'Bros' Captures the Nuances of Gay Dating
As the first openly gay man to co-write and star in a major studio film with a theatrical release, Billy Eichner knows there is a lot riding on the success of Universal Pictures’ Bros, the first romantic comedy from a major studio to feature an all-LGBTQ+ principal cast and two gay men as the leads.
But when Nicholas Stoller first approached him in the fall of 2017 about collaborating on a movie about two men falling for each other, Eichner, who rose to fame quizzing (and yelling at) unsuspecting denizens in New York about pop culture in Billy on the Street, worried about the viability of a gay love story for the big screen. In fact, Eichner quips five years later, he still can’t completely believe that he got to make a mainstream film that feels authentic to his own experiences.
Directed by Stoller and produced by Judd Apatow, Bros follows Bobby Lieber (Eichner), a 40-year-old popular podcaster and curator of the first New York museum dedicated to LGBTQ+ history. An unapologetic, self-assured gay man who has become a self-appointed authority on queer culture, Bobby has prided himself on being emotionally unavailable and perpetually single (with the odd anonymous hookup), but he soon develops an undeniable attraction to Aaron (Luke Macfarlane), a handsome and earnest estate lawyer struggling with the mundanity of his dreary profession.
In a joint interview with BAZAAR.com, Eichner and Macfarlane speak about the film’s universal exploration of masculinity and vulnerability, the different politics and considerations of dating for gay men, and the poignant reason why they struggle to watch new LGBTQ+ shows and movies about teenagers, despite being in awe of the significant strides made in visibility and acceptance.
The success of a romantic comedy is really contingent on the chemistry of the main couple. What do you each remember from your chemistry read, and what do you think were the keys to applying the chemistry you had off-screen to your characters?
Billy Eichner: Luke and I did not know each other personally before he came in for his first audition. We knew of each other, but we’d never spoken before. Our first lines to each other were in the scene where Bobby and Aaron meet, which is what we gave him to audition with, and it was pretty clear right off the bat—maybe because we didn’t know each other—there was a little friction there, there was a little mystique. We were trying to figure each other out, just as the characters were trying to figure each other out, and then as we started shooting the movie, we were becoming friends and discovering each other as our characters were. There was just a little bit of a spark there from the beginning, and we kept building on that.
Our characters really respect and admire each other and love each other, but are also a little scared of each other along the way. They intimidate each other for different reasons. Maybe there’s something of that in our friendship in real life, but I think those are elements of the chemistry, but ultimately it’s kind of this magical thing that’s hard to put your finger on.
Luke Macfarlane: I remember reading the script and just being totally in awe, because it was saying a lot of things that I found very, very true about my own life, especially these notions of masc presentation. I thought the title Bros was very funny, so I was gonna kind of go in with a “bro-y” kind of thing. The Columbus Blue Jackets had just won six games in a row in the Stanley Cup playoffs, and I think I remember casually mentioning that to the room being like, “Yeah, the Columbus Blue Jackets. It’s pretty awesome the way they’re just going through the Tampa Bay Lightning.” But I think that was kind of where he begins, and I was just so fascinated with that idea as a man in culture, [there are] these presentations of masculinity. Something that we’re all guilty of—gay and straight—is the way we build ourselves up to appear a certain kind of way, so I just loved that immediately.
Bros argues that there is a fundamental difference between gay and straight dating—and a gay rom-com just wouldn’t work if you switched out the woman in a classic rom-com for another man. Billy, what were some of the nuances of gay dating that you wanted to capture onscreen?
BE: Gay men just have different rules. When society shuns you for the vast majority of history, you go in a corner and you make your own rules. There’s an upside to it — it’s that you’re liberated, because you’re not expected to follow the heteronormative rules of the world. So we made our own rules, our own belief systems, about monogamy and commitment and relationships, and the level of commitment in an intimate relationship, and what that needs to be or doesn’t need to be. I think LGBTQ folks, we’re now kind of wrestling with that.
All the couples I know, at some point, have to sit down and say, “Alright, are we gonna be monogamous? We’re in love, [but] what’s our level of commitment here? Are we open? If we are open, how open? What does that look like? Do we want to be open? But does that actually work in practice, even though it sounds cool and liberated?” All those types of questions that I know a lot of my gay friends and I think an increasing amount of younger straight folks and Gen Z are [discussing because they’re] not necessarily following the heteronormative rituals and rules either. I think those are questions that needed to be part of telling an authentic story about two gay men falling for each other.
LM: And even beyond the questions of monogamy, there are questions like family building. What does family building look like, and how is that different? Is family building having a throuple? Is family building deciding to have twins with surrogacy? What does your family look like?
BE: We now have all these options, which is wonderful, but in a way, it can also be confusing. What’s your happy ending? What is the happy ending for Bobby and Aaron? Is it getting married and having a big gay wedding, or is it something other than that? That’s what they’re dealing with here.
I think the most beautiful moments of a relationship aren’t necessarily always in the grand romantic gestures—there are the quieter moments when the characters are just enjoying each other’s company and having heart-to-heart conversations. What did you both want to capture in some of the quieter and more heartfelt moments between Bobby and Aaron? Are there any moments that really stuck out to you personally?
LM: Yeah, some of my favorite scenes were the scenes in bed together.
BE: I was going to say the same.
LM: It’s when you’re the most intimate. They’re very long scenes. It’s a long time to spend in one location, especially in a comedy where there’s joke after joke and set-ups and stuff like that. But I think that because they are so comfortable with each other, and that’s when they are the most vulnerable, like literally lying in bed after sex. Those were the most touching for me.
BE: We have this big, explosive sex scene when Aaron and Bobby hook up for the first time one-on-one, and it’s very funny, and there’s a lot of physical comedy. The audience is rolling on the floor laughing, but it’s followed by a very quiet scene where they’re just laying in bed talking and really discovering each other as people in a very intimate way. I don’t think we see a lot of that with straight couples anymore, let alone gay couples.
Those little moments, to me, are some of the most powerful moments in the movie. Because, yes, it’s the first gay rom-com from a major studio, it has all these historical statistics, we deal with LGBTQ history and our context within it in the movie in a way that feels very epic. … But I wanted the moments with Bobby and Aaron to feel very small and intimate, like the opposite of epic. I really wanted the audience to believe that these two guys were falling in love and being vulnerable with each other in a way that they clearly aren’t normally with other people.
LM: I think Bobby says something to Aaron, and he’s like, “Don’t you hate how good this feels?” Which is kind of the thing that’s so hard. And especially going back to what we were talking about with masculinity, there is nothing more intimate than a man laying his head on another man’s chest. And he hates himself, but he loves it.
Bros also offers a very frank depiction of gay sex: There are anonymous hookups and throuples, but the slap fight was the sex scene that probably made audiences laugh the most at the TIFF world premiere. What do you remember from shooting the slap fight in particular?
BE: Luckily, Luke and I are very comfortable with each other, and we wanted to make the funniest movie possible, and also the most romantic movie possible, and I think those sex scenes, if done right, can capture all of that. They can be awkward and hilarious and silly, but also very sweet and romantic. And we watch the types of sex scenes these guys have in the movie evolve over the course of the movie as they get more intimate and fall in love, as opposed to [the scene] just being this animalistic thing that it is at the beginning.
But we just committed to it for the purpose of physical comedy and for the purpose of giving the audience an authentic experience and even shocking people a little bit, because I think that’s fun too. And I always thought Judd Apatow and Nick Stoller movies have a long history of these very big sex scenes—these go-for-broke, hilarious sex scenes. So there’s no reason why we shouldn’t also.
LM: I also think a sex scene, like any other scene you’re gonna write or act in, is identifying what your wants are, and then kind of playing your wants. I think the way that sex scene begins is, we both want to appear tough. And then maybe we want to do some specific things, whether that’s a foot or a hand in the mouth. [Laughs.] But then what we really want at the end is this sign of closeness and intimacy, so we kind of go on that whole journey of getting what it is we want from the other person.
Bros shines a light on the parts of gay male culture that seem to idealize and eroticize stereotypical masculinity. Billy, how did you want to explore that in a way that felt funny but truthful?
BE: I think that is just a phenomenon I’ve observed among myself and my gay friends, especially gay men in my generation, who I think came of age at a time when it was starting to get easier to come out of the closet, but we were still wanting to be masculine. The issue wasn’t necessarily being gay for some of us, but we still wanted to be considered men, and I think society in general has evolved since those days to a certain degree. I think the younger generations of queer people aren’t wrestling with that as much as we did, but at the same time, you see culture at large, not just gay male culture, but all of culture putting a certain type of machismo and masculinity and physical strength and a certain type of body on a pedestal.
Look at the action heroes—the only movies people go see in a movie theater are about these superheroes played by these “roided-out” actors. No one ever talks about the fact that all these guys are probably on some sort of supplement. I think it’s prevalent in all of culture, not just gay male culture. Though, in gay male culture, we have historically fetishized that type of stereotypical masculinity, and I think that’s something that is just deeply ingrained in some of us, and we’re still kind of working through it.
LM: I think we often talk about the importance of RuPaul’s Drag Race. I think we have another kind of drag happening in our culture right now, which is masculine drag: this idea of presenting a certain thing that is not totally authentic yourself.
Billy, the monologue on the beach in Provincetown feels personal, or at least like it’s drawn from your own personal experiences in the industry. What did you want to convey with that speech, and what do you think it reveals about the reason why gay men are so hesitant to break down their emotional walls?
BE: I saw this movie as an opportunity mainly to be funny, to make the audience laugh, but I also thought it was an opportunity for me to be honest. A lot of people discovered me with this very over-the-top, comedic persona on Billy on the Street, or Parks and Rec, or any number of other projects. I was thrilled to work on all of them, but I think gay men in pop culture are often painted in very broad strokes, in one or two dimensions. And I really wanted for both of our characters in the movie to have an opportunity to show all the things we are as gay men and as human beings. We’re all more complicated than that. No one is one-dimensional. I’m not just a joke machine. I love telling jokes, but that’s not my whole story, and that’s no one’s whole story as funny as you might be.
I also wanted to take a moment to acknowledge that even in the midst of this celebratory moment … someone has to ask the question, “Why did it take so long to get here?” And let’s acknowledge all the people who were massively talented and happened to be LGBTQ, [but] simply because they were born a little too soon, they did not get the opportunity we’re getting in this movie, and that’s pretty fucked up. I think we needed to take a moment to acknowledge and to celebrate them as well, because we wouldn’t be here without the sacrifices they made.
LM: I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about the actors before me that never had the shot to get to play a role like this and hope from the bottom of my heart that they’re not jealous, because I think I would be. In a weird sort of way, it’s hard for me to watch Love, Simon … or Heartstopper, because it makes me a little envious, to tell you the truth.
BE: Yeah, we didn’t have those movies [or shows] growing up, and I love those projects.
LM: I love them.
BE: And it’s amazing that they exist. But as much as I love them, and Love, Simon made me cry and I absolutely adored it, I didn’t see myself in Love, Simon, because I’m not a teenager anymore. And when I was making Bros with Nick and Judd, I said, “This movie needs to be about two gay male adults. We get a lot of content that’s about teenagers coming out and college kids hooking up, and that’s all great. It’s amazing, it’s changing the world, but I can’t say that I watch that and relate to it. I’m 44 years old, and elderly gay men like me deserve our love stories too!"
Billy, you insisted on ending the film with an original song instead of a speech. Why did you feel like that was the right way to end this story, and what do you both remember from the process of shooting that scene—and the big, sweeping kiss—in front of the principal cast and all of the extras?
BE: Nick asked me early on, because he knows I can sing, if I wanted to sing in the movie, and it’s kind of a rom-com staple to have a big musical moment. And I said, “No.” I fought against it. I said, “That’s bullshit. No one ever sings to each other in real life.” [Macfarlane laughs.] And I really fought for that, but it did feel like a major studio rom-com, and I did want the ending to feel very romantic and epic.
I also wanted Bobby to do something that was very vulnerable and out of character. It was inspired by real life, because that song was not in the movie, even when we began shooting the movie. And a few weeks into shooting, I asked Luke, when we were hanging out on set, “What type of music do you listen to?” [I was] wanting to get to know him. And he said…
LM: I like country music. And specifically, Garth Brooks.
BE: And I said, “That’s so funny. I don’t know that many gay men who love Garth Brooks.” I’m more of a Madonna/Mariah [Carey] type of gay. It really mirrored our characters in the way that they’re different, and I thought it would be a nice expression for Bobby at the end to embrace something Aaron loves and communicate his love for Aaron in a genre that means something to Aaron and not necessarily something to Bobby.
LM: And truly, nothing quite like running into a huge space with cameras on cranes, where they pan up to the ceiling, quite makes you feel like a movie star than that. And then also to be [below] all these incredible sort of LGBTQ people in history and then to know they were kind of looking down on us, it really was one of those rare moments as an actor where you’re like, “Oof, I’m in a big budget movie, and I’m about to kiss a guy!” It felt very, very special.
BE: And not in the I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry kind of way.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
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