Brian Krause: Not Charming on Charmed

When Brian Krause starred in Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991), yet another "discovering girls on a desert island" movie, there was a collective groan from West Hollywood.  Sure, gay teens probably found him dreamy, but why did they have to sit through two hours of heterosexist "you don't exist" propaganda for a glimpse of a slim chest?

Next he starred in the homoromantic December (1991), as the jock boyfriend of quiet, studious Wil Wheaton in a prep school during World War II.

But it's all downhill from there.

Next Brian starred in an aggressively homophobic movie, Sleepwalkers (1992): Charles Brady (Brian), a feminine-stereotype villain, and his mother/girlfriend, feed off the life force of virgins.  But he takes a moment from his busy schedule to dispatch a gay high school teacher named Mr. Fellows, who keeps hitting on his students. It's Stephen King, so there's bound to be a lot of anti-gay hatred.

Family Album (1994) is not quite as homophobic: Greg Thayer (Brian) is the son of a famous actress (Jaclyn Smith of Charlie's Angels) and her husband (Michael Ontkean).  When his brother Lionel announces that he is gay, it causes immeasurable strife in the family.

Then he starred in some heterosexist "erotic thrillers," which provided some nudity, but they were about guys having sex with girls.

And some buddy-bonding movies, but he never played one of the buddies.

Brian most prominent role to date has been in the tv series Charmed (1998-2006), about three witch sisters (eventually a fourth) living in a gay-free San Francisco.  Brian played Leo Wyatt, the sisters' Whitelighter (guardian angel).  He begins a forbidden romance with Piper (Holly Marie Combs), and eventually they marry and have children.

While the "I've got a secret" genre is always open to queering, the Charmed ladies are so aggressively searching for heterosexual partners that any symbolism is drowned out in the constant exchanges of "I met a new guy!" "Is he hot?"

Plus only one gay character -- Duncan Philips (Blake Bashoff) -- who appears in only one episode, apparently the only gay student at the Magic School, and the only gay person in San Francisco.

Plus female-female friendships are fine, but men approach each other only with suspicion, as competitors and potential enemies.

No word on whether he's a gay ally in real life.  I doubt it.

Toy Soldiers: Muscle on Parade

Every once in a while, a movie producer hires all of the teen hunks he can find, puts them in an all-male environment, and orders a script that involves fighting a common adversary with their shirts off, thus ensuring the avid interest of every gay boy in the world: Tom Brown's School Days, Lord of the Flies, White Squall.  In 1991, the movie was Toy Soldiers.

The plot: terrorists take over an elite prep school for the sons of the wealthy and powerful, and take the boys and their headmaster hostage.  The boys use their troublemaking skills to gather intel on the terrorists, and wise-cracking operator Billy Tepper (20-year old Sean, left) sneaks out to brief the adults.

When they turn out to be ineffectual, Billy and his friends, including comic relief Snuffy (21-year old Keith Coogan, middle) and surly bodybuilder Ricky (19-year old George Perez, right), go on the offensive, incapacitating several terrorists, disabling their bomb, and leading the  younger kids to safety, just in time to be "rescued."

Other boys include the rich "jerk" Joey (19-year old Wil Wheaton, well known for playing Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: the Next Generation).

And T. E. Russell as the pragmatic Hank.

Sean Astin (Billy) was a major teen idol of the period, with roles in The Goonies, The War of the Roses, White Water Summer, and Rudy).  

Keith Coogan (Snuffy) was a former child star with credits in Adventures in Babysitting and The Book of Love.  

There's some buddy-bonding between Billy and Snuffy, but with a large ensemble cast, it's not well developed.

However, heterosexual interest is absent, except for a scene in which Billy confiscates a Playboy from one of the younger kids.  There are references to getting laid and masturbation, but no one mentions a girlfriend or a desire for girls.

Absence of expressed heterosexual desire is almost unheard-off in a teen movie of the 1990s, giving viewers permission to read one or more of the boys -- or all of them -- as gay.

And the parade of underwear-clad, towel-clad, and shirtless teenage muscle (or rather young adult muscle, since all of the actors were over 18) didn't hurt.

White Water Summer/Stand By Me

Although panned by the critics and ignored by most heterosexuals, White Water Summer (1987) became a hit among gay kids and teenagers, maybe for the same reasons that they ignored the critically acclaimed Stand by Me the year before (1986).

 The plot of Stand: four boys (Will Wheaton, River Phoenix, Jerry O'Connell, Corey Feldman) brave a suburban wilderness on a weird quest to see a dead body.  En route they confront their anxieties and bond with each other.

The plot of Summer: four boys (Sean Astin, Jonathan Ward, Matt Adler, K.C. Martel) brave a wilderness on a white water rafting expedition, led by the brutal, abusive Vic (Kevin Bacon).  En route the confront their anxieties and bond with each other.
















The differences:

In Stand, the conflicts involve parentage, family, bullying, and heterosexual destiny.  In Summer, the conflicts involve the boys' relationships with each other and their dismay at the brutality of the adult world.

In Stand, the male body is a site of anxiety and despair; a boy is too fat, or has poor eyesight; leeches attack their crotches.  In Summer, the male body is a thing of beauty. The characters compliment each other, gaze at each other, lie prone against each other.







The boys of Stand are aggressively homophobic, throwing around the term "faggot" and challenging each others' "masculinity."  They are also aggressively heterosexual, discussing boobs, girls, having sex with girls, not having sex with girls.  The boys of Summer mention neither "faggots" nor girls.

Stand ends with the boys parting, and the adult narrator telling us what happened to them -- mostly involvng marriage and family, the "inevitable" loss of boyhood bonds.

Summer ends with the boys together, still friends, the same-sex bond intact.

Wil Wheaton

Speaking of Stand by Me, Wil Wheaton became a popular teen star of the 1980s with several other starring roles, including Long Time Gone (1986), The Curse (1987), The Man Who Fell to Earth (1987), the beefcake-heavy Toy Soldiers (1991), and the World War II buddy-bonding December (1991),  which also starred fellow teen idols Balthazar Getty and Jason London.

But he was probably best known for his role as Wesley Crusher, ship doctor's kid and later ensign on Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-94).  Although Wesley was obviously brought on board to draw teens into the Star Trek sequel, many fans disliked him; Memory Alpha calls him "one of the most hated characters in sci-fi."  Detractors argued that he was a pretentious know-it-all who would just glance at a view screen and come up with the answer that stumped the experienced scientists.

Besides, he wore amazingly ugly sweaters, and he turned down the opportunity to party with three hot teens on a shore leave planet ("Justice," November 9, 1987).

After The Next Generation, Wil capitalized on the hatred of Wesley Crusher by playing a series of jerks, with little or no buddy-bonding.

A football player who covers up a date rape in The Liar's Club (1993).

A Frankenstein built out of both male and female body parts in Mr. Stitch (1995).

An obnoxious, homophobic Christian bookstore manager in Fag Hag (1996).

 He also played a gay character: Marco, a participant in an AIDS charity, in Boys Night Out (1996).

More recently, Wil has been doing voice work, in animated tv series and video games.  He's also had recurring roles on The Guild, Leverage, and Eureka, and he currently plays himself as Sheldon's arch-nemesis on The Big Bang Theory. 

He's a gay ally who has blogged his support of gay marriage.

Chris Young's Book of Love

I saw Chris Young in a performance of the musical Pippin when I was an undergraduate in 1978.  Of course, I had no idea who the 7-year old playing Theo was, or that we would arrive in Los Angeles at about the same time.  I first noticed him on Max Headroom (1987-88), the sci-fi series about the cyber-journalist rebelling against a future dystopia. Chris played Bryce Lynch, Max's agoraphobic computer-whiz sidekick who expressed no interest in girls.

But that was the end of his gay-vague roles.

In Dance Til Dawn (1988), he's a high schooler who spends prom night with it-girl Alyssa Milano.

On Falcon Crest (1989), he's a rich vintner's son who has an affair with a married woman, and is killed by her husband.\

Book of Love (1990) was one of the many, many "nerd wrests the it-girl from her jock boyfriend" movies of the 1980s. But at least it had the cute Danny Nucci.

Then Chris played a newlywed in Married People (1990-91).

I was about ready to give up on Chris completely.  But then he was photographed surrounded by boy-girl couples, but standing next to a boy himself -- coincidence or not, he deserved another chance.

Besides, he took off his shirt a lot.

Next came the "boys-alone" December (1991), as a prep-school boy in December 1941, when the U.S. enters World War II.  His classmates include just about every young adult hunk in the business, including Balthazar Getty, Jason London, and the main homoromantic couple, Wil Wheaton and Brian Krause.

And Breaking the Silence (1992), which is not actually about homophobic silence, but about a kindly lawyer (Gregory Harrison) dredging up memories of sexual abuse as he defends a teen (Chris) accused of murdering his father.

And PCU (1994), about a duo (Chris, Jeremy Piven) battling "political correctness" at their college, is not as homophobic as it sounds, and even has some buddy-bonding.

Chris was still playing high schoolers in Killing Mr. Griffin (1997), about a high school prank that goes wrong.  His character, a basketball star, has a crush on sociopath Mark Kinney (Scott Bairstow). His girlfriend wants them both.

So we see the opposite of the usual pattern of adolescent buddy-bonding followed by a New Sensitive Man adulthood: Chris Young's Book of Love starts out heterosexist, and then moves into gay subtexts.