A New York magazine podcaster has apologized after landing in hot water for giving the new Hulu film “Fire Island” “an F- on the Bechdel test.”
Starring Joel Kim Booster, Bowen Yang and Margaret Cho, the Andrew Ahn-directed film puts a different spin on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice.” The film follows a group of gay men spending a week on Fire Island, the queer hotspot off the coast of Long Island, New York.
But Hanna Rosin pointed out what she says “Fire Island” gets wrong. In a now-deleted tweet, the podcaster wrote: “So @hulu #FireIslandMovie gets an F- on the Bechdel test in a whole new way. Do we just ignore the drab lesbian stereotypes bc cute gay Asian boys? Is this revenge for all those years of the gay boy best friend?”
Created by and named after the cartoonist Alison Bechdel, the test measures “how well women are represented in cinema – it requires that at least two named female characters have conversations with one another about something besides men,” as explained by Filmmaking Lifestyle.
Twitter users, including Cho, called Rosin out on her criticism:
Subscribe to
NextShark's Newsletter
A daily dose of Asian America's essential stories, in under 5 minutes.
Get our collection of Asian America's most essential stories to your inbox daily for free.
Unsure? Check out our Newsletter Archive.
Meanwhile, the creator of the Bechdel test herself approved of the structure of “Fire Island” in a tweet on Tuesday:
“Fire Island” is now streaming on Hulu.
Featured Image via Hulu
