Fire Island: Hulu’s new gaymance movie

It’s summer time in New York City and Noah (Joe Kim Booster) and his friends are headed to Fire Island to party, party, party. They spend all year saving up to take their annual trip to the gay mecca just off of New York City, and this year might be their last time taking the adventure together. 

There was quite a lot of hype at the announcement of Fire Island. The project includes several notable queer industry favorites such as Joe Kim Booster (who both wrote and starred in the film), and Margaret Cho, who plays the guy’s token lesbian friend on the island. 

This has been on our watch list for some time now so we’re excited that we are finally able to get it done and share our thoughts. 

Here’s what we thought of Hulu’s Fire Island. 

Fire Island Overview

As the film opens, all of Noah’s friends are already at the boat that will take them over to Fire Island. Noah is late though, and it’s implied that maybe this isn’t abnormal behavior for Noah. Fire Island is a vacation spot for the particularly rich, sexy, and powerful gays, and Noah and his friends don’t really fit the bill. They don’t let this stop them though and do what they can each year to make the vacation happen. 

This is largely in part due to Erin (Margaret Cho) as she lets them stay at her house on the Island. Without that small charity, the annual trip might not ever happen. When the boys arrive this year, Erin announces that the house is being sold and all of the men decide that they need to make the most of their week this year, as it will likely be their last. 

Noah decides it’s time to get his bestie Howie (Bowen Yang) laid. Howie is in a state of constant lamentation at the fact that he is thirty and has never, ever had a romantic relationship. Noah makes Howie’s sexual status his mission in life while at Fire Island. 

Fire Island is very, very gay but it’s only good to you if you’re the right kind of gay. Noah and his friends are not white enough, buff enough, rich enough, classy enough or any other kind of enough for the gays at the island, but remarkably, they take it in their stride and do what they can to have all the fun they came for. 

There is party after party, drinking, party drugs and boys, boys, boys. Fire Island is exactly the gay festival film that we needed during Pride Month this year. Grab your sequences and your budgie smugglers and take a look for yourself!

Howie and his non existent love life

The boys end up at a fancy party at one of the island’s mansions. When they walk in, it’s clear that they don’t really belong or fit in with the crowd, but they stay anyway. While he is at the party, Howie meets Will (Conrad Ricamora). Will is a stuffy, uptight lawyer that doesn’t seem like the right kind of fit for Howie. And he’s right – Will isn’t what Howie is looking for. But that doesn’t mean that someone else isn’t looking for what Will is offering. 

We loved this storyline a lot because despite the fact that the queer community carries all kinds of whoreish stereotypes about us wherever we go, there are many folks like Howie out there that just haven’t been able to work that part of their life out. Of all the characters in this film, we enjoyed the realism of Howie’s character and his arc the most. 

Stereotypes

Fire Island has them all. All the things that follow the queer community around are present within this film. And for the most part, Fire Island turns them into a celebration of the diverse nature of queerness and the queer community. 

While the film also does attempt to throw shade at the racial and class inequities present within the community, it’s done in such a way that it doesn’t overshadow the celebration of the different types of gayness in this film. 

We’re here, fam, and we’re definitely queer. *insert waving pride flag here*.

Noah and Will

At first, it doesn’t look like Noah and Will are into each other at all. Will is uptight and stuffy and Noah definitely is not. But you know how this goes, opposites attract and all that. On the surface, the hostility that exists between them quickly becomes obvious that they’re actually attracted to each other. Noah can’t work it out – why would someone like Will be into him? But miraculously, he is. We think there is also a moment where Noah wonders what on earth he sees in someone like Will too, but honestly, they’re really very cute together. 

We get the feeling that people judge Will harshly often. While pretty, he doesn’t really exude a welcoming and open vibe and something tells us that people sleep on him often. Heck, even Noah does this at first too. We get it, we really do, and this is why we were rooting for this couple furiously. Why does attractive and gay mean over exuberant and loud all the time? In the words of Hanna Gadsby, where do all the quiet gays go?

These two take their romance back to New York City with them and give it the good old college try. It’s nice that Noah was on a mission to help his buddy find love but picked something up for himself along the way. Everyone deserves happiness in this house!

Fire Island is an honest celebration of the queer community and honestly, with everything that is happening in the world right now, this is exactly what we needed in this pride month. Grab a cocktail, some friends, and give this one a watch folks!

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Fire Island is available to stream now on Hulu in the US and Star+ in selected countries. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for all queer stuff!