
realistic gay storyline. Two teenage boys kissing in a pool isn't
going to raise many eyebrows on a show that features storylines
about a housewife seducing her teenage gardener, a PTA mom working
as a high-class call-girl on the side, and a husband and wife exploring S&M.
Andrew has his flaws. Some big ones, in fact, like smoking pot and
feeling little remorse after accidentally running over an elderly
woman in a previous episode. He's not exactly the poster child for
a wonderful human being--but in that respect, he's no different
from all of the other residents of Wisteria Lane, few of whom you'd
actually want to live next door to.
Despite Andrew's shortcomings, if Desperate Housewives sensitively
explores his coming-out and integrates his sexuality into the storyline
on an ongoing basis, it will be one of the few dramas on primetime
network TV to do so. That it happens to be a series that receives
around 22 million viewers every week just makes it that much sweeter.
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