We're actually going to add a laugh track into this episode, perfect so that everyone knows when we're being funny.
Right.
That's part of my rider whenever I do a podcast, is that I need to come laughter.
She's sheen Ami, no ma, not my name? Yo? What is your childhood? I am a chuck, yo?
What's going down?
Before one.
Round? Welcome to like a virgin. I'm rose dom you. Fran is not here at the moment because she is on fire Island for no know the millionth time this. I was going to say this summer, but it's not even summer anymore. It's literally fall. We took a few weeks off, but we are back today with a brand new episode and it's a good one. We've been holding onto this for a while. Today we have an episode with George Siveris, comedian and host of Stradio Lab, which Frand and I were on a couple of months ago.
Definitely go listen to that. And we talked to George all about Will and Grace. Yes, this is all about musty TV. This is must listen podcasting. Will and Grace is obviously, you know, very iconic and like formative gay media, and we had a lot of fun talking about it. So without further ado, here comes George to talk with us all about Will and Grace and Jack and Karen. I'm imagining that as one of those T shirts where it's like, you know, the different characters listed like Harry
and Hermione and Ron. Oh, it all comes back to Harry Potter, doesn't it. Do you want even more like a virgin content? Well, you should become a patron at patreon dot com slash like a virgin. We do weekly bonus episodes talking about you know, the TV shows, we're watching, the books, we're reading DBD commentaries, all that good stuff. So become a patron now and get into the gig. Honey. Okay, George, I want to know are you Are you a Will, a Jack, a Grace or a Karen?
I mean the deepest, darkest Before I answered, let me just say this because I sent you guys or yeah, what if I was like I'm a Rosario Born, you know, like through and through, I'm actually more of a Leslie Jordan may hear rest in peace. Okay, I sent you guys three topic and I was sort of looking at them and I was like, this is the most like white faggot, like could.
Not be it was true.
The three topics were literally a forgotten Madonna album, Will and Grace, forgotten by the world maybe but by me, and and the which I appreciate.
And the third one was Joan.
Rivers And I was like, this is because there is a world in which I could have tried to be like you know, I like you know, highbrow things too. I could have been like b York, you know Apple, But I was like, no, I want to look into like the depths of my depravity, of like what are the things that truly, if I'm being honest with myself, like affected me, even if they're embarrassing now. And and sadly, no, I appreciate that. That was very brave of you.
And when our producer texted us, I did hear the sound of a giant fan with the words clash.
Whenever I sound on an email.
Yes, it was giving, like it was giving like the gay it It was like, all are the most extreme versions of like that of the culture. But like I actually am curious because they I thought they were great topics. I had no I cast no judgment on that trio. But what is aside from being gay? What is the through line of those three cultural objects, because they said, I felt like I knew I learned so much about you just by the volunteering of those things.
Yeah.
I mean there's a sort of like grotesque ye in, sort of like the late nineties early aughts, white gay male It's like when it was starting to peek into the mainstream. And I feel like Will and Grace was part of that. I feel like people like, I mean, Joan Rivers has such a rich history without you know, she's not just a gay ac on, She's many other
things and whatever. But like, in terms of my life, it was like these female comedians like Joan Rivers and Kathy Griffin and Margaret cho it was like people that appealed to basically the the Jack McFarlands of the world.
Hmmm.
I was gonna say that when you presented us with those three options, I was thinking of them as sort of a maiden mother Crone archetype. But Madonna and Joan Rivers are both the Krone, and they're also both the Mother. Okay, but I still want to know who are you of it?
I mean again, I mean the really sort of human If I'm being honest with myself. The humiliating thing of it is that I am a will like I am like a basic sort of as much as I would like to pretend otherwise, a sort of like on the way to assimilation, white gay guy who works a desk job.
You know what I mean?
Like it's I mean every I mean, yes, I sort of. You could argue I'm a creative like Jack, but it's with a sort of like I'm not like punk rock doing cabaret shows like I am very much doing it.
By the book, was Jack punk?
Right?
I mean, listen to many he was Jack? Jack is Jack is the vomit artist from is.
A performance artist. Jack is rave culture. Jack is a yeah jacket. Jack is Byork Yeah yeah so, And and just if I have the bravery to be a Jack McFarland in the sense of being b York, I would, But instead I am Katie Perry witness Era fran fran I'm gonna ask you the same question, who of the four are you? This is the sex and the citification of pop culture.
I think I I think I'm Debra Messing. I think I'm I think I'm.
Grace Oh my god, you so I think that?
But George you know, I see Will for you in like a more positive way.
Like Will is the character.
That tends to have like the bird's eye view of like what's going on totally, like the kind of the one that's like, hey, can we all keep it together for like one second, you know, but also like manages to slide into hysteria very quick, yes, which is very relatable and human relatable.
He's also I mean, he's a neurotic. He feels constantly slighted. Again I'm describing both me myself and him, you know, neurotic, constantly slighted, sort of like really loves uh, really embraces being gay and loves being in gay spaces, but then there's always something that sets him off and he's like, I'm god, you know, like that's sort of me at a gay bar.
But also like but he also like there's this thing of like he doesn't he's not like a certain kind.
Right, well, that's the dream.
He's a very like corporate gay like Matt, like straight passing gay in some ways interesting for any I Okay, I know we've we've gotten pretty far into this convo, but for the virgins listening, I do want to just provide a little context. We are talking about Will and Grace, the NBC sitcom which started in nineteen ninety eight, starring Deborah Messing, Eric McCormick, Megan Malalley, and Sean Hayes. It's
about a duo of best friends. I think the series starts because Grace breaks up with the boyfriend and has to move in with her gay friend Will, who she at one point was in love with Taylor as old as time. She has an assistant who's wealthy and works for her for some reason, Karen. And then Will's next door neighbor is Jack, a very flamboyant gay man who is very much the sort of like other gays that Will is not like, and yet he absolutely is. So yeah,
that's what the show's about. It ran from It ran for eight seasons in the original run, and then came back for I think a two season revival. Okay, so George, your Will, fran Is Grace.
And you are Rosario. Now I'm Karen.
Yeah, I mean it's you're You're the character most capable of murder.
Splash has murdered probably.
I'll never tell, just like Britney Murphy.
But I also sort of appreciate Abou Karen is that there's a sort of mythology around her, as though she's kind of an otherworldly like she could be one hundred and fifty years old. She like will talk about her past and like imply that she was, you know, in the civil in like World War two or something like.
It's very.
I don't know, it's very it's almost I mean, it's a it's sort of on par with maybe not a Phoebe, but like definitely a Samantha from Sex and the City.
Totally.
Yeah, she is a figure who we are meant to understand like is kind of primordial and like has existed since Adonic time. She also, like I mean, the thing is, as with many sitcoms, if you go back and watch the first season of Will and Grace, it's like a little bit different than The characterizations especially are a little bit different than what they evolved into. Like Karen is not quite as much of a pill pop in Boozehound as she would come to be in later seasons.
I will never forget that.
I think they did two live episodes and there's one in which Karen there's a visual gag where Karen opens up her pill cabinet and it's just like a shoot with pills, like like shooting out of it, and it's so credible.
That episode also guest stars Matt Lower.
Yeah, well it is.
It's an NBC and in fact, I'm sorry to you know, sort of go down this path. But a running gag in that episode is that basically Karen is serving this huge party that she throws every year that she has never invited Will and Grace to because she's embarrassed with them because it's all high profile people and celebrities, and she accidentally, through I think a mistake of hers, invited
them this one year. So they're so excited to be the well with celebrities, and the entirety of the live episode takes place in the bathroom as they're each sort of like going in and out of the room, and Grace is doing this game where she's trying to touch as many famous people's butts as possible, and so one of the people she gets.
Not a part of part of the people she gets is Matt Lower, ironically, and then like there's.
A gag where she like kind of does it, she like gets his butt, and then he like looks at her and he's like, you already got me.
That's kind of funny.
Yeah, a little bit of yeah, a little bit of reverse foreshadowing. Well, you know, there's plenty of stuff that was done and said over the course of Will and
Grace that would not fly now. I yesterday and preparation for this and also for my own enjoyment, I watched all of the Will and Grace Christmas episodes and there's one in which, through hanging out with Grace, Will's mom played by the incredible Blive Dianner, who gave us not only this character but also Gena Paltrow, it learns the word fagola, which is.
Not something she should say. I wonder.
Fagela is a Yiddish word for gay person or it's like saying fag in it is it is? Yeah, I wonder did they ever say fag on Will and Grace?
You know, I think, I mean, maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like they may have.
It's entirely possible they can say it.
They can say it.
I don't think they've said it.
I mean maybe the revival.
Yeah, there's a sort of like something that's gonna google, something that's sort of fascinating about Will and Grace and about a lot of like gay pop culture at the time, is like because of a combination of the fact that it's written by largely straight people, or by by many straight people, not exclusively, but it's written by many straight people, and also that people didn't have anything to compare it
to because there wasn't that much mainstream gay media. The like rules of what's inappropriate and what's not inappropriate just like had not been set in stone yet. So some of it ends up being almost accidentally extremely subversive, just like some of it ends up being incredibly offensive and like transphobic and racist and whatever else. But some of it because they were just like going blind, Like now you're like, oh, this is in fact more subversive than like the queer meat, like than Bros.
You know what I mean.
Like, I think we could definitively say Will and Grace is more subversive than Bros.
In almost every way.
Although I mean, I hate to get to go this deep this early into this conversation, but was was aids ever mentioned in the entirety of Will and Grace?
I know that's I don't think it was a running theme, but it wasn't a bit, not a bit. I mean, if they were really brave. They would just play it for laughs, of course, But yeah, but I do think there was sort of well, you know what, actually I remember this one episode and actually this is sort of like kind of a a window into the darkness of
the soul of Will and Grace. Is like there was an episode where Jack and Will meet this gay elder and he's like this guy who's maybe in his sixties or seventies, and he wants to save this gay independent bookstore and because they're turning it into like a luxury gym, and so Jack and Will are very moved by it and they help him raise money. But the sort of gag at the end is that actually Jack and Will want it to be turned into a luxury gym because that's like more what they want than in but it's.
Sort of like they want to cru but it's sort of like.
There's something almost more honest about like if it's like if that were to happen now on like some sort of Netflix show that my mom watches, they would all come together and save the bookstore, you know what I mean, or like the luxury gym owner would be this huge villain.
And it was sort of.
Crazy that like they really did. They were honest about the fact that Will and Jack, as urban white gay man wanted the luxury gym more than they wanted to support like their queer elder. Like, so that's what I'm mean in progress, Yeah, exactly, Like that's what it's almost like, it's almost like very honest about things like that.
Accidentally, Like I don't know, I think it is.
I think it is like you're being facetious about it being progressed. But I actually do think that that is like what's missing from a lot of the things that are now correctively trying to commentate on what's going on
right now. And I think the thing that like must be said about Will and Grace and like the climate that it came out in, it has a lot to do with the fact that they weren't trying to solve for anything, right like with the Bros comparison, Bros And we love all the people involved, but like Bros existed to solve a problem, you know, like it's it's solved.
It was trying to solve a problem about the inclusion of queer character and brom coms and Will and Grace arrived on the scene being like we don't want to say anything.
And in you know, nineteen ninety eight, like.
By this time, it's like they've gone through the AIDS crisis. Freddie Mercury Ellen on Time saying Yep, I'm gay. Bill Clinton was the first president to like acknowledge gay people as like a voter base in general. Right, Like, there's so many kind of like landmarks that had been achieved to lay the path for it, so that by the time it arrived, which like it was essentially an overnight success. It was like by its first season it was like prime time highest rated show.
It was musty TV.
Honey.
Yes, it was all of a sudden given permission to be as quote unquote problematic as it wants to.
With that luxury gym thing.
I think the luxury gym thing like kind of perfectly encapsulates what made Will and Grace really ahead of its time, which was that it was agnostic of a lot of the baggage that had come before it, which is like most people, most gay people that appeared on TV screens dieedab ads, right, And here is like an audience of people that are kind of sick of the whole AIDS thing, unfortunately, and so of course, it makes sense that the entire first run of Will and Grace would not mention AIDS
once during the entire Yeah, they.
Just wanted to be the fabulous, Like that's what it was all.
And guess what mission accomplished, Sweetie. To your point Fran about it, I think you're so like dead on that it is. It could only have existed in late Clinton era because it is sort of like there's a sort of.
Post AIDS.
And I'm saying that in quotes. I understand that we're not actually in a post AIDS era, but for the average viewer, like a sort of post AIDS gay life almost gave them permission to be less serious about that stuff in the same way that we that like earlier Bamba era pop culture was like trying to be post
race almost. It was sort of like, well, we've like exactly acknowledged gay people, and now we can have a sitcom about it, just like you know, we have a black president, now we can have you know, the show Happy Endings.
Yeah kind of yeah.
And it's it's kind of like to say like something is like ahead of its time is usually like code for like it's really dated now, but like it was, it was. It was ahead of its time, and like I remember, like last decade when Biden was like, Will and Grace probably did more to educate the American public on the LGBTQ community than anything else. He's not one hundred percent wrong.
Well right, yeah, you know, she's.
Because it was so massive, And I think that a lot, because the show itself was not burdened by the weight of quote unquote educating people. That's probably why everyone hates the show, because.
It was about normalized.
It didn't stand for everything.
But I think that and I don't really know necessarily how the creators felt about like aids or like gay activists, but like I could imagine that by the mid late nineties, everyone is all gay people are sick of Larry Kramer, sick of act up, sick of like being you know, it's it's just it's a empathy fatigue, right, It's like what we felt like in the Trump era, where it's just like, I'm actually, I don't want to listen to this anymore. I need something that's just stupid and sexy and fun.
And that's kind of okay, But I want to ask an important question, is Will and Grace for gay people or is it for stray people?
And I think we I think we know the answer.
I mean, it's funny because I do think at the time it was for straight people, and I almost think that maybe like it's long tail, like maybe it was. I feel like now it's for gay people. Like I feel like now nostalgically looking back on it, I'm like, this is fun in a sort of it's almost like watching a drag show or so, I mean, Karen is like a drag character, like you know, it's it's sort of like, yeah, I don't know, you can view it through a different lens and have it be fun for
a gay audience. But I do think at the time it was certainly sold as like, look how normal this is? Look kind normal this is? Don't like, oh way, look how normal this is?
You know, and yeah, and I'm sure like growing up as as you know, like little queer kids, there's like at first an element of like I don't want to like this thing because I don't want people to think I'm gay, And then it's like I don't want to like this thing because it's like it's lame. It's like,
you know, it's like normalizing queerness. It's first three people, and now I think you're totally right that it's like looking back on it and you're like, wait, this actually like is absolutely for me and my sensibility, and like is for queer people like more than anyone else, because we are the ones who like get the references and get the humor and like it is exactly our taste and our point of view.
It's also like, I mean, there's a way in which if they wanted to really sort of do this like respectability politics, normalizing gay people whatever, they they could have made the characters like way.
More respectable than they are.
I mean Jack is still like a sereny, screechy like sort of you know, in quote gay stereotype. And then even Will, who's meant to be like the more respectable one, is very like sort of like neurotic in this quintessentially gay way. Like he certainly is someone who actual gay people can see themselves in. So I think, like it almost like it's slightly better than it needs to be, and I think maybe that's why it has at least a little bit of lasting power.
Yeah, well, I mean it has, like, of course it has aged poorly in some cases, but it's still funny. Yeah, you know, like going back and rewatching it, the jokes still hit. It's very well written, you know, it's like a very well crafted sitcom. I also like the but you know, I don't see Will and Jacka's being sexless, Like obviously it's not like we ever got you know. It's like, because this was airing at the same time as Queer as Folk, like that is a huge counterpoint.
It's not like we ever got like rimming on Will and Grace.
But like Will and Jack they looked like they they were always dating, they always had boyfriends.
And like maybe the word rimming was not said, but it was implied, like there were like dirty jokes.
Sure, sure.
I always think it's interesting that when when we get that critique, when people are always like, oh, they were so sexless, the gay characters didn't get to have sex. And I was like, wait, but like every other joke is about a boy, Like yeah, I was like, what is that?
And also I'm now, this is what I was gonna
say before that I forgot. There's a part I remember specifically, there's a sort of meta joke at some point where Will says something kind of avertly sexual and then Grace is like, don't say that, Will America doesn't like to see you as sexual, like, and it's just sort of joke on the And I those are the little pockets of not to say that that's so subversive, but like, those are the little pockets of knowing this that I think honestly make it a way more interesting show than like a Friends.
Or something that was on at the same time.
The show Friends, Friends did not know and I think that they understood at the strategic level, like what they could and couldn't do with gay identity in public exactly in public opinion. And I think that you know, when you ask the question is that is this for gay
or straight people? It would not have been successful if it was for gay people, right, Like straight people writ large had to give this show its massive popularity in order for it to be platformed and successful, right, And so like the fact that it was massive and then had all of these select you mean Matt Lauer aside, like all these celebrities guess starring like Madonna and Matt Damon, Jenna Jackson, yeah, Share Jay l Brittany, like all the people.
And it's like that creates legitimacy, right, and like the legitimacy and like the kind of acceptance into mainstream culture that the show I guess laid out. It's like what gave kids who would watch it at during during its run permission to be themselves. You're like, Oh, if they're accepted, then maybe i'll be accepted too. Write it's like funny because like assimilation is like the number one critique of the show, and yet like assimilation is kind of why the show.
Was as impactful as it was totally.
And again, I don't know why I keep bringing up Happy Endings, but I was thinking because I was, I don't know, it was in the news or for some reason recently. And if you take a show like Happy Endings, which has have you every seen Happy Endings ever?
No?
What is that about it?
So it's a show that was it's very Obama era.
It's like probably I want to say, like twenty ten or something, and it's like Casey Wilson's in it. It's like a good fun cast, but there's a gay character. And the entire sort of running joke about the gay character is that he's kind of like the biggest slob of all of it, but like he's like very for
lack of a better term, straight acting. He's like kind of a slacker and perpetually unemployed and doesn't dress well and is a slob and whatever, and he is part of this friend group that is all straight people except him, and it's like we're so post gay that they can all joke about it and blah blah. And I almost feel like something like that is way more pro assimilation
or conservative than Will and Grace. I mean, Will and Grace is essentially portraying like this sort of like many chosen family that's like two really oh like absolutely gay guys and two women that are like unmarried or I mean, I guess Karen is married, but like two women whose husbands you don't see.
Yeah at various at various times, she isn't isn't married,
and Grace isn't isn't married. But yeah, I was watching that episode with the one of the Christmas episodes with Blithe Danner and the four of them go to Will's mom's house for Christmas like they are a family and not only got more and more explicit as the show went on, And I think maybe more than anything, that's what Will and Grace like kind of presented to the world was like one of the first real examples of what like a queer Chosen Family could look like, because
I honestly think looking at something like happy endings, which honestly I haven't I haven't watched enough of the show to maybe like make this generalization, but I kind of think that feels more dated than.
No, it's one hundred percent, I think, Like, honestly, I think sometimes Wow, not to make the biggest generalation of all, but I do think sometimes Obama era stuff seems more dated than Clinton era stuff in a weird way.
Like no, yeah, no, I feel that the sort.
Of kumbaya like everyone's the same spirit of both of those eras, it feels way more forced during the Obama era. It's sort of like we're like not allowed to look at anything ugly ever, whereas at least in the nineties you were like not everything was like algorithmically calculated to like appeal to a demographic.
Or whatever anyway. So but yeah, I totally agree.
I also, I mean in terms of the Chosen Family of it all, Like I remember when Will and Grace tried to have a baby together. That was like one of the only times the show I ever sort of got serious because what happened was Grace then met Leo played by Harry Connick Junior, and so who is it really is the best that I ever looked as is Woody Harrelson, also playing Grace's boyfriend.
By the way, his breakout role, Grace had some really.
Good I mean, I want to like go back to the guest stars because that's actually one of the most fascinating parts of Will and Grace. But so Grace sort of was planning on having a baby with her gay best friend, but then met a a Jewish doctor, which is her dream, and then she was like, wait, but I have to see where this goes. I can't have a baby with my gay best friend yet. And they get into this real fight about it, and it's kind of I mean, it's kind of something you would never
see on TV. And I don't even know if you've seen it since, Like it's such a specific experience of like that generation of you know, assimilating gay men who still didn't have you know, domestic partnerships and gay marriage and whatever could adopt or whatever. So I do think in those ways, it was in its own way ahead of its time. Again through this very narrow about this very narrow.
Slipper of the game.
Okay.
Something that has always bugs me and like does seem slightly unrealistic is the fact that Jack and Will never know.
There is a say gag midway through where they're like they wake up they're in like a cruise ship or some thing, or they're in Karen's yeah, I remember, and they wake up naked next to each other. I think it's revealed that they ultimately that had not had sex, but it's like it's sort of a running gag, and I think you're so right in that, like the final step it doesn't take is the fact that if they were actually gay friends, they would have fucked and it would have been okay.
And I feel like that's the version of it.
It wouldn't have had to be a whole thing that they would have just had or or it would have happened long before the show started. They would have had sex once. And you know, there is a very iconic Thanksgiving two parter flashback episode about when Will came out to Grace and Jack is sort of Will's like entree into gay life and like his mentor a little bit, and Jack clearly has a crush on him, and I do think that running joke is maybe brought back a
couple times. It's like probably part of the reason why Jack is constantly nagging Will is like he probably does have a bit of a thing for him. But yeah, like realistically they would have one time, like at some fucking gay club, hooked up and then been like, oh, yeah, whatever, let's just put friends.
And not just Jack. Like you don't see that dynamic at all throughout the show. They don't have other like because they do have a group of gay friends, but there's never any sexual history among any of them.
It's like this couple that has adopted a child.
Yeah, and they would all be fucking fucking together. Yeah, they would be having group sex while Grace was on, you know, with Leo.
Because because they're like so white and so upper class, like there is a kind of like like odorless gass of like conservatism that's like in some of them. And I kind of wonder if like whoever was writing however they were writing the show, is like maybe like rich gays don't hook up with their friends like they maybe there's sluts, but it's like there's some like kind of emotional conservative like guardrail around sex meaning something or something I don't know.
Well, it's also the aids.
I mean, it's also again like the late nineties post AIGs thing where it's like, well, if we're not a dressing that, then we're certainly not having them all, like going around having sex with one another, Like.
Yeah, yeah, well I think also it's probably that because there were so many straight people having their hands on the show, Like straight people truly cannot conceptualize of a world in which you have casual sex with your friends and then.
Stay ye and like it's they just and also as accepting as they were and as accepting as straight people can be in their hearts, they still think what every gay person wants is to settle down and have children in a monogamous relationship. Like it's more of a recent thing to be like accepting of other romantic lifestyles.
I feel, yeah, like polyamory, which, according according to TikTok, polyamorous people are like the most you know, maligned and marginalized.
People, and we are marching at dawn.
I'm not marching for for polyamorous people.
Okay, So speaking of like Will and Jack, I do remember in the last season there is this moment that happens that centers around the idea of a gay kiss on TV, and I do like how Will and Grace is continuously like meta, like you can tell like what they're aware of, what they can get away with or whatever. And in the actual episode, Will and Jack are anticipating
what is supposed to be. Isn't it supposed to be like the first gay kiss on h on network television or something on an episode of NCIS And then they try to watch it and it doesn't happen, like it's cut for cut from you know, network TV or whatever. And I'm pretty sure that it mirrors an actual thing that happened in like gay TV history, where in there was supposed to be a gay kiss and then it
was cut. And so as a part of their last season, they stage up protests wherein they kiss on Good Morning America in front of Al Roker and Will and Jack kiss on Morning TV basically the live Morning TV and then they become the first gay kiss on TV, which
is like kind of genius. It's like really genius and fun and also talks about like the first like the first gay stuff is like that's like a that's a joke that will like remain relevant, like jokes that are jokes are still on SNL about that, you know what I mean?
Yeah, I mean even in terms of the sort of meta the meta element of it, even when when Britney Spears guest stars famously she plays a conservative talk show host that the new conservative network that has bought out TV, which is the network that Jack works at, has placed there to make the show more conservative. And I feel like that's also a sort of commentary on like what you can get away with what the quote unquote the suits, like, you know, want, versus what the people want people making
a show want. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's very it's very sort of aware of the of the culture surrounding it.
I want to rewind really quick, because we didn't get a chance to talk about, like I guess where we were in time when we first watched Will and Grace. I have already sat on the pot that right around the time, I still wasn't allowed to watch like mainstream things, but I like was saving my own money to buy my own shit. I did buy this season six box set of Will and Grace and hid it under my bed, and my mom ended up like confiscating it and throwing it away, so that to me is like but I
remember loving it and being like what the fuck is this? Like, how is this allowed to be in the culture?
Whatever? What are y'all's memories, I guess are attachment to it.
I distinctly remember the first the first time I was like channel surfing and caught it on TV, and I wish I remember the context of this scene, but it's like a scene where I think Will is coming back from Paris, I want to say, and he had sent back a T shirt that has like the Eiffel Tower on it that was meant for Jack's son that he has with like the lesbian couple with Rosio done all over, but Jack had misunderstood and thought the T shirt was
for him. So the big reveal is that he takes off his Bathrob when he's wearing like a belly shirt that has the Eiffel Tower on it, which is clearly like a kid's shirt, and he's like, this wasn't for me, and it's like, of course he's so gay that he thought like a children's shirt was for him or whatever. And I just remember being like almost I in no
way was aware that I might be gay. At the time, I was, you know, probably like eleven or twelve or something, and I remember being so sort of like humiliated by the sight of that and being like, oh, God, like men shouldn't do that, Like this is so like why is he being so feminine? Well, they shouldn't is Let's be real, And that's kind of the moral of the show at the end.
So I have that memory of it.
But then at the same time, it was very sort of like intrigued and titillated by it and found it very funny, and I.
Like wanted to watch more of it.
And the other thing is so at the time we were living in so my parents immigrated from Greece, and then we lived in New Jersey, and then when I was thirteen, we moved back to Greece. So I have sort of these two parts of my life where I was like in America and then outside. And so this was still in New Jersey and we went to a Greek church that was in no way conservative. It was like, you know, in like a blue state. It was not
like Catholic whatever. But for whatever reason, I remember in Sunday school the teacher calling out specifically Will and Grace has like this uniquely evil thing, and he had like never talked about pop culture before or music or TV or movies, but that was like the one thing I remember he singled out. So from the beginning, I almost like had caught on that it was something controversial before I knew what it even was on its own, you know,
on its own. And then I think I really got into it, probably after it stopped airing, because I started just like watching it, like renting it, renting the DVDs, or like watching it online. And it became sort of like a comfort watch, like my number one comfort watch throughout like high school and college that I would like return to, or if I was like home for the Christmas for Christmas break or something, I would just like let it play in the background and watch like twelve
episodes in a row. And Yeah, and it's interesting because it hasn't had the same kind of nostalgic legacy as even even like Friends or something like yes, it was rebooted, whatever, But you don't really see you know, you don't see a lot of like gifts of it or like people constantly quoting it.
I mean you see some, but it's really not.
As much as as as a lot of this other stuff that has had like a second life on streaming.
Yeah, there are no Will and Grace t shirts at hot topic, right, Yeah, there are lots of Friends t shirts at hot topic.
Even though it even though it is I believe, still in syndication. Yeah, I think you can still turn on you know, TBS and catch an episode of Will and Grace. You were talking talking about this episode with like the Eiffel Tower shirt. The femininity really was like a sticking point for pretty much everyone that ever can the show, and it was like a reason for people to basically
hate it, whether you were gay or straight. And like, I think it honestly the kind of like, oh God like terror feeling that like I.
Definitely felt as a kid when I watched it, that.
You felt as a kid that a lot of people feel when they first see a flamboyant character on screen. Like had a lot to do with like, uh wait, what's what the.
Guy that plays with Jack, what's his name? Sean Hayes's physical comedic brilliance?
Like he's such a a comedic genius as a physical comic, like.
Insurmountable.
And I think that his femininity and what he was able to do with physical comedy, comedy and femininity is why we were terrified, but also why it was radical because I didn't get ninety percent of those jokes.
I didn't understand a lot of the zingers, but.
I understood what was physically funny about the show every single character, including Sean Hayes obviously, but everybody's great at physical comedy.
I feel, I mean, I'm glad you brought up the sort of backlash against that character specifically because I mean, especially among gay people, it was like, this is so harmful because it is perpetuating this harmful stereotype that gasp, gay men or queenie like you know, it's like, yeah, they are, and I think it really I notice you.
Say they and not we. Well, yeah, I'm sort of more of a will part of that, but like, yeah, I've met people like.
That for sure, and I accept them. Yeah, sure, But I do think it really overshadows the fact that it was this like genius performance, like to reduce that to like, oh, he's being flamboyant, when it's so much more like he's not being flamboyant in the way that like the bitchy assistant in a rom Com is being flamboyant he's.
Doing like.
I mean, it's just like it's one of them, one of them brilliant sitcom performances of all time.
Oh, I mean, honestly, every single one of them, in a different way is giving an incredible comedic performance. Eric McCormick, like also, I think is a great physical comedian, like has this very sort of like gummy quality to his face.
You know.
Deborah Messing it like kind of is in the same boat. Megan Malally like.
Is a genius.
And Karen is is mother.
Karen she is some mother for that she is like
she she just she is the divadal herself. They all were were incredible and the show, I mean, you know, we were talking about like where we all were when this show came out, and like I like have such a like boring context for it, because like I was just allowed to watch whatever and like my family and I definitely like watched this as part of that Thursday night block Musty TV with Friends and Seinfeld and like whatever other shows were on at the time, and like
somehow this show both seamlessly blended into the other sitcoms that existed at the time because of the kind of performances the actors were giving and also absolutely stuck out and was singular for the same reason.
Also Deborah Messing, like I know, we all sort of roll our eyes at her now and with good reason when you look back on her, just her as a comedic actress, like she is giving Lucille ball like it is.
She is, the way she uses her voice, I mean, and and.
Also like there's a sort of not to use this excuse mer not to use the word I'm choking up, not to use the word brave, but there's a sort of like bravery to like the way that she really
does just like debase herself physically. Like there's a part there's a one episode where she's wearing this dress, this very low cut dress without a bra, and the gag is that Karen is fixing her boobs but they keep like sacked, so she like pulls them up and then they keep sagging, and it goes on for truly like twenty seconds of like Grace sitting there with her moves all but exposed and Karen like trying to pull them up, but then they keep sagging because Grace is so disgusting.
Like that's like the joke of the and it's like, you know, it's not nothing like to just sit there.
It's very brave of her. And I think they all you know, won Emmys and Golden Globes at various points throughout the show's run, also thinking about okay, thinking about the grace of it all, Like this is very Will and Grace is.
Like peak fag.
I mean, Will and Grace is just like there are gay men and there are straight women period.
Like that's I think that's like what we've been.
Of, like because we were all very like you know, we're being sort of redemptive about it and we're being positive about it. But like obviously all of us are aware of like the shortcomings of the show.
Like yeah, there's nothing. Yeah, like we're not mentioning them.
Because I assume your listeners are smart enough to like know them already and we can sort of like ellegrated for what it is. But like it was peak fag hag culture. It was peak like I mean, the way I'm not even gonna talk like the way that trans people were like dealt with was like not even you know, as though like not in human but even lesbians.
Well I clocked a joke with that Will made in one of the episodes I was watching yesterday where he was like I was the only boy who did some kind of like gay thing. He's like, well, the only one who still a boy, And it was like just stuff like that.
But even les I mean, you know, even lesbians though, were also the punchlines. Like you could argue that like, oh we were not as close to sort of you know, mainstream acceptance of trans people at the time. Fine, but like what but but there was a sort of way in which it was like, well, it's gay men's turn, now, maybe lesbians will get a turn later. Like it was it was a show about gay men, and like whenever lesbians were on, they were like truly the butt of the joke.
Oh yeah, every single time.
I mean yeah, I think that, like it's funny because obviously, yeah, a lot of a lot of things like that are like very reductive and all that jazz.
And like I do think that like contemporary.
Criticism, like people that were critical of it while it was running, a lot of them came back to this this thing about like homogeneity, right, like this is not all of us, So why you know, why are these characters so flat.
Why don't they have sex? Why don't they have inner lives?
And I'm like, it's a sitcom about upper or white about upper class like white faggots, like.
And it's also it's not all of us, but it's so it's such a lot of us.
And that's like it's it's scarcity, right, is like what creates that? Like it's like all of us, like eating each other alive is like a product of the oppression. And it's like because there were only two other gay shows out at the time, probably like we all hate all of them, and like it's interesting that like now in twenty twenty two, when we have like seven hundred gay shows, we still.
All, oh a hundred or yeah.
Yeah, it's kind of really using, I mean because yeah.
And again it's almost like like it goes back to the bookstore versus Jim thing. It's like there's a certain honesty to what it was depicting. Like it was not depicting a diverse friend group where everyone is of a
different socioeconomic status. It was depicting a very specific group of people, like two upwardly mobile, rich professionals and then like there are two friends, one of which is like a dumb faggot, and the other one of which is like an you know this like wealthy, fictional wealthy woman that exists as like an imagination of a gay man, you know, like so housing the way I I thought
that was the funniest thing. Wait, God, there was like one line where Karen goes, so Grace is talking about something kind of lame and boring or whatever, but she's like portraying it as interesting. I think she's talking about like planning a game night, so it's like something really stupid, and Karen is just like rolling her eyes, and after every sentence Grace says, she just like expresses her exasperation
even more. And then the final thing she says is which lever do I pull to be crushed by a safe? And it's just like, I mean, it's such a perfect Karen Lyne.
It was jokes on jokes on jokes on jokes.
They never stopped.
I mean, that's what happens when, you know, in ye olden days, when they're like twenty writers in the right and they're all getting paid real money and get residuals to this day, mama, yea truly, and it's wild to think that, like Eric McCormick is still heterosexual, and like, that's crazy, and what an interesting post Will and Grace's career he's had. Because the only thing I ever the only thing I've ever seen him in is he did an episode on Lonard SVU where he was the villain.
It's very creepy.
Oh, I honestly, I'm kind of I'm depressed by the fact that, like none of them really do much anymore. Like I do think they all have like a sublime ingenuity that would lend.
Itself so well to other shows.
Like I mean, well, they've all done things like Megan Malally what is incredible on Parks and rec like she was a recurring but that was a guest star.
Is coming up? So do you guys know Josh Sharp and Aaron Jackson. Yes, she's in there movie which you know, not to brag. I've seen a cut of and oh when I tell you, I when I tell you You're gonna die. I mean it is like it's like all bets are off, Like it is a performance unlike anything I've ever seen.
I'm so excited.
Well, she has that, she has that in her and always has and like the thing I think that the reason why we're like they all deserve more is because we're not like I don't think we're accurately remembering the time when this show was such a cultural jug ornau and these were incredibly famous people who were like winning Emmys and Golden Globes every year, and like probably like they all enjoy the fact that they only have to
work when they want to. And you know, even someone like Sean hay Is like really like is very seems to be very selective about what he like gets involved with, and like he was he was in that Netflix show Q Force and was a producer on it, and like, you know, I think like they're again like they are all making tons of residuals because like this is a sitcom and there are a million episodes of it, and like, of course, yes, I wish we saw more of them, and maybe who knows, like this movie will be a
moment to like reinsert Megan Malali back in pop culture. But like, I don't think it's like necessarily fair to say that like they've done nothing.
It's more like there aren't that many, like there aren't that many sitcoms like that where the full range of their talents could be yes, played like because they are. Yeah, you're right, they are all consistently. I mean Megamali especially has had truly I mean it's funny, like talking about happy endings. She plays Casey Wilson's mom and happy endings and it's like a very funny role. Or like she'll be in Parkson Regg, she'll be in Oh god, she
was recently in something and she was really good. Anyway, it's they're all doing. I mean, listen, Deborah Messing was has done a lot of stage work, none of it, none of it. She also she also had that show where she was Yes Hemistry Laura and.
She and she was she was a.
Cop in that movie Searching. Oh my god, all right, why does she like playing cop? You? You are both reaching.
So you forget about.
Okay, No, here's what I'm trying.
Here's what Here's what I'm getting at when I by mentioning it rose, I think you're looking at it through rose color classes to say that they are being yes, to say that they're being selective about like I think I think we're taking for granted just how homophobic Hollywood is and still is.
And I think that baby, it's not.
And I think no, I do think that, like like when you are known for doing one gay thing for eight years, you'll never get any work outside of that, Like like I mean, especially Sean and Sean and Eric, like no one would ever ever ever cast them in straight like major movie or TV show, like straight roles,
different types anything, like it's not gonna work. And with with Deborah Messing and Megan Malalley, I would I would wager that their reputation and their commitment to a historically gay show is part of like what deters them from being bookable in other places.
And like I don't think I would say that if.
Like Deborah Messing wasn't so desperate about like being in the Lucille Ball biopic or like constantly pitching herself for things.
And I'm like, girl, like you're a legend. You don't need to be doing this.
And I and I think part of like where I'm going as like you know Ellen, when Ellen came out, she did like pay like she paved the way for Will and Grace to exist. But like when Laura Dern played Ellen's love interest for that episode of TV of her coming out TV show, she did not get work for like what six seven eight years, she got like death threats.
She was like cast out from Hollywood.
Like there's so much like residual homophobia that like makes people associated with queer things I guess not bookable. And if it's not a f and if it's not homophobia, it's actually just like the limitedness of casting directors totally.
And well, yeah, I do think a big part of it is the sitcom of it all is that it's probably very hard for a casting director to look at Sean Hayes and see him as anything other than just Jack, you know, like, and it's hard for audiences probably.
To do the same.
And I'm sure that, bundled with the extreme homophobia of the world and of Hollywood, makes it hard for them.
I mean Sean Hayes specifically, it's interesting has like rebranded himself as a sort of power producer.
Like if you go to his.
He's really like produced a lot of stuff and he's like someone people really want to work with.
And I think he has like a good reputation.
I mean, of course, like God will strike me dead because tomorrow it'll reveal that like I don't know, he threw.
Someone out a window. But yeah, I wish that's mess with the best.
Truly.
I want so much for her, I want so much.
Well, she she's an icon and she.
Still got it. She's still got the comedic timing. You know.
I do think there's a lack of focus where it's like she shouldn't be doing She did this off Broadway play that was like a woman aging four decades in real not in real time, I'd say in real time, not time, but yeah, it was like it was it was called Birthday Candles, and it was like every like fifteen minutes she had a new birthday or something. I I'm obviously it's not exactly that, but it's essentially that she.
Did this other play.
She shouldn't be be treating this other which people, if you haven't seen clips of you have to google Deborah Messing Irish accent. She did some play where she was meant to be Irish and she's acting like alongside an actual Irish person, and it's truly, I can't even do it justice, Like it is unlike anything I've ever heard of in my life. If you can find a clip and put it here, truly like it is a treat.
Well, well, she is one of our most iconic redheads, and I what. I had a hair appointment yesterday and I got home afterwards I was watching Will and Grace and I realized my hair color is like Grace.
Are you are giving Grace? I have to say.
Yeah, but I'm also but also Megan Malali in her real life is is a redhead. So I'm gonna say I'm still I'm still a Karen. Yeah we should Karen.
Should all be Karen's write the book.
Decide into our DMS at Like a Virgin four twenty sixty nine and let us know, did you watch Will and Grace? Are you a Will? Are you a Grace? Are you a Jack? Are you a Karen? And we'll be back next week with a new episode. You can become a patron at Patreon dot com slash like a Virgin four weekly bonus episodes so you can also buy our march at Like a Virgin four sixty nine dot com. Follow us on Instagram at Like a Virgin four twenty sixty nine. You can follow me anywhere you want, do
you and you can find Fran at France wishco. Like a Virgin is an iHeartRadio production. Our producer is Phoebee Unter with support from Lindsay Hoffmann and Nikkiktor until next week.
Au Revoir, Just Jack.
And now a clip from our Patreon. Become a patron at patreon dot com slash like a Virgin for weekly bonus episodes and more.
Wow.
Last week I read a gay pirate book, Erotic Yes, All Kidnapped by the Pirate.
And your review.
You're like, remember three and.
A half stars, Yes, but I still enjoyed it. It's about So, it's about this young twink who is moving from England to a an island. His father has been like, is going to be the governor of you know, this
is like early seventeen hundreds. It's like Pirates of the Caribbean vibes And on their voyage they get boarded by a pirate vessel and this this pirate kidnaps him because the boy's father cheated the pirate years before, because the pirate used to be a privateer and because of the boy's father, he was forced into a life of piracy. So the pirate kidnaps him and he's like, well, I'm gonna ransom you back to your father, and so he keeps him on him.
He keeps him on his ship.
He keeps him on his ship, like in his cabin. But unbeknownst to him, this boy, his whole life has been like I want God so badly, and the pirate is like being really mean to him, but the boy is.
Like turned on by it.
He's like, don't be mean to me.
I'll come.
No.
Literally, like there's a scene where because he makes the boy stay in his cabin all day, and so one day the boy's like.
He's like, yeah, lock my cock and the page daddy. No.
One day, the boy's like, well, what am I gonna do?
I guess I'm just gonna jerk off, and so he jerks off, and right after he comes, the pirate comes inside and the boy like hides his hand come behind his back, and the Pirate's like, what are you hiding? And he brings it out and his hands full of cum, and the pirate's like he he he, well.
He acknowledges that it's common. He's like, I caught you jerking it.
Yeah.
Well the pirate's also gay.
Pirate entities just tend to be gay, yeah, like they really it comes with the culture.
Yes, And so they do eventually start fucking and sucking and they fall.
In love fucking sucking too.
Yeah.
And the thing that I always think in these circumstances is their holes and other body parts would be so dirty, so smelly, so smelly, smelly, so covered, and shit so covered and shit, and I do you have to suspend disbelief a little bit. Yeah, that's why I.
The captain bent over and I saw his cleanish wish.
I mean, there is a plot point where like the boys like, please let me take a bath, and so like he does bathe before the first time they have SA so you know, he is like nice and but we all know that baths are not very sanitary.
Yeah.
And it's not even a real bath. It's like a bucket that he's cleaning himself with. It's why I do kind of like sometimes when I read like gay fantasy, because like with the monsters, it's like they don't eat, so they don't shit.
Are you do you prefer shower before sex like in all cases or are you just does it kind of depend.
I do prefer it.
I had someone recently actually ask me not to shower before sex.
Yeah, people ask and I like the musk. Yeah, if you want the musk, that's fine. It's just I don't really want the musk.
I want the musk.
Yeah, oh, I like the musk. I don't like a lot of musk. I only like a little musk.
I like a I really like a musky pit.
I couldn't handle that. I couldn't handle like dark bo.
Not like dank dank, but like I don't want to. I like armpits and I like to lick an armpit, and I don't want to taste deodorant.
Same.
The ideal would be if you showered and then didn't like put anything on and then came.
Over yeah, or you had just like you know, an essential oil or something.
But there's like this guy who asked me not to shower. He was actually like, oh, you should go to the gym.
Oh and get your sweat. Yeah, that's coreact. I mean, look, some girls be into that.
Okay, I know, Okay,