Ben Brainard: Short guy comedian posts adult photos. Can humor and hotness co-exist?

 

Link to the n*de photos

I was intrigued by comedian Ben Brainard's adult photos on LPSG and the celebrity p*nis subredit: comedians almost never post adult or even shirtless  photos. Apparently the consensus is that humor and hotness are mutually exclusive; you can tell jokes or show your stuff, but not both.

So who is this Ben Brainard?

He's a Florida boy, a 5'5" Short Guy, straight or bi, with ADHD, 2.7 million TikTok followers, and a nice backside. 

In January 2026, when ICE was going door-to-door in my town grabbing brown people and shooting anyone who protested, he posted an introduction, "In case you've forgotten who I am, or you're new here: F*ck ICE, f*ck Trump, f*ck this whole f*cking fascist regime."

My kind of comedy.

A stand-up bit:

"When I was in basic training (in the army), the guy who slept in the bunk next to me -- the big spoon most nights -- one day we woke up and he said 'I have a master's in family psychology, and I think I've diagnosed you: you have ADHD.'

'You have a master's in family psychology, and you joined the army?'

'We all make mistakes.'"

I think he was kidding about the big spoon.

"I'm in Nebraska, and they give me two options: Do you want to go to Omaha or Boys Town?  (Pause).  I'm going to Boys Town!  I'm straight, but it sounds like a fun time."

"People call me gay for driving a Prius, but it's a hybrid.  I'm bi."

Well, which is it, Benny Boy?

At least he doesn't riff constantly about his relations with ladies, like most straight comedians.

Ben was born in Florida in 1996, and grew up in Daytona Beach, where he was always "the funny kid."  But he also played three sports, took AP classes, and was voted Student Body President.  After high school, he attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautics University, where he was majoring in mechanical engineering and minoring in physics until he got bored with calculus. Bored with calculus?  I dropped the class twice after failing the first two quizzes.  He dropped out, moved to Orlando, and joined the army reserves. 

He started doing stand-up comedy at the Drunken Monkey Coffee Bar in Orlando, and became famous for TikTok videos that depicted various states arguing with each other.  Here Texas argues that Roe v. Wade allowed people to make their own choice, "but they were making the wrong choice."

He toured nationwide, hosted a podcast, appeared on Amber Live! and Dry Bar Comedy, and in 2025 starred in a comedy special, What a Mature Child.

In 2026, he was a contestant in You Laugh, You Leave: Live on Stage, performing with Shane Bianchi, Ross O'Donovan, and other comedians, while Jimmy Here and a celebrity panel judged them.   The one who gets the least laughs wins.

Coming up, Ben will play a TV host in Painted with L.O.V.E., an indie written and directed by Aaron Diaz (n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends).  It's about a female AI companion who develops romantic feelings for her owner.

The adult photos are on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

He must realize that 99% of his subscribers are gay men.  I respect straight guys who give it up for their gay fans.

See also: "It's Florida, Man," Episode 2.2: Guy gets high, gets n*ked, trashes a pizza place

Leon Mallett:Checking the East Anglia Boy's impressive adult photos first, researching his potential gayness and celebrity status later

Daniel Benson: The gay-vague Disney Channel teen hunk finds a new career showing gay guys his d*ck

18 teen idols who grew up to appear n*de on screen or post d*ck pics for fans

"It's Garry Shandling's Show": Was Garry the world's greatest comedian, bisexual, both, or neither?

I have fond memories of It's Garry Shandling's Show (1986-1990), but it's mostly nostalgia for those heady halcyon days, when I first moved to West Hollywood and everything was fresh and new: brunch at the French Quarter, buying books at the Different Light, cruising at Mugi, Sunday beer-and-soda busts at the Faultline, seeing celebrities at the gym,  and very occasionally visiting someone who had the cable network Showtime for:

This is the theme to Garry's show

The theme to Garry's show

Garry called me up and asked if I would write his theme song

I recall it as pleasant but not remarkable, one of many standup-comic-gets-a-sitcom vehicles from the era.  Garry played himself as a less-successful Seinfeld, with various job and romantic problems.  Sometimes he broke the fourth wall to comment on the situation.   

His George was the nebbish next door neighbor Pete (Michael Tucci), who had a wife and a nebbish teenage son, Grant (Scott Nemes).

His Elaine was "platonic" neighbor Nancy (Molly Cheek), who dated and eventually married Ian McFyfer (Ian Buchanan).

His Kramer was Leonard Smith (Paul Willson), the owner of his condo.

There was a steady stream of other friends and associates, including a lot of Garry's girlfriends, and a lot of celebrities playing themselves: Rob Reiner, Tom Petty, Martin Mull, Red Buttons, Chevy Chase, Norman Fell, Jeff Goldblum, Gilda Radner.

Plots were mostly about "nothing."  Garry babysits.  Garry gets a pet.  Jeff Goldblum visits.

Sometimes they were elaborately self-referential:

Grant wins a trip to Hollywood, where he goes to a taping of his own show.

Grant is accused of beating up a kid at school, but the a member of the studio audience saw what really happened, and tells the principal.

Garry and Pete had a nice gay subtext romance going on, and we all assumed that Pete's son Grant was gay.  Notice his obvious interest in Garry's basket in this shot.

 Like Seinfeld,  he had a "will they or won't they?" love interest and a dumb sidekick, cute next door neighbor  Pete (Michael Tucci).  We all assumed that Pete's teenage son Grant (Scott Nemes) was gay.

The only episode I actually recall involved Grant squashing our gay reading by getting a crush on a girl named Shelby Woo, and serenading her with a song parodying the lyrics of "Hooray for Hollywood."  That character does not appear in the IMDB cast list, so I don't know which episode it was.

After the show ended, I didn't hear anything about Garry Shandling for many years, until word of his death came in 2016.  I assumed that he moved back into stand-up obscurity.

In 2020,  the It's Garry Shandling Book appeared on Amazon.  Oh boy, a small paperback with interesting trivia about the show!  I clicked on "one-click ordering" withou investigating any further. 

More after the break

Jack Caroll is trollied, eaten by lions, endures soap opera angst, does stand-up comedy, shows his backside and his d*ck

Link to the n*de photos

Mobility is a BAFTA Award-winning comedy short about three boys from Huddlesfield, Yorkshire, who get on each other's nerves as they ride the mobility bus to school.  

Surly Dan (Ruben Reuter) insults everyone, mostly by references to the romantic interests of "your Mum."

Upbeat Sonny (Zak Ford-Williams) announces that "the only disability is a bad attitude," and chastises Dan: his behavior is not in keeping with the spirit of the Duke of Edinburgh award. 

Entrepreneur Mike (Jack Carroll) claims to be the future Wolf of Wakefield; he's going to make a fortune on the stock

I researched Ruben and Zak, and discovered that they are both gay in real life.  Coincidence, or a deliberate casting decision?

Time to check out the third, Jack Carroll who also co-wrote the script.  

He has the longest resume of the three: Born in 1998 in Bradford, Yorkshire, started his career at age 12. Comedian Jason Manford saw a video of Jack performing at his parents' wedding anniversary, and invited him to perform at a show at St. George's Hall.  

A film of his comedy bit aired on The One Show,leading to Britain's Got Talent, where he was runner-up, and 13 episodes of the sketch comedy show The Ministry of Curious Stuff (2012). Episodes of 4 O'Clock Club, Katy, Big School, and Ministry of Justice followed.

And the feature film Eaten by Lions (2018).  After their Gran dies, half-brothers Pete and Omar (Jack, Antonio Aakeel) go off in search of Omar's estranged dad. They find him in the tawdry, seedy tourist trap of Blackpool (for Americans, think Atlantic City).  Pete gets a girlfriend, and shows his backside.  I reviewed it several years ago.  It got a low grade for heteronormativity.

Next came 25 episodes of Trollied (2014-18), about the workers in a run-down supermarket (for Americans, a trolly is a shopping cart).  Mark Addy, who stripped down in The Full Monty (1997), played head butcher Andy, and perennial n*de dude Joel Fry played nice guy Leighton.

Jack's character, 16-year old Harry, is the brightest of the group: he received 9 A-grades in his GCSEs (tests taken during Year 11 of secondary school).  He's heterosexual.

In the short Newbie (2023), a new teacher is worried that students won't accept him because of his disability.   Weird-- the guy played a high school student that same year.  But Cole Sprouse was 30 when he finished playing high schooler Jughead on Riverdale.

 

Jack's biggest role to date is Bobby Crawford in 69 episodes of the soap Coronation Street (2023-25). 

In 2023, the teenage Bobby argues with his mum's boyfriend, and gets kicked out.  He looks up his birth dad, Rob Donovan (Marc Bayliss), who is in prison, and gets a referral to live with his Aunt Carla on....Coronation Street.

Ulp...maybe a soap opera community is not the best home.  Aunt Carla has a life-threatening illness, then disowns Bobby due to his friendship with his birth dad. He is kidnapped, becomes a hostage, is accused of murder....

His crush Lauren disappears, presumably murdered; then she reappears, is accused of murder, is blackmailed.  Am I getting this right?  It seems rather repetitive.  Finally Bobby has had enough; he runs away to Majorca to work on a fishing boat with a male friend.  

Jack explains that he had to leave the show to prepare for a national tour, but maybe he was getting tired of the angst.  He's primarily a comedian, after all.

He has performed on Britain's Got Talent, Britain's Got More Talent, Loose Ladies, Pointless Celebrities, Sunday Brunch, This Morning, The Stand Up Sketch Show, and Would I Lie to You?, as well as many live venues.  In 2026 his "Fall Guy" tours Scotland, beginning in Edinburgh. 

More after the break

Free Bert: A chunk comedian, a hot model boyfriend, and gay-friendly actors. What could go wrong? With what to do when you're missing a ___

 

Link to the n*de photos

I'm following Braxton Alexander on Instagram because he appeared in two scenes in Season 3 of The Righteous Gemstones, and I thought his character was queer coded.  Also he never posts any photos of him with a girlfriend, ever, so probably gay, right?  

He's been pushing his fans to watch Free Bert (2026), a Netflix series based on the comedy routines of Bert Kreischer.  Bert is known for ripping off his shirt (I like that) and getting fully n*de (I like that, too).  And here he appears to be pretending that his popsicle is a d*ck.

Bert's d*ck and backside are on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

Several of the cast members have played gay characters or appeared in gay-friendly projects, so doubtless there will be some LGBTQ representation. 

 Plus episodes are set at a pool party and during a "boys' weekend," so there are bound to be some hunks in Speedos (maybe even Braxton, who has never yet appeared shirtless on screen or in a modeling shoot).  

I binged the whole series in two days, so I'll review it by plot thread, not by episode.

Bert Takes His Shirt Off: We begin with Bert performing at the birthday party of frequently n*de hunk Rob Lowe.  The guests don't care about his comedy set; they just want him to take off his shirt, over and over. "It's comedy gold," Lowe assures him, but Bert feels like an object.  What about his clever observations? I don't get it.  Why would you want to see a guy with his shirt off unless you found him attractive? 

Back home, Bert's wife LeAnn (Arden Myrin of The Righteous Gemstones) suggests that he tone down the f* word , put a shirt on, and try to be respectable, since they are sending their daughters Georgia and Ila (Ava Ryan, Lilou Lang) to an upscale private school.  It has a Learning Disability Department, which Ila needs.  

A Certain Act: Trouble begins when daughter Georgia is ignored at school, so Bert plays her up on a podcast. The host asks if the 14-year old has engaged in a certain act.  "No, she's a good girl."

The next day, campus Mean Girl Kiersten has told everyone Georgia's shocking secret.  She is despondent: "My life is over.  What boy will look at me now?"  So not doing this act is  disgraceful for a girl?

Bert gets revenge during his act by criticizing the d*ck size of the Mean Girl's Dad, ultra-rich Landon Vanderthal (not Reggie Van Snoot?).  The bit goes viral, and the Headmaster calls both sets of parents to a conference.  Landon insists that his d*ck is very big, and he's willing to whip it out right there as proof.  Things escalate; Georgia is suspended, and Bert banned from the campus.

Left: Landon is played by Chris Witaske, straight but the creator of the gay-friendly Chicago Party Aunt.

A Missing Body Part:  Back at school, Georgia steals the Mean Girl's boyfriend, Zac (Braxton).  Bert goes berserk.  He's banned from the campus, but he sends his wife to flirt with the security guard, marches into the locker room, and threatens to hurt the boy.  But then he discovers that Zac has a missing body part so he can't have s*x. 

Nonsense.  If you don't have that body part, you get testosterone replacement therapy. and everything works fine.  How does he think transmen do it?

More after the break. 

Adam Devine's House Party, Episode 1.1: Adam shows his tree trunk, eats fro-yo, and flirts with Andrew Santino

 Link to the tree trunks

In 2013-2014,  while Adam Devine was starring in Workaholics and Modern Family and guesting on  Community, Arrested Development, Sanjay and Craig, and American Dad, he somehow managed to find the time for Adam Devine's House Party.  He plays an insecure, jerky, penis-obsessed version of himself, hosting a huge party in a mansion.  Each episode has a brief plot framing the sets of three up-and-coming comedians. I'm reviewing Episode 1.1, "Ex Girlfriend."

Scene 1:  Adam checks the food, booze, and comedians.  Whoops, there's some poop on the floor.  He covers it with a dollar bill. Gross! Everything is ready!  A hundred people burst in.  

Scene 2: To demonstrate how wild he is, Adam smashes a beer bottle on his head.  Uh-oh, too far.  We cut to him with his head bandaged, blood sopping down. Can they keep filming?  Director Kyle says it's fine.

Adam introduces the concept: "Comedy Central gave me a bunch of money to throw an awesome comedy show, and I blew it all on this house party."

Nope, that doesn't work.  Let's try repeating the opening amid gyrating butts --- a boy and a girl.  The boy's is obscured by the title, but that's the one he gawks at. Adam likes boy butts, and he cannot lie.

Scene 3: Andrew Santino invited Adam's ex-girlfriend to the party!  Adam gets all jealous and threatens to not let him perform. Santino claims that he didn't know, and the girl says that they just went out on one date, so who cares?  He counters: "We should have grown old and died together, but someone thought that someone was strange."

Scene 4: The first comic "won't stab you in the back by f*king your ex girlfriend: Ahmed Bharoocha. 

"Gay marriage is still illegal.  Can we get a boo for that?  Aha!  If you booed, you're gay!"  Wait -- anyone who supports gay marriage is gay, and that's a bad thing?   

He continues that it's crazy that gay marriage is still illegal. How can they allow someone who doesn't know any gay people to "vote on their happiness."  It's like going to a restaurant and ordering cake, but the guy at the next table cancels your order: "I don't like cake, so no one gets cake."

More riffs on a teenage God having kids too early, and baby crows.

Scene 5: Montage of a guy drinking, a guy kissing a girl, and so on. Ahmed and Adam discuss his head injury and the likelihood that Santino "won't get out of here alive."  

Scene 6: Adam introduces Andrew Santino, "a shit dog of a human being, but he's super funny."  

He riffs on his father's objections to him moving to California, with all the gay slurs: "you gonna roller blade and give blow jobs for cash."  "That's ridiculous.  Not everybody in California is gay."  

Then his friend asked him to go sky-diving.  The first time, you go tandem, which means that another adult male is strapped against you, his genitals against your butt.What if the parachute fails, and they both die, and his Dad comes to identify the body: a guy's dick in his ass!  He turned gay after all!

Santino lives in West Hollywood, the "gayest place in the world."  His apartment is at the intersection of Rainbow Avenue and Butthole Road.  You know, not all gay men are into anal sex.  His neighbor is a bear, but he eats penis instead of pic-a-nick baskets.  

If Santino was gay, he'd be a power bottom.  He demonstrates how he would clench to guide the action.  That's not what a power bottom is, but I'm surprised that Santino knows about the clenching. 

Scene 7: Adam asks the ex-girlfriend why she prefers Santino.  "Is his dick bigger than mine?" She doesn't know, having never seen Adam's dick.  Don't you go to movies?  Everyone's seen it.    

"Adam, you just took me out for fro-yo, and didn't pay for it.  You don't love me...you just get obsessed, and can't think of anything else."

"I do not get obsessed...wait, fro-yo?  I forgot about that."  He calls a fro-yo - frozen yogurt -- shop and orders enough for everyone.

Scene 8:  Next comedian: Barry Rothbart (top photo.  At least, he claims that's him).  He riffs on why he's so good at sex; ordering in a restaurant using hand signals: and dolphin sex.

Scene 9: Adam shows Santino a photo of his dick.  It might be the "tree-trunk" trick of perspective, or not a dick at all, but Santino is impressed.  He breaks up with the ex-girlfriend: he can't compete with a dick that size.  

The ex-girlfriend is ready to go back to Adam, but the fro-yo machine arrives, so he loses interest.  

Adam and Santino apologize for letting a girl come between them.  We cut to them feeding each other fro-yo.  Gross!   Uh-oh, there's some on Adam's mouth. Santino leans in to...the end.

Beefcake: None except for the blurry tree-trunk cock.

Gay Characters/Comedians: None. A lot of riffing on gay people, and a deliberate gay subtext between Adam and Santino

My Grade: Adam is similar to his Workaholics character: clueless, delusional, but generally pleasant. But the grossness ruins it -- why spend the entire episode bleeding? B-

Bonus: Adam and other guys show off their tree-trunks on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

See also:  Adam Devine's House Party, Episode 1.3: A Bisexual Foam O*rgy is promised

Adam Devine's House Party, Episode 2.9: Adam's O*rgasm, Nick Rutherford's Bulge, and Guys Sucking...

Adam Devine's House Party, Episode 3.1: Adam marries a dude. And it's not Tony Cavlero.

Hacks: Disgraced comedian decides to turn lesbian, gay leather guy spirals, and there are some jokes. With bonus Devon Sawa

  

 

I've been avoiding the recommendation of Hacks, on MAX, because the icon shows two ladies in bikinis, and who wants to watch a tv show about computer hackers in bikinis?  But yesterday I casually looked through the episode list, and saw what looked like a black guy at a gay leather bar.  

Not many black guys into leather -- in years of going to the Faultline in West Hollywood, I only met one.  So maybe this show is worth checking out after all.

Turns out that the title is a misdirection. Hacks is an obsolete term for writers who churn out incompetent but popular trash,  In this case, the hack is Deb Vance (Jean Smart), a Vegas lounge lizard trying to revise her snarky 80s-style standup for a more sensitive generation.  Her head writer and confidant, Ava, had her own standup career cancelled after an insensitive tweet.  I'm reviewing the gay leather bar episode, 2.4, "The Captain's Wife."

Scene 1: At a dusty farm, Deb is filming an infomercial, selling strange-looking socks. Her bus driver, Weed, keeps turning on the air conditioning. Her photographer, Damien, notes that she forgot the American flag print. "Stupid f*king American flag."  Lots of presumably gay characters here: Weed is played by a very butch Laurie Mecalf, and Damien by Mark Indelicato.

Head writer Ava wants to stay behind during Deb's upcoming gig on a gay cruise, because she's afraid of water, and can't swim.   "You're going. Wear a life jacket."

And forget all the sensitive nonsense: Deb's going to do her old stuff, the classics.  "The gays get me." 

Scene 2: Swishy guys in a club bathroom gossipping and snorting cocaine. Marcus  (Carl Clemons-Hopkins, below) puts on a business suit: it's 7:00 am, and he has a breakfast meeting across town.  I remember staying at a sex club all night.  They put out a breakfast buffet at 6:00 am.  They ask him to stick around for his mental health.  He refuses, but he lets them score some of his addies (Adderall, a stimulant used to treat ADHD).

Scene 3: Boarding the cruise ship, Deb wonders why there are so many ladies in line. Famous comedian Margaret Cho, the last cruise's headliner, is just leaving. She tells Deb that the audience was mediocre, but the gay sex was great.

"Wait -- I thought this was a gay cruise."

"It is.  A lesbian cruise."

Uh-oh.  Gay men love Deb, but lesbians hate her.  She doesn't understand why. Ava suggests "the hundreds of thousands of jokes at their expense that you've told over the years."

Scene 4: At the cruise ship bar, Ava is approached by a grabby, hand-kissing, way over-eager lady horndog. She's not actually freaked out.  I wonder if she is a lesbian, too? Wikipedia lists a girlfriend and a boyfriend. 

Meanwhile, Deb calls her agent, Jimmy (Paul W. Downs), to complain about booking her on a lesbian cruise.   He's busy working on a residency -- a permanent casino gig.  "How about Terrible's Casino?"  "No way -- too far from the Strip."  

There actually was a Terrible's Casino, though I can't imagine why someone would choose that name.  It closed in 2020.

Next Deb chides Ava for having fun instead of writing some lesbian jokes.  "You speak lesbian, right?  Cause you're half?"  I don't know what that means. Maybe a lesbian mother and a straight father? 

Scene 5: Back in Vegas, Marcus, the gay leather bar guy, gets home to find two middle aged ladies on his couch. One is his mother.  "What are you doing here?" he asks angrily. "I told you I needed to get work done today." They came to pet his dog and upbraid him for spending all night at the club. He yells at them for trying to control his life.  

Scene 6: Ava is trying to dump someone's ashes into the ocean, when a lady approaches to flirt and ask her to the "She-ano Bar."   Cut to Ava getting ready, telling Deb about the Olympic athlete on board. Girlfriend going to get her some lady jocks.  She invites Deb to come along as her wing-person.  Nope, but Deb is willing to fix her outfit.

As they are bonding, Ava wants to know: with all her jokes about how terrible sex with men is, has Deb ever considered being with a woman?  "Nope.  I like men.  I wish I was gay, because it would be a hell of a lot easier."  Are you crazy, lady?  Let's start with your Sunday school teacher telling you that God hates you, and work our way forward.

Ava calls her out on her straight entitlement, and Deb agrees that it might not have been easier to like girls -- back when she was a kid in the 1960s. But she got a crush on John Lennon of The Beatles and never looked back.

"But why do you like men?"  I was asked that a lot, back when coming out meant a barrage of stupid questions. You like who you like, idjit. You don't have any control over it.

Ava concedes that "your sexuality is not a choice," but Deb still should try to figure out why she is straight.  "Maybe you aren't really attracted to men, you're attracted to their power." 

Scene 7: Convinced to try it out, Deb goes to the She-ano bar and cruises some lesbians.  The next morning, everyone at the breakfast buffet is friendly, and she has embraced lesbians as a potential audience: "They love women, and I'm a fabulous woman." 

Left: Former teen heartthrob Devon Sawa, whom Deb has sex with in another episode. 

Scene 8: Marcus at the club, dancing his butt off with his swishy friends He's dressed as a BDSM bottom, but it's not a leather bar, it's an old-style gay disco. 

He runs into Wilson -- according to wikipedia, his ex-boyfriend.  The breakup has resulted in his downward spiral.  He wanted to call and say "I love you," but he's blocked all of Wilson's social media profiles and deleted his number.  Wilson is concerned about his drug use, but doesn't want to get back together.

More Deb and a lot of Devon after the break

"Baby Reindeer": Comedian is turned gay by a sexual predator, but manages to turn straight again. No baby reindeer.

 Baby Reindeer -- why do British tv series often have titles that sound memorable, but you actually forget instantly because they are just nonsense words?  Remember Drop the Dead Donkey?  Anyhow, it's a thriller about a male comedian being stalked by a deranged female fan, which causes problems with his girlfriend.  So far it's heterosexuals all the way down, but listen to the Episode 4 blurb: "As Donny reports Martha (his stalker) to the police, it triggers the memory of a traumatic experience he had with a man he met at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival years before."

Ulp, surely we're not going to learn that all gay men are sexual predators out to seduce or assault hapless straight guys.  I thought that myth faded into oblivion back in the 1970s.  I'd better review the episode.

Scene 1: Looking very haggard, wild-eyed, sleazy, like a drug addict in search of a fix, Donny (Richard Gad) bursts into the police station to report his stalker. He wonders why he can't tell the cop about Martha groping him and attacking his girlfriend, or about her history of arrests?  He's suddenly reliving a traumatic event that happened at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2011.

Scene 2: Nice establishing shots of Edinburgh and the Fringe Festival, "one of the greatest celebrations of art and culture on the planet."   Donny has to perform comedy at a pub with no stage, just standing in front of three or four people who didn't know he was coming.  And his act is dreadful: he prances around in a dress and fright wig, then announces "My mother died today."  Then he explains that it's incongruous, so it's funny.  

Ok, so "I got circumcized today" -- pulling out gigantic scissors.  "See, I'm saying I have a big penis. It's funny."  Did this guy even workshop his material?

Scene 3: The pubkeeper gives him an admission card to the Luna Bar -- fell out of someone's wallet.  He goes, hoping to schmooze with the Fringe Festival elites. Still looking haggard, wild-eyed, and sleazy. Maybe he could, like, wear a nice shirt?   He latches onto a guy who was on the writing staff of the fringe movie Cottonmouth, and invites him to his show, "LOL on Cancer".  Nope, not interested.

A bearded bear, Darrien (Tom Goodman-Hill), approaches.  They diss the Cottonmouth guy and wish they could slip poison in this drink. Turns out that Darrien actually wrote the script -- the Cottonmouth snob was his assistant!  They're standing very close together.  Is this a hookup? Was Donny bi, back before he found true hetero-love?  

Scene 4: Darrien comes to his show, listens to his ridiculous jokes and performance bits, and offers to give him some pointers. 

Montage of Darrien's tips, like "Make eye contact," and the pub gradually fills up as people like the performance.  Donny tells us that he went out with Darrien every night to a private club (not gay). So, are we supposed to conclude that they're dating?  Why not just say so, or have them kiss?  

We do learn that Darrien is a "polyamorous pansexual."  Um...polyamorous means that you have more than one permanent romantic partner.

Scene 5: Darrien pushes Donny into the pub bathroom, stands kissing-close, and asks "Are you ready?" Donny: "Ready for anything." Sounds like he's up for some snogging. But it's not sex, it's cocaine.

Then Darrien returns to London, and stops contacting Donny.  "It felt strange."

Scene 6:  When the festival ends, Donny goes to acting class at Oxford. We see some of their ridiculous exercises: be a flame; mimic an ape. He gets a girlfriend, but he misses Darrien. So are you interested in him, or not?  Then out of nowhere Darrien calls and asks him to collaborate on a project.

Scene 7: Donny arrives at Darrien's elite flat, gets a tour, and shows his script: about a lawyer who decides to become a pro wrestler at age 50, and is torn between two worlds. Darrien is not impressed, but humors him. I'm guessing we're supposed to be reading them as straight buddies.  

Darrien asks if he wants to get really high, and gives him MDMA and GHB.  Hey GHB is a date rape drug!  But if you want to have sex with him, why not just ask?

More homophobia after the break

"Huge in France": Watch It for the Beefcake

Huge in France (2019) stars Gad  (Gad Elmileh, a comedian who actually is huge in France).  He comes to America and is shocked to find that no one recognizes him.  He is constantly walking into a room, announcing "C'est Gad!", and expecting people to fawn over him.

He's come to reunite with his long-estranged son Luke  (Jordan Ver Hoeve), who wants to become a professional model, and...

um, sorry, I lost my train of thought.

Maybe just one more photo, to get me through the rest of the review.

Jordan is from San Diego (I would have guessed Amsterdam).  He's represented by Brand Model and Talent, which offers a large portfolio of his work.  His instagram offers some even more revealing shots.

Ok, this is the last one.

Luke is being managed and trained by his mom's boyfriend, failed actor Jason (Matthew Del Negro).










More after the break

Sandy Baron's "God Save the Queens": The First Gay-Positive Comedy Album

I knew Sandy Baron as the hot, shirtless, allergic-to-women John Marino in If This is Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium (1969), and, thirty years later, as the irascible next-door-neighbor of Jerry's parents on Seinfeld (1991-1997).

But he had a long career: starting as a Borscht Belt comedian, performing with the legendary Lenny Bruce, appearing on the parody news program That Was The Week That Was (1962-63), starring with Will Hutchins in the sitcom Hey, Landlord (1966-67), and appearing in dozens of movies, game shows, and talk shows in the 1970s and 1980s.  He appeared on hundreds of college campuses

Like many comedians of the era, Baron released comedy albums, mostly recordings of his stand up-routines: The Sickniks, Out of the Mouth of Babes, I Never Let School Interfere with my Education.

In 1972 Baron and Methodist minister James R. McGraw  released"God Save the Queens."  The cover art parodied Disney's Snow White:  a muscular, shirtless prince leaves a tree-house after an unspecified encounter, while forest animals look on.  The person inside calls "Chow [ciao]."

It represents one of the first times in modern history where gay people appeared in mass media as anything but limp-wristed pansies.   The target of most of the jokes is an oblivious or homophobic straight person who cannot adapt to the gay people in his life:

1. It Happened One Night: A man reveals to his wife that he once had a same-sex experience.

2. Do You Take This Man: at a gay wedding, the father of the "bride or whatever" objects.  Because he doesn't approve of interracial marriage..

3. That Was Your Life: The #1 Male Box Office Star in the World, Stone St. Lawrence, is outed during a parody of the biography show This is Your Life.

4. Awe in the Family.  A gay man tries to come out to his parents, who misunderstand and think he's gotten a girl pregnant.  His father reveals that he had a similar "problem" in his youth.

5. Clockwork Pink.  Electroshock therapy used to "cure" gay men.

6. The Plot. A man rants about how gays are "taking over," controlling our toilet paper and dogs.

7. Buy Gay. A man planning to open a gay boutique seeks advice from an elderly Jewish merchant, who misunderstands "gay" as "goy."

8. The Politician.  A politician tries to court gay voters with laughably homophobic statements: "As long as there are no children around, a homo should be able to live anywhere he wants to."

9. The Counselor and the Hustler.  A "gay for pay" hustler goes to a gay employment service.

10. A Fairy Tale: The Queen Came Out of the Closet.  About Prince Different, who lives in a closet in the Land of Normal, but is encouraged to come out through the power of "pride."

Three years later, in an interview in The Advocate, Baron revealed that he cut the album in order to strike a blow for social equality for a minority group.  And for the money.

Danny Kaye was Gay

When I was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, one of our traditions was watching White Christmas (1954), actually a backstage comedy about rival singing acts, with nothing to do with Christmas except the final scene.  It was my first backstage comedy, my introduction to Bing Crosby, and the only thing I've ever seen Danny Kaye in.

But when my parents were young, Danny Kaye was everywhere.  Born in New York in 1911, he was a Borscht belt and Vaudeville comedian before moving to Hollywood at the start of World War II.  He played fast-talking, mugging Russians (The Inspector General, 1949), wistful dreamers (The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, 1947; Hans Christian Andersen, 1952), and, of course, dopey sidekicks (White Christmas).

Plus he had his own radio program (1945-46) and cut many records with both sentimental and novelty songs: "The Woody Woodpecker Song," "I've Got a Lovely Box of Coconuts," "Tchaikovsky" (which involves saying the names of Russian composers at breakneck speed).

He had his own tv show from 1963 to 1967 (I never saw it), and appeared as himself on Laugh-In, The Tonight Show, Dick Cavett, Ed Sullivan, The CBS Festival of Lively Arts for Young People, and The Muppet Show.

His last role was on an episode of The Cosby Show.  He died in 1987.





Comedic actors need a great deal of upper-body strength to do their pratfalls.  As this photo from Baby Jane Collectibles reveals, Danny Kaye had a respectable physique for his era.

But I understand that his stage presence was feminine, even swishy, nearly as gay-coded as Jack Benny, and he played a string of "sissies" who use their wit to triumph over muscle-men. Was he gay?

Yep.  Well, he liked ladies.  He was married to Sylvia Fine from 1940 to his death, and he had various other hetero-affairs with women ranging from Eve Arden to Shirley MacLaine,  But he was also open to same-sex activity and even romance. 

Sir Laurence Olivier is mentioned most often as his partner: they met in 1940, and saw each other off and on for the next twenty years, in plain sight of their wives and everyone in Hollywood.  The rule in those days was to pretend not to notice.