“We filled the dozen weekends between Labor Day and Memorial Day with as much socializing, dancing, sun and sex as we could.” So writes Tom Bianchi in the introduction to his gorgeous and wistful photography collection Fire Island Pines, Polaroids 1975-1983, a candid peek at the storied gay oasis located a mere train and ferry ride away from New York City. Bianchi likens his version of Fire Island, which would soon be devastated by a plague, to the Scottish village of Brigadoon, the mythical place that only surfaces once a in a lifetime. Early into Fire Island, a new romantic comedy directed by Andrew Ahn, our narrator offhandedly refers to the title hamlet as the “Gay Disney World.” One generation’s fantasy land is another’s Fantasyland. This, by the way, is a mark of real progress.
Oh there’s still plenty of socializing, dancing, sun and sex to be had in this queer (i.e., non-hetero) retelling of Pride and Prejudice, written by and starring the immensely talented Joel Kim Booster. Some things never change. Indeed, Austin’s beloved comedy of manners – about headstrong individuals and their disastrous first (second, third and umpteenth) impressions – remains the foundational text, if not the very template, for most rom-coms. Fire Island is no exception, though Kim Booster applies a rainbow filter to a familiar portrait. He plays Noah, a gay New Yorker of no great wealth (and the owner of a woefully outdated iPhone), who absconds to Fire Island for an annual week-long vacation ritual with his four “sisters” (the less offensive term he uses to describe the members of an equally penniless gay-male squad).
The five disembark on Fire Island only to discover their mutual friend and longtime host Erin (Margaret Cho, in prime form) can no longer afford what, to most of us humans, would seem like a palace in paradise. The stay suddenly takes on extra import, a last hurrah. More importantly, it’s a final chance to find a connection, or maybe reel in a fish, in a sea of men. The search for love, or at the very least sex, starts with Howie (SNL’s recent breakout player Bowen Yang) a normal-looking wallflower among one speedo-clad Adonis after another at a tea dance the crew attends upon arrival. Howie catches the eye of Charlie (James Scully), a good-natured hunk of a doctor, who is the means by which all our broke queens gain entry into sheer opulence, a mansion where their outsider class status is thrown into stark relief.
All the while, Noah and Will (a stolid Conrad Ricamora) find their trajectories inescapably intertwined. He’s a lawyer, the richest of the rich among Charlie’s affluent and perfectly sculpted coterie. This will-they-or-won’t-they waltz hews closest to Austin’s fraught courtship between Lizzie Bennet and Mr. Darcy. It’s no spoiler to reveal that despite the machinations of a few villainous side-characters – such as the vapid Cooper (Nick Adams) and the predatory Dex (Zane Phillips) – every budding romance here ends up blossoming.
As a reworking of a Jane Austen novel, Fire Island can’t match Amy Heckerling’s instant-classic Clueless (though Kim Booster does, at one point, quote it lovingly). But that’s an unfair comparison, a bar too high to clear. This sun-dappled film, filled with top-notch performances situated in a specific and important place, instead sets a new standard for the queer romantic comedy. That bar has now been raised a few pegs higher.
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