One of television’s pioneers in bringing gay sex to America’s small screens is getting a little sick of the consequences.
Billy Crystal, who played an openly gay character on ABC’s “Soap,” a parody of daytime soap operas that ran from 1977 to 1981 , told a panel of the Television Critics Association in Pasadena on Sunday that the push to get gays on television is going too far, according to the Huffington Post.
“Sometimes I think, ‘Ah that’s too much for me,'” Crystal said. “Sometimes, it’s just pushing it a little too far for my taste and I’m not going to reveal to you which ones they are.”
There’s certainly no shortage of candidates. Mainstreaming gay characters has been a staple of television for years now, whether it’s the comedy “Modern Family” (and you know what makes it “modern”) or the drama “Orange is the New Black” and a bunch of shows in between.
The problem, Crystal said, is that the pendulum has swung too far – from the era when his character was automatically a laugh-line because of his sexual orientation to now, when audiences might feel like they’re having an alternative lifestyle pushed into their lives, whether they want it or not.
During the “Soap” days, Crystal said,
“There were times where I would say to [the actor who played his boyfriend], ‘Bob, “I love you,’ and the audience would laugh nervously, because, you know, it’s a long time ago, that I’d feel this anger. I wanted to stop the tape and go, ‘What is your problem?’…
“And now it’s just, I see it and I just hope people don’t abuse it and shove it in our face — well, that sounds terrible — to the point of it just feels like an everyday kind of thing.”
Naturally, the remarks made him no friends among the gay-friendly types most likely to be reading about the Television Critics Association.
Dear @BillyCrystal: I didn’t particularly enjoy watching you make love to Meg Ryan, either. http://t.co/qgHkcGbH54 via @gaystarnews
— Adam Sank (@AdamSank) January 19, 2015
But he wasn’t completely without support.
“@ComplexMag: Billy Crystal recently said that sometimes gay scenes on TV are “too much for me”: http://t.co/kx7n70nljM” couldn’t agree more
— Scoop (@CoachScoop_) January 19, 2015
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