Joel Kim Booster is sharing his surprise and thoughts on the Billy Eichner “disposable” drama. Namely, he doesn’t care.
The writer and star of Hulu’s Fire Island, which came out last June, shared a message through Twitter on Sunday. The actor and comedian addressed the pushback to a quote from Billy Eichner during his recent interview with Variety to promote his film Bros.
“It seems like [Billy] was pretty inarticulate in his excitement about his movie getting a theatrical release, which is really fucking cool and something I’m sure the studio and his publicist is making him constantly talk about,” Booster wrote. “God knows I’ve said plenty of dumb shit without a publicist’s help.”
He added, “I’m so proud of my movie and all the people who helped make it happen and am so grateful it was accessible to so many people on streaming, and don’t see it as any less valuable because of that. That being said, I’m also excited to see Bros on the big screen and wish Billy nothing but the best. I truly hope you can enjoy both or neither of our movies without pitting them against each other (even though that is obviously a very fun thing to do and basically what gay Twitter was created for).”
Joel Kim Booster continued by saying that he and Eichner, who was Booster’s first “comedy boss,” have already spoken and moved on from the situation.
Welp pic.twitter.com/ndTQDiu8Xo
— Joel Kim Booster (@ihatejoelkim) September 4, 2022
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Billy Eichner then responded with a follow-up tweet to thank Booster.
“Thank you, Joel. I adore you as an artist and as a friend and I have insane amounts of respect for you. You inspire me to be better and wiser and bolder in my work. That’s the truth. We are all in this together. Thank you so much for this note. And might I add, I’m sorry that I was cancelled and that our remake of I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU CHUCK AND LARRY has been shelved. Hope you had fun at Burning Man. See you on the dance floor.”
But what happened? The quote from the interview that ruffled online feathers was:
“I told myself to look around and appreciate how rare and magical this moment is because you are making a movie that looks and feels like all the romantic comedies you grew up loving, but you’re doing it as a gay man,” Eichner said. “And this is not an indie movie. This is not some streaming thing which feels disposable, or which is like one of a million Netflix shows. I needed to appreciate that ‘This is a historic moment, and somehow, you’re at the center of it. You helped create it.’”
What on earth HAPPENED you two????????
— Andy Cohen (@Andy) September 5, 2022
A shortened version of the quote was then advertised on Variety’s Twitter account, and it led to pushback. The, now-deleted, tweet read, “This is not an indie movie. This is not some streaming thing which feels disposable, or which is like one of a million Netflix shows. I needed to appreciate that.”
Moonlight; Call Me By You Name; Love, Simon; and Fire Island were all mentioned in replies to the tweet as other achievements in gay film history. Hence, Joel Kim Booster’s response.
The shade at Hulu’s Fire Island 🤣
— Brazo y Martillo (@TheUrbanFlaneur) September 1, 2022
People are also rightly pointing out that Fire Island literally JUST came out this year from Fox Searchlight. Does Variety not count it because it's a majority Asian & minority cast or something?!
— Idollization (@idollization) September 1, 2022
Billy Eichner then clarified and apologized though a tweet for inadvertently offending or insulting anyone.
“Being an openly gay man and a loud and proud part of the LGBTQ+ community is one of the things I am most proud of in my whole damn life,” the actor wrote. “And from the bottom of my heart I truly am so sorry if I inadvertently offended or insulted anyone. I really am. Thank you.”
Source: Variety,
