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'Queer as Folk' kicks off season with private party
BY STEVE ROTHAUS for Miami Herald
March, 26th 2004
MIAMI - Queer as Folk kicks off its fourth season with a national tour, starting tonight in Miami Beach.
With all eyes on the Fab Five and The L Word on everyone's lips, the Queer as Folk folk have their work cut out if they want to remain queens of the TV hill.
''We're the reason there's a Queer Eye and an L Word,'' said Emmy-winning actress Sharon Gless, who costars on QAF as Debbie Novotny, the PFLAG den mother to the show's gay men and women. ``Showtime started it all, and they started it with Queer as Folk.''
On April 18, QAF returns to Showtime for a 14-episode fourth season. To celebrate (and drum up fresh publicity for the groundbreaking program), the cable network is launching a national tour for its highest-rated original series -- with an invitation-only bash tonight at the Delano in South Beach.
''They're putting a lot of money into the Miami premiere,'' said Gless, 60, who costarred as Detective Chris Cagney on the hit '80s TV series Cagney & Lacey and now lives on Miami Beach's Fisher Island when she's not shooting QAF in Toronto.
CITY REFLECTIVE OF SHOW
''We're opening in Miami,'' Gless said. ``It reflects our show, that city. Unfortunately, we don't have the heat [in Canada] -- we're shooting in the snow for six months. But the attitudes. . . . Miami is a huge market for us.''
In addition to Gless, QAF cast members Michelle Clunie, Robert Gant, Thea Gill, Gale Harold, Randy Harrison, Scott Lowell, Peter Paige and Hal Sparks are scheduled to attend the Delano party, along with Lenny Kravitz, Britney Spears, Martina Navratilova, Ingrid Casares and KC and the Sunshine Band.
After the Delano celebration, the QAF cast heads to parties in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Gless, who wears frumpy clothes and a fright wig on QAF, said she hates seeing herself on the screen.
''I never watch myself. I haven't in my entire career,'' she said. ``I love to do it, I just can't watch it . . . especially when I look like Debbie.''
Gless is circumspect about the show's fourth-season plotlines.
KEEP IT HOT, KEEP IT FRESH
''Because we are the flagship show in this arena, we have the responsibility to keep it hot and keep it fresh and keep it new. We are nothing without our writers,'' she said.
Fellow cast member Gant says QAF, which shocked many with its frequent nudity and graphic sex scenes, ``is still pushing the envelope.''
''There are a couple of story lines involving bug chasing [when men deliberately infect themselves with the AIDS virus] and gay vigilantism. Very powerful,'' said Gant, 35, a Tampa native who joined QAF in its second season as literature professor Ben Bruckner.
When the series began in 2000, ''We were looking at boys who were in a painful place and looking for love,'' said Gant, who in real life last year dated Kyan Douglas, the grooming guru on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.
''Now it's the story about boys becoming men,'' Gant said. ``The focus is much more on relationships, family, career. A much more mature voice at this point. The show has really found its legs.''
Source: miami.com
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