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Sep 19, 2017

Matthew Lawrence

Born in 1980, Matthew Lawrence is Joey's younger brother, just as muscular, and even more gay-friendly (if that is possible).  It is  hard to think of a project he's been in that didn't involve extensive buddy bonding.


1. The tv series Boy Meets World (1993-2000) was mostly about the romance between high schoolers Cory (Ben Savage) and Shawn (Rider Strong) -- even Cory's girlfriend Topanga (Danielle Fishel) commented on it.

But when Cory married, they needed a new buddy-bond, so during the 1999-2000 season, Matthew arrived as Jack Hunter, Shawn's older half-brother, who immediately fell in love with Cory's older brother Eric (Will Friedle).



2. In Jumping Ship (2001), Matthew plays Jake Hunter, a sullen sailor hired by Michael Woods (Joey Lawrence) to sail him and his brother (Andy Lawrence) to Australia.  On the way they are shipwrecked, learn to work together and care for each other (with their shirts off, naturally), and by the time they are rescued, they have become permanent partners.  The movie ends as Michael is introducing his new partner to his dad.

3. In Cheats (2002), about high schoolers who run a test-cheating business, Victor (Matthew) is obviously in love with Handsome (Trevor Fehrman).  Yes, he's actually named Handsome.

Cheats has some overt gay content: Handsome pretends to be gay to score a passing grade from a gay teacher, and starts a "lesbian rumor" about the school principal, played by comedy legend Mary Tyler Moore.

He also rips his shirt off.













4. In The Hot Chick, Billy (Matthew) discovers that his girlfriend has been transported into the body of a 30-year old man, Clive (Rob Schneider).  He responds with surprise, but without the least homophobic disgust.  Ok, he can't bring himself to actually kiss Clive, but lots of gay men would be equally squeamish about kissing and um. . .the other stuff,  if their boyfriends suddenly turned into girls (others wouldn't mind, of course, figuring that love is love regardless of the body).

In case you were wondering, yes, he does take his shirt off in almost every movie.

See also: Joey Lawrence; Andrew Lawrence.










3 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 11, 2012 at 12:08 PM

    Matthew always surrounds himself with hot, muscular guys.

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  2. AnonymousJanuary 10, 2013 at 9:41 PM

    I've always gotten "vibes" from Matthew ever since he was a teenager. On the short-lived sitcom "Brotherly Love" he starred as the decidedly "femme" middle brother, alongside Joey as the "butch" older brother and Andy (only 7 years old at the time) as the "cute" little brother. Of course, most of the coded gay innuendo was written for laughs (Joey often cracking jokes questioning Matthew's "masculinity", e.g. "heterosexuality"), but Matthew brought an element of sincerity to the role that made the character sympathetic and lovable (and, most importantly, believable).

    ReplyDelete
  3. attmayDecember 3, 2018 at 7:33 AM

    You forgot the two most obvious ones: the ill-fated final season of GIMME A BREAK! with Nell Carter (who had a female domestic partner at the time of her death) and Rosie O'Donnell, and MRS. DOUBTFIRE in which his character (who, unlike all his brother's characters, is not named Matthew) has two gay uncles played by Harvey Fierstein and Scott Capurro.

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