Okay, so I finally got around to watching the premiere of The Beautiful Life: TBL on The CW. And, aside from some passably decent acting, there is little to recommend. But that's hardly worth mentioning (especially since the same can be said of Melrose Place, 90210, One Tree Hill, Gossip Girl, etc...). Rather it is worth mentioning that, in a show about the fashion world, there is exactly one gay character in the large cast--and he's the villain.
The talent scout (played by someone whose name I refuse to even bother looking up on IMDB) is a conniving, lecherous, petty tyrant who attempts to use his influence to extort sexual favors from male clients. It wouldn't be so galling if there were an even slightly more positive representative of the fairier sex. Because I'm not one of those folks who insist that gay people can never be evil. However, for a show set inside this particular milieu to only offer up this bottom-feeding creep as its token sop, seems an egregious statement.
One of the problems with accusing any bit of culture of being homophobic is that the term is bandied about too frequently and without much accuracy. In this case, though, it fits. Because the narrative does its darndest to make its poor models--and, by extension, you the viewer--afraid of this gay fiend.
In a previous post I surmised that this show's exec producer, Ashton Kutcher, is likely a smart guy and also potentially homophobic. While this program hardly attests to his intelligence, it does seem to crystallize the last part of that description.
This show may be someone's idea of a beautiful life, but so far it isn't pretty.
Update: As of today (Sept. 25th) the show has been cancelled. So, good work sensible viewers for not-totally-wretched TV. Feel free to continue ignoring The CW every night except Thursday.
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