BROS

BROS is a hilarious film that a number of reactionaries have been attacking.  C.I. has addressed this at THE COMMON ILLS and 

Part I

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Wednesday, October 5, 2022.  We mainly focus on the backlash within the US in today's snapshot (and we'll continue on that topic tomorrow).

As we noted earlier this week, we are in a backlash period.  With that in mind, THE GRIO reports:

A religious school in Florida delivered a very direct message to students and their parents: Students will only be addressed according to the “gender on their birth certificates” and LGBTQ+ students are not to attend.

NBC News reported that Grace Christian School, in Valrico, used Bible verses in a June 6 email to parents to support its decisions. Students who identify as gay, transgender or gender nonconforming “would be asked to leave the school immediately,” according to the email from administrator Barry McKeen. 

That's shocking and disgusting.

But don't worry, Jonathan Turley will shortly tell us this is a 'free speech' issue.  (That was sarcasm.)

Let's deal with that before we go further.  Jonathan is one of our finest legal minds today.  He is not right 100%.  He is not even consistent 90% of the time.

He is dead wrong on a case that's about to go before the Court, for example.  And he's hiding behind 'free speech.'  Unlike, Jonathan, I actually support free speech.  By that I mean, I support it.  I'm not Jonathan having a freak out because someone leaked to the press a forthcoming opinion from the Court.  A free speech advocate doesn't grab the vapors over that.  

Jonathan would allow people to discriminate against LGBTQs and he would say it was their free speech right.  A baker, he insists, should be allowed to refuse service to a gay couple if the baker doesn't believe in marriage equality.  The baker, Jonathan will tell you, is an artist and has free speech rights.

F**K THAT S**T.

Art, as Jennifer Jason Leigh observes in MRS. PARKER AND THE VICIOUS CIRCLE, is not an elastic term.

A baker may make the most delicious cake in the world, the baker is still not an artist.

And Jonathan's idiotic and ahistorical approach here, if applied, would have allowed the Civil Rights Movement to have never progressed.  You can't sit at the counter, courts would have ordered, because you're interfering with the artist working there whose free speech rights allow the soda jerk to refuse you service because they're religious beliefs say you are not their equal.

There's a lot of homophobia going around and Jonathan apparently believes he can conceal his by claiming discrimination is allowed because a baker is an artist.  I wonder if a museum -- a gallery of art work -- could get away with refusing someone entry based on who they sleep with, the color of their skin, their gender or whatever?  Legally no -- unless you're using Jonathan Turley's 'logic.'

Which brings us back to BROS.

BROS is a romantic comedy that opened at theaters last Friday.  Billy Eichner co-wrote the screenplay and he stars in the film with Luke Macfarlane.  

The filming budget was around $22 million dollars.  It made almost $5 million over the weekend.  So it's made approximately, during the weekend only, 1/4 of its shooting budget.  That's not a bomb.  

Nor was it "a meager opening" -- as the liar Sardine puts it at a publication.

It'll make back its budget and then some, turn a big profit, once it goes into home video and everyone knew that going in.

I have no idea why it was hyped to make $10 million in its opening week.  

I have no idea why everyone IGNORES the reality that theaters outside the cities it did well were taking actions to hurt the film.  If you're showing SMILE two or three times at night but you're only showing BROS once at night and you're the same theater and you're making BROS the last show, you're harming its chances to sell an equal number of tickets.  The showings around the country meant BROS was never going to make ten million its opening weekend.  And I said that before it opened.  

I've had this discussion with THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER and they know this.  They choose to ignore it because they're a homophobic outlet.  They've always been crap, they were part of McCarthyism.  

Richard Newby writes a stupid article for them where he wants you to know how offsides Billy is for Tweeting that "straight people didn't show up."  This is different, Richard insists, from Viola Davis instructing people to show up for THE WARRIOR KING to support African-American female led films.  (No, it's not.)  And the marketing, he wants to insist, is different from MARVEL marking BLACK PANTHER as the first Black superhero film.  

Hmm.

I'm a friend of Wesley Snipes.  Is that why I'm the only one, who for years now, keeps pointing out that BLADE is the first big budget film based on a comic book with an African-American lead?

I'm just so f-ing tired of all the nonsense.

Billy took part in a great movie and he made it happen and he has every right to be upset right now.  Just as an artist -- Jonathan Turley, look over at Billy, that's an artist -- he has every right to be upset. 

BROS is hilarious and it's a great film and it's one of the year's finest.  

I want to address the blaming of Billy for a moment.

'If only it were Channing Tatum, it needed someone who looks like Chan.'

Really?

I sat through the awful FORGET PARIS because Debra Winger's a friend and, sorry, but Billy Crystal is not remotely good looking. 

As for the cast of BROS, please check out Guy Branum's Twitter thread.  

'If only it had stars.'

Let's go to Billy Crystal again.  He wasn't a film star when he made WHEN HARRY MET SALLY  . . .  Nor was Meg Ryan at that time a star.

People are trying to explain why the film didn't meet the over expectations at the box office and some are blaming Billy.  That's stupid and it shouldn't be taking place.  (I don't know Billy, by the way, I've never met him.  I do know Luke Macfarlane.)  He made something really important happen and the last thing people need to be doing is blaming him.

But there's blame going on.  Again: The blame goes to the theaters -- and to UNIVERSAL for not grasping what was happening -- with how they showed the film.  When you bury it in the evenings by only showing it once and at your last showing, you're sending a message the same way ABC did when they slapped a warning in front of every episode of ELLEN during the show's final season.  You're also making it very hard for people to see it.  "Let's go see a movie after dinner.  I wanna see BROS.  Oh, it's not showing until ten.  Hmm.  Want to see SMILE instead?  It's on at seven, eight-thirty and ten."

Alastair and Zachary Patton-Garcia discuss BROS on their latest COFFEE AND TEQUILA.

They have an honest conversation worth streaming.  Which doesn't mean I agree 100%.  I'm on record about the nonsense of casting and selling LOVE SIMON and LOVE VICTOR.  (And since my friend's no longer married to horse face, I no longer have to try to be nice to her.)

But it's an honest discussion and it brings up many issues that are being ignored.  

An issue that they don't bring up is at play currently in industry publications.  There is a move to slaughter BROS.

That's only surprising if you're unaware of the entrenched homophobia in the film industry.

William Haines is rightly celebrated by some as a strong person who bucked the system.  The Tom Cruise of his day,, he made one successful silent film after another, audiences loved him.  William was gay.  MGM gave him the ultimatum of dump your lover and marry a woman or we dump you.  He refused to comply and they dumped him.  He and his lover Jimmie Shields went on to have a long relationship that lasted until Haines' death and they also started a successful business that's still alive today.

William was presented with the ultimatum for only one reason: He was a star.  He was a money maker. 

The same homophobia didn't render 'nelly' supporting actors invisible.  

Why was that?

Why were they, in fact, supported?

Hollywood went out of its way to establish that image.  

They telegraphed this is what gay is.  (Ava and I have covered this at length. If you're late to the party, probably start with our first piece on HAPPY ENDINGS.)

It was about money.  It's always been about money.

Rock Hudson can make money, keep him in the closet.  You can help him stay a money maker by elevating stereotypical portraits of gays so that people know that's what a gay person acts like and, therefore,  there's no way a Rock Hudson could be gay.

MGM continued to employ gay people after William Haines.  It wasn't anti-gay in that way.  But it wanted to protect its own profits and you either played the game or you were out.

Billy has cast a film with LGBTQ actors and that's an uncomfortable reality for some.  Those whining about the marketing campaign,  should grasp that UNIVERSAL could have went with, "Not since Nazimova . . ."  And cited Nancy Regan's godmother (Naimova's SALOME is supposed to be an all gay cast.)  Billy  also presented a hugely diverse canvas of what LGBTQ can be and that's uncomfortable for some.

We live in a world where a no-talent can, and did, smear a dead woman who told her the truth about her gay father.  The no-talent can then say Oh, it doesn't matter.  And in this world no one's going to point out that the entire industry says no-talent is a lesbian and that her marriage to a gay man is a sham and that no-talent, in the 80s, went on a talk show acting as part of a lesbian thruple.

We live in a world where actors and actresses are still told, "Don't come out, it will kill your career."

That doesn't mean the studio doesn't know that Mr. X is gay.  That does mean that they need him to continue to play straight in public.

There is a huge homophobia built into the system and it goes back to the start of the industry.

BROS transgressed and now certain elements of the industry are moving in to attack.

That's appalling.  They're doing it for profit motive.  They're doing it to keep certain things hidden, realities of life.  The closet has proven to be very profitable for the industry.  

Billy made a great film.  He should be proud of himself.  People should see the film.  It's hilarious.   If you doubt it, read some of the community coverage:

Part II

Thursday, October 6, 2022.  We're part two on BROS today and we also note a new event in Iraq and an anniversary.

   

This week, the late Cass Elliot got her star on The Hollywood Walk of Fame thanks to the very hard work of her daughter Owen Kunkle.  Cass was a one-of-a-kind vocalist.  With The Mamas and the Papas (Michelle Phillips, Denny Doherty and John Phillips), she sang on such classics as "Dream A Little Dream Of Me," "Safe In My Garden," "California Dreamin'," "Creeque Alley," "Dancing Bear," "Midnight Voyage," "Got A Feeling," "Monday, Monday," "I Saw Her Again Last Night," "Sing For Your Supper," "12:30 (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon)," "Dedicated To The One I Love," "Too Late," "Words of Love" and many more.  As a solo artist, her classics included "California Earthquake," "Make Your Own Kind Of Music," "It's Getting Better," "New World Coming," "Move In A Little Closer Baby," etc.  "Different" (video above) is a song she performs in the film PUFNSTUF.   There are so many classics waiting to be rediscovered.  I'd include Cass' version of Judee Sill's "Jesus Was A Crossmaker" . . . 

. . . and of Laura Nyro's "He's A Runner."

Owen's done a great job honoring her mother.  Cass is remembered to this day.  And her music pops up everywhere -- yes, LOST, but I'm thinking of Hettie MacDonald's BEAUTIFUL THING.  That 1996 film is an important one.  

We're back to BROS and we're back to my marveling over how some people are so uninformed and some are taking part in the backlash without even grasping it.

BROS is the best comedy of 2022. Billy Eichner co-wrote the screenplay and he stars in the film with Luke Macfarlane.  People are continuing to see it and maybe if theaters were running it it would be making even more money.  I've already detailed how homophobia on the part of theater owners led to less showings on the Friday it debuted.  But what's going on now, especially with AMC theaters, is it's only been shown once or twice a day.  Even so, it made $1.4 million on Monday and Tuesday -- Wednesday's numbers will come out later today.

It's an important film and let's address that because people don't seem to understand what an important film is.

Some are carping and blaming Billy -- on that, I haven't seen anything like that since MOMENT BY MOMENT -- when, as Academy Award winning film editor Verna Fields (JAWS, WHAT'S UP DOC?, PAPER MOON, AMERICAN GRAFFITI . . .) observed they refused to let the film die.  They being the industry.  They slammed and they ripped apart long after it had faded away.  The film starred Lily Tomlin and John Travolta.  It was directed by Jane Wagner.  And it was attacked because the director was a lesbian.

Now MOMENT BY MOMENT is not a great film.  It's not an awful film.  There were awful films released at that time and they were allowed to fade away.  But there was a concentrated effort to go after the film.  As Verna pointed out, many, many films bomb and they're allowed to die but with Jane Wagner's film, they wouldn't let it.  They kept after it, kept insulting and destroying it inflating it into the all time worst movie.

If MOMENT BY MOMENT were widely available today -- TCM can show the crap that is WHO'S THAT GIRL? but they can't show Jane Wagner's film -- it might be re-evaluated.  It might seem better than it did in its own time.

But let's teach the lesbian her place -- that was the industry's goal.  Everyone knew Lily was gay and that she and Jane were in a relationship -- everyone in the industry knew.  And no studio wanted Lily out of the closet and they didn't want her working with Jane.  Which is why Lily and Jane would find their success on Broadway.  

The industry doesn't honor coming out.  It never has.  Ellen came out and ABC pissed all over her show -- adding that warning before every episode, for example, refusing to promote it, acting as though it was a flop when it was still doing better than SPIN CITY or the awful show that replaced it.

Ellen got another shot at sitcoms.  But CBS refused to back it.  It didn't belong on Friday nights -- something they realized when the show landed Mary Tyler Moore and Ed Asner as guest stars on one episode.  CBS suddenly moved the show to Monday nights for one episode.  Oh, wow, look at the high ratings, look at the difference a time slot can make.  Then it was immediately shove it back to Fridays.

CBS didn't want to support it -- like they didn't want to support PARTNERS.  

Sometimes, the industry is more interested in laying down the law than they are in making a profit.

And some of the garbage being published in the trades reads like an effort to destroy Billy.  Even sadder, the trashing is finding an audience gleeful to join in.

(As noted  before, I know Luke Macfarlane and consider him a friend.  I don't know Billy, I've never even met him.)

Billy has made an amazing film and egged on by the trades, some of the garbage is mutlyping online.

 

And some supposedly saw the movie.

They blame Billy, for example, because BROKEBACK was a hit!!!!  If BROKEBACK is a hit then BROS would be too -- it must not be any good!

Did they not see BROS?  The dead cowboy?

I believe Billy makes that point in the film -- sadness and death straight audiences are more than fine with now.  That's where we've progressed as a society.  We can applaud BROKEBACK and even the hideous LOVE SIMON and its after birth LOVE VICTOR.

Ava and I wrote the following in June of 2020:

Original content? Sometimes about the only thing nice you can say is: Well it's new content.

We thought about that as we suffered through LOVE, VICTOR. HULU decided to do a TV series out of the film LOVE, SIMON. And they brought along all the baggage from the film.

You may remember Jennifer Garner and other stars of the film tried to pimp the movie. BLACK PANTHER had done incredible at the box office for many reasons, The people behind LOVE, SIMON suspected one reason for the film's success was that BLACK PANTHER was being pushed as a film with a person of color playing an admired comic book hero. Outside of Wesley Snipes in the BLADE films, that had not happened.

In the crazy world where Jennifer Garner has some sort of career despite so-so talents, it seemed logical to tell people that they should see LOVE SIMON because it was about a gay person.

Here's the thing, and we objected in real time, Chadwik Boseman played Black Panther (and did so with an amazing performance). Boseman is a person of color.

LOVE, SIMON? It starred boxy Nick Robinson as a gay man. But, here's the problem (pay attention, Jennifer), Nick Robinson is not gay (or, if he is gay, he's in the closet).

The idiots didn't get it. They still don't.

LOVE, VICTOR is supposed to instill gay pride. How?

Michael Cimino stars as high schooler Victor who, yes, is gay.

And, if this were 1992, that might be something. But it's not 1992, it's 2020.

How can a series preach gay pride or even just tolerance (we've never been fans of tolerance) when the gay character is played by a straight actor (judging by his INSTAGRAM)?

If being gay is okay (and we agree that it is), why are you casting straight actors in the role?

Anybody remember IN AND OUT? One of the jokes in the movie is that Matt Dillon's straight character plays -- and wins an Oscar for playing -- a gay character. That was funny in 1997. In 2020, it's just sad. 

What a great message for the world, for the youth, for us all -- It's okay to play gay.

Not to be gay, understand, but it's okay for a straight person to play gay.

Both LOVEs refused to cast an out gay actor -- as either Simon or Victor.  

I'm sorry, love Scarlet Johansson to tears, but, no, when trans actors are getting cast so little it is not right for a non-trans person to play a trans character.

This was our beef with Cleveland of FAMILY GUY and THE CLEVELAND SHOW -- Ava and I tackled that repeatedly at THIRD -- why is a White actor voicing Cleveland on FAMILY GUY and it only got worse on TCS when other non-African-Americans were brought on to voice Black characters.

Can a straight actor play a gay character?  Sure.  They might even be able to play it well.  But when out actors are still trying for something more than a bit part, casting gay leads with straight actors is offensive.

And don't pretend that Billy and Luke both being out wasn't an issue.  Don't pretend for one moment.  

Billy could have cast a straight actor as his love interest.  We would've gotten a crappy movie -- because after that concession, he would have had to make many more -- and some ass would be posting online about how it was a hit that made $65 million for the studio.  No, it didn't -- we really need to educate on markets and on theaters and on the issue of who makes the most upfront -- I'm tired of idiots trying to handicap the box office when they don't know what the f**k they're talking about.  They're usually quoting crapapedia -- that's where they get garbage about how LOVE SIMON is the X on the all time list of top grossing teen romance movies per BOX OFFICE MOJO!  That link doesn't work because it never did work because that's not a truth.  And if you want to make a list, you better grasp that SIXTEEN CANDLES had $80 million in ticket sales because you can't take that 80s movie and put it on the list without putting it into today's dollars. 

Billy made a movie that mattered.

When we've talked about this to groups this week someone will raise a hand or clear their throat and I know before they open their mouth where they are about to go . . . "No offense, but I think the pushback in society is to a degree because of trans people."

Do you think that?

You may be right.

And I think: Good.  

There's always going to be a backlash, the pendulum is always going to swing one way and then the next.

It is important that people press for progress.  That's the only way it ever happens.

The trans community shouldn't be silent and they shouldn't have to wait for their rights.  We should all be pushing for equality.  

You don't win anything by being silent.  You don't win anything by saying, "I'll fight in a few years."

Did the trans community make some people uncomfortable?  Again, if they did, good.  That's how we grow.  

And Billy's made a great movie in terms of entertainment.  But he's also made a historic movie by being so true to himself.  

He and Luke are the first gay (out) actors to play a same-sex couple that a film's focused on where they fall in love, where they have sex and neither dies.

Your crappy LOVE SIMON, if you've forgotten, makes the climatic moment of the film Simon finding out who his admirer was.  Yeah, that's all they could handle in the 90s and LOVE SIMON is not going to push for anything better than what we could have seen decades ago.

ABC let Ellen come out but they didn't know how to deal with her once she was out.  It was one thing for her to have a non-romantic kiss with Laura Dern on the coming out episode (idiots continue to refer to it as a romantic kiss -- no, Laura's character is already involved and in a relationship) but when Ellen found Lori, the next season, ABC had such a huge problem with it.

LOVE SIMON takes you to the first gloricous sunset and that's all some can handle.  Billy went beyond that and his film is transformative.

Back when he was president, Barack Obama got really pissed at Joe Biden when Joe went on MEET THE PRESS because Barack was going to do a slow-roll on marriage equality and Joe forced everyone's hand.  Joe also noted, in that appearance, that attitudes had changed towards gay people because of WILL & GRACE.  Joe was right.  

Without representation, people don't exist.  That's true in a democracy and it's true in the arts.  

Billy's put some truth onto the screen.  He's changed the country as a result.

I am very limited on what criticism I will take right now on Billy because he has not gotten any where near the credit he deserves for what he's done.  

Or for the crap he's had to put up with over the last days.

He insulted us!!!! Get a damn grip.  He said straight people didn't turn out for the movie.  He's right.  as a group, we did not turn out.  It's a fact.  

He's blaming!!!! It's a fact and I didn't hear blaming in it, I heard shock and surprise.  And he has every right to have that (or any other) response.  The film achieved.  Where's the audience?

I don't think they were steered to it.  When you have the kind of reviews BROS got?  That's one of your trailers.  Not "Such and such on Rotten Tomatoes" -- a small segment of the audience cares about RT.  That's about it.  What you do is you pull quote from reviews and make that a trailer.  

But UNIVERSAL didn't want to do that.  The attitude was, "We've spent enough promoting the film."  And that was before it opened.  Before.  

A film with those of reviews?  A studio goes all out -- drama or comedy.  They go all out promoting. Studios live for those kind of reviews.

Even now, UNIVERSAL's not doing a good job.  There should have been multiple trailers.  There should be clips on YOUTUBE that you can stream -- multiple clips.  There are not.  

And where is the romance in the trailer?

We do get a kiss . . . after some pushing and shoving that others mistake as a physical fight and think they have to break up -- cue laughter.  As a scene in the movie, it more than works.  In the trailer?  Looks a lot like the reaction to 1982's PARTNERS (the comedy starring Ryan O'Neal and John Hurt).  

Why was UNIVERSAL more scared of romance being shown in the trailer?  

Time and again, you look at everything that went down and you see institutionalized homophobia.

Billy was up against all of that.  And he made an incredible film.

Repeatedly, I see people posting that the trailer turned them off because it mocked straight people.  A number of people are insisting that they are butt hurt over that.

Then they 'quote' the line and get it wrong.  But more to the point, that same trailer - the only trailer -- had Billy and Luke speaking and saying gay people were so stupid.

That happened before the joke about straight people.  

It's interesting to watch this conversation and see what gets emphasized and what goes unspoken.

Alice Walker has always said she writes the world she wants to see.  

And that's what you have to do.  Most of us will never see the possibilities unless someone gives us a glimpse. 

With BROS, Billy goes beyond the climatic coming out moment after which Hollywood wants the gay characters to go away or to drop deep into the background and be supporting characters.  He goes beyond the it's-okay-for-them-to-be-in-love-because-one-is-going-to-die nonsense.  

BROS shatters everything that Hollywood has created over many, many decades.

He didn't settle, he pushed the conversation along.  He took us, in one film, further than Hollywood's done in three decades.

And that's what you do if you're an artist, it's what you do if you're an activist.

No one is ever going to be happy to let go of their prejudice and their entitlement.

Dave Chappelle (who I know and like) has too much fun mocking the transgender community.  He's too vested in it.  And, in his mind, you're an awful person if you're asking him to stop and think for a moment.  I said when the criticism mounted against Dave that he needed to listen and that people were right to press him on this issue.  That's not censorship, that's a dialogue, that's an exchange in the public square.

The trans community pushed their issues and that's what they needed to do.  

They have every right to participate in this democracy, they have every right to raise their issues and to say "Here I am."

And only by doing that are they going to be heard and are they going to be appreciated.  That's how it is for every minority group.  You have to fight.  

But you have to fight smartly.  That's not a slam on the trans community, I think they've done a wonderful job.  That is a slam on some of the people posting carps online about BROS.  Billy delivered.  It's not his fault that the studio didn't.  It's not his fault.

UNIVERSAL did the bare minimum ahead of the film and now they're willing to let the film die.  They're not trying to fix their mistakes.  They're not rushing out a trailer that is nothing but pull quotes.  They're not rushing a trailer that's showing romance.  They're not even flooding the internet with clips.

They want the credit and their egos stroked.  They haven't done anything wonderful.  Billy worked his ass off.  UNIVERSAL's basically copying Aaron Spelling in the 90s, copying him in 2022.  That's not bravery and it's nothing that should earn them any credit.

 

As certain elements within the industry gleefully sharpen their knives for Billy, I wish there was a real pushback leading us to all acknowledge what he has achieved.

 Billy is not Orson Welles and BROS is not CITIZEN KANE.  But we're seeing Billy getting that treatment, the post-CITIZEN KANE treatment where the industry turned on Orson.  

Part III

On BROS, I made the points I wanted to make in the last two snapshots (here and here) and thought we were not going to cover it today.  Then came the online push claiming that FIRE ISLAND does what BROS did not.

No, it doesn't.  

You have no understanding of film if you believe that.  First off, FIRE ISLAND did not become a conversation.  Second, it wasn't a strong film.  The first act is slow and weak.  Ava and I covered it when it came out:

Jane shouldn't do stand up. Stand up comedian Joel Kim Booster shouldn't try to write screenplays. He wrote the script for FIRE ISLAND -- an update on Jane Austen's PRIDE AND PREJUDICE. The first forty minutes are excruciating. Once we get into Joel's character and the film's Mr. Darcy, it begins to work. You actually care about those two.

Otherwise?

Too many movies -- and TV shows (think NAOMI) -- are just spitting out characters and confusing audiences.

The reason films used "types" -- Thelma Ritter and others for character roles -- was to help the audience follow. It's also why famous and semi-famous people are often cast in roles. Outside of Margaret Cho, most of the cast is unfamiliar to movie goers. Joel' screenplay starts with too many characters and they really needed to cast recognizable faces or at least distinct ones. CLUELESS, another update of Jane Austen, worked because it established characters and used 'types' -- the skateboarder, the preppie, etc.  

There is also the fact that it's a celibate film.  Did no one notice that?  Honestly, a number of gay people on Twitter are pimping this as better than BROS but it's a chaste little film for the female/male lead.  If you don't get it, it's PRIDE AND PREJUDICE by Jane Austen.  It's an adaptation.  Joel Kim Booster makes a lovely Elizabeth Bennett, but not much of a gay man living in 2022.  

The film has many things going for it.  But it's akin to an independent film like IT'S MY PARTY in terms of look and feel.  It wasn't an advance and considering Joel's remarks in his NETFLIX special -- his angry screeds -- I'm surprised anyone's pimping this.  Ava and I also noted that, "His persona may just be saying things for humor. If that's the case, keep it up. But if he's serious about getting complaints from gay people about his jokes, he might try grasping that he's not The Voice for Gay America."

I'm glad that PRIDE AND PREJUDICE still resonates.  But FIRE ISLAND reminds me of the play a famous blowhard wrote in college.  It was his life story.  He made himself front and center in the play.  And every other character existed to tell him how great he was.  They really weren't characters in their own right.  After he started writing films (and, later, bad TV), he just knew his play would connect with me.  (I'd passed on his previous projects.)  I was ambushed while having lunch (a friend tipped him off).  I was still a smoker then, thank goodness because I couldn't have made it through his play without a vice.  Indulgent was the kindest term.  

I told him it was as though Jules (Demi Moore's character in ST. ELMO'S FIRE) had written her own story.  There was no understanding of the world around her (I'm not talking politics or anything other than her immediate world) and that the other characters were all props for the main character (him).  There was no arc of growth.  It was just one indulgent scene after another.

I know screenplays, I've read a number, I've acted a number and I'm also good at plot points and finding where the beat should be (those last two are with regards to films I'm not a part of but that friends who are directors seek my opinion on). 

There are many reasons you can like a film.  It can be a hideous mess like 1987's ANNA but you can love it for Sally Kirkland's  outstanding performance.  Jane Fonda elevated KLUTE to film classic with her performance -- the finest performance by any actor or actress in a film that was released in the second half of the 20th century. You can love a film because the character reminds you of someone you love -- or of yourself.  A film can be a significant piece of art all around -- SOME LIKE IT HOT, for example -- and you love it for that reason.

And there are aspects to applaud with regards to FIRE ISLAND.  But, no, it's not on the level of BROS.  It's screenplay dithers at the start.  It's casting is way off.  It feels like a Greg Berlanti project and, no, that's not a compliment.  Greg wasn't the unnamed blow hard I was referring to above.  That blowhard is straight.

It may reflect your life onscreen and that's great if it does.  But by any critical measure it's just an okay film/TV movie.  

It's not revolutionary or brave -- I think Doris Day got more action in PILLOW TALK than Joel Kim Booster did in FIRE ISLAND. 

And to be clear, FIRE ISLAND isn't a bad film.  It's a weak film.  AMERICA'S SWEETHEARTS is a bad film.  

The idiot at WE GOT THIS COVERED insists:

Fire Island came out with a bang as not only was it released during pride month, but according to Mashable, it was the sixth most streamed film during the week of its release, outperforming Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. Meanwhile, Bros was unable to outgross the Avatar re-release and is currently being vastly outperformed by the new horror film, Smile.

May 24th is when SONIC 2 came out on streaming.  That means it was in its fourth week of streaming release when FIRE ISLAND 'beat it.'  JURRASIC WORLD: FALLEN KINGDOM is a 2017 movie.  And that week that is highlighted?  FIRE ISLAND is not the number one streaming film -- not even number one of rom-coms.  No, Sandra Bullock's LOST CITY is number three -- and it came out on streaming May 10th -- and weeks and weeks later it still beat FIRE ISLAND.  I don't know how you see that as a win but most people aren't stupid enough to scan Crapapedia and then write a report.  You can call it cribbing but let's be honest, it's plagiarism -- and plagiarism of a very bad source.

BROS came in number five last weekend.  It's harder to sell tickets -- a pandemic, Hurricane Ian, fears of harm over buying a ticket to a movie with a storyline about gay people, etc -- so don't compare the two -- but if the metrics were exact, BROS still did better.  Yet WE GOT THIS COVERED starts out their (mis)report insisting BROS bombed. (BROS sold 1.5 million in tickets -- that's Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday -- Thursdays numbers will be released later today.  People are continuing to see the film.)

Another thing, stop writing about the movie if you didn't see it.  And I'm not really sure what you can understand about a film and its response in the United States when you're writing from Australia -- in other words, maybe butt the hell out.  It's interesting that BROS is said to be "less gay" than FIRE ISLAND.  That's not accurate.  Again, maybe don't comment on the movie you didn't see.  Aaron (Luke MacFarlane) is a "BRO" singular.  And Bobby (Billy) thinks Aaron only likes BROS.  But Aaron is the only BRO in the film.  (Some men in the club may or may not be BROS -- they don't have dialogue and we don't know.)   I'm sorry that idiots on Twitter who haven't seen the film have influenced an idiot at WE GOT THIS COVERED to write about something that's completely inaccurate.  There are tons of characters in the films -- gay, lesbian, bi, trans, etc -- Aaron's the only BRO.  We assume that his old friend from high school is probably a BRO. (Bobby makes that assumption when he's worried that Aaron doesn't find him attractive.)   But Aaron spent his life assuming that his hockey team buddy was straight.  And he's not acting very BRO when he's in bed with Aaron, Bobby and Steven. 

Jamyl Dobson's character may strike some as a BRO but a BRO wouldn't have a Barbra Streisand poster up on their wall.  Again, it helps, when critiquing a film, to have actually seen it.

There are a multitude of characters in BROS -- they are not all the same.

And that's what screenwriter  Joel Kim Booster doesn't grasp -- not everyone is alike, not everyone is the same.  Actors in FIRE ISLAND can only do so much with a weak script. 

The idiot at WE GOT THIS COVERED is repeating a false charge and that is why you really need to see a movie to comment on it.  The exception is commenting that you have no interest in seeing the film.  I'm fine with that.  I have always been fine with that.  But if you don't see the film you really shouldn't be talking about what it is or what it isn't because you honestly don't know.

I loved WORLD CAN'T WAIT and Debra Sweet (I know Debra).  But when she started slamming a film and calling for it to be censored -- when she hadn't seen it?  We dropped WORLD CAN'T WAIT.  

I'm an artist first and foremost.  And I'm not ever going to support cries of censorship to begin with.  But when you start attacking a work that you haven't seen?  

Go find another person to plug your activities because it won't be me.

You failed to do the basics before jumping into this conversation.  You're an idiot, Erielle Sudario for writing the article.  And it reveals how vested you are in attacking Billy and what he has done that you rush your ill thought out words into print.  They couldn't pass a fact check. Don't they teach journalism in Australia?

Equally true, since I'm now writing on the topic again, let me plug my friend Luke who is better looking than anyone in FIRE ISLAND.  He has true charisma.  Not just chemistry with Bobby, but true charisma.  And he looks hot as hell in the film.

We need to point out  the sexism involved in Twitter segment that WE GOT THIS COVERED elected to amplify.  A small group of gays are saying FIRE ISLAND is better because it's their life (they wish) and they're worried about representation.

Really?

Or are you just self-involved jerks?

Because I only saw Margaret Cho playing a lesbian in FIRE ISLAND.  

14 people in the main cast and only one's a woman -- and this is representative?  

If that truly reflects your life, what a sad life you live.

(There are 21 characters in the main cast of BROS.  I am counting Debra Messing who plays herself -- and is hilarious -- as a character because she's in more than one scene.  I am not counting Kenan Thompson, Ben Stiller, Amy Schumer, Seth Meyers or Kristin Chenoweth as characters -- they do cameos.  Explain to me also which FIRE ISLAND characters were bi, trans or non-binary?  Again, a small group of Twitter trolls are playing 'woke' but just sporting their hatred of women and anyone who isn't like them.)  

The unruly Twitter children are out of their minds as they drool over their own mirrored reflections.  It's why they rush to celebrate FIRE ISLAND -- a bunch of young, gay men -- and say BROS -- whose characters truly are LGBTQ and straight -- isn't 'representative.'

COFFEE AND TEQUILA has offered two strong pieces covering BROS this week.  We've already noted the first one in a snapshot but let's put it in this snapshot too.

And now here's the more recent one.