The Queer Eye of It All

Drama with gay people? Shocking.

*Note: Johnathan Van Ness uses he/they pronouns, which is why some quotes in this piece use differing sets of pronouns.

Johnathan Van Ness, turns out you weren’t the only one strugs to func, your entire crew was strugs to func with your bad behavior. Okay, sorry for the clunky intro line, but there’s something there. Much like the houses that Bobby Berk would singlehandedly reconstruct while his coworkers had deep feelings, gave blowouts, and peeled onions, the bones are good.

Johnathan Van Ness is a name your ears may have missed in the past handful of years. You might recall that they got married in 2020 and that they’ve made jokes about being in a relationship with co-star and “chef” Antoni Poroski about once a year to try to remain relevant.

You might have been vaguely aware of the fact that the reboot of Queer Eye was still going on—eight seasons strong with a ninth on the way. Perhaps you saw that they won a Creative Arts (read: fake) Emmy!

And you may have heard that Bobby Berk had decided to leave the show ahead of the upcoming season, seemingly having moved on to bigger and better things.

But when a star of a collaborative personality-based reality program leaves, it can’t be good. For starters, there’s the ever-looming fear that the magic is lost. Imagine if Clinton Kelly or Stacy London had left What Not to Wear? Who would’ve been the mean one to tamper the meanness of the other mean one? Who would’ve committed emotional terrorism?

Of course we don’t even have to imagine scenarios to see how these kinds of things play out. Look at American Idol since the dissolution of the OG three. Katy Perry is out here committing near-hate crimes on screen and viewers haven’t heard the words “that’s gonna be a no from me dawg” in over ten years.

Then there’s the other it can’t be good. As in…something happened (Bobby Finger talking out of the side of his mouth voice).

When Bobby first announced his retirement from Queer Eye, everyone was like “yeah of course.” Because, as alluded to earlier, he had the hardest job of anyone. He was the expert on home and interior design. Coworkers Antoni Poroski, Johnathan Van Ness, Karamo Brown, and Tan France were the “food and alcohol,” “grooming,” “social interaction,” and “fashion” experts respectively. Can we see how these things might entail differing amounts of labor? ONE IS LITERALLY DOING CONTRACTING. And despite doing the heavy lifting, he was often cut out of large portions of each episode…

And of course there was disappointment from viewers because the Fab Five are a package deal. They had an on-screen chemistry that was quite impressive. And there is something very special about a group of queer people being celebrated as experts and as positive influences in this world. So to lose one of that group was quite a hit.

But Bobby’s retirement didn’t really come out of nowhere. Poppington readers may know that not everyone was invited to Antoni Poroski’s recent bach trip (or seemingly the wedding). The notable absences of fellow cast mates highlighted some cracks in the foundations.

For anyone who believed the Fab Five were all friends, all of this information pouring out in the past year is probably quite shocking. Because they did do a great job of putting on airs. And at a time, it seems some of them really were close. And maybe still are. Tan and Antoni have always seemed to get on, whereas Bobby and Karamo have seemed to keep more to themselves. JVN has gone in and out of Antoni’s orbit (though they probably think it’s the other way around).

Most recently, an expose on Queer Eye has been released by Rolling Stone. The piece details the history of the “Fab Five,” as well as behind-the-scenes drama that may have led to the show’s dissolution.

To continue on the Bobby train, Rolling Stone’s sources revealed that Bobby had been thinking of ending the show, except he thought everyone was on the same page. He kept going because he felt he had to, ultimately feeling that Season 8 (New Orleans) felt like a natural ending point. He felt as though the rest of the Fab Five knew they were a package deal. But when they received a renewal after the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, he was the only one to decline.

As it would turn out, Tan France and Antoni Poroski had previously and surreptitiously campaigned for Berk to get a replacement in their friend—and Nate Berkus’ 13-years-younger husband—Jeremiah Brent. Well they got what they wanted in the end. Brent has officially been announced as Bobby’s replacement for Season 9.

Perhaps the most shocking news to come out of this Whole Thing (to some) was that Johnathan Van Ness, the quirky, funny, sassy, hair diva themself is…actually quite toxic. Four sources told Rolling Stone about Van Ness’s egocentric and emotionally abusive behavior. One claimed that they need to “yell at someone” at least once a day.

Van Ness’s behavior was so bad that crew members were scared to interact with them and that cast mates didn’t want to shoot with them. And they didn’t want to shoot with other cast members because they wanted to be the center of attention.

A source told Rolling Stone, “when he comes to set, everything changes if he’s in a bad mood.” This is what cast members have said about Emmy Rossum on Shameless. Tough stuff.

And now we’re sitting here looking down the barrel of four more seasons of a garbage fire and nobody’s there to rebuild the dumpster when it burns down (Jeremiah Brent notwithstanding).

I can’t say I’m shocked that things behind the scenes of this show are bad and messy. That’s kinda how it goes when you put big personalities together. And home and improvement and lifestyle shows almost always contain some level of toxicity and drama, save for Mari Kondo’s Tidying Up.

That said, we now have the tough task of picking a new queer person to lift up until they fly too close to the sun and burn out. Any takers?