Hollywood Reporter (Purposely) Misses Point on Drag Queen Outrage

Christian Toto
March 25th, 2023 1:30 PM

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Tom Hanks’ show biz beginning couldn’t be more humbling.

The two-time Oscar winner broke out via an ABC sitcom where he spent much of his time wearing women’s clothing.

“Bosom Buddies” wasn’t sexual in nature. The show featured two men (Hanks and the late Peter Scolari) dressing as women in order to live in the only affordable apartment in town.

 

 

The show proved a modest success, running for two seasons and nudging Hanks into feature films like “Splash” and “Bachelor Party.” The rest is Oscar history. Hanks became this generation’s Jimmy Stewart, the Everyman able to anchor everything from war films to tales of men left behind by time and memories.

Now, The Hollywood Reporter is using Hanks’ breakthrough series to mislead its audience about the latest culture war fight:

Drag Queen Story Hour and related events.

The far-Left outlet brings back “Bosom Buddies” to suggest that conservatives are suddenly, inexplicably outraged by drag performers.

Why do they hate people who are different? Why can’t they leave drag performers alone? That’s not written in the piece, but it’s implied from start to finish.

In doing so, the site ignores the key reason for the Sturm und Drang.

Some drag queens are performing highly sexual material for very young children … even toddlers. It’s being encouraged across the culture, including by New York’s Attorney General, Letitia James.

 

 

The media is downplaying this element of the story as much as possible, but platforms like Twitter abound with footage showing drag queens interacting with children in highly sexual ways.

Hanks and Scolari did no such thing. Nor did other famous drag performers like Milton Berle, Flip Wilson and, famously, Robin Williams in “Mrs. Doubtfire.”

They dressed in drag, while drag queens add more dimension to the art form. It’s often sexual in nature and has been aimed directly at adult audiences for decades. The practice has had its detractors, but their voices were small and on the boundaries of the culture.

That’s no longer the case.

In fact, in recent years the Left has been critical of drag comedy. The New York Times ran an article in September asking, “Are Men in Dresses Still Funny?” Even RuPaul, arguably the most popular drag performer of the modern age, has come under fire from the Left.

A 2015 Slate piece raised significant questions about drag with no pat answers.

Those critiques weren’t framed by the press as hateful, nor should they be. Now, anyone criticizing drag is considered a bigot, or worse.

That’s no accident.

Stars like Cyndi Lauper have similarly slammed drag critics in recent days, ignoring the core arguments in play. The press, in turn, minimize, or ignore, the overriding concerns in play.

 

 

The Billboard article in question is cartoonishly one-sided and doesn’t allow the critics in question a fair chance to expound on their arguments.

Again, that’s no accident.

One thing is clear from both the current kerfuffle and past attacks on drag performers. The art form is both complicated and best suited for adult audiences. If drag performers kept entertaining adults exclusively, the current culture war battle would have never begun.