'Straight Up' Review: Jam Sweeney's Gay Braiac Screwball Comedy - Variety

gay screwball comedy

A scriptn of trop appearg I Thk I Do (1997). I Thk I Do is a gay screwball edy wrten and directed by Brian Sloan. Five years ago, Bob ( …

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MARCIA GAY HARN (‘SO HELP ME TODD’) DISCS THE ‘SCREWBALL EDY SENSIBILY’ OF NEW LEGAL SERI [EXCLIVE VIO INTERVIEW]

Jam Sweeney's tale of a young gay man who don't like sex — and thks he mt be straight — is a new kd of braiac screwball edy. * gay screwball comedy *

As a gay man, he was also a trailblazer, and his relatnship wh Billy Daniels was somethg of an open secret Hollywood. "Some Like It Hot" is outrageo all the bt ways, featurg plenty of cross-drsg, and is rife wh subtle and explic referenc to homosexualy.

Homosexualy, amongst other thgs, was explicly outlawed. Osr Homolka,.

“Straight Up” tells the story of Todd (played by Sweeney), an sanely articulate Asian-Amerin gay software r, wh shirts buttoned up to his Adam’s apple, who’s so quick and fsy and arch that the thoughts pour out of him like nfsnal word salad. So what he cis, on a whim of iron, is that the reason he’s nng om his sexualy is that he is not, fact, gay. Der, his two bt iends — Meg (Dana Drori), a tic mol and supereak, and Ryr (Jam Scully), his longtime gay chum — beg to differ.

HE JT WENT GAY ALL OF A SUDN: CARY GRANT AND THE SCREWBALL COMEDY

Girls aren’t gay-bld anymore. He’s gay, and has nvced himself that he’s havg a sexual-inty crisis, all to avoid nontg his real crisis: that he has walled himself off om the human race. Taken at face value, “Straight Up” is the story of a gay du who puts himself through his own form of gay-programmg therapy (so naturally, ’s doomed not to take).

Is Todd someone who, as Ryr observ, “n’t get over your ternalized homophobia”?

"The Gay Divorcee" (1934). The mil film "The Gay Divorcee" is the first lead role pairg of dancg partners Fred Astaire and Gger Rodgers (the duo prevly appeared together supportg rol the prev year's "Flyg Down to R"). “I thk I loved the fact that was a edy, ” reflect Marcia Gay Harn on what first drew her to the script for her CBS seri “So Help Me Todd.

*BEAR-MAGAZINE.COM* GAY SCREWBALL COMEDY

Marcia Gay Harn (‘So Help Me Todd’) vio terview - GoldDerby .

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