#i was reflecting on being a gay man and choosing to take on a project about vampires and deciding they should be old enough to fuck

[marypsue]

Something about The Lost Boys, a deeply, deliberately queer movie all about vampires (so necessarily obsessed with blood transfer/exchange), where being attracted to the wrong person, taking risks around them, taking their tainted blood into your body, will change your life irrevocably and doom you to death, coming out in 1987, and saying that the real source of the majority of the problems caused by sharing tainted blood is a respectable middle-aged middle-class white man obsessed with power, heteronormativity, and the replication and eternal enshrinement of the nuclear family structure, and that the only way to survive and cure the infection is to destroy him...whoooo.

[jgroffdaily]

Excerpts:

It’s a personal story for Groff, who relates to Frank’s interior life and how others (don’t) respond to his struggles. For example, his showbiz peers suggest he take a vacation in response to a tearful breakdown. “No one wants to really make space for Frank’s darkness or his pain…that feels so familiar to me,” Groff says. “It feels very gay. And then there’s also something about it that feels quite American of like, just…take a little trip, and then you’ll come back, and you work, and everything will be fine. But there’s not a real investigation of sadness or despair.”

Merrily is personal by design — for actors and audience members alike. Groff quotes the musical’s producer, Sonia Friedman (and sister to Merrily’s director, Maria Friedman): “There are certain shows that are beyond theater, and this is one of them where you want the audience to follow the characters’ stories. But you want them to also reflect on their own lives as well as this, because [the show] keeps saying, how did you get to be here?”

It’s a question that Groff contemplates as he journeys backward in time each night at the Hudson Theatre. Like Frank, the 39-year-old has two decades of career and adulthood to reflect upon. He marvels how the teen reading a Sondheim biography in front of his high school science fair project went on to garner three Tony nominations (for Merrily this year, Melchior in Spring Awakening in 2007, and King George III in Hamilton in 2016), voice Kristoff and Sven in Disney’s hit Frozen films, and lead the groundbreaking HBO dramedy Looking as Patrick.

Outside the spheres of musical films and theater, Groff has broken ground as a gay actor by starring in the Netflix crime thriller Mindhunter as Holden Ford and in The Matrix Resurrections as Smith. He was also a lead in M. Night Shyamalan’s Knock at the Cabin last year and will appear in the new season of Doctor Who — starring Ncuti Gatwa as the first Black queer star of the long-running British sci-fi series. “He’s a supernova of talent,” Groff sings of Gatwa; an It’s a Sin fan, he also jumped at the chance to work with Russell T Davies after the showrunner personally invited him to join the season.

This enviable acting career is not what Groff envisioned when he came out publicly in 2009 in an interview with Broadway.com. “I would rather be myself and be in a relationship and not have that compromised by this career thing,” he recalls reasoning at the time — effectively choosing to be himself openly over the possibility of becoming a leading man.

“I felt like I was opting out of that [star] trajectory because of coming out,” he says. “And so everything that’s happened to me with the success of film and television has been a complete surprise to me because I thought…by coming out that that was impossible.”

Groff credits his coming out with saving him from becoming a Frank, who makes a devil’s bargain for material gain. In fact, by appearances, Groff is an anti-Frank. To wit, he arrives via bicycle to his Out photo shoot at the Duplex gay bar in the West Village. He says he even favors riding a bike to the theater each day over an offered car service. Later at Julius’ around the corner, he takes a bite (and then finishes) a burger prepared for a photo op, and then thanks the owner and chef by name. So not the stereotypical fame monster.

“Being gay has allowed me to forge my own path,” he attests. “I don’t feel at the mercy of the traditional Hollywood machine because I never really felt like I fit in there. That equation wasn’t where I lived. And so I’ve just been sort of over here following my artistic heart, which was a choice I made long, long ago. I sort of credit that for not buying into the stuff that Frank in the show kind of buys into.”

Groff calls his success in the entertainment industry “a lucky gift of timing,” noting how he came of age at a turning point for gay acceptance in America — and after the worst of the AIDS crisis in NYC. His speech following each Merrily performance helps raise funds for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, and it “means so much” to him because he is mindful of “all of the gays that came from small towns to move to New York to do theater and how many of them died.” Groff was born in Lancaster, Pa., and was raised amid Amish communities before pursuing his Broadway dreams in the Big Apple.

As a working out actor, “I feel so lucky and I feel some sense of responsibility, of really breathing it in and taking it in,” he confesses. “Even 10 years ago, I don’t know if I would have been cast in this role of Frank, ’cause even in theater, it’s such a straight character.… There’s also something that feels like a shift in the times that’s allowing me to play this role right now as well.”

His casting in such a diversity of roles on stage and screen “feels a part of this wave of progress of people being not only accepting of actors being out, but of actors being able to play multiple different things and not get so pigeonholed…. I’m so grateful to be living in this time.”

Like Patrick, Groff feels like he’s ready for love, in part because Merrily sparks “reflection and embracing an ownership of the past to cross through into the future.” By chance, the same night this writer saw Merrily in April, Groff’s first boyfriend, celebrating a birthday, was also in the audience.

Groff recalls how, at 3.5 years, this relationship remains his longest to date — and one that occurred at a crucial period in his career. Groff dated him from ages 19 to 23 when they were still closeted yet lived as roommates in midtown Manhattan. His ex, who he did not name, is a dancer who helped teach him the choreography for Fame at Crunch Fitness; Groff played Nick Piazza in a regional production at North Shore Music Theatre in Massachusetts. “I was so slow at picking up choreography,” he confesses. But the fancy footwork made a lasting impact. Fame led to Groff being signed by an agent, his membership in the Actors’ Equity Association, and his Broadway debut as an understudy for the lead role in 2005’s In My Life. A year later, he was appearing in Spring Awakening.

“There was something about having him at the show last night,” says Groff, calling it a “full-circle moment.” He adds, “I’ve been single now for a couple of years and I’m feeling…ready and open for anything. If that’s continuing with that, if that’s a relationship, I’m cool with that.”

In addition to the occurrence of a rare NYC earthquake, the day of this Out interview marked another fateful event: the 63rd anniversary of Barbra Streisand making her TV debut on The Tonight Show. Groff appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to commemorate the occasion. But his Barbra standom doesn’t end there. The actor wants to one day buy a Village restaurant called & Son Steakeasy, which used to be the site of the Lion, a gay bar where Streisand first sang publicly during a singing contest (according to a plaque there, at least). His goal is “turning it back into a gay bar and calling it BARbra.” A neon “BARbra” sign even hangs in his Merrily dressing room as a reminder of this dream.

Other dreams are poised to come true as well. Merrily’s revival is one of the biggest hits on Broadway right now, boasting sold-out shows and one of the Great White Way’s highest ticket prices. It also received seven Tony nominations this year, among them nods for Groff, Radcliffe, and Mendez.

Groff has been Tony-nominated twice before, but the theater world’s highest honor has lost some of its luster from the days when, post-high school, he taught a class on the Tony Awards at a theater camp. (He’d show clips to his pupils and have them vote for Best Actress. Wicked and Avenue Q were contenders that year.)

“When I was a kid, the marker of success was like an Oscar or a Tony or like whatever the award was,” he says. “Now I understand 20 years later that that’s a fun part of the game of it all. But it’s not what makes your artistic heart sing.”

The eschewing of awards recognition is also very anti-Frank. However, Groff also recognizes the importance of a good speech, like the “beautiful and touching and inspirational” words for the LGBTQ+ community that Hamilton’s Lin-Manuel Miranda gave at the Tonys after the Pulse nightclub shooting. If he has the opportunity to give his own remarks onstage, “I’ll attempt to honor whatever is happening in that moment,” he promises.

For now, Groff feels like his character at the end of Merrily, as three starry-eyed young friends look to the skies and imagine what dreams may come. “We gotta be the luckiest people who ever lived,” he quotes.

“I feel that. I really like to be living in this time and working in this way,” he says. “It’s more than I ever could have dreamt of. And so I just wanna soak it in, take it in, and keep going.”

[lurksunderthebed]

Funnily enough i had a long ass convo with one of the dudebros that just decided to drop by and comment how Ghost and Soap are NOT GAY!!! on one of the comment's that initially didn't even mention anything about them like that other than saying "they could have been friends or something more like romantic", and this guy just lost it. Problem with them is they wanna latch onto their "role" models so desperately it threatens their masculinity when someone dares to read these characters as anything other than cis het man.

Bear with me it's gonna be one long ass essay; The need to gatekeep a certain character because their views don't aling with how the rest of us choose to interpret them because according to them, their view is a fact but ours that's not aligning with their bias is a headcanon, make it make sense. Saying and seething that "Ghost isn't GAY!!!" isn't a fact, that sounds like an agenda to me because seeing Ghost as a bi/pan anything else doesn't count in the "manly man" category for toxic dudebros because masculine men only are allowed to dominate and bang women, right? It just shows how simple minded and uneducated the lot of them really are. Cannot fathom man and a woman having a platonic bond without saying "yeah they're polygamous, that's a thing in military for men to have side bitches" whilst defending fiercely Ghost and Soap as being anything other than "bros" because they feel attacked.

Don't get me started on the whole double standard issue either; it's very hot and cute when Ghost threatens Milena but it's disgusting and no no for Ghost and Soap who literally have an established bond between them and clearly care for one another. Same goes for Valeria, they were ready to pair her with Soap just because it was a woman and a man. A man has to bang chicks lol/ This philosophy is so tiring and dumb that it just shows you how a cis het man actually sees women. And i'd go as far as to say it implies misogyny aswell. Take that as you will. But this issue is present in every sort of fandom whose target audience is mostly basement dwellers that rely on their mums for a brand new GPU.

I think the whole thing has to do with projection. When it comes to people who lash out and get ridiculously upset about these sorts of things, especially about a FICTIONAL character it's cause they view it as an attack on themselves.

Which is all sorts of sad, because we're not talking facts here or canonical events, it's about how those fans see themselves in their fav characters.

As I said earlier, you could read into people's sexualities all you want. Aside from Laswell hilariously enough, there isn't any definitive proof of het/gay/etc in any character in 141. If there was, you bet my overly analytical self would find it and make a note of it for Ghost or Soap.

There's arguably more proof on Ghost being queer than him being straight/het which is the funniest thing. The easiest read is him being just not interested in people as a whole, especially with how much he doesn't really interact with others personally (outside of Soap).

Personally, I think when it comes to those sorts of people it's best to just leave it be. No amount of actual factual basis or any sort of reason will change their minds. Because it's not the characters in question that is the issue, it's themselves as people that push their own agenda into it.

Again irony at its finest. For all the people out there upset at those pushing the "gay agenda" onto these characters, it's really themselves pushing their own values onto them. Realising this would require more self reflection than most of that vocal fanbase actually have.

[laurelier]

MEG YOUR POST IS SO BEAUTIFUL??????!!?????????

just the whole perspective of ariel as someone who looks at eric and sees a romantic partner, but first and foremost herself, the truest reality of who she is? fuck me man. the movie does too well with hiding the trans theme behind the big fat love story but shit it's so clear. and ursula as a character inspired by a drag queen, who you so accurately describe as a mentor, a say-it-to-your-face gay aunt who prepares ariel for the real world. shit meg

i also wanted to say this part was beautiful and i find a lot of recognition in it and i have goosebumps again now

*overshare sirens*—this feeling of Ariel’s here, this oh shit, that should be me…….. to be just entirely too frank with you all, I like to imagine it’s not dissimilar to the way I personally feel when I look at Harry wearing clothes I wish I could wear in a way I wish I could wear them. The way he appears in his own self being the way I’d live in mine, if I could choose. Which sometimes I feel is me projecting at uncomfortable heights but—it’s just. It’s so powerful to see someone who, for you, for so many reasons, embodies a possibility you didn’t know existed before, a choice you didn’t know you could make.

Ok first of all—thank you???????????? so???? much????? I'm forcing myself to take the compliment first we're taking the compliment yes we're not deflecting. We're saying thank you. Mostly just thank you for reading? And responding?? For your tags?? For sending this ask????? For EVERYTHING???

More thoughts more thoughts for u, as usual I'm coming down from the high of reading tag reacts and leo's is related to this. All this shit is making me wanna write ANOTHER POST someone stop me about the way I think these two dumbass mfs that we spend so much time talking about fuck with the pronouns in their love songs to leave room for that very idea you laid out there, that loving someone deeply and profoundly and genuinely and openly is a road to the self. I'm not going to start making Home connections here. I won't do it. I won't do it to myself. No I will not I cannot I will not no thank u.

But yeah, like, that's there with E and A—Ariel sees someone she loves romantically, and also, in my mind equally or maybe even more, who represents a truer vision of herself. And I don’t at all say that to suggest that you ~find yourself in~ or ~are completed by~ anyone you fall in love with—rather the opposite, that we love those who remind us of ourselves, or who reflect us in a way that strengthens and confirms us. Shockingly enough I get real mushy about this: just like. How much more real it has made me feel, over the course of my lil life, when I've known that other people have truly seen me. Or when something about them has made me see myself. I don't mean, like, me asking anyone else to validate me or convince me of my worth—I mean identification, recognition. You are me. I am you.

And maaaaaannnnnnn the quote you pulled. That's from so deep in my little heart. Right now so few people in my life know that I feel that way—or, like, have heard me say that so honestly, you know? It's sitting right in the middle of my little chest that you see that and feel it and know it also. He's just. So important to me. His tender vulnerable soulful way of existing.

Thank you beautiful ellamerm thank you thank you thank you.

In reference to this

[teacupfulofstarshine]

when you look at me with those eyes (i’m speechless)

summary: virgil finally manages to ask out the pretty enby in his class, just in time for his father's epic gala event. sadly, neither of them would know fashion if it bit them in the ass. luckily, they both have friends to help them out. 

(OR: almost 3k words of analogical being useless fluffy gays)

wordcount: 2934

ships: romantic analogical, background romantic roceit, background queerplatonic intruality, background romantic remile

cw: cursing 

read it on ao3!! 

“So, uh, wh - what do you say?” 

Logan looks up from their desk, homework long forgotten. Their left hand is stretched out to cover the little doodle they’d been doing of the back of Virgil’s head, and now Virgil himself is standing in front of them, rubbing the back of his head awkwardly and looking anywhere except at Logan. He’s still wearing that patchwork purple plaid hoodie, and for some reason the only thing Logan can think of is that it’s definitely a violation of their school uniform. 

Virgil’s eyes skitter back to their face, skipping from their shoulder to their chest to their neck to their cheek. Their eyes meet for a moment, Virgil’s illuminated by the afternoon sunshine pouring in, and Logan forgets how to breathe. Virgil’s pink face gets even pinker, and his eyes settle on a point fixed above Logan’s shoulder. 

“Are you just gonna stare at me?” he snaps. “If you’re gonna reject me, just -”

“No!” Logan blurts. Virgil’s shoulders jump up to his ears, and Logan stands so fast their chair falls over behind them. “I - I mean - I’m not rejecting you, I - um - yes! Yes, I - I’d love to! That is to say - I - uh -” 

Virgil laughs a little, reaching out and tucking a stray curl of Logan’s hair behind their ear. They hadn’t even noticed that wisps had started escaping their high ponytail, but Virgil just smiles at them. “Cool,” he says. 

“Yes,” Logan breathes. “It - it is, objectively, quite ‘cool’.” 

“The event’s on Saturday night.” Virgil’s fingers tuck their hair behind their ear, gently tracing down the curve of their neck and sliding up to touch their jaw. “Pick you up around six PM or so?” 

Logan swallows, and they’re sure Virgil can hear it but he gives no indication if he did. “That - that sounds optimal.” They cringe inwardly - optimal? What the hell? - but Virgil just laughs and slides his hand up to cup their cheek. 

“You keep busting out all those smart-person words and I’m gonna have to kiss you before I buy you dinner, and that’s not very nice of me.” His hand drops from Logan’s face, and it takes all their willpower not to scream for him to put it back. He gently picks up their hand, lifting it to his bitten-raw lips and gently pressing a kiss to the back. “That’ll have to hold you over until then.” 

He turns and saunters away, and Logan grips the edge of their desk. They almost sit down on the chair they’d knocked over, catching themselves at the last second. Looking around the empty classroom, they catch sight of themselves reflected in the windows. They’d opted for a mixture of the uniforms today, wearing the boys’ shirt, vest, and tie over the girls’ skirt, knee-high stockings, and shoes. Their hair is tightly tied back with a plain hair tie, no ribbon, only one curl out of place where Virgil had tucked it behind their ear. 

They don’t typically dress themselves for much other than school (uniform), work (uniform), or home (casual clothing). They have no idea what they should wear for a date. Their phone buzzes on the desk, and they snatch it up quickly, flipping it open to see a message from Virgil. 

(They’d forgotten he had their number, from that project they did together last month.) 

You have: One! New message! 

FROM: Virgil 

hey, forgot to tell u - this gala is like, a bfd for my dads’ company, so dress up! like its prom or smthn, or a wedding 

Logan exhales, gathering up their school things and shoving them into their bag with an uncharacteristic haphazardness. This is going to require . . . outside intervention.

(Meanwhile, a few doors down, Virgil slams the door to his own classroom, shoves his face into his hands, and lets out the quietest feral screech he can manage. Derek, seated on the teacher’s desk with Roman pulled up between his legs, raises a single eyebrow.

“Is that a screech of success or a screech of failure, Virgil?”)

*~*~*~*~*

“What does one wear on a ‘fancy date’? I have never been to a wedding or a prom, let alone a gala! I do not own anything fancy!” Logan paces around their bedroom, hair hanging loose around their shoulders. Patton is on his back, hanging upside-down off of their bed and flipping through some sort of guitar catalog. Remus is curled up in Logan’s desk chair with some sort of slime in his hand. “Remus, if you get slime on my belongings I will end you.” 

Remus grins, looking deranged, and Logan resists the childish urge to throw something at him. 

“Don’t sweat it, Lo-Lo!” Patton says. “I’ve got a ton of pretty clothes in my room, you can borrow something from me! We’re still the same size, right?” 

“I assume so,” Logan says, “but what if I do not look right in your clothing? Our styles are vastly different, I would not wish to present a false impression of myself to him, I -”

“You worry too much!” Remus says. “Virge asked you out even though you’re a workaholic disaster who wouldn’t know the meaning of ‘relax’ if it bit him in the -”

“Remus!” Patton scolds, throwing one of Logan’s decorative constellation pillows at him. Remus bats it away with his foot. 

“Please do not throw things around,” Logan says tiredly. “Particularly my things.” 

“Sorry, Lo!” Remus does not apologize, but he does put the slime he’s been playing with back into its little plastic container. 

“Well, actually,” Patton says, flipping over onto his tummy, “it just so happens that I’ve been waiting for exactly this moment.” Logan looks at their twin in confusion. “I knew that eventually, there was gonna come a day where you would look at somebody and want to go on a date with them, whether it be a simple movie or a fancy date like this one, and you were gonna call me in here - didn’t know Remus would be here too, but he’s not unwelcome -”

“Thank you?” 

“- and you’d pace around and panic and go, ‘Patton! I don’t have anything optimal for this date, and our personal styles are so vastly different! What ever is there to be done?’” Patton flings one hand dramatically across his forehead like a Victorian woman fainting onto a couch. Logan raises one eyebrow. 

“So! I came up with the perfect solution! I’ve been secretly acquiring outfits for you! Stuff that you could wear for a variety of situations that you wouldn’t ever think of! We can mix and match to find something you like! Oh, and I also have a ton of unopened hypoallergenic makeup in a box in my closet!” 

Logan stares at him, blinking and trying to process everything Patton’s just told them. “You . .. you really did all that, for . . . for me?” 

“Yeah, of course I did! You’re my twin, Lo. I love you.” Patton smiles, bright and open and honest, and Logan blinks again, and suddenly their cheeks are wet. 

“Are you fucking crying because Patton is a considerate brother?!” Remus cackles. Logan whirls around, hiding their face and wiping at it frantically. “Oh my god, you are, I fucking called it, Roman owes me twenty bucks!” 

“You bet on this?” Patton asks, disapproving. Logan laughs a little, turning around to hug their twin. They can’t quite bring themselves to care about Remus’s gambling right now. 

*~*~*~*~*

“Why are you bitching?” Roman asks, pulling Derek’s hand up to his face. He’d forgotten his saline solution at his own house, so he’s wearing his old red glasses, bangs pulled up in a shitty unicorn-horn ponytail as he squints at Derek’s nails. Derek holds a book up with his free hand. “You managed to get them to go out with you, didn’t you?” 

“Yeah, but I was awkward as fuck about it, Roman!” Virgil complains. He considers throwing something at Roman, or shoving a pillow over his face and screaming (again), but the deep indigo-purple polish on their fingernails is still drying. “I touched their hair, they probably think I’m a fucking creep!” 

“As someone with that exact reputation,” Derek says, “I highly doubt they would have agreed to accompany you on a date if they shared your sentiments about yourself.” 

“Yeah, but -”

“Lighten up a little, man,” Roman says, carefully stroking the yellow brush over Derek’s index nail. “You’re totally fucking with the vibe of the chill session.”

“What do you want me to do?! I told them to dress fancy cause we’re going somewhere nice, like I have any idea how to dress other than ‘crawled out of a dumpster and sewed together some punk band’s leftovers’!” 

“Why did you think you invited me?” Roman says haughtily. He’s imitating some YouTube video they’d watched earlier. “I’m the king of style!” 

“You’re the king of something,” Virgil mutters. 

“No, seriously, I’m gonna help you!” Roman says. “I’m sure you have something that looks half-decent buried in your closet, and I am nothing if not an expert in bringing things out of the closet.” Derek’s cheeks blush faintly pink, but he doesn’t say anything. “And Der here is amazing with makeup -”

“I wouldn’t say experience with stage makeup and covering my port wine stain makes me amazing or anything,” Derek begins. 

“Well I would, so shut the fuck up,” Roman says smoothly. Derek rolls his eyes and huffs fondly. “Seriously, Vee, did you really think we were gonna egg you on to ask the pretty nerd out for this long and then leave you high and dry when the time came to deliver the goods?” 

Virgil exhales, bringing his hands up to his face to examine his nails. “I think they’re dry . . .”

“Nice! Get over here, once I’m done with Derek’s base color I’m putting sparkles on you.”

“What? Why?” 

“Because it’s my house and I get to choose the bonding activity, god damn it.” 

*~*~*~*~*

“No.” 

“What do you mean, no?” Logan says, pulling their hair up into their traditional high ponytail. “What else am I supposed to do with it? I hate leaving it down, it feels bad on my neck -”

“I know,” Patton says, “but you can’t just put it in the same old ponytail you always do! This is a fancy gala event, you have to be fancy! ” 

“What else am I supposed to do with my hair?” 

“You will not do anything. I will do your hair,” Patton says firmly. “And by I, I mean Remus, because I’m not good at hair.” 

“Remus is not putting his hands, which have been god only knows where, in my clean hair.” 

“Rude!” Remus says. “I washed them three times today! You can inspect them if you want, I promise they’re clean!” Logan squints at his hands critically before sighing and settling into the chair in front of Patton’s vanity. 

“Very well.” 

Remus brushes through their hair and then combs it, carefully working through the knots while doing his best to preserve their natural curl. He separates two small wings and pins them out of the way before pulling the rest of Logan’s long curls into a mid-height ponytail and braiding it with surprisingly delicate fingers. He carefully twists the long braid up into a bun at the nape of Logan’s neck and pins it there with a gleaming silver hairpin tipped with a shining eight-point star with a dark blue jewel set in its center. 

Carefully, Remus unpins the locks of hair he’d set aside and braids them as well, weaving them into a crown of braids on Logan’s head and cleverly hiding the ends by pinning them into the braided bun. Finally, he pins back a few stray wispy curls with silver bobby pins that have star-shaped cubic zirconium on the ends. “Take a look!” 

Logan has had their eyes closed the entire time, quietly stimming with their hands. They open them slowly, looking in the mirror and tilting their head back and forth to see all of the work Remus has done. “Oh,” they say softly. “I love it, Remus. I look beautiful.” 

“You always look beautiful,” Remus says. “I’d ruffle your hair if I hadn’t spent so much time making it look decent.” Logan leans back, gently pressing their cheek against his shoulder. Remus huffs and mutters something about “gross affectionate shit,” but he still lets them do it. 

Patton breaks out the makeup after that, spinning the stool around so that Logan can’t see their own face in the mirror. “Alright, Lo! Time to accentuate your pretty face!” 

“That was a surprisingly accurate use of the word accentuate.” 

Patton just shrugs and grins at them. “I know big words!” 

*~*~*~*~*

“You look fine,” Roman says, pulling a strip of fabric around Virgil’s throat and beginning to knot it into a bowtie. Virgil can’t stop himself from looking over himself in the mirror one more time - dark black dress pants, a silver dress shirt, a deep purple vest that matches the polish on his nails, black and purple eyeshadow accompanied by dark red lipstick and sharp cheekbone contour courtesy of Derek. Roman pulls the purple-and-silver striped fabric of his bowtie into the final bow, and he smiles. 

“Don’t worry, Virge. I know you’re worried, but you look fine.” 

“You don’t look like a vampire at all,” Derek adds. Virgil hisses at him. “That is certainly going to help that image.” 

“Seriously,” Roman says, “don’t worry about my stupid boyfriend. Logan agreed to go out with you, and I’m sure they’re going to find you absolutely stunning.” 

Virgil rubs the back of his neck, blushing, because he knows that if he touches the hair Derek and Roman had combed and gelled and styled and wrestled with for the past thirty minutes they will collectively murder him without a second thought. Derek smiles, reaching over to pat his shoulder. “It’ll be okay, Vee. Seriously. I know I mock you a lot, but you really do look good. It’s gonna be okay.” 

Virgil still feels nervous when he steps out of his car in front of the address Logan had given him. The lights are bright and cheerful, and when he knocks on the front door with his free hand, the door swings open eagerly. “Hello!” the man says cheerily. He’s wearing a pink tie and a brown cardigan, and he looks like Virgil expects Patton to in a few decades. “You must be Virgil!” 

“Uh, um, y-yes sir!” Virgil yelps. 

“Oh, you look precious! Remy, dearest, Logan’s date is here!” 

“Cool, babes,” a voice floats in from the kitchen. “I’ll take over the soup.” 

“Come on in! You can call me Emile, Lo is upstairs with Patton and Remus getting ready! Just wait here in the foyer, I’ll go up there and get them!” Emile hurries off up the stairs, and Virgil fidgets nervously with the flowers in his hand.

Patton all but slides down the bannister, grinning. “Are those for Lo?” 

“Y - yeah?”

“I’ll go get a vase out of the kitchen so they can put them in water before you two go!” Virgil pulls a single star-shaped lily bloom from the bouquet and spins it between his thumb and middle fingers. Emile comes hurrying down the stairs with a camera, sets himself up at the foot of the stairs, and shouts for Remus. 

“Finally,” Logan huffs, and then a door creaks open and shuffled footsteps approach the top of the stairs and then Virgil promptly forgets how to breathe. 

They look gorgeous. 

They have a crown of braids leading to a braided bun, studded with jewels that gleam like stars and a larger star pinning the bun back. They’re wearing the most beautiful dress Virgil has ever seen; the top is black, high-necked, and form-fitting, with short sleeves that are see-through ruffles of black gauzy material. The sleeves and the bodice are covered in sparkling silver rhinestones that look like stars in the night sky. There’s a silver band wrapped around their waist, and the skirt is made of layers of loose folds of fabric. The front comes down to their knees and the back comes down to their mid-calves, and the pattern is a soft blue-pink-purple galaxy color scheme. They have simple dark blue ballet flats on their feet, and as they get closer, what little breath Virgil had in his lungs is gone. 

Someone with experience has clearly done Logan’s makeup. Their eyes are coated in shimmery dark-blue-and-silver eyeshadow, eyes lined with soft smudged pencil and popping out of their face, freckles somehow still visible under the makeup. Their lips are glossy and pink and look so deliciously kissable that Virgil can barely restrain himself. 

“You look wonderful,” the vision in front of him says. 

“You - I - um - good!” Virgil stammers. Logan blushes, and Virgil thrusts the bouquet at them. “These - for you!” 

“Oh!” Logan takes the bouquet and smiles, and Virgil nearly passes out. “They’re beautiful! I -”

“I have a vase for you!” Patton chirps, hurrying in to take the bouquet and plop it into a vase. “I’ll leave it in your room!” Logan smiles, and Virgil reaches up to carefully tuck the lily behind their ear, into the carefully woven braids.

“You look beautiful,” he says honestly. “You’re the most beautiful person I have ever seen in my life.” Logan flushes, smiling. 

“It makes sense that you would think that, since you cannot see yourself.” 

(Years later, at their wedding, Patton will tearfully and proudly recall how Logan and Virgil had been fifteen minutes late to the gala because Logan’s compliment had caused Virgil to faint from sheer gay joy.) 

[hellomynameisbisexual]

I’ve identified as straight, I’ve identified as gay, and I’ve identified—and still identify—as bi. My sexual identity is something of a shapeshifting mass that I can never quite firmly grasp. In the minds of many, I’m confused. But I don’t see it that way. I’ve always been confident in my sexual orientation; it’s just changed over time. For the majority of my life, I was solely romantically and sexually linked to women. But in my late 20s, I started to experiment with men (something I’ve wanted to do for a long, long time) and really liked it. Now, I’m far more attracted to men than women, but who’s to say my sexual preference won’t sway again?

“It’s not uncommon for people’s sexual identities to change,” sex educator Erica Smith, M.Ed, tells NewNowNext. “I know this as a sexuality educator and because I’ve experienced it firsthand. I’ve identified as bisexual, lesbian, queer, and straight (when I was very young). It wasn’t until I was in my mid-30s that I relaxed into the knowledge that my sexual attractions are probably going to keep changing and shifting my whole life.”

According to Alisa Swindell, Ph.D. candidate and bisexual activist, it is not always our sexuality that changes. Usually, it’s our understanding of our sexuality that evolves when we explore what feels right to us. “Our understanding of gender and how it is expressed has been evolving at a rate that has not previously been known (or studied) and that is changing how we understand our own desires and responses to others,” she says.

Many outside factors can influence our sexuality. For instance, Swindell thinks many bisexuals are playing against a numbers game. “There are more people with other gender attractions than same-gender, so more often bisexual people end up in relationships with people of another gender and find it easier to pursue those relationships,” she says.

In her opinion, this sentiment is especially true for women, as there is still a lot of stigma toward bi women within lesbian communities. Men, however, experience a different set of challenges.

“Once [men] start dating [other] men, they often find themselves in social situations that are almost exclusively male and so meeting women becomes harder,” she adds, effectively summarizing my lived experience as a sexually active bisexual man. “Also, those men, like all of us, were socialized to respond to heterosexual norms. So many men who enjoy the queerness of the male spaces are still often attracted to heteronormative women who do not always respond to male bisexuality due to continuing stigma.”

The continuing stigma often pressures bisexuals to adopt a monosexual identity. Take Leslie, a “not super out” bisexual, as an example. Leslie dated a woman from her late teens to early 20s, keeping her sexual orientation a secret because her parents were conservative and she didn’t want to ruffle any feathers. As she revisits her past same-sex relationship with me, she has a realization: “In reflecting on all of that, I think deep down I thought that being with a man would just be easier.”

Now married to a man, Leslie feels like she’s lost her bi identity, though she’s still attracted to different genders. “When I see people I follow online and find out they are bisexual I usually reach out and say, ‘I am, too!’ so I can collect sisters and brothers where I can,” she adds. “Otherwise, as I am cisgender-presenting I often feel like I don’t really have a say but I offer my support.”

This loss of identity is all too common. “Maintaining a recognized bisexual identity can be difficult as monosexuality is still the assumed norm,” Swindell says, noting that showing support—whether that looks like keeping up with issues that affect bisexuals, correcting people who mistakenly call bisexuals gay or straight, or encouraging our partners to not let that slide when it comes up with friends and family are all important for maintaining an identity—as Leslie has, is important to maintaining a bi identity. Smith adds this loss of identity may be attributed to a person’s own internalized biphobia, too.

“When it comes to sexuality in particular, there is rightfully a lot of autonomy given to people to self-identify. If someone self-identifies as queer or bisexual, none of their sexual or relational behavior, in of itself, alters that,” psychotherapist Daniel Olavarria, LCSW, tells NewNowNext. “Of course, there is also a recognition that by marrying someone of the opposite sex, for example, that this queer person is exercising a level of privilege that may alter their external experience in the world. As a result, this may have implications for how that person is perceived among queer and non-queer communities.”

Jodi’s experience as a bisexual person is more reflective of my own: She shares that she’s gone through stages where she only dates men, and others where she only dates women. Available studies suggest that only a minority of bisexuals maintain simultaneous relationships with both genders. In one report, self-identified bisexuals were asked if they had been sexually involved with both men and women in the past 12 months. Two-thirds said yes, and only one-third has been simultaneously involved with both genders.

As for a possible explanation? “It can be really difficult for us to find partners who are comfortable with us dating other genders at the same time,” Smith offers up as a theory.

“If I’m in a situation where I have to be exhibiting a lot of ‘masculine’ energy (running projects, being very in charge of things at work, etc.), then I tend to want to be able to be in more ‘feminine’ energy at home,” Jodi adds, clarifying that people of any gender identity can boast masculine and feminine energy. “Likewise, if my work life looks quieter and focused on more ‘feminine’ aspects such as nurturing and caregiving, I tend to want to exhibit a stronger more masculine presence while at home.”

Bisexuality is, in many ways, a label that can accommodate one’s experience on a sexuality spectrum. This allows for shifts based on a person’s needs or interests at any given point in their life. Perhaps “The Bisexual Manifesto,” published in 1990 from the Bay Area Bisexual Network, says it best:

Bisexuality is a whole, fluid identity. Do not assume that bisexuality is binary or duogamous in nature: that we have “two” sides or that we must be involved simultaneously with both genders to be fulfilled human beings. In fact, don’t assume that there are only two genders.

Sexuality is complicated, and how we experience it throughout our lives is informed by a multitude of different factors—the exploration of power dynamics, craving certain types of sexual experiences, and social expectations can all influence our gender preferences at any given time, to name just a few. Much like our own bodies, our understanding of our sexual orientation will continue to grow.

I’ve come to accept this ongoing evolution as a wonderful and inevitable thing. Imagine having a completely static sexual orientation your entire life? Boring! Being able to explore your sexuality with wonderful people of all genders is intensely satisfying and uniquely insightful, no matter how many others try to denounce what you feel in your heart or your loins.

I didn’t choose the bi life; the bi life chose me. And I am grateful.

[your--isgayrights]

Okay i actually have no clue on how tumblr works (hope I'm doing this right lmao) but I'm writing my first fic (I still can't really move on from orv so I decided to make my own content lol.), I really love your writing style, do you have any tips??

Hmmmm tips tips tips tips.... First of all I’m really flattered that you like my writing enough to ask me about it! I’ll try to give my best answer... I think that I used to read a lot of people’s “writing tips” but ultimately I ended up not really understanding them until I started writing a lot? Either way it’s fun to read how other authors think... It’s really cool that you’re writing your first fic and you thought to come to me... did I already say that? Okay long post under the cut.

I don’t think this will be all that helpful, but this is just things that I think about if that’s interesting!

For me a lot of writing is like struggling with motivation (I have ADHD so that’s probs why), I really have to pace myself while writing because I can’t just force myself to do it. If I go in every day and think “I have to write today I’m not doing anything so I should be writing” I can get burnt out really easily, even if I really like the thing I’m writing and know how it’s supposed to go. So one of my big things is that when I’m not thinking about writing I’m not thinking about writing. that gives my brain a break and refreshes me when I get back to my google document.

Something I’ve also struggled with having to remember is that there’s like. Never a perfect way to write. What I end up doing is thinking up ideas and fragments and sentences in my head and the very moment I think of something I like I have to write it down in my notes app. Most of my writing process ends up being like. Filling in the blanks and connecting the dots between scene fragments. 

For fics in particular I’d also just recommend rereading your favorite parts of the og work! I’m the kind of person who has a pretty good reading memory, so people may have noticed that I include a lot of little details referencing the text in my fic. Just reading the work kind of helps you remember the voices of the character and the style of the narration, and if you just like. internalize it. you can probably replicate it pretty well if you wanted to.

OKAY I say that but don’t worry too much about replicating things in the og work perfectly. I find that a lot of times when I’m writing I’m inserting a lot of personal touches and putting things that are a part of me in the work. Writing is always going to be like. an extension of your voice, no matter what you’re writing. I think that when I heard about stuff like that from authors in the past I was always like. What? I’m not writing about things that happened to me. I’m writing about grown adult men having emotional issues, silly. But there’s like a lot more nuance to writing about yourself, I guess. Like you don’t have to have like a self insert or be projecting onto a character to have yourself reflected in something you’ve written.

I’d say that like, whatever you write as your first fic is going to be lovely, but when you grow up as a writer and look back on it, you’re not going to remember who you were when you wrote it. I think that’s why a lot of people look back on their first works and are like “I can’t believe I wrote that, what was I thinking, cringe cringe cringe ugh.” Like I definitely do that sometimes, but I’ve found that the old work I’m happiest with nowadays is the stuff where I can recognize myself in it, even if I’m not in that fandom anymore or if there’s old jokes or typos I don’t remember making. 

With that being said, I’m the kind of person who always gives myself a mission statement when I’m writing. I sort of mentally go, okay, I’m writing this kind of thing, and this is why I’m writing it. It can be something like oh I’m writing this fluff piece because I love this character and wish they had a happier ending, or  oh I want to write this multi chapter fic exploring an issue touched on in the original work but I feel like with my own experiences I could expand on it more than the author did. Just something that tells me why it is important to me to write this thing when I’m writing it.

AAAH I feel like I made that sound more dramatic than it really is, that’s just how I think I guess. I’m the kind of guy where its like things need to have like MEANING to me when I do them. I’m dramatic and gay and that’s my personality I guess 😔.

Hmmm maybe it’s also my BIGGEST writing tip tho. Like kind of just thinking things through when you’re writing is pretty important. When I was first learning to write at all (talking about baby baby me here this is like sort of a side tangent sorry) I think that a lot of times I would copy phrases and developments that I had liked in things that I had read without really fully considering why I would include those things other than the fact that that was just what I thought writing was. It’s important to consider what importance every scene and sentence has to do with the flow of the story. Are they just things that are happening, or is there a reason that the audience needs to know these things? The weight of your words should have some sort of consequence as a result of you writing them. Are you telling the audience information they need to know? Is it about how the character feels? What does this say about the character? Etc.

I suppose that’s sort of my own writing style. You’ll probably notice that I don’t write a lot of descriptive prose if you read my fic. The thing about me is that I never want to write something that makes my audience question why they’re reading it, I guess. I’m sort of self conscious and think about the reading experience a lot. All of the things I choose to describe are usually so that the reader can understand where people are in the scene and what emotions they are having. There’s a lot of emphasis that I put in like. A reader’s ability to read into things, which works against me sometimes because I’m not always certain if people picked up on different things that I put a lot of thought into (the curse of being seen... sob).

ALSO use paragraph breaks. In my first fic (that I’m not going to tell anyone what is even though its on ao3 because im shy) the thing I always regret the MOST is that there are big chunky paragraphs that are hard to read through at the start. Like my eyes get lost. I mentioned I have ADHD before but even though I like. physically can’t read a big chunky paragraph I will always write them that way if left to my own devices. Paragraph breaks don’t have to just be broken up by dialogue they can be wherever you feel like doing them. You need a lot of them. This post should probably have more of them... oh my god it’s so long...

OKAY FOR REAL THOUGH IF YOU COULDN”T SLOG THROUGHT THE REST OF THAT THE MOST IMPORTANT TIP IS RIGHT HERE: 

JUST LET YOURSELF WRITE

I have a lot of like. academic trauma, so maybe this is just me, but the reason I didn’t write fic until I was like 16 was because I was always really scared that whatever I wrote wouldn’t be good enough for some impossible standard I was setting for myself. I was always telling myself that I had certain bad writing habits or that I was terrible for never being able to focus on things for very long and all of my projects were doomed to failure before I even started. But then I wrote my first like 8 chapter fic in the summer of my junior year and I was like... oh. that wasn’t so bad. Like. It’s okay to know your limits, but you don’t really know them until you start writing. Like I wrote an 8 chapter fic, and then a few one shots, and then I tried to take on a very complicated project that ended up being over 40 chapters and I had to put it down because I just wasn’t really at the writing level to finish it. I would advise against writing fics that take so long to write that you start hating the way you wrote the first chapter, basically lol. Know how whatever you’re writing is supposed to begin and end before you start writing it.

Nowadays I always have like. plot outlines in my head when I start a fic. Like okay this needs to happen here this needs to happen here etc. I like making lists if it seems to overwhelming when I’m writing something long, just to organize my thoughts. 

OKAY I JUST TALKED A LOT. SORRY IF YOU DIDN’T WANT TO READ ALL OF THIS BUT I’M A LITTLE CHATTY IF YOU DIDN’T NOTICE.

Defo feel free to dm me if you have like questions or just want to chat about orv or whatever. I’m a lonely little man out here floating on my pile of words, and I’d love to hear what your fic is about!! 

[gascon-en-exil]

This past weekend I picked up another Steam dating sim, Full Service. I don’t think I could do a complete write-up like I’ve done for some others, but it’s worth mentioning some highlights and lowlights.

The Good

A lot of content for an indie erotica game, with seven primary love interests, over 200 CGs, and over twenty endings running the gamut from tenderly romantic to wildly kinky to dubcon/noncon scenarios. There’s more actual gameplay here than any of the dating sims I’ve previously talked about, with some light scheduling and resource management and a gifting/heart level system comparable to Fire Emblem support ranks or even more so heart levels in those old Harvest Moon games (are those still a thing?). The second playthrough adds more story content to better explore certain character motivations, and there are even after stories - epilogues, essentially - unlocked after perfect endings that catch up with the characters some time later and feature brief animated sex scenes. In the tradition of most gay dating sim protagonists that I’ve come across, Tomoki is fully vers, and his love interests are evenly divided by favored position: three tops, three bottoms, and one fellow vers with a little additional flexibility for certain scenes/combinations. Speaking from extensive personal experience I consider this much more reflective of how the gay/bi male population as a whole approaches anal than something like To Trust an Incubus contorting itself to ensure that every single guy is vers.

The premise is that all the love interests work at a spa/massage parlor that specializes in happy endings. All of them could be considered sex workers, and some of them have alternative sources of income in a similar vein, ex. modeling. This is not the easiest subject matter to write well without being either overly glorifying or overly preachy, and I was pleasantly surprised to discover that for the most part Full Service walks the fine line between the two. It doesn’t shy away from the potential dangers and hardships of sex work (especially in some of the bad endings) or from the issues it can create with forming romantic connections, but it also remains generally sex positive and never condemns its characters for what they choose to do with their lives or suggest that they’d all be happier doing something else. The most judgmental the game ever gets seems to be a projection of Tomoki’s own prudishness...which comes off as deliberately hypocritical considering all the raunchy things he can get up to over the course of the game.

Speaking of sex positivity, it’s actually impossible to go through a full playthrough and only have sex with one person, and the fact that around half of the love interests’ development occurs outside plot events means that it’s quite likely that Tomoki will sleep his way through half or more of the spa’s masseurs before all is said and done. Furthermore, despite what I said in my Chess of Blades review about a poly relationship being beyond the scope of a typical dating sim this one pulls it off with one pair of love interests that Tomoki can potentially end up with at the same time.

While she’s not a love interest, there’s a trans woman in the supporting cast. Her full story isn’t revealed until your second playthrough owing to her major role in the plot, but I appreciated the depiction of someone who discovered her gender identity/presentation through her sexual relationships with men. Thara may not be the sort of trans character who would appeal to typical fans of either yaoi or bara, but having explored feminization kink in the context of sex work myself I thought she was a nice addition.

The Bad

So...voice acting. Most of the game goes for vocal work in the style of Fire Emblem Awakening and Fates, short clips that only somewhat match up with the text on screen and are meant to be more suggestive of what the character is saying. Those are fine enough if not always exactly on point, but then there are the perfect endings which are fully voiced. There’s a fair bit of variance in this game’s vocal talent and even audio recording equipment in one or two cases - sadly one of my favorite love interests has a noticeably lower recording quality to his audio, and it’s no more evident than in his perfect ending where suddenly he’s voicing full lines of dialogue - and then there’s the recurring problem these games have with fully voiced sex scenes and how generally silly those come off. I really have to ask: does anyone genuinely feel that full or even partial voice acting adds anything to the eroticism of such scenes? Props to the voice actors for doing their best with the material, but the sounds of sex are just not easy to vocalize unless you’re actually doing it - at least not without sounding ridiculous.

Harping on lack of realism in gay sex scenes has become rather passé, and I can overlook things like everyone being muscled and well-endowed, no one wearing a condom, or there rarely being any mention of artificial lube. However, there is one glaring issue that over and over shattered my suspension of disbelief, because it comes up in like 80% of the game’s sex scenes: these men have no refractory periods, at all. Almost every scene has all characters involved cumming twice, with only one or two lines of text between CGs as a break. Even worse than the inherent absurdity of a man cumming and then being hard again five seconds later is that it leads to the scenes coming off as quite predictable. With only a handful of exceptions sex scenes in Full Service consist of two NSFW CGs: a foreplay CG - oral, rimming, or some light kink like bondage or nipple or armpit play - and then an anal CG. There’s a lot of variety in positions and (tame) kink elements on display, but it’s undercut when almost every encounter follows this exact script.

On some subjects Full Service flirts with a particular kind of kink but can’t find it in itself to commit. Tomoki’s romance with his boss Rald is almost an instance of this, although they do end up having one of those (allegedly) scandalous workplace romances with its kink potential left intact. Less fortunate however are the twins Oki and Okan, who Tomoki can romance either individually or together in the aforementioned poly ending. The twincest is indeed hot, but it’s explained in supplementary material (if not necessarily the game itself) that two really aren’t twins or even related which annoys me as the same sort of cop-out as Coming Out on Top’s teacher/student romance. Here it’s a bit more forgivable as the reason Oki and Okan are more or less RPing as twins is tied into the plot.

The...Eh

Full Service’s setting is difficult to pin down. It’s clearly somewhat inspired by Japan and takes place somewhere in the real world as various other ethnicities get referenced throughout, but it’s all rather vague. I honestly can’t even tell if the developer is Japanese or Western, as there’s signs pointing to either.

There’s an annoying mascot character who runs a gacha for gift items - in-game currency only, thankfully - but the script knows how silly he and uses him sparingly in the plot and heart events.

One of the love interests is (so I’ve read) the protagonist of a completely different indie game, recognizable because he looks like a JRPG protagonist and has plot-convenient amnesia. He’s not a bad character by any means, just a big bundle of genre clichés.

With both Chess of Blades and Coming Out on Top I pointed out that best friend romances were a tricky business and tend to end up lighter on conflict. Full Service really yanks the rug out on that one, but it’s impossible to say any more without heavy spoilers. Suffice it to say Tomoki does have a best friend romance, but it’s hidden and hard to obtain and figures into the main plot in a thoroughly unexpected way.

What I said pertaining to second playthrough reveals also brings up another serious issue the game attempts to tackle, this one with more mixed results. It’s sex trafficking, which indeed ties into the larger sex work premise but in my opinion doesn’t land nearly as well as the rest in large part due to it being treated as a mystery and the centerpiece of many a lategame reveal. There are worse ideas for a source of conflict independent of who Tomoki ends up dating, but I’m still not sure about the overall execution.

So in summary? It’s not entirely my genre and there’s a lack of polish in parts, but a lot of gameplay for a dating sim and so, so much porn. Kind of middle of the pack for me.

[melanch0lyism]

Here it is bois- Jagged Little Pill full plot synopsis

So, a lot of people in the JLP tag have been asking for a detailed synopsis of the show. I’m here to deliver! This goes out to @sunveiins and @lovebug1313 who I think were the first couple of people to start asking and wanted to be tagged to know when this was posted. Hope this helps for anyone who can’t get out to see the show!! (Also sorry this was delivered a bit later than promised I’m the worst sksdfn)

Warnings: Drug addiction, sexual assault, heavy topics like that and obviously spoilers if you want to go see the show for yourself

ACT 1:

-Mary Jane Healy is a mother obsessed with being seen as perfect, the best at everything, and with her family’s squeaky clean image. Literally all her energy is invested into making sure nobody knows that a single thing is wrong in her life.

-The show opens at Christmastime, and she is writing her annual family Christmas letter (the purpose of which is basically to brag about how great the Healys are doing and how she’s winning at life). 

-She writes about how her husband Steve got yet another promotion at work. Her daughter Frankie is in high school, as artistic and expressive as ever. (“In fact, right now, she’s upstairs with her best friend Joann working on a little craft project. *Lights on Frankie and Jo upstairs literally making out* “We always emphasize the importance of female friendships.”) And her golden boy, her perfect oldest son Nick, has just been accepted early to Harvard. (Right Through You)

-A celebratory breakfast for Nick reveals that the family is actually falling apart. Steve works so much that his marriage to MJ is now distant, hostile, and non-intimate. MJ is pressuring Nick to be perfect and keep up the family’s image. She’s constantly arguing with Frankie, who is adopted and feels the fact that she is black is being erased by her family in this white trash Connecticut town. (All I Really Want)

-Nick’s friends at school congratulate him and encourage him to come to a party that night to celebrate. Frankie and Jo complain about their complicated relationships with their mothers (Jo’s mom does not accept that she’s gay). (Hand in my Pocket) 

-MJ has a prescription for opiates as she had been in a car crash earlier that year. When they are unable to refill the prescription, she gets in touch with a dealer. (Smiling) WARNING THIS SONG WILL BREAK YOU EMOTIONALLY :)

-In class, a student named Phoenix (a good boy 12/10, the only man in the show apart from Steve who deserves rights) defends Frankie’s writing as the rest of the class ridicules it. The two start talking and developing feelings for one another, and they plan to meet up that night at the same party Nick had been invited to. (Ironic)

-Steve calls MJ to say he has to work late again. They get in an argument. Steve loves MJ and wants to work on things between them, but MJ is having none of it. (So Unsexy) Nick consoles an upset MJ who tells him that he’s “the only thing she’s done right.” She asks him to hang out with her, but he says tells her he was planning to go to the party. Nick sings about the pressure he feels from his mom to never screw anything up. (Perfect)

-Frankie and Nick roll up to the party. (Lancer’s Party [So Pure]) Frankie finds Phoenix and the two bond over their complicated home lives. Jo, who was dragged to a church function by her mother instead of being able to go to the party, joins the song. (That I Would Be Good)

-Bella, a friend of Nick’s, had gotten drunk at the party. The next morning the students are circulating pictures of her passed out with her shirt pulled up and talking shit about her. Frankie and Jo go to check on her and make sure she’s ok (despite the fact that they literally do not know her). Bella tells them that another friend of Nick’s named Andrew had raped her the night before while she had been drunk, but that no one will believe her. Frankie and Jo assure her that they believe her.

-Frankie goes home to confront Nick, who she knew had been with Bella and Andrew at the party. Nick brushes it off, citing Bella having been drunk and being known for her tendency to be dramatic. Their argument is overheard by MJ and Steve. Frankie tells Nick that as the only witness, he has to go to the police. MJ and Steve insist that he do nothing, as he had been drinking at the party as well and there could be consequences if that gets out. Also- insert subtext that MJ went through something similar to Bella in her college days. (Wake Up)

-MJ goes to church for the first time in years to pray for help with her addiction, her marriage, and her children. (Forgiven) (No one asked but this is my favorite song in the show, such a powerful moment. Idk if they do this still but at the ART they made it snow onstage, which really added to the sense of isolation the characters were feeling. One of the like 5 points in the show where I bawled my eyes out.)

ACT 2:

-Steve finally convinces MJ to go to marriage counselling with him, where she insists the problem is entirely his. (Not the Doctor) Big argument. Steve is frustrated that they haven’t had sex in almost a year while MJ says they shouldn’t need to since she knows from looking at his internet history that he watches weird porn every day. She feels unheard and unappreciated for all she does. He tells her she doesn’t have to do so much and starts singing a love song to her that gets hijacked by Phoenix and Frankie singing to each other. By the end of the song, the two end up in bed together. (Head Over Feet)

-Jo walks in on Phoenix and Frankie. While storming out of the house she runs into Steve and MJ and tells them what Frankie is doing upstairs. Phoenix gets the fuck out of there, so Frankie's alone to deal with her parents. She gets very upset that her parents aren’t ok with her choosing to have sex while they don’t care about what happened to Bella. She runs away from home, telling them some piece of paper doesn’t make her their daughter. That turns into yet another big fight between Steve and MJ.

-Frankie takes a train alone to NY. (Unprodigal Daughter) She tells Phoenix over the phone that she loves him, and is pissed that he isn’t ready to say it back. 

-Students at the school discus how outrageous they think Bella’s accusation is. Bella comes to the Healys’ house to talk to Nick, but only MJ is there. MJ tells Bella that the same thing happened to her in college (likely the first time she had said it out loud). After Bella leaves, Nick, feeling the guilt of being the only person with the power make people believe Bella, tells MJ the full extent of what happened the night of the party. He had been in the room when Andrew assaulted Bella, but had been drunk and in shock and did nothing to stop him. (Predator) Nick tells MJ that he wants to go to the police and help Bella bring Andrew to justice. She tells him what’s done is done, and the only thing telling the truth would accomplish is ruining his own life. Nick accuses her of only caring because harm to his reputation is harm to hers. 

-Jo comes to New York to pick up Frankie (who ran out of money and became desperate) and ends whatever undefined relationship/FWB situation they had going on. (You Oughta Know) (Holy shit. This one song alone deserves a tony. I cannot stress this enough- Lauren Patten is a GODDESS. I’ve never seen a standing ovation in the middle of a show before this.)

-MJ has overdosed on her painkillers and ends up in the hospital. (Uninvited) Steve arrives at the hospital and the fact that he didn’t know she was struggling rUINS HIM. (Mary Jane) They finally agree to actually put work into fixing their marriage. 

Steve, through tears: “I never meant to make you feel like work was more important than you or the kids. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed, I’m sorry. I’ve made so many mistakes. I’m such a mess.” MJ: “I’m detoxing from opiates. I win.”

MJ admits to Nick that she was wrong, and tells him to go to the police- Bella’s story is more important than their family’s reputation. Nick had already told the police what had happened.

-Everybody attends a rally Frankie throws for Bella, believing her now that Nick had come forward. There’s an important moment between Nick and Bella where he apologizes and she's mad that he gets to be the hero, that her saying it had happened wasn’t enough. (No) (Side note: in the ART version I don’t think Nick had a line in this song, letting Bella speak, and he just held up a sign that said “silence is violence” which was so much better.)

-The time has come for MJ’s next Christmas letter. She decides it will be the last one she writes and is honest for the first time about what had happened in the past year.

She writes about how she is in awe of Frankie, who spent the past year fighting for justice for Bella. MJ publicly admits her own past of sexual assault. She mentions that Andrew is being taken to trial and will not defend himself- he wants Bella’s to be the only story told. MJ and Frankie reconcile. (Thank U)

Instead of discussing Steve’s work again, she talks about how they are both in therapy individually and as a couple. He took up guitar lessons, but only knows how to play one Alanis Morissette record.

She opens up about her overdose and her experience in treatment.

Frankie dares her to send out the letter, and she does. “Merry fucking Christmas!” (Wow MJ Healy telling all her friends she has flaws? We love character development)

-Everyone reflects on what they learned (very cliché but it works). Frankie and Jo rekindle their friendship. Jo has a new girlfriend. Frankie and Phoenix decided to be friends. (You Learn)

[carversourcebe]

Charlie’s interview for Digital Spy

Warning : this post contains spoilers about Ratched !

What first drew you to the role of Huck in Ratched?

“First of all, I love Ryan Murphy so much. I appreciate what he's done, and the way that everything he makes is in dialogue with the zeitgeist, and also pushes things forward, whether that's in terms of representation or subject matter. And I love him too as a person.

But then, Huck, in particular, was the first time I've really been given the opportunity to work from a physical place with the special effects makeup that I had on. It was a challenge for me. But that's what made it very exciting, to have something to really sink my teeth into and explore.”

How long did it take to apply Huck's make-up?

“Initially, it took about four to five hours in the chair to do each morning. And that speeds up as the team gets more accustomed to putting it on. It ends up also just passing by you – you've done it so many times, and it seems pretty quick.

The one thing that was so weird for me is, I've never worked with a full scleral lens. One of my eyes had this full lens in it, and I couldn't see out of it. I'm a klutz to begin with, but my depth perception was completely thrown by the process [laughs]. I was just walking into stuff all the time on set.

But, it's one of those immediate things. It's sort of a physical experience, having that stuff on your face and in your eye. It begins to shape how you are in the world. And that is, I think, the magic trick – the alchemy that an actor is attracted to. It's kind of shifting into an unknown or unfamiliar place, and playing from there.”

Evil characters are often scarred or disfigured in Hollywood, perpetuating harmful stereotypes, but I'd argue Huck is probably the only nice guy in the whole show.

“[laughs] I might agree with that too.”

Was that something you were mindful of going into this project?

“I definitely felt a responsibility to honour several different kinds of experiences. Not only does Huck have these scars on his face, but he's lost part of his hand – he's somewhat disabled. So to tell that story honourably, and to do research... There was a sense of communion with the character.

I had three or four of the scripts in my hand before we started filming, but I didn't necessarily know where the character was going, or how they were going to get there. But the purity of Huck – he undergoes this huge journey over the course of the season, into self-acceptance and self-love. There was this pure, good, honourable person at the core of it all.”

You mentioned that you only had three or four scripts at first – How did you feel when you got to the finale and read the death scene for Huck?

“[groans] Ugh! OK, so, I did know in advance that I wouldn't make it past the first season, which is kind of liberating. You know you're probably going to have an impactful death.

And it's sad. There was a split mentality about it. On one hand, I could create the biggest arc for the character, knowing he wasn't going to be around. But it was sad to let it all go. I had a very sentimental relationship with Huck.”

You mentioned earlier how much you love working with Ryan Murphy, and obviously you've got The Boys in the Band coming up as well. Would you ever be interested in working on American Horror Story?

“Oh, of course, if Ryan would have me, I would do that. I think that just sounds like so much fun. What a gift to an actor. Go for it.”

I feel like there are lots of parallels between Ratched and American Horror Story...

“Sure, sure. And that's what made Ratched so fun. There's this kind of baroque quality. There's a believability to it, and I think it's grounded by the performances and the characters. But you get to do things that we don't get to do in our average lives — and certainly not in most TV or film ones.”

Let's make it happen! And going back to The Boys in the Band, what does it mean for you personally to star in such an important gay story with an openly queer cast?

“It will be one of the honours of my life to not only have been part of the production, both on stage and on film, but to have shared in that with all of those guys. We really became a family, both on Broadway and while shooting the film in Los Angeles. There was such a shared sense of experience and identity.

I think things have certainly gotten easier as an out actor in Hollywood. But most of the time, I'm the only out person on a set, and while that's not necessarily lonely, it does do things to you. There's a sense of modulation about how authentically I can interact with people.

So that, in terms of a personal and professional experience, was very special. And to be a part of a story that has existed for 50 years; one that really was, and certainly represents, a paradigm shift in representation, at least in American culture. That's important.

I think there's a huge chunk of gay history in America, a piece of time that feels lost in some ways because of how many people we lost to the AIDS epidemic. And to feel in this play a sense of identity with, and a continuum to, 1968 – there is an indelible quality or spirit to queer life that I don't think could ever be removed from us, or erased from the narrative. This play is picking it back up, and re-canonising it for a new generation.”

Speaking of gay history, one of my favourite shows of all time is Desperate Housewives. A lot of time has passed since the show ended, but would you ever be interested in returning for some kind of revival?

“Oh, sure! If that's what the people want, then give them what they want. That would be a blast, to go back to Wisteria Lane. Gosh, I count my blessings for having had that be my first job in the business. And, wow, what a way to start.”

Since coming out, you've played a number of queer characters on screen. Was that a conscious decision?

“For a while, it was what I was up for, most often. The prevailing wisdom when I decided to come out was: you know, even if you do choose to come out, you have to be very careful about getting pigeonholed.

And I took issue with that. I found it kind of offensive. I don't want to be limited as a gay man or a gay actor. I don't want to be limited to only playing gay roles. But at the same time, to be told I might be endangering my career by choosing to play more than one of them? That just didn't seem true or accurate of the times.

I'm a part of a shift happening where, yes, I'm a gay actor who's taking on gay roles, but there are so many more queer people stepping into positions of power, whether that is as producers or writers or directors. Suddenly, the queer narratives that become available are complicated and different from one another.

As more representation becomes available, the breadth of queer experience and human experience becomes available to play. And those are stories that I am just interested in and want to tell. Because I think that they are impactful for a wide audience, not just a queer audience, and they're stories that haven't been told.”

There's been quite a shift over the last five years in particular. A lot more drive and authenticity that wasn't there before.

“Yes. And as an actor, I'm interested to see: what kind of situations do gay characters find themselves in? What kind of mashups of genre can these characters exist in so that their sexuality is not the first thing that you notice about them?

Because, as a gay person, it isn't the first thing I want someone to know about me. I don't care if it is, but, we're all complex human beings. And I want to see that represented better onscreen.”

What do you think the industry needs to do to improve queer representation?

“I don't think anything can be achieved instantaneously. So much of what needs to happen is more equity behind the scenes, and having all kinds of people in positions of power. I think that's what needs to happen most. Even on the crew side. Crews can be more reflective of the world we actually live in.

Representation is important. But I wouldn't want any story to be confined by obligations to represent everybody well all the time, you know? Not all stories have to be pretty. Not all stories have to be representative of a community, even though they may be represented in those stories.

There's a direct relationship between representation and an audience developing a sense of affection for a community or a member of a community. The trans community – particularly the black trans community, and black trans women – have had almost no representation onscreen. There's a direct relationship between that and the transphobic violence which exists in the United States and across the world.”

When you came out, what was the fan response like at the time?

“Oh my God. The fan response was incredible. I felt immediately held by everybody who, I guess, had taken a shine to me in the work I'd done.

In your head, you, of course, run through the worst-case scenario. But I just feel I was so supported by fans and the entertainment industry. I'm insulated by a lot of privilege in that. But it wasn't the easiest decision, and I'm so grateful for how it turned out.”

You might have worried about your career after that, but here you are with huge projects like Ratched, and The Batman coming up too. It must be really gratifying to look back and know you made the right choice.

“It is gratifying. I feel I get to participate more authentically and on my own terms. Whereas, before, I don't know – with an act of omission, it felt like I was pretending to be somebody else for everybody else's comfort. And I don't think that's how you want to live as an artist or as a creative person.

By having been authentic about that, I can take bigger risks and accomplish more as myself moving forward.”

Almost every queer person can relate to that feeling, pretending to be something they're not at one time or another.

“Yeah, you realise that you're accommodating other people's feelings over your own. You've got to put yourself first, and trust that by being honest with yourself, and putting yourself first, you're going to be a better person to everyone else.

I just feel so fortunate to have made a personal decision in the middle of this journey, and to have had it bear the kind of fruit it's beginning to bear.”

Link for the article here