Ecstatically, dangerously and provocatively funny

Popular culture is not doing so great right now. Almost everywhere we turn, everything kinda seems to be regressing or collapsing. But that is not the entire narrative. There are still some things happening that feel optimistic and very much worth celebrating. There are people who are pushing back against popular cultures demise. People who might just be offering us one of the greatest collective cultural movements of the 21st century so far.. People who just so happen to be a bunch of comedians.

Ive been thinking about a particular group of artists and what makes them so special for a few years now. But it was Tilda Swinton who recently made something really click for me. She was giving a joint interview with her Problemista director and co-star, Julio Torres, when the interviewer started asking Torres about how much he supports and features his queer comedy community in his projects. Torres explained that those are simply the people that inspire him to want to make work. And then Swinton interjected with something I found extraordinary.

I want to say something its going to sound corny but its really for real, she said. I might cry. When you talk about your community being represented in this film, this is where I started with Derek. Im so old, and Ive been doing it for so long, but here I am in this evolved version. Its the same community. It is just 2024. Its such an amazing feeling for me. Im sorry Im being sincere, really sincere right now. Its like a miracle because its, like, the same. And I wish Derek was here. He would just love it so much and would love everybody. And its like a real torch. On it goes.

The Derek Swinton was referring to is the late Derek Jarman, her longtime artistic collaborator and one of the leaders of the New Queer Cinema movement. New Queer Cinema a term coined by film writer and scholar B. Ruby Rich in 1992 refers to a group of fearless, uncompromising films from the late 1980s and early 1990s made by artists like Jarman, Gus Van Sant, Gregg Araki, Todd Haynes, Isaac Julien, Lisa Cholodenko, Cheryl Dunye, Bruce LaBruce and John Greyson. Their work represents some of the most important and influential queer cinema ever made, and it came at a time when LGBTQ people desperately needed bold and authentic cultural representation.

When Swinton characterized Torres's relationship with his community as an "evolved version" of Jarman's relationship with his, it felt like confirmation that we are currently witnessing a whole other movement in queer art. A movement led not by filmmakers (although some of them, like Torres, do co-identify as such) but by a group of fearless, uncompromising, multi-hyphenate comedic artists. Artists who have been beacons of hilarity and ingenuity during a time that hasnt just been difficult for LGBTQ folks but for anyone trying to maintain any sense of hope and joy. Artists who well collectively call in homage to the great Prof. Rich the New Queer Comedy movement. 

To get a sense of the artists Im referring to, find your way to the portraits that artist Paul Twa so wonderfully illustrated at the bottom of this piece. They represent just some of the luminaries I think are at the heart of this movement: Torres, Bowen Yang, Patti Harrison, Joel Kim Booster, Cole Escola, Mae Martin, Matt Rogers, John Early, Megan Stalter, Aaron Jackson, Josh Sharp, Vera Drew, and Hannah Einbinder. But New Queer Comedy extends well beyond these 14 people. I could easily name dozens more. Just as New Queer Cinema included an ever-evolving group of artists, this should be the same.

Now, its important to make it very clear that queer comedy itself has existed in various incarnations for a long time. Theres a new Netflix documentary Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution that delves into that and features some of the countless comedians who have paved the way: Rosie ODonnell, Margaret Cho, Scott Thompson, Guy Branum, Sandra Bernhard, Mario Cantone, Wanda Sykes and Judy Gold, to name just a few. And theres a whole generation before them as well, including absolute pioneers like Rusty Warren and Moms Mabley. 

But what Swinton is speaking to regarding Torres, and what I am suggesting with the idea of a New Queer Comedy, goes well beyond comedy. Its about people who emerged through comedy and now are pursuing everything from film to television to theatre to music to podcasts (or in some cases, many of those all at once). And what makes their collective work unique is the emphasis they have all put on community and collaboration as theyve built their careers.

As both a queer person trying to exist in these times and someone who has written about LGBTQ arts and culture regularly for the past several years, witnessing all these folks uplifting each other has sincerely been a great light in a period that has been increasingly defined by darkness. Ive had the pleasure of interviewing several of the people highlighted here, and whenever Ive brought up this idea of community seeming like such an integral part of their careers, theyve beamed with pride.

It really makes me happy and a little emotional to think of what you just said, Matt Rogers told me after I named a bunch of other queer comedians who were having a big moment at the same time as him. Because everyone that you just listed is so deserving and is so unique and is so bold in what they do and have been through so much.

When I chatted about this with Joel Kim Booster, he said that part of it had to do with timing.

I think there was a real sea change about 10 years ago when I started, he said. Ive talked to gay comedians that have been doing this for 20 years who talk about how isolated they felt coming up in this industry, because there was this idea that there could only be one of us that was successful. There could only be one of us on the lineup. There could only be one of us who would break through, and then the door would close behind them. The industry would have their gay guy and that would be it. And I think somewhere around the time we started it, we were like, F--k that, you know?" 

Timing is indeed everything. When B. Ruby Rich took stock of the rise of New Queer Cinema in the early 1990s, she argued that it was spurred on by four things, all of which converged in the decade before: AIDS, Ronald Reagan, camcorders and cheap rent. Two parts outrage, two parts opportunity. New Queer Comedy also feels enabled by and responsive to its historical moment.

The artists included in this piece were all born between 1985 and 1995, which means they came of age and started their careers during a moment in Western culture (the late 2000s and early 2010s, essentially) when queer people felt emboldened to be themselves like never before. For the first time, the political and cultural landscape seemed to be welcoming us. At roughly the same moment, the rise of the digital age (particularly podcasts and streaming services) offered countless new ways to both create work and build fanbases. But just as their careers started to gain momentum, the rise of Trump and extreme conservatism followed by the COVID-19 pandemic drastically changed the mood of the culture. 

Where some of these artists may have found that Obama-era optimism gave them a sense of possibility for the future, the whiplash of MAGA and all it represented made the stakes very different: being subversively, authentically, originally queer was now a responsibility. And it was a responsibility the artists of New Queer Comedy were very much up for. Just look at some of the movements defining works so far, from Problemista to The Peoples Joker, Fire Island to Dicks: The Musical, Oh, Mary! to Patti Harrison: My Huge Tits Huge Because They Are Infected Not Fake! all are audacious and uncompromising reflections of their queer sensibilities. 

At a time when so many idolized (cis, male, wealthy) comedians choose to punch down, the artists of New Queer Comedy have shown us that you can be ecstatically, dangerously, provocatively funny while also building a future thats better for everyone. So lets celebrate that.

Rogers and Yangs pop culture and comedy podcast, Las Culturistas, is undeniably a community centre for the New Queer Comedy movement perhaps even its primary catalyst. Since it began in 2016, the podcast has often served as an entry point for readers, publicists, finalists and Kayteighs into the work of the vast majority of the people illustrated in this piece. Its also been a showcase for the talents of Rogers and Yang, whose comedic chemistry is essentially unparalleled.

Of course, Rogers and Yang have offered us much beyond Last Culturistas as well. Rogers was a series regular on both I Love That for You and Q-Force, two criminally underrated (and prematurely cancelled) shows. Hes also made a serious play to become the new prince of Christmas with both a special and an album. Yang, meanwhile, has become one of the all-time princes of Saturday Night Live, successfully queering a 49-year cultural institution like no one ever has. Hell also soon be seen in both the Wicked movies and Andrew Ahns remake of The Wedding Banquet, all of which could not be more anticipated in my household.

Early, Escola and Harrison each blur the line between comedy and surreal performance art onstage and everywhere else, and the world is much better off for it. There were precisely three times in the last year in which I laughed so hard I thought I might die, and they all occurred while watching a live show by one of these manically funny, wickedly subversive talents. 

You may know Early for his pioneering collaborations with the brilliant Kate Berlant or from giving us one of the most hilarious television characters of the past decade in Search Partys Elliott Goss. (It should be noted that Search Party was in general a huge spotlight for New Queer Comedy, though for Early in particular). And this past year, Early has taken centre stage in both the comedy special John Early: Now More Than Ever and in Theda Hammels film Stress Positions, both of which are a masterclass in physical comedy and devastatingly precise satire.

Escola is another master of physicality and acidic delivery, as their scene-stealing performances as demon twinks in Difficult People and Search Party both make clear. (Is there anyone who can execute a better pratfall?) But this year, they finally ascended to the status they have always deserved when their tornado of a performance as Mary Todd Lincoln in the play Oh, Mary! (which Escola also wrote) became the toast of the New York theatre scene. Its being re-staged this summer on Broadway, where Escolas star will continue to rightfully ascend.

Harrison, meanwhile, pushes the envelope even further toward transgressive performance art. I first became a fan from her ability to hijack podcast recordings (namely Las Culturistas) with her raunchy, delirious improv bits and from the act of corporate impersonation that got her banned from Twitter. But I had no idea how wild her comedy could be until I saw her onstage in Patti Harrison: My Huge Tits Huge Because They Are Infected Not Fake!, which spins out into a carnival of taboo-pushing body horror. Make no mistake: Harrison has range.

2024 is already shaping up to be a pretty exceptional year for queer cinema, and that is in no small part thanks to Drew and Torres, who wrote, directed and starred in two wildly imaginative (and wildly different) films: The Peoples Joker and Problemista. The former is a radical DIY parody of comic book movies and an autobiographical trans coming-of-age narrative all rolled into one. The latter utilizes the story of a budding toy designer to find poignant and surreal humour in the bleakness of humanity (and notably also led Tilda Swinton to give the interview that inspired this entire piece). Both herald the arrival of exciting new voices in filmmaking. 

While these films were both Drew and Torress directorial debuts, they were by no means their career beginnings. Drew came out of Chicagos improv scene to work as an editor on shows like Comedy Bang! Bang! and Who Is America? (the latter of which got her an Emmy nom). Torres has been a multi-hyphenate force since he started writing for Saturday Night Live in 2016 (where he was largely responsible for the shows all-time greatest sketch, among other things). He co-created and starred in the delightful HBO series Los Espookys in 2019 and is about to return to that network with the series Fantasmas (the most anticipated new show of 2024, as far as Im concerned).

Blessed were we last fall when God himself (in this case, Bowen Yang) bestowed upon us Dicks: The Musical. Written by and starring Jackson and Sharp, the film is essentially an extreme queering of The Parent Trap that follows allegedly identical twins (played by Sharp and Jackson, who do not look alike) as they conspire to reunite their divorced and deranged parents (Nathan Lane and Megan Mullally, naturally). A full-blown musical featuring flying detached vaginas, sewer boys and Yang playing God, Dicks is already New Queer Comedy canon.

The film was the culmination of a decade of work for Jackson and Sharp, who originally performed it as an Upright Citizens Brigade show in 2014 in the basement of a grocery store. The show would run for a year and a half, and became legendary in New Yorks queer comedy scene. Jackson and Sharp continue to be legends of that scene (and leaders in orchestrating the citys queer improv), and are also arguably the all-time greatest recurring Las Culturistas guests (particularly for this 2019 episode).

Though they each exude it in different ways, its hard to find comedians as charismatic as Kim Booster, Martin and Stalter. Theyve just got that queer je ne sais quoi.

Most of us discovered Stalters light when she rose to prominence improvising nightly characters on Instagram during the pandemic (as in her instantly iconic 2021 Hi Gay video). Cut to 2024 and we still cant get enough of her. Shes already had supporting roles in several films released this year (including Problemista) and is getting rave reviews as the titular lead character in the upcoming Cora Bora. And then, of course, theres her scene-stealing turn as the hysterically unprofessional assistant Kayla on Hacks.

Martin was also something of a pandemic-era breakout, with their wonderful Netflix series Feel Good literally premiering in March of 2020 (this interview with Martin was the last one I did in my physical office for several years). Since then, the Toronto native has been offering their singular dry wit all over, whether via the ongoing podcast Handsome (which they co-host with fellow queer comics Tig Notaro and Fortune Feimster), the 2023 comedy special SAP, or a recent, extraordinary episode of CBCs The Nature of Things where Martin explored the science of gender and sexual fluidity. 

Kim Boosters exceptional charms have been on public display since he started doing standup in New York in the mid-2010s, though hes put them into overdrive these last few years. In 2022, he wrote and starred in one of New Queer Comedys key works, the heartfelt Jane Austenqueering Fire Island (which also stars Yang and Rogers). Since then, hes released the electric special Psychosexual and successfully gone toe-to-toe with the great Maya Rudolph in the vastly underrated series Loot, which just wrapped its second season.

Both born in 1995, Edebiri and Einbinder are the relative babies of this list (everyone else was born before 1991). But that hasnt stopped them from becoming New Queer Comedys most decorated duo. For their breakout performances on The Bear and Hacks (arguably the two best shows on television right now), they have gotten tons of well-deserved love from the Golden Globes and Emmys, with more where that came from surely on the way.

Edebiri (one of our great queer allies) and Einbinder (who identifies as bisexual) both found their way to standup in college, which led Edebiri to the Upright Citizens Brigade and Einbinder to open for Nicole Byer on a show at her college campus. Soon, Edebiri was busy writing and acting for shows like Big Mouth and Dickinson (and maybe also being the showrunner of The Kominsky Method?), while Einbinder became the youngest person to do a standup set on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Their careers only exploded from there (with Edebiri's hysterical performance in Bottoms another major highlight), and the sky sure seems like the limit going forward. Which can certainly also be said about each and every person in this piece.