Exploring Gay Panic Humor in Something Rotten!

http://howlround.com/exploring-gay-panic-humor-in-broadway-s-something-rotten

"This is Stoppard via Shrek, Gilbert & Sullivan via South Park. It is witty and smart about its inside jokes, forcing you to stay attentive to every throwaway line and visual gag which skewer everything from Webster and Spenser to Les Miz and Dreamgirls. And yet, at the heart of the show is a troubling undercurrent of gay panic that is both countered and amplified by the show’s own form."

I am not linking this as an endorsement, by any means. Just something for ya'll to chew on...

Updated On: 12/11/15 at 12:49 PM

There is no doubt that Brother Jeremiah is a one joke character, and that joke is that he's a closet homosexual. But the play is also making fun of him for being so homophobic.

The show is so silly it's really hard to take anything seriously or be offended by its content.

For that type of person who looks to be outraged by anything I suppose they would have a conniption over aspects of Something Rotten!, but really it's harmless.

Actually, we too were bugged by the rampant gay-panic humor in SOMETHING ROTTEN. It reminded us of the gay panic humor we detested in BOOK OF MORMON, and especially the gay-panic humor in THE SCARLET PIMPERNELL years ago. At PIMPERNELL we actually wanted to crawl under our seats as the audience around us roared at the gay-panic schtick onstage.

What we felt at SOMETHING ROTTEN didn't rise to the level of being offended per se, more like being bummed out that this vein of comedy still has such a life in 2015.

I loved Something Rotten. I thought the humor very funny.

"There is no doubt that Brother Jeremiah is a one joke character, and that joke is that he's a closet homosexual."

I found it offputting. Not quite offensive because I don't think it's my place to be offended. But I was bothered by the fact that it wasn't even really a joke. And it went nowhere. Spoilers, I guess, but...

Good question, SweetLips, given the examples provided in the linked essay.

I would use the term "gay panic humor" to mean jokes about how nervous--or "panicked"--homosexuality makes straight men. The iconic example is the "Not That There's Anything Wrong with That" episode of SEINFELD. Such humor has become the go-to substitute now that the old fag jokes are no longer politically correct (or funny). Its target is the straight-male fear of penetration and his confusion resulting from his inability to read gay codes, coupled with his certainty that each and every gay man is trying to bed him.

But what the essayist describes in his essay are just plain old fag jokes. The target of the humor seems to be gay men themselves with their exaggerated affects (and particularly if they refuse to announce their sexuality to all they meet). I haven't seen the show, but the writer is describing "pansy humor" that would have been common in the 1930s or 1970s (the intervening years being ones in which homosexuality was hardly mentioned at all).

Updated On: 12/12/15 at 12:21 AM

I tend to notice that those offended by these types of things tend not to be in the groups that are supposedly targeted. They're looking to be offended, not reacting to a specific offense.

I had no problem with this joke whatsoever and I'm in the supposedly affected group. Is it not worth examining what the closet does to people, including through comedy?

Is the joke funny? That's a separate question. I thought it was, but that's a matter of opinion.

I don't know anything about gay panic humor but Something Rotten sucked so much. So I don't know why gays would want to come see it.

Hamilton22 said: "I don't know why gays would want to come see it."

We don't want to go see it. It's like, if you want Cheerios, you want Cheerios. Not Honey Nut Scooters. Same goes with this. Why see the off brand "The Book of Mormon" when you can just go down to the Eugene O'Neill.

haterobics said: "Something sucking a lot doesn't sound negative to the gays."

That's why I'm here! Heyo!