SCAD TVfest kicked off yesterday by honoring a few of its esteemed guests with awards, including actors Joel Kim Booster and Matt Bomer.
Booster was presented with the SCAD TVfest Rising Star Award, but has been working in the industry far longer than that moniker might suggest. While Booster has risen to prominence over the last few years due to projects like 2022’s “Fire Island” (which he wrote and starred in) and the AppleTV+ comedy “Loot,” which was featured at the festival, he’s been working in comedy and stand-up for years.
“I quit my day job in 2016, so I kind of consider that the moment that I really made this my full-time job and really entered the industry,” Booster said. “I had so many moments early in my career where it was like, this is the big break. This is the moment that’s going to change everything, this is what’s going to propel me to the next level. And you know, what you learn really fast is that that doesn’t always pan out.”
“Loot” stars Booster as Nicholas, assistant to a recently divorced billionaire named Molly (Maya Rudolph) who’s trying to do a little right in the world. At the beginning of the series, Nicholas is desperate for Molly to give up her attempts at being a do-gooder so they can both happily return to days filled with billionaire-scale debauchery. But as the first season goes on, Nicholas’s evolution, and in particular his friendship with an employee at Molly’s nonprofit named Howard (Ron Funches), is key to the show’s arc.
Booster (who is gay, as is Nicholas on the show) has been open in interviews about playing the stereotypical “gay best friend” character and how his threshold for taking on those roles has shifted over the years. Although Hollywood might be willing to pat itself on the back in terms of the number of LGBTQ+ characters on screen nowadays, Booster said what really matters for him is the depth and specificity that can be found in those characters. Being able to write for himself on projects like “Fire Island” – a modern, queer take on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” – has been instrumental in that regard.
“‘Fire Island’ was hugely important to me, because finally, it was a character that I felt was real, and real to me, and I identified with,” he said. “It was a real wake up call for me of, if I’m going to ever not play these kinds of characters, I’m gonna have to do it myself. I think that’s a real message to everybody who’s frustrated where they are, is tell your own story. And if you can’t, find somebody who will and work with them and support those people who are.”
The same day, Bomer received The Hollywood Reporter’s Trailblazer Award. Bomer – who is known for roles in projects such as “White Collar,” “The Normal Heart,” and more recently, Bradley Cooper’s “Maestro” – attended the festival promoting the miniseries “Fellow Travelers.”
Bomer stars and serves as an executive producer for the show, which follows the decades-long romance between two men who first meet during the height of McCarthyism in the 1950s. Sen. Joseph McCarthy is well-known for his anticommunist sentiments, but he also perpetrated a witch hunt against LGBTQ+ people, leading to what’s called the Lavender Scare and the mass dismissal of gay people from government jobs in the mid-20th century. Bomer plays Hawkins Fuller, a State Department worker who staunchly hides his sexuality, but develops a relationship with Tim Laughlin (Jonathan Bailey), a young, religious congressional staffer.
Bomer, who is also gay, said he has never considered himself to be a trailblazer, but rather lucky to be the beneficiary of a long line of others.
“I’m grateful to be here today, and grateful that I’m at a place now where I can have some agency and [be] a part of projects like ‘Fellow Travelers,’ where I can sort of be the genesis of it and put stories out into the world that I think are important to tell,” he said.
The Lavender Scare isn’t something that’s necessarily taught in schools, and before reading the book that “Fellow Travelers” is based on, Bomer said his knowledge of the time period was limited. He said he hopes a show like “Fellow Travelers,” which is so steeped in LGBTQ+ history, can help fill in some of the gaps for audience members who might be in the same boat.
“I think it’s important to befriend a lot of people from your community, especially people who’ve been around before you, so that you can have some perspective on where you come from and whose shoulders you stand on,” Bomer said. “I just think it’s important to keep filling in these blanks, because we have so many amazing chapters in our history. I hope we get the chance to do more.”
“Loot” is streaming on Apple TV+, and its second season will premiere April 3. “Fellow Travelers” can be found on Showtime. The SCAD TVfest will continue to run until Feb. 10.
