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Gay characters on soaps

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  • Member
I can't tell you how badly I want a gay villain on a show.

One step at a time, brimike. First, the gay Black man; then, the gay villain. ;-)

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  • Member
Aren't we getting a gay villain with Zac on ATWT?

^one note cartoon characters don't count.

Zac probably isn't even gay. I didn't want to believe it at first, but it's highly possible that he and Zoe are really lovers (and not twins, or related at all), and Zac is only playing the role of wanting Noah as a way of getting into Luke and Noah's little...circle.

Tune in for wasted potential on "As the World Turns," weekdays on CBS!

  • Member

Haven't read any spoilers, but I think Zac and Zoe are twin Grimaldis and Zac is gay. I believe they really are twins because they both have the thing which tipped Noah off to them both being Pisces.

What about Doris Wolfe on GL? She is usually portrayed as a power-hungry, publicity-seeking, corrupt type, and although her portrayal has softened somewhat since she was revealed to be a lesbian -- the softening makes her three-dimensional instead of "one-note" -- I still think she could qualify as a gay villain, although not a gay male one.

Edited by jfung79

  • Member

I don't trust most of the current showrunners in daytime enough to believe they would be able to tell a story about a gay villain which would not heavily imply that their homosexuality is part of what makes them evil, or that they are mentally ill and damaged because they are gay. Even the supposedly more progressive primetime shows fall into this trap.

  • Administrator

There was already a gay villain on daytime - Vincent from Passions.

I don't trust most of the current showrunners in daytime enough to believe they would be able to tell a story about a gay villain which would not heavily imply that their homosexuality is part of what makes them evil, or that they are mentally ill and damaged because they are gay.

Passions didn't imply those things. Vincent was just evil and messed up and it wasn't because he was gay.

I always figured that the gay equivalent of the "I'll blackmail him by threatening to announce that I'm pregnant for him" was "I'll blackmail him by threatening to announce that we made out/slept together/have mutual romantic feelings." That, in and of itself, is enough to send some "straight" guys' worlds crashing down.

Yup, it happened with Vincent blackmailing Chad.

  • Member

Wasn't Vincent a hermaphrodite who could make himself male at one time and female at another? I wouldn't classify him as the typical gay villain you see on a show.

I didn't think they did that great a job with the other gay characters in the story, like Simone (girlfriend murdered, shipped off) or Chad, but then Chad was such a bad actor, maybe it wasn't the writing.

  • Member

Vincent was a real mess, but that was what Passions was all about. And yeah, I don't think it counts as a gay character since he could change into any sex he wanted.

  • Administrator

At the time of Vincent was blackmailing and sleeping with Chad, we didn't know Vincent could change sexes. But before we found that out, Vincent was a typical villain who was gay. Him being gay didn't play a factor in him doing bad things. He wasn't bad because he was gay. He was a bad guy who just happened to be gay.

Passions also showed Rae and Simone in bed kissing and about to make love (I think....my mind's a bit fuzzy on this).

Sure they weren't the best written storylines, but it did happen on Passions. :)

  • Member

I didn't like Passions but Toups is right. It was never implied that Vincent was bad because he was gay. He was bad and gay but there was no cause/consequence link between both of them.

  • Member

I hope I didn't come across as saying Passions was sending out that message. What I said was I don't trust daytime to tell a story about a gay villain because of the gay = evil trap which is so easy to fall into. I didn't count Passions because I never thought of that character as gay. I had forgotten viewers didn't know about him being able to change gender until after the affair was discovered.

  • Member
Yup - but as a gay man, I can't tell you how badly I want a gay villain on a show. I'm seriously salivating over it. Enough with the self-righteous, morally outstanding, do-gooders. The white-washing of homosexuals is stale. Making them all angelic goes totally against the concept of equal rights. If homosexuals are just like everybody else, then why can't we show ALL kinds of homosexuals - the ones you love, and the ones you love to hate?

You're not the only one. Having seen the Celluloid Closet, I am well aware about the legacy of gay characters in American cinema... being villains, outcasts or getting killed/killing themselves. But, oh, how delicious of a time would it be if, say, David Hayward on AMC or Faith Rosco on GH were homosexuals?

There was already a gay villain on daytime - Vincent from Passions.

Passions didn't imply those things. Vincent was just evil and messed up and it wasn't because he was gay.

Yup, it happened with Vincent blackmailing Chad.

You're talking about Wanda Sykes? :unsure:

  • Member
LOL! Maybe it's just me. Not to get all personal, but my coming out was about the least stressful thing I've ever done in my life. I dated women for awhile, and then I dated men, and my friends/family didn't really react at all. Or if they did, they didn't do it around me. Being gay is about as important to me as having blue eyes. It's just not something I think about. Don't get me wrong - I consider myself very lucky and blessed in that regard. I know many people struggle with it. I credit both my generation, and the evolved nature of my friends and family at the time. So I tend to look at gays-in-the-media from a different perspective. But I know I'm in the minority, so I don't mean to imply that everybody else is as ready as I am for this. Forgive me if I came across bratty, Mark. I do tend to see this from a perspective other gay men do not, and I totally respect that.

Not bratty at all! But I'm about a decade older and came from a less evolved environment. Maybe I'm "stuck" in the past...except I look at Prop 8, and I think "nope...this world hasn't changed...not outside of New York and LA, and maybe SF and Provincetown". And even in LA and SF, the numbers weren't sufficient to carry the day on Prop 8.

I don't want storytelling confused with agendas. But...there are a lot of people out there who are just dying to see promiscuous, nasty homos...let's throw in some pedophiles too...to confirm everything they already know to be true.

Absolutely! I'm all for that! But it would be nice if a gay male "vixen" swooped in to steal the man of our gay hero's dreams. Granted, they can't do the "I'll get pregnant with his baby" story - but there are other ways to do it.

I do want to see this. But on B&B. It would fit in perfectly on B&B.

On my Y&R...I'd much prefer it to be a tender young legal aid lawyer...who calms the savage beast of the hirsute prodigal son trying -- so desperately -- to win the acceptance of the family he never knew, and that has rejected him.

  • Member
You're talking about Wanda Sykes? :unsure:

I KNEW I wasn't the only one who thought that! He looks exactly like her!

I don't want storytelling confused with agendas. But...there are a lot of people out there who are just dying to see promiscuous, nasty homos...let's throw in some pedophiles too...to confirm everything they already know to be true.

With the writers we have now, I'm sure that's what they'd get, a one-note, slutty, queeny, promiscuous gay. If we had writers who knew what they were doing (or were allowed to do it, or even wanted to do it), I'd like to think that they could write a promiscious, "nasty" homo as a person with feelings and a past, a person who is who he or she is for a reason, be it for better or for worse.

  • Member

On gay villains - I think the gay soap character needs to stop being sanctified and so far GL does the best job of that with Doris. She's corrupt, angry and hardened but has a soul. The best soap villains overall are those who don't twirl their mustaches but those who are deeply hurt, angry and tortured by something inside of them and do bad things as a result. Daniel on OLTL was a huge misstep because his sexual orientation became the deep, dark secret that caused him to do the things he did. The story would have been much more interesting and acceptable to me if he had been having an affair with Paul Cramer and killed him to keep political secrets from getting out; I would have accepted that more than an otherwise good man who turned to murder to hide the fact that he was gay. Being gay should never be the cause or excuse of someone's villainy, and if it IS there should be a character to represent the other side of the coin. I know it sounds very agenda-y, but I'd say soaps are still where cinema was in the 50s-70s. Luke, Noah and Bianca are so whitewashed it's nauseating. The most believable gay-themed story in soap history so far is Olivia and Natalia, because they are imperfect and human. Imagine Luke or Noah doing something to intentionally hurt someone! Heavens no.

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