I am not a crying type of person. I have probably shed two tears in my adult life so far, yet seeing Noah's Arc did that to me.
Those who saw it may think "why on Earth did a light show like that set him off?"
In fact, I'm pretty shocked it did as well. The fact of the matter is that it was so suprising to see black gay men and their lives at the center of a series, not just as comic relief (cf. To Wong Foo, Holiday Heart--god, that was bad). That's something that I had been waiting to see my whole life up until this point. You see, growing up in a place where I was the only out gay black male for miles (at least to my knowledge at the time), I often doubted myself, because, frankly, there were no role models to follow.
In this media age that we've been in since the 1960's, most people look answers and clues from television. No such luck there in my case. When I was coming of age in the 1990's gay men were shown on television as either AIDS victims, sociopathic predators (the disturbing effects of the Dahmer case still linger in Milwaukee), or Ralph Lauren-style preppies in either New York or Los Angeles. If the answers weren't going to present themselves, then I figured I'd better get involved in putting them out there. Then and there, I decided to be a writer.
Now, I'm not going to say the series is flawless, but I don't really care about the flaws right now. Let them queen out and have rampant sex! Let them couple up in hierarchy-be-damned relationships! It doesn't matter, because we're becoming more and more visible now. And somewhere out there, this might very well open up a world of possibilities.
This is our Julia.
5 comments:
I agree with you...though I seen some flaws as far as representation of the Black gay community, it was just great to see such a show for us.
So would you say it's a Black version of Queer as Folk?
ive said this on a few blogs .. i didnt see Noah Arc, but i know some people who did and a FEW of them were deeply disappointed .. hopefully, i will get to check it out - but we dont have Logo!
Hopefully, Patrik-Ian Polk is still selling the DVDs.
Hiraku! I watched Noah's Arc, an honestly I thought it was horrible. Those characters did not touch me. They felt very flat, like caricatures that were not fleshed out, they totally lacked depth. Watching it gave me a flashback. I remember being 10 and watching the Cosby Show. The sense of pride I felt watching a bourgoise Black family on television. We are so starved for visibility that we will take it any way it comes. Now when I watch reruns of Cosby, I am shocked that I didn't realize it was fluff - pure escapism. I wish it had better writing and believable acting.
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