The shirtless parking valets: A shock of joy on "Suburgatory" on the night before Thanksgiving. With Mohr and Parker backsides and a lot of bare chests

 

Link to the n*de dudes

When I was growing up, you almost never saw a bare chest on tv.  On the rare occasions when it happened -- Denny Miller surfs to Gilligan's Island,  Ponch and Jon hit the beach on CHIPS, Kevin poses for an art class on Mr. Belvedere -- you felt an intense, palpable joy.  Not desire so much as understanding.  This is it, what we were made for. Beauty.  Truth.  The Eternal Masculine. 

With the advent of cable and then streaming tv, nearly every actor took off his shirt frequently, and some even put their junk on display.  And of course we can go online and see 100 n*de men before breakfast. When you see it all the time, that shock of joy vanishes.  

But it returned on Wednesday, November 23rd, 2011, the night before Thanksgiving, when Suburgatory aired Episode 1.8, "Thanksgiving."

Suburgatory (2011-14) starred Jeremy Sisto (left, showing his sausage) as George Altman, an architect who moves his teenage daughter Tessa (Jane Levy) from Manhattan to Chatswin, Connecticut.  She is not pleased, but she tries to find some semblance of cool amid the Mean Girls, Dumb Jocks, and Ladies Who Lunch.

It was not our favorite show -- mostly women in the cast, a lot of heterosexism, and some low-key gay stereotyping -- but it aired between The Middle and Modern Family, so we had no choice.

George's backside is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

In Episode 1.8, it's Thanksgiving in Chatswin, and Tessa is upset because Dad George has rejected their traditional Manhattan activities for dinner with the ultra-rich Dallas Royce.  In the B Plot, Tessa's friend Lisa is upset because her middle-class Mom, Sheila Shay, insists that she wear a "Puritan dress" to their Thanksgiving Dinner.

 When Tessa and Dad George arrive at the Royce mansion, they see shirtless valets parking the guests' cars.  

Whoa, that shock of joy came rushing back!  

Maybe because it was so unexpected.  Who hires shirtless valets?  Especially at Thanksgiving, when it's in the 30s and 40s out?  And there are twelve people at that party. Why do they need four valets?  

Director Alex Hardcastle was not even trying to be realistic. He presented us with a vision of masculine beauty to counterbalance the feminine vibe of the rest of the episode (spoiler alert: Tessa's friend Lisa spends about ten minutes of air time n*ked, in protest of that Puritan dress). 

The first Indian Valet vanishes immediately, but when George's friend Noah hands his car keys to the second, we get a bare chest and shoulders close-up.  He looks like a college athlete.

He disappears, but as Noah walks toward the door, we see the two Pilgrim valets, one extremely muscular, the other a rather thin twink.  No closeups, but they are visible for several seconds, organizing the various parking slips.

Later we get quick glimpses of the two Indian Valets at the Royce table,  so they must be Royce relatives co-opted for the job.  The Pilgrim Valets are visible at the middle class Shay table, so presumably they were hired. 

But who are the actors?  In 2011 I let the scene slip into memory, but last night I saw it again during a rewatch.  With 15 years of experience on this website, RG Beefcake and Boyfriends, and Tales of West Hollywood, I am equipped to research their other acting roles,  look for n*de photos, and check their social media to see if they are gay. 

More after the break.

A Roland for an Oliver: Gay Medieval Lovers

"A Roland for an Oliver" is apparently a common expression, although I've only seen it in British fiction.  It means that you're equally matched (for instance, these brothers can both bench press exactly 320 pounds each).

It's derived from the Medieval gay lovers that I first read about in The Young Folks' Shelf of Books during my early childhood.

I heard about them again in college, when my French Literature class was assigned a modern version of the 12th century Chanson de Roland, the national epic of France.





During the siege of Viana, Emperor Charlemagne agreed to let the outcome rest on single combat between two champions.  He sent his nephew, the bold, heavily-muscled Roland, the Prince Valiant of France.  Count Gerard of Viana sent his grandson, the handsome, quick-witted Oliver (or Olivier).  Their talents were complementary; they were perfectly matched.

As they fought, an angel appeared, separated them, and bade them become friends (the same thing happened to Simon and Milo a few generations later).

They spent the rest of their lives together, fighting side by side, and their love, with its divine mandate, was acclaimed in every corner of Charlemagne's Empire.

Then the Saracens began wending their way through Basque country,  In 778, the approached the pass at Roncevaux, Spain, in the Pyrenees.  If they entered France, they would take all of Europe.  Charlemagne and his troops tried to stop them.  In the heat of battle, Oliver was killed, and the distraught Roland cried:

So many days and years gone by
We lived together.
Since thou art dead, to live is pain.

Then he died as well.

Actually, the battle had nothing to do with the Moorish caliphate; Basque guerillas ambushed Charlemagne's troops, in retribution for his destructiion of their capital, to rob them.   Roland really existed, the leader of the Franks' invasion of Brittany, but there's no historical evidence for the existence of Oliver.  The Chanson de Roland  created him to be Roland's true love.

I didn't bother to point out the homoromance to my French professor, who no doubt would have insisted that Roland, like Aschenbach in Death in Venice,  wasn't Wearing a Sign.  He was betrothed to Oliver's sister, after all, and in the Italian epic Orlando Furioso, he falls in love with a woman (and flies to the moon).  

More after the break

Skyler Gisondo's Hot/H*ng Photos, Part 5: A bathtub, a glory h*le, b*ndage with Scotty, bonus Corenswet and Hoult

   

 Link to the n***de photos

This is a collection of hot or humorous photos of  Skyler Gisondo, star of The Santa Clarita Diet, The Righteous Gemstones, and Superman

1. "Another photo collection?  Haven't you seen enough of me?"

I can't help it, buddy.  You keep posting interesting pics.

2. And now that you're starring in Superman, we have interesting photos of David Corenswet to worry about, too.

3. And Nicholas Hoult

4. "Hey, I thought this was a photo collection about me."

Sorry.  How about a long-hair bathtub pic? 

5. "Have you met my girlfriend?"

Odd time to introduce her.

More after the break

Off Campus: Hannah must choose between a hocky star with a backside and a bad boy with tats. Plus a gay bestie and fratboy c*cks

Link to the n*de photos

Apparently the success of Heated Rivalry has started a trend. Producers thought, "Ok, viewers want to see more hockey players," not "viewers want to see more gay romance," so we're getting a lot of hockey player hetero romance.  I'm watching Off Campus (2026), on Amazon Prime, in spite of the annoying commercial breaks, in case there's a  gay character -- or some dicks.

Scene 1:Hockey Star Garrett (Belmont Cameli, left)  puts on his uniform, listens to "Dancing By Myself," and practices, while Hannah does janitorial work, listening to the same song.  

Finished, he takes off his shirt -- the tattoo says Nullum Gratuitum Prandium, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch," which presumably will become important later.  He langorously showers.  Hannah, wearing headphones, can't hear the shower, and accidentally sees his backside -- and his front, when he turns around.  She hurriedly exits, grinnng.

Belmont states in an interview, "Obviously I'm being sexualized to some extent, but I never felt exploited." 

Scene 2:  90% of viewers tune in to see Cameli's backside (and hopefully front), so they got it out of the way. Now we can get on to the plot.  At a hoity-toity university, the philosophy professor explains to the class that C means C, so 70% of the students got C+ or lower on their papers.  Hannah's gay bff Dexter (Miles Gutierrez-Riley, the boyfriend on Agatha All Along) complains that it's a jock class, so why should he bother?  Philosophy is a jock class?

Jock Beau (Khobe Maxwell, who played a gay guy in Cruel Intentions), looks at his grade and wonders if he can still drop the class.  His bro, Garrett from Scene 1, points out that they need it for their major, but not to worry, the coach will talk to the prof about "creative grading."  

When I was an undergrad, every student had to take a philosophy class.  I took "Modern Philosophy." assuming that it would be, like, modern.  Nope, it was about Kant, Hume, and Berkeley (pronounced Barkeley; that's the only thing I remember from the class).

BFF Dexter gawks at them: "Jocks -- so pretty, so entitled."

"Aren't you above stereotypes?"

"Girl, I'm beneath stereotypes."  He takes another look at  Beau.  "Maybe behind."  This will become important for shipping later.

Hannah got an A, but tells BFF Dexter that her grade was "not good."  Hockey Star Garrett looks over her shoulder and exclaims "You aced it!"  This angers Hannah, for some reason.  You forgot to complain that "He's arrogant!"

Scene 3: On the way out, BFF Dexter points out bad-boy music major Justin Kohl (Josh Heuston, n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends), Hannah's crush  Their third friend joins them and asked if Hannah has made a move yet.  "He doesn't know who I am.  Am I supposed to fling myself at him?"  "Yes!!!"

Hockey Star Garrett joins them.  After they criticize him for being rich and goodlooking, he tells Hannah that he's failing the class, and wants her help on the next assignment, n oral presentation.  "Nope." Why not?  Just because he's arrogant?  

"But you owe me for the sneak peek.  Tons of girls would have paid for that view."  What about guys, heteronormative jerk?

Scene 4: Hannah leaves them to bike across the campus of Briar University (actually the University of British Columbia).  She stops at Kaufman Center, where Professor Daveed (Brandon Scott, left), is conducting the student orchestra.  He glares at her for being late.

After class tells her that her scholarship for the year has been cut.  Not because she was late, because the government thinks that the fine arts are useless.

"But this is the third week of the semester!  My only hope of staying in school is to get another scholarship!" 

There aren't any other classical music composition scholarships, but what if she changes her major to performance?  Nope, she's a lousy clarinet player.  

So what about pop music composition?  Lots of scholarships there, given out at the Pop Music Showcase

"I can write pop music.  How hard can it be?"  Famous last words.

Scene 5: The frat house.  The guys, Tucker, Dean, and Logan (Jalen Thomas Brooks, Stephen Kalyn, Antonio Cipriano) are bickering as they prepare for the party tonight.  There are shirtless shots and discussions of cooking.  

Hockey Star Garrett comes in later, when the party is already going on.  Tucker is cooking "dippables."  Dean is kissing a girl.  Other party guests are playing video games and...chess?  I thought frat parties were all beer pong and hetero bedroom stuff.  

They criticize Hockey Star Garrett's taste in music -- it's old-fashioned, from the 1990s. So he's a pop music fan.  Maybe he and Hannah can help each other.

Meanwhile, at Malone's, Bad Boy Justin and his band are performing, while Hannah, working the bar, is having a fantasy about him.  Her friend asks what she's going to compose for the Pop Showcase: "Taylor Swift or Lady Gaga?"

"I'm more Taylor."

"So be Taylor, and go talk to your crush, Bad Boy Justin."  

He's singing "A little less talking, a little more 'touch me," which is basically what Olivia Newton John sang in "Physical," and Julie Andrews in My Fair Lady.

Never do I ever want to hear another word
There isn't one I haven't heard
Here we are together in what ought to be a dream
Say one more word and I'll scream

"Nope, I'm too scared." 

"Ok, then.  Everybody is going to the Block Party tomorrow.  You can talk to him then."  They have block parties at universities?

More after the break