“Empire” Features Gay Kiss; Focus Group Loses Interest

If you’ve been watching FOX’s new hit show, “Empire” (which you probably should be) you would know that Lee Daniels is doing something pretty amazing for the African-American LGBTQ community. Lee believes that there’s a stigma when it comes to being gay. Not only does he feature a prominent gay character, but this character is black, a part of the hip-hop community, and in mixed race relationship. Boom. Way to go, Lee!

As much as people are loving the show (and even Jussie Smollet’s character Jamal), they are still having a slight hiccup when it comes to part about being gay. When the show’s pilot was shown to a test audience, viewers were able to give immediate feedback by using a nob to indicated from zero to 10 how they felt. For a majority of the episode, viewers were at a 10 until…the gay kiss.

Audiences were NOT a fan of the character Jamal Lyon (Smollett) and his boyfriend Michael (Rafael de la Fuenta) sharing an on-screen smooch.

And Lee had something to say:

‘They’re at a ten until the two men kiss. So at the end the questioner asks, “Why is it a zero when two men kiss?” And you knew that the hundred people in the room — most of them, 90 percent, 95 percent of them were heterosexual — didn’t want to admit to their homophobia so they just sort of look at the floor—it’s like not admitting to be a racist. “But can you tell me why you’re at a zero? Why do you go from a ten to a zero?” Because it’s unaccepted.

‘I think that it’s slowly becoming a thing because we are making it a thing. It is the civil rights of our time right now and I think we have to not back down.’

Well said, Lee.

Obviously, we loved the gay kiss. But we’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter…