So in the video below, the supervillains are gossiping about whether the guys are gay, and one of them says, “Of course they’re gay … they listen to the Gipsy Kings in their Duo Car.”
I don’t get the reference. The Gipsy Kings are a Spanish-language band that performs a variety of styles and in a variety of languages. Nothing particularly gay about that. Their wiki page didn’t indicate that any of their members past or present are gay. So either it’s just a weird reference to the guys liking “exotic” music or I’m missing the joke.
Now, it the villain had said she overheard them listening to the Pet Shop Boys in their car, I could see it…
FFS I can’t embed the link. Just trust me, I guess
I think the joke is more that the Gipsy Kings aren’t associated with what a typical manly American straight male listens to, so it’s another ambiguous blip on the gaydar. Of course, in real life, there’s nothing unmanly about their music (or wearing a pink shirt or so many supposedly unmanly things), but the small-minded villains can’t help but notice these “signals” instead of executing their dastardly plans. Pet Shop Boys would also work, but is a bit more on the nose and perhaps not as comical.
Compare to the film Heathers, where a bottle of mineral water is left with a murder victim to make the cops believe he was involved in a gay tryst. At some level it could even be funny.
Possibly also an attempt to contrast with “Dixie Chicks”?
When I do some research on The Ambiguously Gay Duo, I discover some interesting things. It didn’t start on Saturday Night Live. It started on a sketch comedy show called The Dana Carvey Show, which only lasted for eight episodes in 1996. It then moved to Saturday Night Live. The voices of the duo were Stephen Colbert (Ace) and Steve Carell (Gary). The sketches were inspired by the 1954 book Seduction of the Innocent by Fredric Wertham, which alleged that Batman and Robin were in an implied homosexual relationship. The sketches about the duo ended in 2011, which was too long, since it made its point long before that.
Random thoughts after digging myself.
- The Gipsy Kings had 1 performance on SNL, in 1989, when Robert Smigel was a writer. Maybe something funny happened that week and an inside joke was born.
- The episode aired in 1998, the same year the Gipsy Kings had a bit of a moment with their cover of Hotel California appearing in The Big Lebowski. (OK, probably a long shot since I don’t think anyone saw this movie in the theaters).
- The immediate response to the comment is, “Listening to the Gipsy Kings makes you gay?” Followed by “I heard George Clooney is gay.” Part if the joke is that everyone around the ABG is clueless about gay culture.
I dunno.
They also mention Noah Wyle, about whose personal life I know nothing either.
George Clooney and Noah Wyle were both very pretty men who were on ER together and I surmise there was a lot of fantasizing (slash fiction) about a possible relationship. Personally, I think Goran Visnjic, who was prettier than both (and actually did kiss Mr. Wyle on the show) would be a better match for either.
A lot of people saw it when it opened in 1998, though it wasn’t a blockbuster. It made money for the distributors. A lot of people have seen it in the theaters since then. It’s been one of the most common films for people to watch over the years when a theater has it as a reshowing of a cult movie. No, it’s not true that people only see old movies just by streaming and/or playing DVDs/videotape
I’ll amend my statement, I don’t think the movie was big enough at the time to make the Gipsy Kings a recognizable reference on SNL for a song they released 7 years prior.