The description of this one is so subtext-y that it needs very little introduction:
Peter Harris (Stephen Austin) has grown up on a farm and his father (Bill Sorrells) hopes his son will follow in his footsteps, but Peter has his sights set on a ballet career—something his parents know about but his father refuses to discuss. When Peter is awarded the lead in "The Nutcracker," he has to choose between basketball practice and the performance. His father struggles with the situation, but after he sees his son dance for the first time, Peter's father witnesses his son's special gift.
Which obviously means this explores two separate (yet almost equally important!) issues. The overt issue of MY PARENTS DON'T UNDERSTAND ME and the delivered-only-through-subtext issue of I AM A BOY AND ALSO LIKE BOYS.
The treatment of all of this has much the same effect as the ballerino's uniform: the spandex tights cover it up, but the dance belt pushes it to the forefront, so while you can't actually see it, it's all you're able to think about.
So there are two ways to proceed with this: either the rather abstract "follow your passion and your parents will come around" or, you know, this one.
I think it's probably obvious which way I would rather take this, but let me explain! It's not just because the songs are catchy or that I am an insufferable Gleek or because specific is easier than abstract (though probably also because of those reasons), but because as a culture we have sort of progressed to the point where what Martin Tahse may have been trying to pound into impressionable brains can actually be explored without trying to ineffectively hide it behind a weirdly held binder or an awkwardly placed backpack.
Dawson's Creek was really the first to break ground in both the "gay teens are people too" and the "gay people sometimes actually act like normal people and sometimes even kiss" categories with Jack McPhee. Which is impressive! And was risky for The WB. But it set an important precedent, and I'm not going to dwell much further on it because I've never actually seen Dawson's Creek, which may be surprising (!), and maybe I should watch it at some point JUST BECAUSE.
But anyway!
Now there are gay teens almost everywhere and their gayness is usually no longer a Very Special Episode thing. Which is nice!
(I should maybe mention something about Queer as Folk because it fell somewhere between Dawson's Creek and now, but I don't want to because the US version was so, so, so bad and the UK version is kind not much better and also British so it defeats the purpose of this new format, but I have to say two things: first, I just last week discovered that the British Michael, whatever his name was, the one who liked Doctor Who instead of comic books? was played by the guy that played one of the wireless operators in Titanic and I like him much better in period costume, and second, holy hell Charlie Hunnam is in Sons of Anarchy and that just blew my mind completely.)
And now we have Gossip Girl's Eric van der Woodsen and Glee's Kurt Hummel regularly appearing on network television being as gay as they want with no particular special treatment given to them (except the occasional kidfooting around Eric because he was a cutter and Kurt's extensive wardrobing). What's fantastic is that there is now some nuance (at least as much as these shows allow).
And because of this, I've been able to realize how misguided I was during those several months freshman year when I thought ties around bare necks were a good idea. So thanks for that!
