Queer Eye: Makeup and Politics
By ANNE KWOK ‘21
Ever feel like your life is down in the dumps? Wouldn’t it be magical if a team of amazing individuals came into your life, pointed out everything that’s going wrong, and revamped nearly every aspect of it? Netflix’s popular reality show Queer Eye plays with this concept of turning a target’s life upside down in the span of one week, with the help of a team of five talented experts with fabulous stage presence.
Season 3 of Queer Eye premiered in March 2019 and gained the highest ratings yet, including a 91% on the Tomatometer and an average audience rating of 4.5/5 on Rotten Tomatoes. Originally named Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, the show returned fifteen years later and had its name shortened in order to include a wider range of people appearing as the makeover targets, including passionate hunter Jody Greene, devout Christian Mama Tammye, AJ, a gay man who wants to come out to his mother, and many more. Queer Eye features the “Fab Five” on their tour through the South, with the collective goal of performing a radical “makeover” on a person at each stop. These five inspiring, exuberant men have various talents and carry different responsibilities in the final “makeover” of each episode’s subject; the group consists of Antoni Porowski (Food & Amp; Wine), Bobby Berk (Interior Design), Karamo Brown (Culture), Jonathan Van Ness (Grooming), and Tan France (Fashion).
Queer Eye attained an overwhelming amount of success which most attribute to the feel-good formula of the episodes. Each episode features a target who is in obvious need of a decluttered space and a healthy diet away from microwaved hot pockets, who is stylistically and culinarily challenged, and who has a deep-rooted tension, whether it be cutting off ties with children, struggling to come out, or feeling stressed with a family of six. Queer Eye scopes out people who need that extra push in their life to succeed, through a complete home renovation, a wardrobe and hair change, a cooking class in preparation for an end-of-the-week dinner party, and one deep conversation with Karamo, a licensed psychotherapist, that usually ends in tears. The satisfaction element of these transformations—especially the home renovation and fashion change—appeals greatly to viewers who are almost instantly gratified at how quick a person’s well-being and confidence can skyrocket. The show boasts a hopeful, inspirational message: by changing these few aspects of yourself, you can start a new life of success and happiness. It’s a comforting thought—one that, perhaps, satisfies viewers who go on to demand more of these exhilarating stories.
Indeed, Queer Eye is ambitious in the sense that the show attempts to emotionally propel a cultural change in their makeover targets. In Baffler reviewer Laurie Penny’s words, “Queer Eye is a cultural intervention masquerading as a Netflix series.” Most of the series takes place in small towns in the South like Yass, where homosexuality is mostly still taboo. Political tones in the episodes are rather subtle: for example, the team discovers a “Make America Great Again” hat in clutter, and Tan speaks to devout hunter Jody about his opinion on guns, eventually both agreeing on gun control laws. Mostly, the politics are driven by Karamo, a black male, who speaks about his aversion to the police when the quintet are stopped by a policeman as a prank (a nominee for his friend) while Karamo was driving. The episode does not show much of his tense interactions with the makeover target, who is also a policeman, but opts to highlight their honest conversation where they try to understand their differences later in the episode. This selective display of tension fits their feel-good brand, but viewers who are there for the entertainment appreciate the Fab Five’s touching on sensitive topics. Throughout the episodes, we see several of the Fab Five open up about their childhood living in the South; in the Mama Tammye episode, Bobby, who had gone to church daily as a child, exclaimed that he “spent every Sunday crying and begging God to not make me gay,” which called for a big bear hug from Christian Mama Tammye, who had once distanced herself from her gay son. That the Fab Five members experience individual growth along with the targets is one of the most gratifying things in the series, which contributes to the devotedness of viewers as they deeply connect and are moved by the men’s growth.
Queer Eye is a zesty remake on the original and fights “for acceptance” instead of just tolerance, as Tan France asserts. Each episode caters to a successful formula and inundates viewers with hilarious and rowdy interactions, heartfelt affirmations, honest, moving conversations, fabulous transformations, and, at the end, many tears for the rewarding, life- changing growth the makeover target experiences. My favorite episodes that embody all these elements perfectly (aka the episodes that made me smile but also grab tissues the most) are “God Bless Gay,” “Too Gay or Not Too Gay,” “Elrod and Sons,” “You Can’t Fix Ugly,” and “From Hunter to Huntee.” Whether it’s to fill a study break, or to watch with your friends and family, these 40-minute episodes of pure fabulousness will touch your heart and leave you smiling all day.
Image courtesy of Google Images