Frank Oz weighs on 'Same Street' wrer sayg Bert and Ernie are gay

BERT AND ERNIE ARE ED A GAY UPLE, 'SAME STREET' WRER CLAIMS
SAME STREET SAYS BERT AND ERNIE 'DON'T HAVE A SEXUAL ORIENTATN' AFTER LONGTIME WRER CLAIMS THEY'RE GAY
THE FIGHT OVER SAME STREET’S BERT AND ERNIE AS A GAY UPLE, EXPLAED
ARE BERT AND ERNIE A GAY UPLE? FALLY, THE ANSWER
FRANK OZ WEIGHS ON 'SAME STREET' WRER SAYG BERT AND ERNIE ARE GAY

BERT AND ERNIE ARE ED A GAY UPLE, 'SAME STREET' WRER CLAIMS

A former wrer for the Muppets said he nsired Bert and Ernie to be gay — and Same Street quickly refuted his terpretatn * ernie and bert gay *

A former wrer for Same Street said a recent terview that he nsired Bert and Ernie to be gay — but the show rebutted this claim, sayg the puppets “do not have a sexual orientatn.

SAME STREET SAYS BERT AND ERNIE 'DON'T HAVE A SEXUAL ORIENTATN' AFTER LONGTIME WRER CLAIMS THEY'RE GAY

“I always felt that whout a huge agenda, when I was wrg Bert & Ernie, they were [gay], ” Saltzman said.

’ But those two… you had characters that appealed to a gay dience. Are Bert and Ernie gay? Same Street has always had one nsistent official answer (no, they’re not), but that hasn’t stopped the two famo felt roommat om beg gay ins and occupyg a unique role the queer rights movement.

Controversy over their perceived homosexualy has raged termtently for s, spearhead by both alli and adversari — and a new flare-up shows that ’s not gog away anytime soon. The official negatn was echoed by puppetmaster Frank Oz, who origally performed Bert oppose Jim Henson as Ernie, and who stated on Twter that “They’re not [gay], of urse.

THE FIGHT OVER SAME STREET’S BERT AND ERNIE AS A GAY UPLE, EXPLAED

For those queer fans lookg for narrative subtext, there’s plenty to be found the personas of Bert and Ernie; after all, there’s a reason we as a culture have been discsg their relatnship for s, a reason that they ntue to be held up as gay ins across generatns — and a reason people have spent s beg hoppg mad about . It’s all pretty gay!

Among homosexuals, Bert and Ernie of Same Street are the real thg. Bert and Ernie nduct themselv the same lovg, discreet way that lns of gay men, women and hand puppets do.

“I don’t believe there was much public discsn, ser or otherwise, about the crypto-gayns of The Odd Couple the 1960s and ’70s, ” he wrote an email.

ARE BERT AND ERNIE A GAY UPLE? FALLY, THE ANSWER

“That kd of disurse only appeared ncerng work about straight characters by gay wrers — most famoly, whether Who’s Aaid of Virgia Woolf was somehow ‘really’ about a gay uple, ” he add. “In 1980, when I published my Bert & Ernie thg, there were still no out gay characters mass media.

The piece of the zegeist I was rpondg to was, jt a after Stonewall (which BTW occurred a few months before Same Street premiered) and the first pri march, the hly ‘normalized’ nature of out gayns plac like New York. The nversatn between Saltzman and terviewer Reddish is illumatg and poignant, equently returng to Saltzman’s experience as a young gay man the early ’80s, one fdg his way out of the closet jt as the AIDS epimic was begng to be wily unrstood.