Top Gun was the ultimate action movie, a classic buddy film, and an ’80s summer blockbuster rife with machismo—with quotable (occasionally cheesy) lines and plenty of eye candy (all those shirtless men!).
But I hate to break it to our more innocent readers: It’s also widely considered a gay classic. Now, those not-so-subtle homoerotic undertones are overt and used to maximum effect in a new original parody, Bottom Gun, from the comedy writers at Good Luck Macbeth Theatre Company.
The team of eight writers are Ashley Atack, who heads up parodies for the company; GLM producing artistic director Chris Daniels; and Ryan Costello, Ian Sorensen, Stacy Johnson, Michael Wilder Frazel, Mojo Montelongo and Rhiannon Box. With a long track record of film parodies, the GLM team knew Top Gun would be its next victim several years ago.
“There may be so many people who love Top Gun and have different feelings about it, but it’s a very gay movie!” said Daniels with a laugh. “Objectively speaking, if you look at the dialogue, if you look at a lot of the scenes, it is very homoerotic. We were watching it and going, OK, who watched this and was like, ‘No, this is a totally straight movie?’”
Many people agree about its not-so-secret subtext; fan sites proclaiming it obviously gay abound. It made determining the parody script’s direction easy.
“It was appropriate with Top Gun: Maverick (being released), and also with the current state of affairs, things that are happening,” Daniels said, referring to the nation’s leaders’ pervasive anti-queer sentiment. “We were really wanting to, you know, take something and really queerify it.”
With an eye toward including queer writers, Atack assembled her team. Thus began an approximately five-month writing process. First, the writers made note of “landmark moments” that fans of the film would want to see. They then divvied up the story into sections, with small subsets of writers tackling each. A series of readthroughs helped them stitch it all together cohesively.
“In a writing room, there has to be trust,” Daniels said. “You could look at someone else’s joke and go, ‘You know, I don’t necessarily think that’s funny, but somebody’s going to think it’s funny. And so how do we appeal to different senses of humor?’” Those individual styles wound up complementing each other and making the humor more inclusive.
Daniels said the writing team intentionally left space for actors to make things funnier, to bring their own energy to the show. He recommends viewing the film before attending Bottom Gun, so you don’t miss the clever Easter eggs buried throughout—though there’s plenty for the uninitiated to enjoy, too.
Director Jayton Newbury—in his last Reno gig before moving to Seattle—said the final product is as silly as you’d hope, with all the various writing styles shining through.
“They put a lot of time and heart into it, and I think a lot of them are very excited about this parody,” Newbury said. “I mean, I’m a little biased, but I think it’s one of the best-written parodies we’ve had.”
Newbury said Bottom Gun plays heavily on the “obvious, at least to me, sexual chemistry” between Maverick and Iceman. An intimacy director, Thomas Rao, worked with the actors to ensure everyone’s comfort in the more charged moments. GLM’s new executive director, Sara Eastman, is an experienced choreographer who put her talents to new use in this show’s “volleyball dance break.” Newbury also added his talents as fight choreographer.
According to stage manager Evelyn Mejia Ronquillo, projections are used on the minimal set, a nod to the Southern California/fighter jet ambience. Leads John Byerly, the first-time actor playing Maverick, and Ben Clarkson, our Iceman, have enjoyed hamming up their characters—pretending they’re pilots (“Think of how a 5-year-old would do it,” jokes Byerly) and delivering their ridiculous lines in deadpan fashion. Both actors’ backgrounds include improv experience, which they’ve brought to their roles.
While no one would argue the show is politically motivated—it’s a comedy, after all—Mejia Ronquillo said the timing certainly adds to her anticipation of the show.
“There’s queerness on stage; there’s queerness in the production team … so I am personally really excited to bring a queer show, especially at this time, at the tail end of Pride Month, to life,” she said.
Bottom Gun is onstage June 27 through July 26 at Good Luck Macbeth Theatre Co., at 124 Taylor St., in Reno. Tickets are $28, with military and student discounts, or $38 for VIP seating. For tickets or more information, visit goodluckmacbeth.org.