American Horror Story has been a reliable source of outrageous horror for over a decade. Creator Ryan Murphy struck gold in 2011 with season 1, retroactively titled Murder House, and blew the lid off anthology TV with its entirely different follow-up season, Asylum. This put the FX network on the map during a golden age of television that occurred at a time before the influx of eight thousand streaming apps oversaturated our screens and bank accounts. And while Murphy has had a slate of projects that were either overtly queer (Glee) or queer-coded (Popular, Nip/Tuck), AHS isn’t technically a “gay” series. Despite this, Murphy and his team have utilized the show’s platform to give the community a voice, whether by hiring out gay actors as significant players or by including queer characters and storylines on a show that isn’t necessarily about such. For something that was a big part of the cultural zeitgeist during its earlier years, it was pretty noteworthy to showcase members of the LGBTQ+ community and tell their stories in such a bold way. With June being Pride Month, we at Horror Press thought it a suitable time to pay tribute to what a very gay showcase American Horror Story has been all these years, so let’s go ahead and take a peek behind the rainbow curtain.
From its inception, AHS made strides in the industry by featuring multiple out actors like Sarah Paulson, Zachary Quinto, and Dennis O’Hare in prominent roles. We’re all aware of how fearful Hollywood is of out and proud actors because, after all, how could a gay person possibly play straight, or why would straight viewers care to watch people they have no chance at bedding? Murphy’s casting gave the one-finger salute to this ignorant train of thought. Over time, the show’s flamboyance and queer actor count progressed, incorporating the likes of Billy Porter, Matt Bomer, BD Wong, and Cody Fern into the fold. Of course, most of these actors had careers in their own right before the show, but including so many of them in a single series – and often playing queer characters – was simply unheard of. It should be acknowledged that there was an admittedly slow start regarding the casting of POC actors, with the introduction of Angela Bassett and Gabourey Sidibe to the series in season 3 being the only major POC actors until season 6. Still, I suppose we can never quite have it all…
Yet while the show’s cast was revelatory for the time, its fictional queerness had more humble beginnings. Later seasons could sometimes be so in your face with their excess and eleganza you’d think you were at a Pride parade, but the OG, Murder House, was much more subtle. Jessica Lange’s tour-de-force performance as insidiously nosy neighbor Constance Langdon fed the gays who worship at the altar of powerful women acting their asses off. While not explicitly gay, a presence like Lange’s, along with Connie Britton’s gorgeous mane and the framing of Dylan McDermott as an object of sexual desire (daddy, indeed), certainly supported the gay agenda.
This first season also includes a ghostly gay couple at the genesis of Rubber Man, a BDSM fetish suit that immediately became one of the series’ most iconic and recognizable frights. Depicting a realistically rocky relationship that met a violent and tragic end – as most things on AHS do – Chad and Patrick’s struggles were no different from those of the Harmon family at the center of the season’s drama. Rather than focusing on their relationship as “the other” to be juxtaposed with the show’s straight counterparts, Murphy and his writers integrated this gay couple seamlessly into the action, and sometimes that’s just as welcome as highlighting the differences in queer stories.
Asylum veered in the other direction by using the discovery of protagonist Lana Winters’ lesbian relationship as a MacGuffin to set her journey and the plot itself into motion. Set in the good ol’ days of 1964, Lana is forcefully admitted to the asylum under the guise of curing her “mental illness” of homosexuality. Unfortunately, horrific things like this did and still do occur in our world, and such a strong and fully realized queer character as Lana must be celebrated. Paulson’s performance sees her going head-to-head with the legendary Sister Jude. Their rivalry is one for the books, providing a feminine psychological intensity not seen since Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? The series’ darkest season even imitates some of Baby Jane’s campiness, giving us a brief reprieve via the frantic and silly Name Game sequence.
It’s not all dark and full of terrors on AHS, though, and seasons Coven, Hotel, and Apocalypse bring a delightfully mean-spirited sense of frivolity to the series. As previously mentioned, the gays love a feminal force of nature, and Coven provides us with an entire class of them. A gay fantasy of the highest praise, season 3 finds us at Miss Robichaux’s Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies or Hogwarts for bad bitches and the queers who love them. A Real Housewives of Salem-style battle for the literal supremacy ensues, and to borrow a meme-worthy phrase from scandalous Housewife Erika Jayne; it’s going to give the gays everything they want. The library is open, and these women aren’t holding back.
Coven is stacked, blessing us with a pantheon of devilish witches to root for. We have Misty Day (Lily Rabe), the lovably naive white witch with a penchant for Stevie Nicks; an extended cameo and performances (yes, plural) by superstar Stevie herself; venomous celebrity Madison Montgomery, embodied frightfully well by Emma Roberts in a way she emulates twice more in Scream Queens and Scream 4; Frances Conroy as every gay’s favorite quirky aunt, Myrtle Snow; and Kathy-friggen-Bates as a resurrected slave owner hilariously tormented for her sins by Gabourey Sidibe’s Queenie. Coven’s true indulgence, however, is Angela Bassett as the queen mother of voodoo Marie Laveau and her centuries-long feud with the witches. This finds her at odds with reigning Supreme, Fiona Goode (once again, Miss Jessica Lange). Eventually, the adversaries form a truce to team up and dismantle the witch-hunting patriarchy. Add to all of this a witch whose power is death upon any man she sleeps with, and it’s no wonder the season’s first episode is titled “Bitchcraft”.
Coven is later succeeded by season 8’s Apocalypse, an Avengers: Endgame level crossover event that finds the witches of Miss Robichaux’s fighting the supernaturally aged antichrist Michael Langdon, who was birthed during the climax of Murder House. Newcomer Cody Fern brings big pansexual energy to the role, and while much of the season is fan service, Murphy – once again – gives the gays everything they want.
These witches paved the way for what would become the series’ signature sense of wicked fun, but it’s season 5’s Hotel that brought the stuff of gay legend to our screens in the form of LADY GAGA as The Countess. Like most gays, I’ll never forget where I was when I learned she would be starring in the season, and while there was some apprehension concerning her acting chops (this was before her Oscar nomination), I think I can speak for the community when I say we were gagged. Thus, Lady Gaga ushered in what I consider to be the queerest season of television that isn’t inherently about gay culture. With high fashion and old school elegance, gore galore, a frequently nude Matt Bomer and Lady Gaga, exquisite cinematography, and a plot not unlike a soap opera set in Hell, Hotel plays out like a nightmare version of a star-studded perfume ad. It doesn’t all make sense, but really, who cares?
Jessica Lange’s spirit is also not forgotten, and as it’s the first season without her on the cast, Gaga & Co. do their damnedest to bring the drama in her honor. With one icon gone, two must become one, and The Countess is joined by former flame Ramona Royale – hello again, Angela! Their romance is beautifully presented as an elevator tableau, tracking its ups and downs through the decades as they come and go from the hotel’s lift. It’s a bittersweet sequence that portrays the demise of a couple with nuance and serves us haute couture to boot.
The character of Liz Taylor, played by Dennis O’Hare, is also one to look out for when it comes to nuance. As the aging transgender bartender of the Hotel Cortez, Liz takes in others’ pain while silently suffering in the shadows. O’Hare brings tragedy and levity to the screen in equal measure, and Murphy has yet to surpass Liz Taylor’s depth when it comes to writing queer characters for AHS. One scene, in particular, finds Liz coming face to face with her adult son from a life she has long since left behind. Something of a precursor to what Murphy would eventually do with Pose, the heartbreaking truth behind stories like this is essential queer storytelling.
Much more can be said about the very gay showcase that is American Horror Story. There is the homoerotic slasher throwback season 1984 that also debuts Angelica Ross as the series’ first black trans actor, Double Feature going full inclusivity with the bizarre pregnancies of gay males via alien experimentation, and underpinnings of gay panic seen through characters like the extremely possessed and sexually charged Sister Mary Eunice in Asylum and scantily clad serial killer Dandy Mott in Freakshow. And I haven’t even mentioned Jessica Lange performing David Bowie and Lana Del Rey or the queer warlocks of Apocalypse! Wow, this show is really gay, huh? In all seriousness, AHS has had its highs and lows of quality and critical acclaim, but its unapologetic and unabashed queerness deserves to be commended. On behalf of myself, Horror Press, and the month of June, we thank you American Horror Story for bringing queerness, warts and all, to the main stage. BALENCIAGA!!!