STEVEN
CAPSUTO: I was volunteering with a gay peer
counseling group, taking calls from teenagers and young adults.
Some of them said they were considering suicide. When I asked
why they were so afraid of being gay, they said that all they knew
about gay people was what they saw on TV. That made me realize
just how important television is in terms of visibility.
Z:
And it gave you the idea for the book...
S.C.:
It just piqued my curiosity at first, and I wanted to know how
television had changed. In the 1970s, when I was a teenager,
the image of gay people was very positive, with depictions like
Billy Crystal's character on Soap. But in the 1980s,
once AIDS exploded on the scene, everything changed, and I decided
to write an article about it. I got more and more interested,
and eventually spent eleven years researching the subject.
The book was supposed to come out in 1996, but then Ellen
happened and we decided to hold off and include that.
Z:
What social factor most influences gay images on television?
S.C.:
Definitely the news. I was lucky enough to interview
one of the head writers for the series Dynasty. I asked
him why, if Steven was gay, they kept having him romantically involved
with women. He said that when AIDS first appeared, the public
associated gayness with disease, so they decided to end Steven's
relationship with his boyfriend and marry him off to a woman.
Later, when things calmed down, he went back to dating guys... until
Rock Hudson's death, in response to which they heterosexualized
the character again.
Z:
What were the first gay characters?
S.C.:
The first was in 1954, on a series that aired Broadway plays.
They staged a show called Lady in the Dark, and the gay character
was a very swishy fashion photographer. He even had lines
where he talked about his attraction to men. Around the same
time [actually 13 years later], a series called NYPD ran a plot about blackmailers targeting gay men in
New York City, and it drew an interesting parallel between racism
and homophobia.
Z:
When was television's first man-on-man kiss?
S.C.:
In 1983, in the TV-movie Trackdown, but
it wasn't in a positive context. He's a killer about to go
on the lam, and he gives his boyfriend a goodbye kiss. It
was acceptable because he was the villain, and his gayness made
him seem that much more evil and twisted.
Z:
And the first kiss between women?
S.C.:
You started to see those in the 1990s, but it was always something
you could explain away as not a "real" lesbian kiss.
The newspapers ran massive headlines about them, but it turned out
to be things like the kiss on Roseanne or L.A. Law,
where it was a lesbian [or bisexual woman] kissing a straight
woman. The most devious example was on Star Trek: Deep
Space 9. The characters were two space aliens who get
new bodies when they die. So you had two actresses playing
a couple who, in a previous incarnation, had been husband and wife.
That made it okay for them to have a long, steamy kiss.
Z:
What's the best image out there today?
S.C.:
There's a series in the United States called It's
All Relative. It's a boy-meets-girl story where
the girlfriend's parents are a very cultivated gay male couple and
the boyfriend's parents are a straight couple who run a bar.
It's fun, but it falls into the new stereotype: what defines a person
as gay isn't homosexuality, but rather a flair for fashion, decorating...
Z:
You don't believe in that prevailing stereotype?
S.C.:
Anyone who's seen my apartment knows that not all gay men have
a knack for decorating. But then there's Will on Will &
Grace, who's always cleaning and very fashion-conscious.
You get more of the same on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy,
which was all the rage last summer. It's the ultimate expression
of the cliché that gay guys are fabulous and that straight
guys are pigs.
Z:
What is your favorite gay character, past or present?
S.C.:
Carter on Spin City, because he's a prominent role
and he's not desexualized, and yet they never reduce him to being
just "the gay guy." He was also groundbreaking as
one of the first gay characters who wasn't apolitical: he was very
up-front about who he was, and was willing to take a practical stand
on issues that affected him.
Z:
What are the main differences between Europe and North America?
S.C.:
Basically, that in America they censor sex and in Europe,
violence. That's the case on the mainstream networks, anyway.
The premium channels, which don't depend on advertisers, can run
whatever they want, like the American Queer as Folk, which
is at least as raunchy as the British series.
Z:
What do you think of the situation in Spain?
S.C.:
I love Diana on the sitcom 7 Lives, and
in general I think the image of lesbians on Spanish TV is good.
They are portrayed far less often than gay men, but they're less
stereotyped. Spain today reminds me of the U.S. in the 1970s,
with its campy, comical celebrities like Boris Izaguirre, or male
characters that fit some sort of stereotype, like the dance student
who used to be on One Step Forward. That's not to say
that Spain is backward. You're living through the same logical
progression we did, but just slightly later.
