Documentary on Gays in the Media

Tonight I went to a lecture at the University of Hartford entitled,

DOCUMENTARY ON GAYS IN THE MEDIA

The Humanities Center features the debut of the documentary, “Further Off the Straight and Narrow: A Decade of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Visibility, 1995-2005” on Thursday, April 13 at 7 p.m. The documentary will be shown in Wilde Auditorium which is in the Harry Jack Gray building at the University of Hartford. Katherine Sender, the producer and director, will be present for a discussion about the documentary after the screening.

The documentary is an entertaining, provocative and thoughtful examination of the portrayal of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people on television over the past ten years. Popular shows like “Ellen”, “Will and Grace”, “Queer as Folk” and “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” are examined, as well as the representation of gay people in television news and sports. Sender asks how are we to make sense of the great increase in gay representation--from virtual invisibility before 1970 to the "gay chic" of today? “Further Off the Straight and Narrow” is one of the first in-depth documentaries to cast a critical eye over the growth of gay images on TV. Leading media scholars provide the historical and cultural context for exploring the social implications of these new representations. The documentary also includes many clips from television shows representing gay people from 1995 to 2005.

Katherine Sender is an assistant professor at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of the book “Business, not Politics: The Making of the Gay Market”, and a new article, “Queens for a Day: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and the Neoliberal Project”, as well as many other articles on gay media and marketing. She is also the producer, director, and editor of a number of documentaries, including the original version of “Off the Straight and Narrow” which examined gay representation on television from the 1950s to 1990s.

The documentary was a rough cut, not the final version and she asked for our input to it, what we thought was good and what we thought could stand improving. I thought that over all it was a good documentary, however I thought that the part on transgender was a little weak and could be improved. We recommended a couple of TV shows that she could include; like “The Education of Max Bickford”.