8 Times Actors And Directors Fought For Better Queer Representation In Their Projects
most groundbreaking gay characters on TV. Berlanti further explained, "There hadn’t been a gay kiss that was romantic on primetime TV.
There had been joke kisses, but there was never a romantic kiss between two characters, let alone two high-schoolers." Even after he negotiated the kiss between Jack and Ethan, the WB had specific stipulations about what the scene could show. "The network said they wanted it filmed across the street from a very, very wide shot," Gina Fattore, a writer for Berlanti, shared. "I was the one who was on set to produce it.
Greg said to me, 'I want this to be a great kiss. I want there to be closeups, and I want it to feel romantic.'"Berlanti continued, "Gina was calling with spy updates, telling me, 'OK, I think I've got them 10 feet away from each other, and I was like, 'That’s nothing!
They need to be closer!' But we got our kiss."As a result, they created a two-episode arc for Rosa, making sure it was authentic to both the character and queer audiences — and part of that authenticity included actually using the word 'bisexual' to combat bi erasure. "It was important to me that ‘bisexual’ was said," Beatriz revealed, "because I grew up in a time where it wasn’t heard often." She further expanded, "Many times in media, we are presented stories that are about queer characters that automatically connect with dramatic events or sometimes traumatic events, and just one way of seeing people is not all that they are.
