The family has gathered in front of the tv set, as usual: the tv is on every night from dinnertime to bedtime, a backdrop to all of our other activities.
7:00: Welcome Back, Kotter. I look up briefly to see Horshak (Ron Pallilo) explain, yet again, that his name means "The cattle are dying."
7:30: What's Happening!. I look up briefly to check out Haywood Nelson's butt and bulge.
At 9:00, I turn off the tv and start doing homework. A few moments later, my brother Ken comes clomping up the stairs. "You'll never guess what they're watching down there!" he exclaims. "Barnaby Jones!"
"You're kidding -- Jed Clampett as a private eye?" The oldster detective is played by the star of the Beverly Hillbillies.
"And Catwoman is his secretary!" Lee Meriwether, who plays Barnaby's daughter-in-law, was Catwoman on Batman.
"Gross! Next they'll have Scooby-Doo!"
Ken laughs. "Don't take my word for it -- you have to watch to see how terrible it is."
"Come on!" I complain. "Old people tv?" My friends would rib me unmercifully if they found out I had watched something as lame as Barnaby Jones!
Ignoring me, he flips the tv on, and clicks the dial to CBS.
"You're the man for me!" Muscle Shirt says.
"Let's not get carried away!" Tight-Jeans protests.
"This looks good...I mean, awful." I stammer.
Looking back, I'm surprised that I didn't come out at that moment. But no, I absolutely did not connect I want to see those guys kiss! with gay.
"What did I tell you?" Ken flips the tv set off, flops down on his bed, and opens a math textbook.
What about Muscle Shirt, with his baseball-sized biceps and the romantic plaint of "You're the man for me?" He must have been a guest star.
Before the days of the internet, there is no way to track down the episode. I'll have to wait for summer reruns.
But during the summer, I am working at the mall on Thursday nights. The scene of gay romance is lost forever.
Asher Brauner has been in a few movies of gay interest: he played "Buddy" in Alexander: the Other Side of Dawn (1977), about a teenage runaway who becomes a hustler, and "Ted," in the gay-themed Making Love.
He played the hero in the Indiana Jones spoof Treasure of the Moon Goddess (1987), and a man-mountain who takes out entire countries in American Eagle (1989) and Merchants of War (1989).
And he was the hero of a gay romance that I misread 30 years ago on Barnaby Jones.
It was the 70s. Broadcast was all that was, so no gay romance. (You'd be surprised how many times I've explained in the past week that the Orange Troll can't censor Cartoon Network for having a gay wedding in the way the hand up his ass can because the FCC only can censor broadcast, and even that's not their primary function.)
ReplyDeleteMark Shera was Soooo damn hot! Where is he today? Would be amazing to hear he is gay!
ReplyDeleteHe's 71, so he might look somewhat different than he did in 1979 (don't we all). I can't find any other biographical information, but if we look under his real name, Mark Shapiro, there's a Mark Shapiro who is one of my friend's friends on Facebook. The right age, and probably gay.
DeleteThat's a sweet memory but yeah in those days we tried to find gay romance anywhere we could on tv or the movies. Is kidnapping another way of saying I love you?
ReplyDeleteIn comic books it is: Namor and Sue, Jericho and Nightwing.
ReplyDeleteDC recently gave Tim Drake a boyfriend. Ironically it was Bernard: Before Flashpoint, Bernard was the kid always telling Tim how his stepmother was hot. Seems like an odd choice.