It is a series about LGBT life in Manchester that ran last year. It is made by the same crowd that made Queer as Folk back in the 90s. It got me thinking, the strength of Cucumber lies in its unflinching portrayal of gay male sexuality but also, its use of older characters.
Time and time again, gay characters appear as young, innocent and newly out. Gay life seems to be just one giant youth club. I wrote another piece about the need to see older LGBT people on screen a few months ago. I still say that any LGBT presence on screen is fantastic and should be encouraged however we need to start talking about the older members of the community. I really loved that here were two men who knew they were gay. In fact, no member of Cucumber appeared to struggle with their sexuality, they just knew and were proud. This is fantastic.
I believe that the coming out story has a place in LGBT cinema as its a huge part of our lives. However, I don’t believe it should dominate cinema or TV. I think for those of us who are out, older and open, it is great to see that reflected. I would like to see this more in lesbian TV. Cucumber should also be noted, has a fantastic bisexual character. It’s not often that bisexuality is presented onscreen in a way that doesn’t make the character or the sexuality seem unhinged. Freddie simply has sex with girls and boys and thats it.
Lesbian TV could do with a more rounded representation. I know its all about the upcoming fourth series (which has a lot to fix after the lacklustre series three) that is being released in June. If you look at it, there are a lot of positives in trans-awareness, diversity and the character Red. But there are some negatives as well in that Piper is the most annoying character and there are no lesbian older characters. All the women that are gay are young, gorgeous and Ruby Rose. I think this might be all we have at the moment. It’s a bit of a dry spell for lesbian sexuality.
Not to mention that we just don’t hear any mention of intersex or asexual.
In fact, cucumber came with a series called Tofu in which the characters and random people discussed sex. While it was very frank and open, there was one mention of asexuality. I was happy to see a large scope of people from young to old, gay to straight and porn stars to dominatrixes. I think the whole thing didn’t get nearly enough praise.
After all, I wasn’t out when Queer as Folk was on TV. It was about a year or two before I realised I was bisexual. I still remember that moment when Aidan stood up and referred to him using every swear word for a gay man that you could think of. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. It was powerful. The whole series is still (although sadly dated now) powerful.
I actually feel this way about Frankie and Grace on Netflix. The second series was released this month and it was wonderful. I felt that while this is well liked for the excellent comedy, it isn’t given enough praise for its focus on the more negative aspects of sexuality and age. No topic is off limits including masturbation and arthritis, menopause, sex at an older age and erm, lube. I’m impressed by the whole thing. I think its opening up taboo areas of conversation. I think there was a definite push to do this in the second series.
I would suggest that anyone try both series. It’s really worth it. We need to get a conversation going about sexuality and age as its not really discussed. I think we’ve opened up a lot in recent years but I would love to see that final push into recognising that we have more areas of sexuality then gay, straight and bisexual. That we have more genders then male or female and that you can be sexually active AND in your sixties.
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