The early history of gay TV

By FRANCES GRANT

In the time before Queer Eye for the Straight Guy burst into being, all the glam-tastic energy in the universe was radiating harmlessly through the vacuum of space.

Then a straight guy and a gay guy got together, compressed all that zeal for primping, preening and making the frumpy stylish into one small television show and - bam! - the universe was filled with a new and powerful force, now known as the Fab Five's "homo improvement" law.

In tonight's episode of the hit makeover show we journey back in time to discover How It All Began (TV2, 8.30pm) as Carson, Ted et al trace the origins of their quest to "make over the world, one straight guy at a time".

The boys take us back to the pilot episode and such dark eras as the Bigcellphoneozoic - the time when, as Carson gasps in horror, "we wore our cellphones clipped to our pants - what were we thinking?" Such is their embarrassment at yesterday's fashion faux pas, they insist the pilot comes from an aeon beyond human comprehension: "We made this in 1979."

It is hard to believe there was a time when the straight man, unwashed, unwaxed, unmanicured, once ruled the earth, that there was a time when the term "to zhuj up" was not part of the lexicon - although it's still so recent we don't know how to spell it.

The Fab Five and producers pore over the pilot like palaeontologists on an extremely interesting dig. "He was our first monobrow," they fondly reminisce, as the gang start to excavate through the strata of grunge accumulated in the closets and bathroom of their first victim, Lawson.

Even back then, the boys note, the embryonic Queer Eye world had its signature style: the bedroom fashion show, the round of multicoloured cocktails while they surveyed the results of their admonitions and ministrations.

The unkempt, style-free heterosexual male never stood a chance. Straight blokes were about to learn the pain of waxing, the delights of shopping, the thrill of finding orderly rows of product in the bathroom and that nose hair is a capital offence.

Back then Carson already stood out as the cliche sitcom gay guy, the outrageously flamboyant one with all the wit. His definition of bisexual? "Buy me something and I'll get really sexual." The place bad clothes go to die? "Tragikistan."

Of course there is much to deplore in such a superficial makeover show: the obsession with image and appearance, the rampant consumerism of urban status products, not to mention the stereotyping of gay men as fashion obsessives who like to scream a lot and talk only in innuendo.

But somehow they get away with it. The Female Eye for the Queer Style cannot help but appreciate the stellar job the boys are doing at getting lazy blokes to scrub up a bit, clean the house and try cooking dinner.

For all their scolding and mock horror, the warmth the boys lavish on their victims is infectious. Rather than humiliate, they maintain a respect. As they say, "We are not here to change you, we are here to make you better."

But a lot of the show's appeal depends on the saintly fortitude and sheer goodwill of the victims. The straight blokes might be slobs but their good-natured stoicism is a virtue much underrated.