February 9, 2001 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE 11

on the airoff the press

New 'Survivor' also has a gay contestant, Hatch says

by John Graves

Openly gay Survivor winner Richard Hatch has been hired by Us Weekly to comment on this year's Survivor: The Australian Outback in his own weekly column, "The Hatch Report."

In his introductory column, which appeared in the magazine's February 5 issue, Hatch said, "In the next 14 weeks, I look forward to meeting the new contestants— they're an awfully good-looking group."

Get your gaydar working, Hatch says. "Word is out that one of the guys is gay and unattached. Imagine if he wins!"

No, that's not my Bush

Bowing to pressure from conservatives and President Bush's own "hands off" statements, Comedy Central has ordered producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone to remove all references to Bush's twin daughters from That's My Bush, their upcoming live-action comedy series about the first family.

The controversy started when a proposal to portray the president's 19-year-old daughters as incestuous lesbian lovers was leaked. to the press. It generated a flood of complaints from the anti-gay American Family Association and the conservative web site LoudCitizen.

Parker and Stone, creators of the outrageous animated series South Park, had already decided to drop the lesbian incest storyline when Comedy Central ordered the president's daughters removed from the new show altogether.

In a statement, spokesperson Tony Fox said Comedy Central "wasn't comfortable with them being in the show," adding, "There's some question about their status as public figures."

'West Wing' has online vote

After an online vote last July in which viewers picked their favorite Will & Grace episodes resulted in high ratings and a strong Internet response, NBC is asking viewers to vote online for two of their favorite episodes from the first season of the White House drama West Wing.

Online voting at www.nbci.com/ westwing is open until February 21, after which NBC will pick the top two viewers' choices to re-air at 9 pm on February 25. It's a chance for lesbian and gay fans to choose their favorite lesbigay-themed episodes of the series, which will receive a special award for its handling of lesbigay topics at this year's Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Media Awards ceremonies. Anne met new beau behind camera

Some of the mystery surrounding the breakup of Hollywood's most visible lesbian couple was explained when Us Weekly spotted Ellen's ex Anne Heche and her new

boyfriend Coley Laffoon smooching it up at the Warner Bros. Golden Globes afterparty.

"We met when I interviewed him to shoot my documentary," Heche told reporter Todd Gold. When Gold asked what the documentary was about, Laffoon replied, "Ellen." 'ER' doctors are growing closer

The relationship between ER's Dr. Kerry Weaver (Laura Innes) and staff psychologist Dr. Kimberly Legaspi (Elizabeth Mitchell) certainly has heated up.

The first episode of February sweeps month opened with the two women having breakfast after their first night of love, and ended with Weaver returning to Legaspi's arms after a harrowing day. Weaver's decision to report a workplace injury of an illegal alien to OSHA had led to a disastrous INS raid on the sweatshop where the man worked.

A girlfriend for Original Cindy?

African-American actress Valerie Mae Miller talks about her life and her role as Original Cindy in a cover feature interview with Laurie K. Schenden in the February issue of Curve magazine. Original Cindy is the lesbian, best friend of Max, a geneticallyengineered superwoman in the new action series Dark Angel.

"The first question I usually get is, 'Are you a lesbian?'" Miller told Schenden. “My only concern with that is, I think labels kind

of put people in little boxes. A lot of times when you have heterosexual actors playing gay characters, that they're so concerned about other people's perceptions that they want to step out in front immediately and say, 'Oh, I'm not gay.' So I just say it's not for anybody to know. It's not a big deal and it shouldn't be a big deal."

Miller told Schenden she was impressed with the way her character was introduced without fanfare at the beginning of the show, as if being out and gay was not an issue in Max's not-so-distant future.

Miller noted that she has been discussing the possibility of a girlfriend for Original Cindy with the show's writers.

"We've been going back and forth about the kind of woman she should date. I'm different from Cindy. Cindy's always going after these little blonde, bony, supersyurpy-sweet white girls. And to me that would be boring. But you know, that's Cindy."

'Guido' TV show begins

Variety reports CBS will begin airing Some of My Best Friends, the renamed gay sitcom based on the 1998 film Kiss Me, Guido Wednesdays at 8 pm beginning February 28. It will replace Bette Midler's new sitcom Bette, which moves to 8:30 pm.

The show stars Jason Bateman as a gay writer whose roommate is a straight aspiring actor played by Danny Nucci. CBS will air a bonus episode of the show on Monday,

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Dear Ms. Tomlin

Finally, Lily Tomlin has made it official, coming out in a mid-January interview on the New York City cable-access TV program Gay USA and a later one in Us Weekly.

But, with all due respect to Tomlin and other stars who take the "I don't want to be a poster child" position, a question we should all ask ourselves: If not you, then who?

Our lesbigay and transgender children desperately need role models for the whole world to see. Even straight actors playing lesbigay roles get letters from lesbian and gay young people thanking them for presenting positive images of themselves.

Our children need to be aware of real-life lesbigay and transgender people, both from those who live in quiet harmony with their life partners and those who have made a positive and powerful impression in this world. People whose accomplishments they can aspire to achieve, people who they can be proud to tell their parents about, people who are not just accepting of themselves but who celebrate their wonderful creation. ✓

John Graves is the producer and host of Gaywaves, on Cleveland's WRUW 91.1 FM Fridays at 7 pm, and at http://radio.cwru.edu. Dave Haskell, Jim McGrattan and Kim Jones also contributed to this column.

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