ABSTRACT
Recent films such as Magic Mike (2012) and its sequel, Magic Mike XXL (2015), place the male body and sex work on display in ways that differ from the grittiness and stigma that characterized earlier films, such as Midnight Cowboy (1969) and American Gigolo (1980). The gigolos in the earlier films engage in homosexual prostitution only when their circumstances become dire. In contrast, the recent films—marketed toward heterosexual women—avoid homophobic narratives and have found a large audience that ranges from straight women to gay men and a whole sexual spectrum between.
While American Gigolo puts Richard Gere’s body on display in much the same way Magic Mike features Channing Tatum’s, these films feature different forms of sex work and have different relationships to queerness and stigma. Although Gere’s body is appealing to gay viewers, that very appeal is coded as a source of shame for them. In contrast, Magic Mike enthusiastically embraces the beauty of its male characters without undercutting the pleasure of looking at them with a moral critique of sex work.
Moreover, reflecting a cultural moment quite different from the 1980s, films like Magic Mike have begun to incorporate queer elements in ways that would have been impossible in prior decades. As Hollywood films have evolved from homophobic representations of the male sex worker to celebrations of queerness, the industry has gained a greater understanding of the LBGTQ+ community as cultural consumers worthy of attention. Indeed, some Hollywood films have been more progressive in their representations of male sex workers than U.S. and international independent films.
While the Magic Mike films deliberately avoid a moral critique of sex work, they are intensely concerned with presenting an economic critique, depicting the strippers’ work as both entrepreneurial and pleasurable.
