Hulu original movie Fire Island is notable for two reasons: One, the emergence of its writers and star, Joel Kim Booster, as a fresh new …
Hulu original movie Fire Island is notable for two reasons: One, the emergence of its writers and star, Joel Kim Booster, as a fresh new voice. And two, that something good actually emerged from Quibi’s gigantic smoking crater. Booster originally developed the idea of a comedy set on New York state’s gay haven Fire Island for Quibi, but the short-form streaming network’s untimely demise moved the project to Fox Searchlight to be developed as a film. Real-life besties Booster and SNL writer/star Bowen Yang – both Asian, openly gay and funny as hell – anchor the movie, basing their characters’ friendship loosely on their own. The result is a vibrant and raunchy rom-com aiming to wed big laughs with a big heart. The Gist: We meet Noah (Booster) as he voiceovers about his love of Jane Austen, and how the guy he just spent the night with has “boyfriend energy,” which just ain’t his bag, baby. That’s him in a nutshell: he’s more committed to his favorite authors than to having a serious relationship. A decade ago, he formed a makeshift family of fellow gay fellas: Luke (Matt Rogers), Keegan (Tomas Matos), Max (Torian Miller) and his closest friend, Howie (Yang). Every year they take a weeklong vacation to Fire Island, the Atlantic sanctuary for underwear parties, assless Speedos and other Incredibly Gay Things. Save for Howie, who jetted for the West Coast to work at a startup, they’re all working-class types with meager bank accounts, so they stay with their mother figure Erin (Margaret Cho), who can afford her place only because she scored a bunch of lawsuit money after swallowing a piece of glass in a restaurant. But! Erin’s broke and has to sell soon, so this may be their last Fire Island adventure. Do they have to make it count? Probably. Perhaps Noah will stop being a hit-’em-and-forget-’em commitmentphobe and find someone worth settling down with; perhaps Howie will finally find true love and land his first-ever steady boyfriend, with whom he can share rom-com cliches, e.
