Fellow Travelers’ Stars Address That One Scene That Makes Our Toes Curl

Summary:

• Fellow Travelers is a Showtime political thriller adapted from Thomas Mallon's novel of the same name.
• The show follows a love story between two gay men that begins in the 1950s and spans four decades. It contains several graphic scenes of intimacy.
• As stars Jonathan Bailey and Matt Bomer explain, these scenes carry as much meaning and emotion as any other.

Over the past few decades, television and movies have gotten much better at portraying gay characters and bringing more diverse stories to the screen.

Not only are they just as romantic and captivating as many other beautiful stories that we know and love, but they can also enlighten audiences about some real struggles that the queer community has been and still is facing to this very day.

Unfortunately, there is still a long way to go before the entertainment industry becomes completely safe and inclusive for all kinds of people and their stories, but 2023 was a memorable year with some very notable releases.

Fellow Travelers, the Showtime series starring Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey as two secret lovers who carry their relationship through the years, is definitely one of them. Judging by the critical and audience reviews, everyone seems to agree.

Fellow Travelers’ Most Shocking Scene

Despite the length of the story and all the parallels, the show draws between four very different decades in U.S. history and the way those eras have affected the lives of the main characters, discussions about it always seem to come back to episode 1, which is set mostly in the 1950s.

While people admire the portrayal of the tense years of the Lavender Scare, that's not the only tension being discussed. Raw, intense, and very passionate intimate scenes that take up a lot of screen time also get a lot of attention but are often misunderstood as being added for shock value only.

This is especially true for the toe-sucking scene between Tim and Hawk, which has caused a lot of debate on the web. Jonathan Bailey has shared his own thoughts on why this scene in particular, and all sex scenes in general, are so important to the characters:

“Not only is it incredibly complicated, not only is it really hot, it’s also something that masks as being provocative, but actually it’s really psychologically impactful, and people who get it get it. <...> It captures exactly what’s going on for Hawk and Tim, hopefully, allowing the viewer to experience a bodily reaction to it in the same way,” he said to The Hollywood Reporter.

While Fellow Travelers is far from a kid-friendly show, it is a very educational piece for any adult who is open to learning more about the darkest pages of history that aren't covered nearly enough. Doing so through the prism of a heartbreaking yet truly beautiful relationship between Tim and Hawk only adds to the pleasure.

The final episode of Fellow Travelers airs today, December 15, on Showtime. You can catch up on all previous episodes by streaming the show on Paramount Plus with Showtime.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter