The weird homophobia of the 2011 Fright Night
I never liked the 2011 reboot of Fright Night for many reasons. I hated the loss of the vampires’ ability to take wolf and bat forms, and the loss of Jerry Dandridge recognizing Amy as resembling a lost love. It’s a cliche trope in vampire stories now but I liked it. I hated that Peter Vincent’s character growth was utterly lost. There were lots of things I hated…
However, as I sit and think about it, I realize there’s another very good reason to dislike the Fright Night reboot. It’s blatantly homophobic… It really, really is.
When they were asked why Evil Ed is no longer portrayed as a closeted gay kid (which was hinted at in the original) the answer was given that teens don’t have to deal with homophobia like the 1980s. Umm… What? There are plenty of kids who end up homeless because their “religious” homophobic parents rejected them. There are many who haven’t quite accepted themselves yet and don’t want to be different.
Ed was not only a closet gay kid, he was played by a gay man. Now he has been utterly straight washed.
Not only that but Billy Cole (who was implied to be Jerry’s henchman and very likely lover) was removed from Fright Night entirely.
Peter Vincent was named for Peter Cushing and Vincent Price and in the original Fright Night he was a has-been horror movie star and now host of a horror TV series. If you don’t know what a horror host is think of the Crypt Keeper at the start of each episode of Tales from the Crypt, or Elvira. A good update on this could have been someone with a web series who did web reviews and commentaries and was still a hasbeen horror actor.
The Fright Night remake turned Peter Vincent into a Las Vegas style stage magician, removing all reference to the men he was based on. The claim given was that today “Kids don’t know what horror hosts are.” Considering horror hosts still exist and you can even find youtube channels of horror hosts, I find this questionable. Technically The Talking Dead on AMC is a horror host TV series.
And this is also bothersome because the original Peter Vincent was played by Roddy McDowall (who spent most of his life in the closet) and the character was based, at least partly, on Vincent Price, whose daughter confirmed after his death, that he had been bisexual. Again, straight washed.
So to recap, the 2011 Fright Night Straight Washed Evil Ed, removed Jerry’s henchman / male lover and indication that he wanted a polyamorous relationship with Amy, and changed Peter Vincent so drastically that he no longer resembled the older bisexual man he was originally based on- or the gay man he was played by, and they tried to make him more ”macho” and masculine.
You would think the more recent version would have been more open about the characters’ sexual identities but instead it straightwashed everyone.
It’s odd but I think the 2011 Fright Night is more dated and more conservative than it’s 1985 counterpart. Hell, the 1988 sequel even had a mute Trans vampire. What did the Fright Night 2011 reboot’s sequel give us? A direct to video sequel that was actually yet another reboot…
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