"Give me your vice grips, Art."
Mar. 23rd, 2011 08:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreamer_easyRecently had the pleasure of seeing again one of my fave episodes of Night Court, 2.10 The Blizzard (1984), for the first time since the late eighties. It is what JMS might have dismissed as a "fags are people too" story, but it's always stayed with me: it was the first time I'd ever seen anyone react in a completely matter-of-fact, blasé way to teh gay.
It's a modest show, but it still makes me laugh out loud, and there's great ensemble work. IMHO the show's secret weapon is John Larroquette as DA Dan Fielding, who is six foot four and uses every inch of it to comic effect, often to fill in those awkward sitcom gaps around the actual jokes. When The Gay Character tells Dan he's very attractive (fair enough, he is), this is the result:
Not long afterwards, they're stuck in a lift together, with hilarious results, such as Dan's perhaps unwise attempt to escape:
In Queer Theory, Gender Theory, Riki Wilchins notes, "Gay rights activists have responded to conservatives' attacks by stressing the normality of homosexuals. We're just like straight people, we just sleep with the same sex. This strategy has been enormously successful." This is most definitely the approach taken with the character of Warren Wilson (played by Jack Riley), who we learn served in the military, is a dedicated capitalist like Dan, was in a ten-year relationship (his "companion" died not of AIDS or gay-bashing, but overwork) and thinks ballet is "sissy stuff". All the jokes are at Dan's expense, not Warren's. In the end Dan of course Learns Something, leading to the punchline:
"Don't just stand there - somebody get a camera."
So much for the "fags are people too" business. But the part JMS might have applauded, and which has stayed with me all these years, is how the other characters react to Warren's homosexuality: they don't.
Dan: That Wilson guy. He's gay.
Harry: *blankly* ... and?
Billie: Turns out that Wilson is gay, right, so anyway, he thinks that Dan is gay, and he must have said something to Dan because Dan went crazy and wondered how the guy could think that.
Selma: *deadpan as usual* These are the days of our lives.
This probably seems hopelessly trivial, especially seen at this distance; but at the time I had never seen anything like it, on screen or off. (There's a Remington Steele episode from around the same time where they couldn't even say the word "gay": "You mean he's... euw!!!") It entered into my tiny mind as a picture of what the world ought to look like.
(Because, man, somewhere, in one of these... memories, is Dan's impression of the Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz. When I saw that in 1986, watching videos with headphones on in the middle of the night, I almost suffocated.)
It's a modest show, but it still makes me laugh out loud, and there's great ensemble work. IMHO the show's secret weapon is John Larroquette as DA Dan Fielding, who is six foot four and uses every inch of it to comic effect, often to fill in those awkward sitcom gaps around the actual jokes. When The Gay Character tells Dan he's very attractive (fair enough, he is), this is the result:
Not long afterwards, they're stuck in a lift together, with hilarious results, such as Dan's perhaps unwise attempt to escape:
In Queer Theory, Gender Theory, Riki Wilchins notes, "Gay rights activists have responded to conservatives' attacks by stressing the normality of homosexuals. We're just like straight people, we just sleep with the same sex. This strategy has been enormously successful." This is most definitely the approach taken with the character of Warren Wilson (played by Jack Riley), who we learn served in the military, is a dedicated capitalist like Dan, was in a ten-year relationship (his "companion" died not of AIDS or gay-bashing, but overwork) and thinks ballet is "sissy stuff". All the jokes are at Dan's expense, not Warren's. In the end Dan of course Learns Something, leading to the punchline:
"Don't just stand there - somebody get a camera."
So much for the "fags are people too" business. But the part JMS might have applauded, and which has stayed with me all these years, is how the other characters react to Warren's homosexuality: they don't.
Dan: That Wilson guy. He's gay.
Harry: *blankly* ... and?
Billie: Turns out that Wilson is gay, right, so anyway, he thinks that Dan is gay, and he must have said something to Dan because Dan went crazy and wondered how the guy could think that.
Selma: *deadpan as usual* These are the days of our lives.
This probably seems hopelessly trivial, especially seen at this distance; but at the time I had never seen anything like it, on screen or off. (There's a Remington Steele episode from around the same time where they couldn't even say the word "gay": "You mean he's... euw!!!") It entered into my tiny mind as a picture of what the world ought to look like.
(Because, man, somewhere, in one of these... memories, is Dan's impression of the Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz. When I saw that in 1986, watching videos with headphones on in the middle of the night, I almost suffocated.)
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Date: 2011-03-22 10:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 12:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 02:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 09:13 am (UTC)I'm bingeing on the series at the moment :) loses its impetus a little in the latter seasons, but I'd agree totally on the ensemble's strength, particularly once Christine and Roz really settle in. (Even if Markie is a scene-chewere and the latter, for all her win, ain't no Selma :)