2102 Tickled Pink

Long before there was excitement about gay cowboys, there was gay TV. I watched a production of Nick at Nite last night called "Tickled Pink," in which gay writers, producers, comedians and actors chortled and snickered over all the gay sub-text in the shows they'd been in that most of the time went right over the heads of straight people. And oh how the gay guys loved their divas--Mary Tyler Moore, Maud, Lucille Ball, Buffy the Vampire, Wonder Woman, etc. Any woman who stood up to the established norm was their heroine. It's probably not an accident that it is being shown this week. They were quite proud that 30-40 years ago, gays were being written into shows, and that all the straight people involved in the productions knew the lavender story board, but the audience was ignorant.

One of the unintended consequences of everyone coming out of the closet is that a whole vein of humor will have been mined out of existence.