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Streitmatter, Rodger. From "Perverts" to "Fab Five": The Media's Changing Depiction of Gay Men and Lesbians. New York: Routledge, 2009. 222 pp. $37.95.
While it may not plow completely new ground, Rodger Streitmatter's From "Perverts" to "Fab Five" needed to be written. It also is a valuable addition to the growing library of studies on the gay and lesbian experience in modern American history.
Streitmatter builds on - and frequently references - important previous work by others including Ed Alwood Straight News) , Vito Russo The Celluloid Closet), Stephen
Tropiano The Prime Time Closet), Larry Gross Up From Invisibility), and Randy Shifts And the Band Played On). These works provide a basis for the first of his eighteen chapters on specific media benchmarks in the coverage of gays and lesbians.
Much of what Streitmatter writes about, especially in the first part of the book, has already been chronicled. Many of these media milestones, including the 1 977 debut
of the comedy Soap, featuring a recurrent gay character played by comedian Billy Crystal, have been examined by other scholars. The biggest service that he provides here is bringing those important events together in one wide-ranging book.
However, the later chapters of the...