Image Credit: ‘Dawson’s Creek,’ Sony Pictures Television
Today, GLAAD has unveiled the 20th edition of the “Where We Are On TV” report, which monitors LGBTQ+ representation across the major TV networks and streamers.
Though there’s a small uptick in queer characters over last year (489 to be exact!), the big, depressing takeaway is that nearly half of those characters are on shows that were canceled or will not be returning next year, which sets a “dangerous precedent.”
Still, in the broader context of pop culture history, it’s astounding how far we’ve come. For example, it was just 25 years ago—younger than some Gen Z-ers!—that Dawson’s Creek aired a historic gay kiss that stirred up mobs of angry protesters.
On May 24, 2000, The WB’s hit teen drama aired its Season 3 finale episode, “True Love,” in which out high schooler Jack McPhee (Kerr Smith) locked lips with classmate Ethan (Adam Kaufman), marking the first time a romantic kiss between men had been shown on a network TV program.
Now 53, Smith—who is straight—recently guested on the Boy Meets World recap podcast Pod Meets World, in which he recalled the scary fallout from that milestone moment after it aired:
“We had protests outside the stage yelling and screaming,” he remembers. “There was a brick wall that separated me eating my lunch from a crowd of people that were angry as hell. If I had walked out there, they’d probably beat the crap out of me.”
It’s fair to say this wasn’t what he signed up for, quite literally.
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After a stint on CBS soap As The World Turns, Dawson’s Creek was Smith’s first recurring role on a primetime show, joining the series in its second season as a new kid at school (he was 26 playing 16, as is so often the case with these teen dramas) seemingly introduced as a new love interest for Joey (Katie Holmes). At the time, there was no indication Jack was going to be gay.
“Nobody knew. I didn’t know. The WB didn’t know, Sony didn’t know, none of the producers knew,” he spills on the pod. “It was an idea in [screenwriter] Kevin Williamsons’ head, that’s it.”
Smith & Williamson @ the 2000 GLAAD Awards | Photo Credit: Getty Images
By that point, series creator Williamson was already a hot commodity in Hollywood thanks to the success of his slasher franchise-starters Scream & I Know What You Did Last Summer, films we can retroactively find queerness in after he came out himself publicly.
Apparently, he had an “epiphany” one day that the main characters of Dawson’s Creek each represented facets of his personality (Josh Jackson’s Pacey was brainy, Michelle Williams’ Jen was his wild side, etc.). “But nobody was representing his sexuality at that time,” Smith recalls, “because he was in the closet publicly and he wanted to come out publicly beyond his family and friends.”
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So Smith was surprised one day—scared even—when Williamson asked him to chat over coffee: “This is, like, two months into the job for me. I’m thinking, ‘Oh crap, am I getting fired?'”
Instead, Williamson hoped to talk with him about the “different avenue” he wanted to take Jack on the show, having him come to terms with his identity and, by the end of Season 2 (Smith’s first on the show), have him come out as gay.
“I said, ‘Look, can you give me the day or a couple of days? Because I need to make some phone calls and basically call everyone that I respect’,” Smith recount to the Pod Meets World hosts, adding that he wanted to “make the right decision here because at that time in 1998, this is a tough one.”
And, as he admits, that meeting was a bit of a “bummer” at first. “I’ll be honest about this: I was really excited because I just got my dream job and I’m so excited. And now I’m being asked to do something very, very different.”
But he really did call just about everyone in his life—his agent, his family, his friends—and they all overwhelmingly encouraged him to do it. Apparently, fellow star John Wesley Shipp (who famously played Dawson’s dad) even told him, “Kerr, do it because you will get the best of Kevin Williamson’s writing.” And, as Smith is able to see over 25 years later, he was right.
Image Credit: ‘Dawson’s Creek,’ Sony Pictures Television
“Looking back in hindsight, I just wanna say this: I’m super, super proud of what we pulled off because as you know, the face of television has changed and I think people’s acceptance of other people, sexuality, or whatever it might be is much more broad and much more open these days.”
Well, that’s true, to a degree. Though as the latest GLAAD report points out, in an era of contraction for Hollywood where studio execs are seemingly becoming more conservative in every sense of the word to appease a certain person in office, we worry about the future of LGBTQ+ representation on TV!
As amazing and groundbreaking as it was to see Jack and Ethan kiss on Dawson’s Creek back in 2000, we’d prefer queer storylines to be part of the norm instead of going back to an era where every coming-out, every gay romance became a lightning-rod of controversy!
You can listen to Kerr Smith’s full guest appearance on Pod Meets World right here. All six seasons of Dawson’s Creek are currently streaming on Hulu and Netflix.
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