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| Brothers; obscure 1980's US sitcom | |
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| Topic Started: Apr 12 2009, 08:54 PM (246 Views) | |
| Deleted User | Apr 12 2009, 08:54 PM Post #1 |
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Deleted User
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I was way too young to really watch or even understand the show as a kid (it ran from 1984-1989), but many episodes of the show are now available in full on YouTube (check out user giovannif7 who uploaded them) and I watched the first three episodes last night. While the show definitely reeks of a low budget series (it was made for Showtime), it's still a very important show for the LGBT community and even 25 years later is very fresh and "wow, I can't believe they said this in 1984". A real shame that Paul Regina passed away a few years ago, he was quite a handsome man and deserves more credit as one of the first gay leading characters shown as a protagonist, over a decade before Ellen. The eldest brother on the show Lou is Fiona Apple's father. |
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| Deleted User | Apr 13 2009, 09:13 AM Post #2 |
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I just watched half an episode on youtube... sadly, that was more than enough for me. The jokes went stale years ago. I do admire what they were doing though. There really should be more shows like that around. Will & Grace, as much as I love the show, probably hurt the gay community more than it helped it (because people are stupid enough to believe that all gays are like Jack)... This reminded me that I honestly think kids should be forced to watch Milk in school. I truly, honestly believe that would help a lot of kids to understand just what it was and IS like to be gay. |
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| Deleted User | Apr 13 2009, 07:31 PM Post #3 |
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That is true that most of it is very dated, but the context of it is amazing IMO. Considering this was right when AIDS was starting to creep up in the public consciousness and homophobia was far more rampant, it was amazing that a show like this managed to last five years on the air with two gay leading characters (while Donald was a total queen stereotype, Cliff was the polar opposite and the definition of a "straight acting" guy who happens to like dick, so it was more versatile than W&G) without leading to any cliche storylines where the token gay lead rethinks his sexuality like on Soap when Jodie went through his straight period. According to Wiki, it was the very first show to tackle the AIDS epidemic too. I can only imagine just how revelatory this show had to be for gay viewers in the mid 1980's considering Ellen coming out was such a "shock" for prime-time television a decade after Brothers. In a way, it's nice to see how far we've come, and it proves that even in the 80's, Showtime was ahead of the curb when it came to LGBT programming. I hope they do release this on DVD or air repeats on Logo or something because it's an oft-forgotten part of gay television history that deserves credit for opening doors. Very sad that the guy who played Cliff died so young, he had liver cancer that took his life a few years ago. |
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8:20 AM Jul 11
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8:20 AM Jul 11