I enjoyed Heated Rivalry, the hit Canadian tv show about gay hockey players, more than I expected. The show is mainly centred on Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov, the two best players in major league hockey. Hollander and Rozanov are rivals in public and lovers in private.
The first two episodes are somewhat middling. The two actors have very cute butts but I did begin to wonder whether the show was just an excuse for Bell to show very softcore gay porn. Male grunting can get a bit dull after a while.
Although there is quite a bit of sex in the third episode, there is also a clear tonal shift. We move from the heavy thrusting between Hollander and Rozanov to the meet cute between Scott Hunter and Kip the smoothie guy.
Scott Hunter is a veteran hockey player who, when we first encounter him, is still in the closet. He meets Kip when he stops to buy a smoothie. We see the relationship develop rather quickly and then come to an apparent halt because Hunter is unable to leave the closet even though he obviously has feelings for Kip.
What struck me most about the Scott and Kip storyline was just how retrograde it felt despite taking place in New York City about 10 years ago. The idea that, in the 2010s, an out gay man like Kip would even consider having a relationship with a deeply closeted hockey player feels like a bit of a stretch. The two actors mainly succeed in selling the story, but it does occasionally feel like a time warp.
Episode four brings us back to Hollander and Rozanov. As their relationship deepened, so did my interest. Hollander is depicted as hockey obsessed, which is likely the result of having a Japanese-Canadian momager who is hockey obsessed. His white father is depicted as being rather hands-off and is later revealed to be a federal civil servant.
Hollander is in the closet because he wants desperately to be “normal” even as he must know, deep inside, that he comes up lacking. He is an almost-but-not-quite-white player in an overwhelmingly white sport. He’s a man who is exclusively attracted to men, but he is surrounded by very heteronormative macho men.
Shane compensates by drinking ginger ale (which looks like the beer that everyone else is drinking) and by paying people, such as a stylist and an interior decorator, to make him and his surroundings look “normal.” When Ilya says of Shane that “he’s so boring and he drives this terrible car,” Shane immediately retorts “it’s a normal car.”
In this way, Shane is the millennial version of Wai-Tung in The Wedding Banquet, that is, a fictional gay man who desperately wants to pass as and, if at all possible, be heterosexual. The 21st century twist is that Shane faces no obvious danger or repercussions for being gay.
Instead, Shane is in the closet because he’s convinced that others will care or that he will disappoint his mother. When Shane’s father comes over to Shane’s cottage unannounced and sees Shane and Ilya kissing passionately, Shane is forced out of the closet. He panics and is comforted by Ilya, who faces real danger if outed at the wrong moment, and the two men go over to Shane’s parents’ cottage so that Shane can come out properly.
As expected, Shane’s (upper?) middle-class parents are understanding. His mother feeds the two lovers and both parents are seen asking Shane and Ilya questions about their relationship. Even as Shane continues to panic, his parents show their support and even tell him that they suspected he might be gay. Later, Shane apologizes to his mother because he believes he has failed at being a model son and she apologizes to him because this is a fantasy written by white people.
Compare these heartwarming scenes with what happens when Wai-Tung, who contracted a sham marriage to placate his parents, finally comes out to his mother. Poor Wai-Tung is so desperate that he comes out to his mother just as she finishes congratulating him about Wei Wei’s pregnancy. After he tells her that the marriage is a sham, his mother accuses Wai-Tung’s lover Simon of leading Wai-Tung astray and shows relief only when Wai-Tung confirms that Wei Wei is pregnant with his child and not someone else’s. In the end, his devastated mother tells Wai-Tung that his father must never find out.
Shane’s repression in the pursuit of normal reminded me of Connell Waldron in Normal People. Connell wants his mother to “act normal” when she gets upset that he didn’t ask Marianne to the debs even though his mother knows that he and Marianne have been sleeping together. Connell’s reaction to his mother saying the word “fucking” in some way mirrors Shane’s reaction to the word “lovers," which Ilya uses to describe their relationship to Shane's parents.
Connell finds out too late that all his friends knew that he had been sleeping with Marianne and that no one would have minded if he had invited Marianne to the debs. Connell reacts by calling Marianne – who does not pick up – and leaving a tear-filled message on her voicemail.
Shane’s break from the prison of normalcy is treated much more gently. He and Ilya explain themselves to Shane’s sympathetic parents, who care only inasmuch as they care for Shane’s wellbeing. In season 2, Shane may find out that everyone else, at least everyone who matters, feels that way too.
Chinese New Year seems like as good a time as any to discuss the decline of American soft power and the rise of Chinamaxxing.
I read something recently on social media about how young Americans, presumably those under the age of 30, may never understand just how cool the United States used to be in the eyes of foreigners. This is not a new observation. I had the same thought when I rewatched The Wedding Banquet. Would younger viewers, in America and elsewhere, understand why Wei Wei wanted a green card so badly?
New York City in the 1990s was the centre of the known universe. The Cold War was over. America had won. Ambitious people the world over wanted to go to the United States, particularly to New York City, and live their American Dream.
Thirtysomething years later, the youth are now “Chinamaxxing”, which – according to Wikipedia (although the entry is flagged for deletion) – is a trend on social media that involves adopting “norms and traditions typically associated with Chinese culture.” The entry goes on to cite various consumption habits indicative of “Chinamaxxing”: drinking Tsingtao, eating congee and drinking hot water.
If you consider the heft of American cultural hegemony in the 20th century, one could imagine a day when “Chinamaxxing” could include watching Chinese movies, learning Mandarin, reading Chinese books in translation and listening to Mandopop.
That day is probably closer than we think.
That thought brings me to Taiwan. Recently, I read something online that I had not yet considered: one day, the Taiwanese might decide, of their own free will, to join the Mainland. If, in the 1990s, everyone wanted to be American, is it so inconceivable that, one day soon, everyone might want to be Chinese? And not just in terms of drinking hot water or eating congee.