Lee Daniels record so far is about 50/50, directing four movies and scoring with only two, the 2009 brilliant Precious and this year’s Lee Daniels’ The Butler, which so far is contender for the Oscars. The other half of the equation unfortunately is less good, with his directorial debut with Shadowboxer and last year’s The Paperboy.
In a
recent interview to Out Magazine, Daniels said that he is going to use the success
of The Butler to do a different type of action movie. The untitled movie would
star actor Alex Pettyfer (The Butler) as one half of an action duo, who is also
gay and in an interracial relationship; “we
don’t find out they’re gay until the end of the movie.” Sorry for the lack of
spoiler alert but it was Daniels himself that said that in an interview so, yeah.
But if you don’t want to know more, stop reading.
“Look! The people you were rooting for this whole
time are actually gay lovers! Deal with
that, America!” Ha!! Yes deal with that."
Daniels
then added that because The Butler was successful he wouldn’t have any
problems.
“I
don’t think I’m going to have a problem now. I made a $100 million for The
Butler. I’m in a rare group. So this is something I feel good about.”
Where
to begin…let’s start with the obvious, if you’re a director and you are talking
about a movie that you haven’t made yet, don’t talk about the twist in the end,
you’re spoiling the entire movie.
Second,
maybe less obvious but more important, interracial gay lovers? Really, that’s
the shock? Give me a break. The first gender-role reversal film was called A
Florida Enchantment and was made in 1914, skipping some years we have in 1967
one of the most iconic interracial straight couples in a film that deals with
interracial relationships, Sydney Poitier and Katharine Houghton in Guess Who’s
Coming to Dinner than in 1975 we have an unrated film that among other things
have gay relationships on screen and that is now considered a classic in its
genre, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but you know what, your new film is going
to say “Deal with that, America!” by having an action hero being gay and in an
interracial relationship, please…
If Mr.
Daniels wants to have America to deal with that, he should have made the movie in
the 1970’s.
You
know what I want to see? A film with a lead gay character in which the
story doesn’t revolve around the fact that he is gay, you know a normal film.
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