While Pride Month, always celebrated in June, is already coming to an end, the series remain a refuge for finding fabulous LGBTQIA+ characters. Here are 5 fictions and documentaries to discover on SVOD platforms: Drag Race France on France TV Slash, Farewell my shame on Canal+, A League of Their Own on Prime Video, Heartstopping on Netflix and pride on Disney+.
Each year, Pride Month is an opportunity to celebrate the LGBTQIA+ community as it should be, between political battles and joyful Prides organized around the world. And since the performance also takes place on our screens, it is also an opportunity to discover colorful works. For the most cinephiles, we have already concocted a selection of 4 flamboyant films. But for fans of the small screen, magnificent series are also available on SVOD platforms.
So you have the choice between putting on your best outfit for Drag Race France on France TV Slash, fight against homophobia in football with Farewell my shame on Canal+, test your baseball skills with A League of Their Own on Prime Video, melt your flabby little heart with Heartstopping on Netflix or retrace a history of LGBTQIA+ struggles with pride on Disney+.
Drag Race France on France TV Slash, the reign of the best queens
You dreamed of it: France TV did it. In 2022, the public service group finally adapted the iconic show Ru Paul’s Drag Race in a beret and chopstick format, with Queen Nicky Doll at the helm. A revolution on French television, which was a phenomenal success for its first season. In this competition, several drag queens compete each week in parades, singing, dancing or comedy events. Drag Race France thus takes up all the tasty codes of its elder, by adding its little personal French Touch.
After the coronation of Paloma last year, the show resumes service for a second season, from this Friday, June 30, 2023. The opportunity to follow 11 new candidates (including Cookie Kunty, the revelation of Three nights a week) in their quest to become the queen of French drag. You can already meet them thanks to the Meet the Queensavailable on France TV Slash. Drag Race France, it is thus the promise to enjoy a new episode every week, with the same intensity as a thrilling detective series, so quickly we become attached to these sparkling and ferocious drag queens. The icing on the cake: the show carries real political messages on transphobia, homophobia, racism or grossophobia.
- Watch if you liked: Ru Paul’s Drag Race ; Queer-Eye ; Three nights a week
- Must see if you are looking for: competition; drag queens; humor ; for all ; feel good ; political subjects; importance of representation; long episodes; fun and benevolent show; find Kiddy Smile and Daphné Bürki in the jury; legendary lip-syncs; redo your stock of iconic gifs
Farewell my shame on Canal +, the sensitive portrait on homophobia in football
It’s a fact: homophobia is still far too present in French society, but especially in sports circles such as football. Ouissem Belgacem, promised a great career as a professional player, had to sacrifice his dreams of light to be able to live his sexual orientation freely. Already the author of an autobiography released in 2021, the former budding football star continues to raise awareness of the homophobia that plagues the environment with this documentary series.
In just 4 episodes of 30 minutes, Farewell my shame paints a moving portrait of Ouissem Belgacem, surrounded by his family and former sports colleagues. He recounts the ravages of toxic masculinities, but also how he himself participated in homophobic behavior to survive in these football clubs. A deep, thoughtful, detailed testimony, which shows how discrimination can literally shatter lives and dreams. Farewell my shame is a difficult, but necessary, and strangely hopeful series.
- Watch if you liked: Gays in France; The invisible ones; Ted Lasso
- Must see if you are looking for: documentary series; sport ; intimate testimonies; soccer ; discrimination; coming out; Company ; fight against homophobia; (re)discover the incredible journey of Ouissem Belgacem
A League of Their Own on Prime Video, feminist and queer baseball
Passed almost unnoticed when it was released last summer, A League of Their Own (Or An extraordinary team in French) is nevertheless an invaluable treasure for the entire queer community. Devoted to the pioneers of women’s baseball in the 1940s in the United States, the series paints an important and never boring portrait of these ultra badass sportswomen. We follow the stories of Carson Shaw, who left her life as a housewife for her dream as an athlete and Max Chapman, who is racialized and cannot even participate in the trials to join a baseball team. Two crossed destinies, mixed with that of other independent women, including Greta, embodied by the brilliant D’Arcy Carden (The Good Place).
More or less adapted from the eponymous 1992 film, A League of Their Own takes the side of developing a story centered on female characters, who suffer from many discriminations, between homophobia, racism and sexism. As Ted Lasso in its field, the series gives pride of place to sport, but above all does not forget to highlight the players, their doubts, their trials and their loves, in particular lesbians and bisexuals. A deeply queer nugget, which we can’t wait to discover the (very short) season 2 and its small 4 planned episodes.
- Watch if you liked: A League of Their Own (the film) ; Bliss ; Betty ; Friday Night Lights ; GLOW ; The Good Place
- Must see if you are looking for: sports series; historical drama; well done lesbians; long episodes; sorority ; inspiring; baseball; humor ; gold casting; love ; to get better ; 1940s in the United States; want to take up baseball; an incredibly touching episode 6
Heartstopping on Netflix, the cloud of romantic sweetness
When it comes to queer representation, one recent series in particular comes to mind immediately: Heartstopping. Adapted from Alice Oseman’s graphic novels, this little bubble of good humor and love takes us alongside Nick and Charlie. These two English high school students, one popular rugby player and the other shy geek, will gradually discover their respective feelings, under our eyes filled with tenderness.
Available on Netflix, Heartstopping is a cocoon of fresh air, which highlights gay characters, but also transgender, in a benevolent plot with wishes that does good. Finally, LGBTQIA+ stories can rhyme with positivity, in this delicate romantic tale, which has easily risen to the top of the best Netflix series of the moment. Note that the timing is impeccable to view it, since season 2 of Heartstopping will finally be available from August 3, 2023.
- Watch if you liked: Love, Simon ; Young Royals ; Sex Education ; Normal People ; my first times
- Must see if you are looking for: LGBTQIA+ romance; candy ; kindness ; feel good ; teenagers but all public; cartoon atmosphere; short episodes; pastel colors; Olivia Colman as adorable mom
- Go your way if: you don’t like the dripping marshmallow of love; you hate geek and wise teenagers; you are grumpy and you don’t like anything, we see no other explanation
pride on Disney+, the retrospective of LGBTQIA+ struggles
Long erased from history, queer people have nevertheless fought for their most fundamental rights for decades. The documentary series pride finally does them justice and gives all the attention they deserve to activists, from the first hour or more contemporary. Each episode of this retrospective therefore focuses on a decade in particular, since the 1950s, detailing all the great moments in the history of LGBTQIA+ fights such as Stonewall or the discovery of AIDS.
We thus discover many figures little known in France in these 6 fascinating chapters, fed by testimonies, sometimes unpublished, of personalities as essential as the author Audre Lord, the trans pioneer Christine Jorgensen or the activist Madeleine Tress. pride has the intelligence to mix these archives with more current interviews but also with reconstructions, embodied by actors like Alia Shawkat (Search Party). You won’t get bored for a second watching this joyful and motivating documentary series, which reminds us that the fight is far from over.
- Watch if you liked: When We Rise; A Secret Love; Viewable: Out on Television; Trans Identities: Beyond the Image
- Must see if you are looking for: documentary series; History ; LGBTQIA+ fights; discrimination; testimonials; long episodes; militancy; for all ; end Pride Month with ideas for future struggles
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