Ferdia Shaw: From a Disney Channel flop to Chekhov, best friends with an Elf, Gaiety grad. With his Kilkenny cock and a Dwarf bum

No offense to aficionados, but I have never been able to get into Irish literature. It's either vaguely disturbing or incomprehensible.

Ulysses: "Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls... which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine"

Dude is into water sports?

"The Isle of Innisfree": "I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, and a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made."

Or you could use bricks. 

The Unamable: A novel consisting of the ruminations of a featureless entity living (if you can call it that) in a jar. 

Nuff said

Artemis Fowl: The first of an 11-volume series of young adult novels about a teenage richter, a villain who eventually reforms, in a world where goblins run organized crime syndicates and fairies have a police force.

It sounds interesting, but it put me to sleep.

In 2020, a movie version appeared, starring Ferdia Shaw as 12-year old Artemis, Tamara Smart as his girlfriend, Colin Farrell as his kidnapped Dad, Laura McDonnell as an 800-year old Elf cop, and Josh Gad (below) as a Dwarf giant who joins the Fellowship of the...um.... 

The plot had little connection to the book series, which enraged fans, and it was too convoluted to draw in new viewers.  It got an 8% on Rotten Tomatoes.  Critics called it a "confused, muddled, sloppy mess of bad intentions and worse execution."  

Disney expected a theatrical hit that would lead to a long-running franchise.  Instead, Artemis Fowl was plopped onto the streaming service Disney Plus, and after a few years quietly removed.  

Ferdia Shaw, who beat out 1200 hopefuls for the chance to play Artemis and become a Disney star, was born in Dublin in 2004, but grew up in Kilkenny.   Although he comes from a show biz family (grandson of famous actors Robert Shaw and Mary Ure, nephew of Ian Shaw, some sort of relation to "angry young man" John Osborne), he has only two other acting credits listed on the IMDB:

Poster Boys (2020): Petty thief Al (Trevor O'Connell) and his smart-aleck nephew (Ryan Minogue-Lee) go on a cross-country road trip. Ferdia plays a hooligan.

 Wellness (2025): a group of wellness influences attend a team-building exercise in the wilderness that goes terribly wrong. He plays minor character Duine Aisteach.

 More after the break

Owen Vaccaro: Marky Mark's son wins three Girls of His Dreams, posts girl-hugging photos, but is he gay? With Marky butt and twink cocks

 In the short Silver Fox (2024), not to be confused with the 2017, 2018, 2023, and upcoming movies with the same name, famous gay comedian Joe Fox (writer/director Julio Vincent Gambuto) returns to his home town for a show, and in his dressing room, announces that he's going to do it in drag.  His oldster friends, Nick and Brian (Dan Butler of Frasier, Alec Mapa of Ugly Betty), disapprove: the audience is coming for gay jokes, not a political statement.  

But his twink assistants, Chris and Rocco (Logan Rozos, Owen Vaccaro), think that the idea is fabulous.

The conversation moves from outfits to gay assimilation, straightwashing, the younger generation's debt to the gay people who came out during the homophobic 1980s and 1990s, their debt to the Civil Rights Movement, how gay stereotypes have changed over the years,  how we should handle the newly revived homophobia and transphobia of the fascist state...

Wait -- Owen Vaccaro?

Could there be another one?

If you see every movie that Mark Wahlberg is in, because he's friggin' Marky Mark, then you've seen Daddy's Home (2015): Mild-mannered Brad (Will Ferrell) is trying to be a good father to his wife's kids.  When their biological father Dusty (Mark) shows up, he assumes that the guy is a jerk because he's muscular and rides a motorcycle.  The two try to one-up each other in being The Good Dad.    Eventually they decide to co-parent.  

It was not a great movie. But Marky Mark took his shirt off...

And Will Ferrell's not bad, either.

10-year old Atlanta-based actor Owen Wilder Vaccaro played their son Dylan.  He displays the interest in basketball and girls that characterizes all preteen boys in Hollywood movies. 

I didn't see the sequel, Daddy's Home 2 (2017), regardless of the possibility of Marky Mark with his shirt off, but I just went through it on fast-forward. The dads' Dads show up for Christmas, and try to one-up each other in similar situations.  12-year old Dylan gets "the talk," tries to impress the Girl of His Dreams, and finally kisses her.   

The only queer-coded moment comes when various girls line up to kiss him under the mistletoe, and a boy is #8 in line (maybe Colton Osorio).  It's a throwaway gag: a boy wants to kiss a boy?  How ridiculous!

Owen's next film, The House with a Clock in its Walls (2018), is a fantasy based on the 1973 novel by John Bellairs: an orphaned boy (Owen) goes to live with his uncle (Jack Black) in a mysterious old house, fights an evil sorcerer, and gets a girlfriend. Annoyingly heterosexist.

There are two posts with gay content in Owen's social media.  In May 2018, he poses with pride merchandise and says "Hooray for Target! Love wins!" (This was before the department store chain gave in to the Orange Goblin and removed LGBT people from its website and its shelves).  

And in December 2018, he is shown hugging a girl named Carly.  His shirt depicts an astronaut with a pride flag on his visor.  Comments mostly assumed that they were a romantic couple, but one said "I think it's a platonic friendship."

But there's nothing of gay interest in his movie roles:

More after the break

Zakary Risinger: Family Equality, the Gay Men's Chorus, a Pride cake, a drag housewife, Ryan's butt, twink dicks, and I'm still not sure

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Modern Family Episode 8.14: Alex is promoted, Cam is injured, and Phil dreams of parking lots. With a dozen gay actors, two short guys, and Fillion butt

 

We've been watching Modern Family, even without Adam Devine as Andy.  Last night's episode was 8.14, "Heavy is the Head" (2017) -- a little dated, but it had a lot of gay representation and beefcake.

The Phil/Jay Plot

Scene 1:  Phil (center) and his father-in-law Jay (right) are at the groundbreaking for his lifelong dream of building his own apartment complex, Dunphy Towers. Corporate guy Jared Cook approaches with an offer to buy the property for 20% more than they paid.  Phil says no, but Jay wants to play with him for a bit and get the offer up.

Left: Jonathan Chase's butt, sexing his boyfriend in Another Gay Movie (2006)

Scene 2: Foreman Pete (Robert Baker, left) found a sewer line running through Phil/Jay's property, so they can't dig the basement of the new apartment building.  Shouldn't they have checked that first?  Plus there are pockets of methane gas everywhere, bursting into flame at random moments.  The project will have to be scrapped.

Scene 3: Phil and Jay approach Jared Cook, the corporate guy who wanted to buy the property, and accept his offer.  Nope, he heard about the structural problems, and the deal is off the table. 

Scene 4: They decide to turn the space into a parking lot.  Problem solved.  Phil announces that this was his dream all along.  Really?

The Claire/Gloria Plot

Scene 1:  Claire has to be careful around her birthday, because her stepmother Gloria (who is the same age) keeps giving her dumb gifts, then complains that she doesn't appreciate them.  This year Gloria is giving her a spa day, which is ridiculous -- she hates that girly stuff.  So she claims that she's too busy.

Scene 2: Claire is the new CEO at her father's company, Pritchet's Closets and Blinds.  Her marketing manager, Ben (the incredibly cute Joe Mande), complains that the workers are going ballistic about the budget cuts.  No overtime pay?  No bagel?

"We didn't have the Christmas sales we expected."  Do people usually put closets under the tree?

"Maybe we could fire someone, like Kenny in the warehouse."

"No, I love him. He makes fun of you."

Claire holds a staff meeting and claims that she's making sacrifices, too,  like flying coach. And she's taking off her office door to indicate that she's always available.

Ulp, when she enters her office, Gloria is there, with a huge gourmet lunch. Now the staff won't believe that she's cutting corners!

Scene 3: While Ben stands guard, Claire rushes through her caviar-and-champaign lunch.  She thinks she's done, but no, Gloria has arranged for the spa to come to the office.  And Claire can't say anything, or Gloria will get hurt feelings. 

When the swishy masseur Joshua (Artie O'Daly) appears, a worker asks who he is.  "Um..he's applying for a job as a forklift operator.  There are lots of gay forklift operators." 

Joshua:  "I'm not gay!"  

Left: Artie O'Daly is gay in real life. He is currently starring in the youtube sitcom Bad Boy, with Blase Maffia III.

Scene 4: The massage, plus a manicure. Claire is starting to unclench, but assistant Ben is having more and more trouble keeping the workers out: "Your girlfriend's office smells like truffles."

"My girlfriend is your boss, and she is not my girlfriend."

More after the break

Madden Zook: 5 soul-winning movies and 3,000 girl-hugging photos prove that he's straight, right? Plus some nude ballet dudes

 

Madden Zook, who just appeared as #50 most popular on the Teen Idol website, looks like a model -- a little skinny, but with one of those "ratboy" faces that are all the rage. 

No question that he's straight in real life. 90% of his photos show him hugging, kissing, smooching, and licking girls.  Oh, here's one where she is just sniffing his bicep.

The girl-hugging would usually disqualify a guy from further research, but I was fascinated: the heterosexism was so very, very over the top, absurdly excessive.   Lots of straight guys devote most of their social media to hugging and kissing The Girl of Their Dreams, but every single photo on his Instagram and Facebook?  Dozens of them? What are you trying to prove, buddy? 

Ok, I found one with no girl. She must be taking the photo.    

So, how did Zook become a teen idol? Hugging and kissing girls won't make you famous. He must have done some acting or singing at some point.    

He has five acting credits on the IMDB:

Laps (2018): Swimmer Mitchell (Brayden Benson, center) is being bullied, so he tells the swim coach (Ian Lang).  That's progressive.  When I was a kid, the teachers said "You have to settle your own disputes," and my Dad enrolled me in judo lessons.  Didn't help.

Zook (left) and Cameron Judd (right) play the bullies. 

It was written and directed by Ian Lang, whose Internet biography reads: "And we know that God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to his purpose" -Romans 8:28. 

Maybe Zook is fundamentalist, and hugs and kisses a lot of girls to prove that he's not "that way" in spite of his swishiness? 

Answer after the break

Nick Vardakas: Sex toy guy, lucky f*king dude, Atari spirit, Dillon's boyfriend, IT major. A lot of d*ck pics, but is he gay?

 

 In Righteous Gemstones Episode 3.1, Kelvin and Keefe start a Smut Buster project with the teens, buying up sex toys (so adults can't get them?).  Nick Vardakas is shown examining a toy that's particularly popular among gay men.

In Episode 3.3, Nick is one of the teens making anti-smut signs as Kelvin invites Keefe to Cousin's Night, and in Episode 3.4, he appears at the Parents-Teens United Party where Keefe is outed.  

Hi father is played by Nick Arapolglou, who later confronts Kelvin about the "rumors swirling around" (after confiscating the toy from his son's room?).

Our Nick grew up in Charleston and attended Wando High School in Mount Pleasant, where the Gemstone Salvation Center is located (in fiction).  He appeared in Way Off Broadway and Dracula: A Radio Play, and participated in Army Junior ROTC and the swim team.  He also posted a video of a school film project where he tries to get the courage to talk to a cute boy.

Wait -- talk to a cute boy?

Nick's social media up to that point consists entirely of buddies -- no girls except his mother.  No mention of a senior prom.

No girls at his graduation party in June 2021.  

Those are some interesting femme rings, buddy, and did you get your hair frosted?

But he's interested in mechanics and ROTC.  He and his buds visit a Porsche Museum.  These aren't the typical gay guy's interest.

Nick's first professional acting job, on The Righteous Gemstones, came while he was a student at Triton Technical College in North Charleston.  He also started a career in modeling (in case you are wondering, 6'0", waist 32", shoe size 12"). 

He received a certificate in cyber security in 2023, and transferred to the College of Charleston, where as of this writing he is majoring in IT.  His "About Me" page says that he has experience in acting, mechanics, cooking, IT, and customer service, and speaks English, Spanish, and Italian. Not Greek? Vardakas is a Greek name.

And three more acting credits:

In Lucky F*king Kid (2024), an ad for Lucky Energy Drink shown "on all social media," Nick plays a 23-year old "no money loser" who is paid to deliver a "totally unpaid testimonial."

The Hitchhiker (2024) was written and directed by Ben Beauchamp and Timons Flower (who directed  Spider-Man: The Dark Age with Jak Kristowski) and stars Gemstone alum Dillon Brady as the Hitchhiker.  Nick plays his boyfriend or victim (it's hard to tell from the trailer).

I usually put a n*de photo on the first page of profiles, but I couldn't find any of Nick that weren't explicit, so they have to go after the break.  

Caution: explicit.

Noah Matthews Matofsky: Head Lost Boy, model, disability advocate, Oscar Wilde fan, boyfriend. With bonus n*de Matthews and Captain Hook's hook

  

Peter Pan & Wendy (2023) omits the most egregious heterosexualization of recent Peter Pan movies by skipping the usual Peter-Wendy romance, and by  making Captain Hook (Jude Law, below) gay.  Well, he's usually gay-coded, but his time around he mentions a childhood  boyfriend  -- Peter himself (Alexander Molony), who refused to leave Never-Never Land and grow up, while Hook choose an adult career as a pirate.

I got the same rhetoric when I was a kid: "When you grow up, you will drop your same-sex loves  to devote your life to what really matters, finding and winning the Girl of Your Dreams."  I turned 14, 15, 16, 17 and the joy I felt in masculine smiles never vanished, but my boyfriends began to treat me as a mere chum, someone to discuss girls with. They were Captain Hook leaving Neverland, but I remained, refusing to "grow up."    

Some of the other male actors were of interest, including Joshua Pickering (Wendy's brother John Darling), a cute member of the Short Guys Brigade.  And Noah Matthews,  who plays the gay-coded Slightly: the leader of the Lost Boys, the only one who remembers anything of his life before Neverland, and the most musical.

"But your son said the sleepover was 'clothing optional.'" 

 Sorry, that's another Noah.  Slightly was played by Noah Matthews Matofsky, the first actor with a visible disability to star in a Disney movie, a leap forward in disability representation.  Especially since the character Slightly is not disabled. Noah was cast because the casting director, and then director David Lowery, loved his audition (they also bonded over a comparison of the Lost Boys and Lord of the Flies).

This was the 16-year old's first on-screen acting job, and rather daunting -- he had to spend six months in Canada during the COVID pandemic, spend hours filming in the hot sun, and still do his schoolwork.  But he loved the challenge, and there were perks -- the Lost Boys shared an apartment with a pool on the roof, so after the shooting and schoolwork, they had pool parties.  Tell me more.  

And Michael Darling (the one with the teddy bear) was played by Jacobi Jupe, brother of Noah's crush Noah Jupe (left). It's not everyday that you get to hear all of the gossip about your crush from your roommate.

More after the break.  Caution: Explicit.

Max Ehrich: Disney Channel dancer, Dome hacker, gay soap opera teen -- wait, is that a different actor? At least the d*ck is really his

When Max Ehrich (try to type that without adding an "l") appeared on the celebrity penis website, I did some preliminary research, and found that he is gay in real life, dating Connor Paolo, and he played a gay teen on The Young and the Restless.  

So this will be my third profile of a gay soap opera teen.   

Max played Fenmore Baldwin, son of Michael Baldwin and Lauren Fenmore, born in 2006, but turned into a teenager when he took over the role (2012-15).  

Most of his plotline involved drugs:  becoming addicted, stealing drugs from the hospital and spending a month in prison, overdosing and going to rehab.  He was blackmailed into spiking the punch at a party, so everyone would lose consciousness, and Detective Mark Harding (Chris McKenna) could murder Austin, who was having an affair with his niece Summer, and frame her.  

Also Fen is crushing on Summer, so she talks him into a variety of misdeeds, including cyberbullying  Jamie Vernon (not for being gay).  Then, when she starts crushing on Jamie, Fen frames him for theft, is accused of pushing him off the roof, and bullies him into a suicide attempt.

Next Fen's drug dealer, Carmine (Marco Dapper, left), who also happens to be having an affair with his mother, is murdered, and Fen thinks that he did it...

Wait, back up: a crush on Summer?  What happened?  Where is the gay plotline? 

Maybe they meant some other project.  Max begins his career as a Nickelodeon-Disney Channel boy, playing a dancer in High School Musical 3 and Shake It Up, Carly's boyfriend in an episode of ICarly, and CJ's older brother, who gets two girlfriends, in nine episodes of 100 Things to Do Before High School.

In Under the Dome (2013-15), an impenetrable alien dome is lowered over a stereotypic small town. Among the stranded visitors are a lesbian couple, a murderer, and  in Season 2, computer hacker Hunter May (Max).  He gets a girlfriend.

American Princess (2019-20): a mis-titled comedy featuring a girl who abandons her wealthy lifestyle to work at a Renaissance faire.  Max plays her boyfriend. 

Southern Gospel (2023): A "rock n roll star" realizes his childhood dream of becoming a preacher.  Ugh.

It's based on the real-life  Dr. Gary Smith,  who founded the City of Life Church in Kissimmee, Florida. Ugh. 

A Cowboy Christmas Romance (2023): A standard Christmas romcom: lady with a high-pressure career in the Big City spends the holidays in a small town, where she finds love with a cowboy (Adam Senn).  

I don't know which of these guys, if either, is Adam, but Max plays her brother.  The plot synopses on Wikipedia and Decider don't state whether he is gay or not, but presumably not, or there would be massive headlines eveywhere. 

More after the break

Daniel DiMaggio: The queerbaiting boy of "American Housewife" grows up to play Count Chocula and post n*de photos

 

You may be familiar with Daniel DiMaggio, no relation to Joe DiMaggio, as Oliver Otto on American Housewife (2016-21).  I never heard of it, but I wouldn't have watched anyway.  Who wants to watch a sicom about June Cleaver or Donna Reed?  

It starred Katy Mixon as Katie Otto, a housewife who, although not pretentious herself, is immersed in the ultra-pretentious world of ladies who lunch in Westport, Connecticut, along with her husband (Diedrich Bader), two daughters, and son Oliver (Daniel). 

She has a lesbian best friend, and there's a gay character (Jake Choi) in Season 5, so there's a bit of representation.  The main problem fans had was queerbaiting Oliver.  

He is presented as gay, with everything from pictures of muscular men on his bedroom wall to an interest in ballet to a boyfriend, the wealthy, femme Cooper (Logan Bell).  Everyone thinks they are boyfriends, anyway, including Cooper himself, who is upset every time Oliver claims that they are not dating.  But then he backs off and gets a girlfriend.  

Logan Bell (the femme one) is gay in real life, and states that he played Cooper as gay.  So why five seasons of "crumbs" that led nowhere?  Fans were irate when the showrunners were too cowardly to let Oliver come out.

Daniel already has two strikes against him (baseball metaphor, har har) for five years of queerbaiting.  Let's check on his other projects.

He was born in 2003 in Los Angeles, and began acting at age nine in the short Geisho (2010): a man (Horatio Sanz) wants to become the world's first male geisha.  Kind of gender-fluid.

Next, a 2013 episode of Burn Notice, which, I discovered today, is not about a hospital burn unit, in spite of the misleading title.  It's about a spy who was "burned" (fired). How the heck are potential viewers supposed to know that?   Daniel plays the young version of focus character Michael (Jeffrey Donovan). 

More after the break