In June We Gay

On Monday I shared with you the trailer for Fire Island, director Andrew Ahn's upcoming comedy about a group of gay friends (including SNL's Bowen Yang and Margaret Cho) who storm the gay beach for some gay ol' summer adventure -- that is hitting Hulu on June 3rd, but the night before that here in NYC the film will be opening the Summer Edition of NewFest Pride, and you can buy tickets right this second for the screening and the after-party at this link. The full fest will run for four days with in-person AND virtual screenings -- I'll share the rest of the line-up when the time comes but for right now hit the jump for today's big press release...

And These Are Your Gay Emmys

I yelped several times reading through the winners of the Dorian TV Awards just now -- awarded by the LGBTQ+ critics guild GALECA of which I am a member, we got so much right! And then we gave some awards to Succession, but I guess we can't get everything right. Ahem. Anyway we gave two yes two prizes to Bryan Fuller's horror doc Queer For Fear (read my review of it here), which got the biggest yelp out of me. We gave it both "Best LGBTQ Doc or Doc series" as well as the more general "Best Doc or Doc Series" and dammit it deserved 'em both. We also gave several awards to Somebody Somewhere and The White Lotus AND we gave "Best TV Movie" to Andrew Ahn's Fire Island! We have good taste! Except for Succession. Hit the jump for the press release and list of winners....

Suddenly Conrad

Earlier today -- hell just two hours ago with those gratuitous Zane Phillips photographs -- I said that I could fill up this blog with pictures of the Fire Island movie cast for months straight. Well I sure am off and running with that idea today now, here adding co-star Conrad Ricamora to the heap -- and Fire Island is definitely the kind of movie where you'd like to see the entire cast just piled up in a sexy heap. Ricamora plays one of the film's several love interests, but most importantly he stands in for the Me's of the world -- the people who just cannot with that whole Fire Island Scene. And much to the film's benefit, as much as it does ultimately make its case for that place it never exactly argues too hard with his point-of-view either. It threads the needle anyway, mostly because Andrew Ahn is a supremely gifted filmmaker who makes complicated perspectives come off easy as pie. Anyway I am saying all of that now because I didn't have room to get into it with my review of Fire Island, which you can read right here at Pajiba. Go! Read it!

Which brings me to my next point -- it's now after Memorial Day, which means I now have Summer Fridays off from my day job! Yay me! Yay three-day weekends! Which also means I (probably) won't be posting on Friday again until September. Don't you give me that look -- my brain needs the goddamned break. There is plenty of content if you scroll down, and down, and down. Just go down, dammit! (Why am I always screaming that at people?) Have a good weekend, y'all. And watch Fire Island on Hulu! And follow Conrad Ricamora on Instagram right here:

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This Trailer is Fire (Island)

Big dose of happy this morning as the first poster and the first trailer for Andrew Ahn's film Fire Island have arrived! Ahn is the extremely talented filmmaker behind Spa Night and Driveways (read my Driveways review here), both of which are MNPP-tested and approved. On the surface Fire Island seems like a departure for him -- those movies were introspective and quiet and Fire Island, a comedy about a bunch of queer friends (including comedian Joel Kim Booster, SNL's Bowen Yang, and Margaret f'ing Cho) vacationing at the titular gay mecca, is maybe probably not the same vibe. But I can't wait to see and find out whatever it is, and this trailer's a lot of fun. This hits Hulu on June 3rd -- watch the trailer now:

Time For a Booster Shot

It's July of 2021 and I still haven't listed my favorite movies of 2020, I am a flop. And I feel especially floppish about it when I think about how much praise I haven't yet lavished on several small movies that are one hundred percent in my Top 10 and still haven't gotten nearly enough attention, like for instance Andrew Ahn's phenomenal film Driveways, which I did review last May right here, but which enough superlatives can't be thrown at. It's so good! If you haven't watched it yet you can rent it on Amazon right here. 

Oh and you should also watch Ahn's also-phenomenal film Spa Night from 2017, which can also be rented on Amazon, although I came to that one late, in the wake of my love for Driveways. I really should have seen it at the time and feel bad about that one. Anyway I bring all of Ahn's filmography up because today we got word on his new movie and it's pretty damned exciting -- it's a rom-com called Fire Island that will star two out gay Asian men -- Joel Kim Booster (seen at the top of this post), and SNL comedian Bowen Yang. 

"Described as a modern day take on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” the film will center on two best friends embarking on a weeklong vacation to Fire Island — the historic gay escape off the southern shore of Long Island — with the help of cheap rosé and a cadre of eclectic friends."

Booster you might know from recurring roles on Shrill and Search Party; he's also a producer on the show The Other Two, which is a good reminder to me that I still have to watch The Other Two dammit. I keep forgetting. Yang I'm sure y'all know by now, he's had a couple of big years on SNL. The star of this project for me though is one hundred percent Ahn in the director's chair, as I'll follow him anywhere at this point. We will be keeping our eyes on this one! But for now let's keep our eyes on the fine-as-fuck Booster, whose social media reveals a treasure trove of self-exploitation, some of which I will now share on yonder jump...

Pics of the Day

One of our most anticipated movies of 2022 is Fire Island, a new gay rom-com from Driveways and Spa Night director Andrew Ahn, and they have just dropped a big batch of first look photos -- head on over to Vanity Fair for not just several more shots of the extremely photogenic cast including Joel Kim Booster, Bowen Yang, Conrad Ricamora, Matt Rogers, Margaret Cho, and Nick Adams, but also a fine report from the set that speaks with several of the people involved. Here is my original post about the movie when it was first announced (which includes a nice little gallery of JJK photos because natch) -- I'm such a huge fan of Spa Night and Driveways (read my review of that film here) that I'll follow Ahn anywhere, anytime, forever. And I'm especially curious to see how he handles this one, which seems at first blush much more boisterous tonally than his previous work. Fire Island is out on Hulu on June 3rd. PS go watch Driveways right now, please. It's an absolute low-key masterwork, it really is.

Joel Kim Booster Four Times

There are a few more of these photos over here alongside the interview with the comedian turned star of upcoming queer ass Hulu comedy Fire Island, which we here at MNPP are excited about because.. well 1) I saw it last night and it's terrific. Do I need to keep counting after that? The fact that I can say with actual learned knowledge that the movie is real good ought to be enough! But you should be excited because 1) I say it's terrific (I will review it with more words next week), and 2) it was directed by Andrew Ahn, the already-director of the stellar two-some Driveways and Spa Night and one of the most talented young directors we've got. Watch the trailer for Fire Island over here if you haven't yet, and mark your calendars -- the film is opening NewFest's pride-month edition next Thursday in NYC (last I heard there are still tickets for the later screening) and then it drops on Hulu the next day, June 3rd. 

Feast On This

Having missed Spa Night when it came out in 2016 I only came around to writer-director Andrew Ahn when I saw his 2019 film Driveways at Tribeca that year. But that movie stirred something deep in me (see my review here) so I've been ecstatic to see bigger name actors running wildly toward Ahn ever since -- in 2022 with his sweet queer comedy Fire Island and now this past weekend his updated re-do of Ang Lee's The Wedding Banquet, which on paper feels blasphemous but in practice is turned into a glorious ode to queer family by Ahn. The new film stars Bowen Yang, Lily Gladstone, Kelly Marie-Tran, Han Gi-Chan (seen above, a real revelation in the swoon department), Joan Chen, and Youn Yuh-jung, and as I say in my just-dropped review of the film over at Pajiba -- everybody's great in it but it's Youn who steals the whole thing, giving a performance I immediately fell head over heels for. I love this even more than the performance in Minari that she won her Oscar for (and I loved that movie and that performance). All around another grand success for Ahn, and for the rest of us a soothing super-gay balm in trying times. A warm and funny gift of a film!

A Brand New Wedding Banquet

I sent this news story to myself two nights ago meaning to post about it but so goes my brain, forever distracted by shiny things -- anyway you have maybe heard by now but Fire Island and Driveways director Andrew Ahn (longtime MNPP fave) is remaking (sort of) Ang Lee's classic 1993 queer rom-com The Wedding Banquet! You'll understand why I say "sort of" when I share the plot, but before that -- this news comes along with a stellar name cast: Lily Gladstone, Bowen Yang, Kelly Marie Tran, Joan Chen, and Oscar winner Youn Yuh-jung! There's only one person who hasn't been cast yet and that's the hot Korean guy named Min who's at the center of everything, aka the role that was played by hot Winston Chao in Lee's movie. 

Mmm Winston. Anyway those are a lot of names of actors when the main roles in Ang Lee's original film didn't contain that many characters, which is where the "sort of" with regards to this being a remake comes in -- this version's plot has some extra complications. The plot:

"The plot revolves around Min, whose marriage proposal is rejected by his boyfriend Chris (Yang). Min then convinces his best friend Angela (Marie Tran) to marry him for his green card and offers to pay for the IVF treatment of the latter’s partner, Liz (Gladstone), in return. Although Min and Angela plan a “subtle city hall elopement,” their lives are turned upside down when the former’s grandmother arrives in Seattle to throw them an extravagant Korean wedding banquet."

I think Ahn's making smart choices here, beefing up the life of the female character with her own romance -- the fact that it's bringing legend Lily Gladstone along for the ride is just bonus. Okay it's a really really exciting bonus. Now we just wait to see who Ahn casts as Min... and might I make a suggestion: 

After Past Lives I need all the Teo Yoo I can get. That said I think he's straight (actually I have no idea) and I wouldn't be surprised if Ahn is looking for a openly queer actor. So any suggestions?

Good Afternoon, Gratuitous Michael Graceffa

(Editor's Note: This was meant to be a "Good Morning" post but my office internet has been down all day. So here we are!) So who watched Welcome to Chippendales? The Hulu series that starred Kumail Nanjiani, Juliette Lewis, Annaleigh f'ing Ashford, and Murray Bartlett? (I shared the trailer here.) Naturally I did although I felt like I was always playing a lot of catch-up with it -- anyway I made it to the end right about the time it was ending so we're square. I thought it was pretty good! The story we've seen a million times before -- literally, this exact story about Somen Banerjee and these murders has been told several times before -- but they gathered a terrific group of actors who were delights in themselves, and that's before we even get to talking about the strippers themselves...

Finally catching up on #WelcometoChippendales and holy hell Quentin Plair y'all pic.twitter.com/noT3n5diZv

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) December 22, 2022

Speaking of I really thought I'd end up doing a big post on Quentin Plair honestly, but despite the show taking full advantage when they had him around 1) his character's arc was truncated and 2) his Instagram isn't nearly self-exploitative enough. One glance at Michael "Mikey" Graceffa's online presence though (especially his Insta) -- hoo boy. He is making up for it for the entire cast!

I need to re-watch Andrew Ahn's Fire Island from last year for several reasons -- one of them being that it was an excellent movie! -- but especially now that I see Mikey here was in the cast; I don't remember him at all. There were so many hot dudes in that movie though that my eyes were crossed most of the time, trying to take it all in. I think he's mostly a Broadway person? He is clearly a dancer. I know this because I have eyes and my eyes are telling me that that is a dancer's butt. Anyway I am sure y'all might know better, what he's done stage-wise. Me all I know is what my eyes are telling me, and... yeah, they're still crossed. Good lorrrrd. Hit the jump for dozens more...

Quote of the Day

"When “Living End” came out, it was so polarizing in the gay community. People would tell me, “People are getting into fist fights in bars.” On the one hand it was such a punk rock movie and the attitude of it was so kind of “fuck everybody,” and at the same time it was hot guys making out. And what the movie had to say was so alienating to them that people would get so passionate about it. And Jim Stark, the producer, he’d say to me, “You make these gay movies that gay people hate. They’re too punk rock for gay people and they hate them.” So he’s like, “If you make a straight movie, I’ll produce it and get you real money for it.” And I said, “OK, sure,” because fuck it. Why not? So that’s why “Doom Generation” has a subtitle, “A Heterosexual Movie.” So I made this heterosexual movie, but in a very punk rock bratty way, made it so gay."

Today IndieWire (in the middle of a 90s Celebration Week) got Andrew Ahn, the immensely talented director of Fire Island and Spa Night and Driveways, to interview legendary queer punk director Gregg Araki! Read it all here! I love how much Araki there has been in the air this past week. I posted some photos last week and then just yesterday I retweeted out this interview with him at i-D magazine on the subject of the 30th anniversary of The Living End. (He also says in there that he is at work on a new thing.) All of that's a net positive, but that chat with Ahn really spilled this over into true bounty. Two great tastes, together at last! Now let's get his damn movies onto blu-ray.

Gonna add this photo of Gregg Araki and John Waters to my inspiration board pic.twitter.com/82CIXBYCBp

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) September 27, 2021

A Banquet of Beauties

Since I'm covering Sundance virtually this year there are a few choice titles I am missing out on that I'm extremely -- to put it mildly -- bummed about missing. And right up there at the tippy top is writer-director Andrew Ahn's re-working of Ang Lee's film The Wedding Banquet. I told you about this movie back in April of last year -- it stars Bowen Yang, Lily Gladstone, Kelly Marie Tran, Youn Yuh-jung, Joan Chen (Josie Packard!!!), and the stunning Han Gi-Chan seen above leaning on Bowen's shoulder but we owe ourselves a better look at him, we do:

Swoon. Anyway Ahn (one of MNPP's favorite young filmmakers who's previously gifted us with Spa Night, my beloved Driveways, and the gay rom-com Fire Island) has remodeled Lee's story for 2025 in ways I won't dive into because everyone should just watch the movie and experience it. But I'm going to trip over that exact statement now by sharing the first teaser for the movie anyway because I live in a constant state of hypocrisy. Just don't watch this thing I am posting if you don't want to know like I said you shouldn't!

Thankfully we don't have ages upon ages to wait for the film even if we're missing out on it right this minute -- it is hitting theaters on April 18th! I think we'll probably survive at least that long (fingers crossed, knock on wood, etc) so let's go add this one to all of our calendars. And you can see the poster and several more images from the film right on here after the jump...

Oh Mary & Abe

I realize that, even though the play got extended here in NYC several times, the audience of human beings on this earth that have gotten to see Cole Escola's hilarious play Oh Mary! imagining the deranged relationship between Mary Todd Lincoln (Escola) and her husband Abe (Conrad Ricamora) is minute. But I saw the damn thing and loved every over-the-top hilarious second of it, so I'm gonna post about it -- specifically a fun interview with Escola and Ricamora over at Queerty today, where the pair try on silly outfits at a local thrift shop and talk about their own queer histories. Of course after this play and his sexy turn in Andrew Ahn's gay rom-com Fire Island I'm nursing a big ol' crush on Ricamora so that doesn't exactly hurt either...

Zane Phillips Fourteen Times

Fire Island actor Zane Phillips certainly caught our eye from the first moment he flashed that stache across that sweet Andrew Ahn romantic-comedy, and we've done a couple of posts on him since then -- how could we not, look at what we're working with here? So naturally we jumped on his new photo-shoot for Behind the Blinds magazine with about as much speed as we'd jump on Zane himself if he was ever standing in front of us. We mean that in the kindest, friendliest, least-threatening sense, of course. Not another restraining order, please! Anyway per usual BTB has gifted us with one million photos to share, and if they work it like usual we'll probably get one million more before they're through. Remind me to send roses to their offices some day, but for today hit the jump for all the photos...

  

Zane Phillips Eight Times

The list of obscenely hot dudes in Andrew Ahn's film Fire Island -- hitting Hulu tomorrow! Review coming soon! Here is the trailer! -- is very long and very, very thick. How thick is it, you ask? It's so thick I could be posting about these dudes for weeks. And I might do just that! I already shared some recent super hot photos of the film's star and screenwriter Joel Kim Booster last week, but today I am feeling this dude -- his name's Zane Phillips, he plays a guy named "Dex" that catches Joel's character's eye (among other body parts), and you should obviously follow him on Instagram right here. Oh and you need to hit the jump for seven more photos... 

Good Morning, World

It just doesn't seem correct that I have only done one post on actor Zane Phillips in the six-ish weeks since Andrew Ahn's wonderful film Fire Island hit Hulu -- if you follow Zane on Instagram (and I assume y'all did that then if you hadn't already) then you know he's been delivering the cintent we crave way more than that one post would let on! So today on this last day of this short week for me I will catch us up some! 

Not all. Oh no, not all. There are some photos I'm leaving in the folder because there are mornings when I will need a filler and Zane, hoo baby, he'll come to the rescue just fine. It honestly feels wasteful, sharing the batch I'm about to in one go, because any single one of these photos are enough to leave our jaws on the floor for an entire day. But we'll give ourselves a big beautiful gift today because we deserve it, dammit.

I'll also do Zane a solid and mention he got an acting job in the past week -- he's going to be in a Netflix series called Glamorous that stars Kim Cattrall as former supermodel turned CEO of a beauty brand blah blah blah stuff happens read the link. It sounds like a super queer friendly show i.e. Netflix doing some clean-up with regards to recent well-documented LGBTQ misdeeds. We'll see. Anyway, Zane! There's some more Zane to stare at after the jump...

My 20 Favorite Movies of 2022

Well I didn't plan on doing this today but what the hell -- seize the moment and such. Unlike last year, where I still haven't shared my favorite movies of the year, that is. That's right -- I'm just going to go ahead and give you my favorite movies of the year 2022 right now, right this moment. Wham bam let's just get it done. I've made it pretty clear here and elsewhere that my hatred for lists and awards has truly gotten the best of me -- ranking something as individual and personal as art as "the best" within a broad context has become nonsensical to me. I don't really even see the use of it anymore.

That said, individually I do find it fascinating -- seeing a single person's favorites, that is. Groupthink obliterates the outliers and quirks of individuality (which is how shit like Green Book or CODA ends up winning a Best Picture prize) but if there's a writer or friend whose opinion I trust I wanna see what they liked, as a singular person, in hopes that they'll direct me to something I might not have paid attention to. See John Waters' list at ArtForum every year -- I've gotten more out of those than any Oscars ceremony ever.

Anyway since I'm a member and/or a writer for a few places where I have had to submit my favorite movies of 2022 a few times already I did make this list awhile back, and I've had it sitting here staring at me. So why not share it? I don't know that I'll ever have the time to do a great big slew of "Golden Trousers" awards like I was doing a decade ago -- with a full-time real-life job AND writing regularly for two other websites AND keeping MNPP itself going my time is thin gruel right now y'all. But please, enjoy this much, if you care to!

My 20 Favorite Movies of 2022

20. Soft & Quiet (dir. Beth de Araújo)
-- my review here -- 

19. Everything Everywhere All At Once (dir. The Daniels)
-- my review here -- 

18. Close (dir. Lukas Dhont)
-- my review here -- 

17. Pearl (dir. Ti West)
-- my review here -- 

16. White Noise (dir. Noah Baumbach)
-- my review here -- 

15. Brian and Charles (dir. Jim Archer)
-- my review here -- 

14. Peter Von Kant (dir. François Ozon)
-- my review here -- 

13. The Northman (dir. Robert Eggers)
-- my review here -- 

12. The Eternal Daughter (dir. Joanna Hogg)
-- my review here -- 

11. Aftersun (dir. Charlotte Wells)
-- my review here -- 

10. Mad God (dir. Phil Tippett)
-- my review here -- 

9. Please Baby Please (dir. Amanda Kramer)
-- my review here -- 

8. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (dir. Laura Poitras)

7. Tár (dir. Todd Field)
-- my review here --

6. Living (dir. Oliver Hermanus)
-- my review here -- 

5. Great Freedom (dir. Sebastian Meise)
-- my review here -- 

4. Benediction (dir. Terence Davies)
-- my review here -- 

3. Decision to Leave (dir. Park Chan-wook)
-- my review here --

2. Bones and All (dir. Luca Guadagnino)
-- my review here -- 

1. Flux Gourmet (dir. Peter Strickland)
-- my review here -- 

------------------------------------

Runners-up: Fire Island (dir. Andrew Ahn), The Inspection (dir. Elegance Bratton), Holy Spider (dir. Ali Abbas), Bodies Bodies Bodies (dir. Halina Reijn), Triangle of Sadness (dir. Ruben Östlund), Three Thousand Years of Longing (dir. George Miller) A Wounded Fawn (dir. Travis Stevens), Dinner in America (dir. Adam Rehmeier), Women Talking (dir. Sarah Polley), Mrs. Harris Goes To Paris (dir. Anthony Fabian),  Alcarràs (dir. Carla Simón), Pleasure (dir. Ninja Thyberg), The Banshees of Inisherin (dir. Martin McDonagh), Watcher (dir. Chloe Okuno), The Cathedral (dir. Ricky D’Ambrose), Resurrection (dir. Andrew Seaman), The Quiet Girl (dir. Colm Bairéad), Nope (dir. Jordan Peele), Satan's Slaves 2 (dir. Joko Anwar), After Yang (dir. Kogonada)

So there that is! Go watch all of those movies, please.

And on to 2023 we officially move...