In the previous sections. I had demonstrated how Pai portrays gay men as both stereotypical trendsetter and mainstream gay men. These fashion and trendy
representations of gay men establish gay men as the leading consumers in the capitalist society. In addition to these trendy portrayals, hyper-masculinity is also represented in “Tea for Two”. There are two kinds of hyper-masculinity in “Tea for Two”. These are portrayals of (1) bodybuilders, and (2) hyper-masculine clone and skinhead culture. The following sections delve into criticisms of hyper-masculine
subculture in Pai’s “Tea for Two”.
Bodybuilding is celebrated in gay communities. Bodybuilding is a
hypermasculine bodily performance. Bodybuilding is a nudity for people to inspect John Burger, in his Ways of Seeing (2008), claims that “to be naked is to be oneself.
To be nude is to be seen naked by others” (54). Burger claims that “nudity is a form of dress” (54). Nudity is a demonstration for people to see: any forms of muscle are waited for people to interpret. In addition to bodybuilding, wearing tight clothing and thus reveal the muscular body is an act that reveals desire. As indicated in Chapter One in this thesis, some of the Asian American gay men would also work out in gyms to train their muscles. These Asian American gay men would conform to the
bodybuilding trend in the white gay communities and are willing to identify with it (Wat 61). Wat concludes that bodybuilding is not merely a health-incentive activity.
Bodybuilding also embodies the spirits of capitalism. Existing studies agree with Wat’s theorization. As indicated in his “The White Man’s Muscles” (1997), Richard Dyer points out that “the built body is a wealth body” because “an enormous amount of leisure time has been devoted to it” (155). I consider this is true because gay men would have higher chance to receive discretionary income in a male-privileged society. In order to showcase their discretionary income, gay men would work out in the gym to train their body: their muscles are transformed and thus become another piece of “clothes” for other gay men to identify. Dyer points out that a built body requires “forethought and long-term organization (153)” because bodybuilder has to follow a disciplinary schedule and strict diet. Disciplinary schedule again resonates with Tony and David’s well-organized lifestyle.
There are two bodybuilders in Pai Hsien-Yung’s “Tea for Two”. They are a mix-race couple and work as the bartenders in Tea for Two.
One of them, Gino, who had grown up in Little Italy, was a champion
bodybuilder who had graced the cover of Body Magazine. Even in the frigid month of December, he worked the bar in a form-fitting, muscle-displaying fuchsia T-Shirt, his chest and back muscles popping up everywhere and straining his T-shirt until the seams looked about to part. (7)
Gino’s partner, Fernando, is a Filipino American who “always wear a tight shirt in the Winter” (7). Again, Fernando met Gino in a homosocial context: Fernando was a cook in Clarck Air Force Base in Philippines, where Gino served as a member of the same Air Force Base during the Vietnam War. “After the war, Gino pulled every string he could to bring Fernando to the U.S. They never missed a day at the gym” (7). It’s possible to assume that Fernando is strongly influenced by all the American commodities imported from the United States when the Vietnam War occurs.
As pointed out by Dyer, Hollywood film narrative always situated white
muscular hero “up against foreignness, [colonial] treacherous terrain and inhabitants, animal and human” (154), Dyer concludes that a muscular body is also against
“femininity and non-whiteness” (153). This white muscular male body as an ideal body celebrated in Hollywood narratives might cast an influence on Asian gay men.
Films would spread the idea of white muscular male body as an ideal body. This spreading of ideal images is similar to Wat’s examination on gay pornography magazines.33 Clients in Tea for Two gather here to awe the male figure of the bodybuilder, Gino: “He was all man, Tea for Twos masculine masterpiece, and quite the showman when he mixed drinks” (7). These clients fetishize and project their libido desire on Gino’s muscular body. According to Shaun Cole’s analysis in “Body Talk” (2000), in the 1980s going to gyms becomes a new trend for gay men as a result of AIDS. People would prefer going to the gym to become bodybuilders. However,
33 Wat indicates that white gay magazines also portray the body of white gay men as ideal bodies. This would cast influence on how Asian gay men view their own bodies. The desire is unified through the distribution of the magazine.
this gym-trend also leads to the celebration of muscularity. Many muscular gay men are only interested in muscular gay men. A muscular body is not only a physical feature for other gay men to identify, it is also an indicator of sexual attractions.
However, white gay men’s masculine images may be self-contradictory. In white gay men communities, the sartorial items for working class sartorial items are also rendered masculine because of homosociality of the working class. Adopting the sartorial items of clone subculture is a trend of gay communities. Many gay men adopt working class sartorial items to acquire hyper-masculinities. These gay men wear leather jackets and bikers’ suits. This clone culture is viewed as outmoded masculinity in the 1980s. During the 1980s, many gay men in the United States would instead go to gym to build a hairless muscular body. According to Murray Healy’s studies on gay skinhead subculture34 in England in 1980s, gay skinhead might dislocate the male attributes of skinhead subculture – as “working class, socially fixed, violent, with extreme right politics” (4) for the reason that gay men are usually
“unnatural/effeminate, middle class, socially mobile, weak, with left politics” (4).
Since white gay members are supposedly effeminate and delicate in the view of popular culture, white gay men would deploy a set of hyper-masculine traits to empower themselves. Thus, the existence of a gay skinhead would, therefore, destroy the real masculinity, since gay men are stereotypically viewed as effeminate. An effeminate member of such a masculine subculture would contradict to the solidarity of masculinity and can bring up doubts on the masculinity this subculture celebrates (4-5).
In “Introduction” of this thesis, I argue that wen masculinity of Chinese gay men would be misunderstood by white gay men as effeminate and delicate. However, wen
34 Gay skinhead culture in 1980s also celebrates leather jackets and bodybuilding culture. It’s pretty similar to clone subculture in the 1960s with the only different emphasis on hairs. Skinhead culture dislike hairiness.
masculinity also demonstrates how a subject meticulously arranges his lifestyle and have a long-term plan for his future. Big Brother Luo’s long-term plan shows his resolution to pursue his freedom before he went to study in the United States. This resolution demonstrates meticulous planning. I would argue that wen masculinity in Pai’s narrative is to resist against the hyper-masculinity celebrated in the white gay men communities, as all the hyper-masculine characters in Pai’s “Tea for Two” all die in AIDS.