Created by Oscar-nominated Philadelphia screenwriter Ron Nyswaner, based on the novel by Thomas Mallon, the eight-episode Showtime miniseries Fellow Travelers is an exquisitely crafted work of queer historical fiction. With a nuanced gay love story at its centre, it is a captivating, sweeping, and deeply moving epic that takes in the Lavender Scare of the 1950s and follows its repercussions in the lives of those directly affected through the achingly brief post-Stonewall period of liberation in the 70s to the devastation of HIV/AIDS in the 80s.
Shifting back and forth between the decades throughout doesn’t only create a gripping structure as the narrative unfurls in fragments, but the juxtaposition of these eras makes starkly clear the links between the way the US government attempted to shame, stigmatize, and root out its queer employees in the 1950s under Eisenhower and its willful neglect of its citizens during the early years of the HIV/AIDS crisis under Reagan. There are also echoes of the present-day wave of politically led homophobia and transphobia, underscoring how quickly and sharply forces can still move against us despite, or more accurately, because of the increased societal acceptance and progress towards equality that we have achieved.
Back in 1952, Hawkins “Hawk” Fuller (Matt Bomer) is a decorated Second World War veteran establishing himself as a career diplomat in Washington DC. When necessary, he’s a master of skullduggery with his sights on moving to Europe for a life of more freedom. Reluctant to declare his own political leanings (he’s “neutral like Switzerland”), and claiming he doesn’t vote, he has close ties with dignified Democratic Senator Wesley Smith (Linus Roache). Smith is a fictional character whose last name is presumably a nod to real-life senator Margaret Chase Smith who delivered her “Declaration of Conscience” speech in 1950 warning of Joe McCarthy’s anticommunist witch hunt. Although Wesley hasn’t spoken out quite to that degree, he is known to be skeptical of McCarthy’s motives and methods.
With Hawk estranged from his own wealthy father, Smith has been a paternal figure in his life since he was a teenager and rumours are swirling that he’s expected to marry the senator’s daughter Lucy (a terrific Allison Williams in a beautifully layered performance), who frequently accompanies Hawk to high society and political soirées as his unsuspecting “beard”. She’s an engaging character that is treated with sympathy as one of the countless spouses who suffered as the collateral damage of societal and legislative homophobia that forced queer men and women into marriage as cover.
Handsome, suave and disarmingly charismatic—giving gay Don Draper vibes—Hawk prides himself on actively avoiding emotional attachments with men, picking up tricks at public restrooms and on his late-night visits to the Cozy Corner nightclub. That might be about to change when Hawk encounters an idealistic, sensitive younger man freshly arrived in DC, Tim Laughlin (Jonathan Bailey), at an election night party. Tim is attractive and endearing, and the chemistry between the men is immediately palpable, though given the setting and the times, unspoken.
McCarthy (Chris Bauer) vows to “make America safe and strong again” as he celebrates the Republican’s landslide victory, while a wide-eyed Tim admiringly applauds, unaware of the dire consequences that the Eisenhower administration will have for him as gay man. The opening episode—the first of two directed by executive producer Daniel Minahan (Halston) that skillfully establish the characters, tone and world of the series—ends with McCarthy speaking on the eve of Eisenhower’s executive order 10450 of 1953, pledging to purge the government of “deviants” and “sexual perversion”. From that point on, a single accusation—even from an anonymous source—could have monumental repercussions, destroying marriages and breaking families apart, with the suicide of those targeted not uncommon.
The enforced surreptitious nature of queer sexual encounters, relationships, and hushed, heavily coded conversations are vividly evoked. As is a sense of the constant threat of being observed and overheard, with office doors closed tight and blinds fully lowered. As a war hero, Hawk believes he’s beyond reproach, “bulletproof”—a fitting term that describes his emotional armour too—but as the pressure mounts, is anyone in DC unimpeachable?
Having secured a job for Tim in his idol McCarthy’s office, in return Hawk expects him to feed back the occasional nugget of information that might be useful to Senator Smith, whom Hawk would like to see run for President one day. DC is after all “the capital of ulterior motives” as Hawk puts it to Tim. As their relationship becomes passionately physical, there are some fascinating, playful shifts in power during their liaisons as Tim relays private conversations between McCarthy and his unscrupulous chief counsel Roy Cohn (a compellingly brooding Will Brill). During one steamy sequence, Hawk agrees to take Tim to a party full of influential people as the younger man sucks his toes then fellates him. It’s right up there with the rimming scene in the first season of The White Lotus (and the rimming scene in the first episode of Russell T Davies’ Queer As Folk for that matter) as one of television’s most memorable depictions of gay sex, and there are plenty more to come in Fellow Travelers as the series progresses.
With his tearoom trick, Hawk is a dominant top and during consensually rough sex he punches the young man on his back as he penetrates him from behind before throwing him down on the bed like he is discarding him once he has finished with him. It’s an insightful scene in how it contrasts with the far more intimate sex he has with Tim, whom he fondly nicknames Skippy, nuzzles his armpit and enjoys watching orgasm as he masturbates him. With Tim, Hawk still gives strong daddy top energy—amusingly accentuated by the fun soundtrack choice of jazz singer Anita O’Day’s “You Turned the Tables on Me”, just as the lyrics “You used to call me the top” come in—but there’s a real tenderness to Hawk’s caresses. As the pair hold hands and gently touch each other’s skin during their postcoital conversations in bed, bathed in warm lamp light, we see a deep connection form between the two. As well as power play, their difference in age and experience come into their sexual dynamics, with Skippy willingly taking on the role of Hawk’s “boy” in the bedroom. When it comes to every sex scene, the specificity, character and narrative development, along with the intentionality of the choreography, don’t make them any less hot, in fact those details often contribute to them being even more sizzling.
Despite the bleakness of public life for queer folks in the 50s, there is unmistakable bliss in these bedroom scenes and queer joy to be found in the privacy of parties like the one Hawk’s secretary Mary (a wonderful Erin Neufer) invites Tim to at her home, where gay men and lesbians can drink, dance, drop their guards, and relax in each other’s company. In these aggressively heteronormative times though, debilitating internalized homophobia is common, with one of Hawk’s government friends sharing that he can hardly bring himself to look at the men he has sex with. Meanwhile, the young Tim is tormented by Catholic guilt, having grown up with a strong faith.
Uncompromisingly and unapologetically queer, Fellow Travelers never feels like it is striving to be palatable for a straight audience, but is more concerned with authenticity. The tearoom sequences in the 50s for instance refreshingly lack any hint of judgment in authorial tone, but instead capture the illicit thrill and danger of public sex with strangers with the threat of police entrapment or a raid hanging in the air. Later in the 70s, those scenes contrast with the unbridled freedom in the queer haven of Fire Island, the hedonism of shirtless bodies writhing together on a dance floor, and the liberation of open-air orgies in the Meat Rack (those in the know just call it “the Rack” according to Hawk). While police hostility and violence against the community rears its head once again in San Francisco at the end of the 70s during the brutal bar raid in retaliation for the White Night riots following Dan White’s lenient manslaughter conviction for the assassination of Harvey Milk. The inclusion of such real-life events, characters and places are never jarring, but artfully woven into the fabric of the storytelling, while archive footage is sparingly used to impactful effect. There’s touching use of archive images and film in the gorgeous opening credits sequence too, that reasserts that whatever the state or society at large might have tried to do us, queer love has always been here and endured.
Key to the success of the piece, Bomer and Bailey both deliver exceptional performances, bringing well-calibrated, subtle distinctions to their portrayals in different decades. Together their work is spellbinding. In their hands, Hawk and Skippy are an indelible screen couple that I was thoroughly invested in throughout, laughed with and wept for. Cast by BAFTA-nominated and Emmy-winning Avy Kaufman along with Scotty Anderson, the entire ensemble is first-rate, with actors in supporting roles all making their mark, including those with relatively short screen time such as Rosemary Dunsmore as Hawk’s accepting mother Estelle. The stunning silvery grey dress that she sports as her husband is on his deathbed is one of the standouts from costume designer Joseph La Corte. Having delivered great work on Fosse/Verdon, La Corte again excels here with some ravishing pieces that not only immediately evoke each era (there’s a sumptuous, distinctly Sirkian look to the 60s country retreat scenes), but inform our understanding of the characters without pulling focus.
Running alongside the central love story is the affecting bond that forms between Hawk’s drinking buddy Marcus Gaines (a magnificent Jelani Alladin)—a Langston Hughes admiring journalist covering Congress—and the enchanting Frankie Hines (the magnetic Noah J. Ricketts). They first meet at the Cozy Corner, where Frankie is a server and performs in drag alongside the legendary Stormé DeLarverie (Chelsea Russell) as part of her Jewel Box Revue. (Please can we get a spin-off series focused on Stormé). Marcus enjoys “sex without emotional entanglements”, but Frankie might just be cause for him to break that habit. Through these characters, the series explores the intersection of being Black and queer in a theoretically desegregated DC, where the Black-owned and run Cozy Corner welcomes white patrons, while other white-run clubs where Frankie performs shut Marcus out. There are poignant moments of Marcus caring for his elderly father (Franklin Ojeda Smith), who he comes close to coming out to, and one of the most moving scenes in the entire series comes in the 80s as Marcus embraces a younger HIV positive man repeating “you’re innocent” to him over and over until he begins to really hear it and believe it.
This is a swooningly handsome show, with real attention to detail in its historical accuracy and production design, but its beautiful visuals are never at the expense of its emotional pull. There’s warmth, not just in Simon Dennis and Ronald Plante’s cinematography, but in the tenderness with which the story is told. Paul Leonard-Morgan’s evocative score, with its stirring recurring theme, isn’t overused and never overpowers. The dialogue is consistently sharp and sparky, and while it often informs us about the circumstances of each era it feels natural rather than expository as the character’s lives are intertwined with political intrigue. It’s up there with the greatest, heart-shattering screen romances of all time.
By James Kleinmann
The first five episodes of Fellow Travelers are streaming now on Paramount+ With SHOWTIME in the United States with new episodes launching every Friday, also airing in the US on Sundays at 9pm ET/PT on SHOWTIME, and streaming internationally on Paramount+ in Canada, the UK, Australia, Latin America, South Korea, Italy, Germany Switzerland, and Austria.
The most perfect review of this breathtakingly beautiful series that I’ve read. Thank you, James!