Joel Kim Booster reflects on the creative process for Fire Island: “There were a lot of battles”
Joel Kim Booster has opened up about the pushback he faced when creating Fire Island. Back in June 2022, LGBTQ+ movie enthusiasts were treated to the queer Pride and Prejudice retelling/rom-com starring Booster, Bowen Yang, Matt Rogers, Tomas Matos and Zane Phillips.
The film, which is currently streaming on Hulu in the US and Disney+ in the UK, follows two best friends – Noah (Booster) and Howie (Yang) – as they embark on their annual weeklong vacation to the titular gay hotspot.
Since its release, Fire Island has been praised for its rejection of harmful queer trauma tropes and for its celebration and glorification of LGBTQ+ culture.
The movie has also been lauded for casting queer actors in queer roles, as well as for having a queer director in Ahn. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Booster opened up about the film and the process of creating an unapologetic and relatable story for LGBTQ+ viewers “One thing that was really important to me with Fire Island was that it was a gay movie for gay people,” he explained.
