Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss
Tags: romantic, storytelling

Plot synopsis:
Billy Collier (Sean P. Hayes) is an aspiring photographer in Los Angeles who has had little artistic success and much romantic frustration. He comes up with the idea of recreating iconic screen kisses from Hollywood movies (such as Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr's in From Here to Eternity) using drag queens in the female roles. While out for coffee with his roommate Georgiana (Meredith Scott Lynn), he meets Gabriel (Brad Rowe), the server. That night at a party, Billy's friend Perry (Richard Ganoung) agrees to finance Billy's Screen Kiss project and Billy serendipitously runs into Gabriel. Billy recruits him to model and the two develop a friendship (although Gabriel says that he has a girlfriend in San Francisco).
Billy quickly becomes infatuated with Gabriel, but cannot figure out if Gabriel is really straight; Gabriel does little to help, continually sending ambiguous signals. At Perry's invitation, the two attend an exhibit by photographer Rex Webster, who tries to poach Gabriel as a model (and potential trick). Webster offers to take Gabriel to Catalina Island for an underwear ad shoot, sparking Billy's jealousy. Back at Gabriel's place, Billy and Gabriel seem to be getting closer but their rapport is interrupted by a phone call from Gabriel's girlfriend Natalie.
Billy shoots his first setup with Gabriel, the Lancaster-Kerr kiss. Following the shoot, Gabriel tells Billy that his relationship with Natalie is over. Billy mentions the Kinsey scale, on which Billy describes himself as a "perfect six," but Gabriel admits he does not know where on the scale he falls. Back at Billy's apartment, they continue to talk and drink and Gabriel asks if he can spend the night on the couch. Billy suggests that Gabriel sleep in his bed (ostensibly because of Gabriel's height), to which Gabriel eventually agrees. When the two are in bed, Billy makes tentative overtures, to which Gabriel seems to respond initially; however, Gabriel suddenly pulls away, after which Billy apologizes and gets up to sleep on the couch.
Gabriel gets the underwear modeling job and goes to Catalina. Billy follows after him to Catalina with Georgiana, who, on the rebound from her boyfriend, Andrew (Christopher Bradley), hooks up with drug-addled island resident "Gundy" (Carmine D. Giovinazzo). Billy crashes Rex Webster's (Paul Bartel) underwear shoot looking for Gabriel, but does not find him.
Billy eventually tracks Gabriel down at Rex's party later that night and the two talk on the beach. Billy relates to Gabriel how confused he was when he came out, saying, "I swore to myself that if I could ever be there for somebody, I would, so that that person wouldn't have to go through all the shit I went through. What I'm trying to say is, if you're having problems figuring out where you stand, even if you're not sure of what you're supposed to want-" Abruptly, however, before Billy can finish, one of Gabriel's fellow male models walks up to them. Billy instantly realizes that the two of them are in some kind of relationship with each other and Gabriel tells Billy straightforwardly, "Billy, I'm pretty sure what I'm supposed to want." Gabriel tries to soften the blow, but Billy rebuffs him. Billy feels hurt and humiliated and even wonders if Gabriel used him to get his modeling career off the ground. Later, Perry tries to console Billy, telling him that a few years earlier Perry had similarly fallen for someone who did not return his affections; Perry confesses that that man was Billy. The next morning, Georgiana has ditched Gundy. Billy and Georgiana then head back home.
The movie ends with the opening of Billy's "Hollywood Screen Kiss" series exhibition in Los Angeles, which includes his photos of Gabriel. The exhibit appears to be very successful and Billy receives many congratulations from various visitors. Perry shows Billy a magazine with an underwear ad featuring Gabriel and suggests that Billy give him a call. Billy demurs, saying he needs some time away. Toward the end of the night, after his friends have gone, Billy meets a handsome young man named Joshua (Robbie Cain) who enthusiastically admires Billy's photographic work. It is suggested that along with his newfound artistic success, Billy may at last find romantic fulfillment as well.
The film is punctuated with Billy's fantasy sequences of himself and Gabriel in pastiches of romantic film scenes, including the aforementioned From Here to Eternity and the films of Fred Astaire. Billy carries a Polaroid camera with him everywhere, and his reminiscences are illustrated with Polaroid photographs. The film in fact opens with such a monologue, with Billy relying on a series of Polaroids while relating how he grew up gay "in a small town in Indiana, where there's plenty of corn, fast cars, and straights. Lots and lots of straights. I mean, a lot." Billy's opening narrative demonstrates his awareness that he is in a film and breaking the fourth wall.
Several scenes in the movie are backed up by classic songs of bygone times sung by notable and lesser known divas; these are lip-synced by more or less the same troupe of drag queens, a running gag throughout the film.

Review: If you watch this movie expecting Sean Hayes to play a Jack McFarland ("Will & Grace") type character, you'll be disappointed.
He comes across a waiter/bass player (Brad Rowe as Gabriel, a character I'm not too crazy about) working in a coffee shop, who becomes his model & the object of his affection.
The sexual tension between these two can be cut with a knife (it's nerve wracking.) I especially like the scenes where Billy opens up to Gabriel about his life & experiences.
The story of this somewhat naive photographer trying to make it in Los Angeles, under another writer/director would have gone for the 'on your face' attitude, rather than give it the romantic tone Tommy O'Haver imparted on the movie.The performances are good.
Sean Hayes, who has gone to bigger and better things, is fine as Billy, the photographer.
Brad Rowe, as Gabriel, the object of Billy's love, is fine also.
Paul Bartel, Holly Woodlawn and the rest, do a fine job.Tommy O'Haver made a charming movie about people that are so normal they could be straight for all we know..
O'Haver must have summoned all his Indy Film clout to muster the likes of Paul Ganoung, Meredith Scott Lynn and the fabulous Paul Bartel to lend their talents both on and off the camera, but the coup of coups was casting Sean Hayes.
Hayes is superb as Billy, a struggling gay photographer yearning for love.
The rest of the film dances around the inevitable question and let's just say that things have a way of working out for the best, albeit differently from what we often expect.Actor, writer, director and absolute gay icon Paul Bartel, who unfortunately passed away a couple of years after Screen Kiss, is deliciously unctuous as a would be mentor.
The story about Billy who is often rejected by his love interests will give you a very different view of homosexuals, whom often portrayed as a group of people who have sex a lot and always change partners.
"Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss" Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Panavision)Sound format: Dolby StereoAn LA photographer (Sean Hayes) falls madly in lust with an aspiring model (Brad Rowe) who's been hired to pose in a series of pictures inspired by old-time Hollywood movies.
Spiced with dream sequences that recreate moments from Hollywood's 'golden age' (most impressively, an Astaire-Rogers dance routine between Hayes and Rowe to the strains of Petula Clark, with drag queens on backing vocals!), the film pays affectionate tribute to the movies of a bygone era, movies which inspire the leading character on his never-ending quest for perfect happiness.
Watch out for the magical scene in which Hayes and Rowe share a bed for purely platonic reasons, only to end up touching each other by 'accident'...Also starring Meredith Scott Lynn (STANDING ON FISHES), Richard Ganoung (PARTING GLANCES), Paul Bartel (EATING RAOUL), Carmine D.
At the end he finally get's his photos seen at a show and another friend introduces him to someone else that loves his work and you can see that he is probably headed for love again and you leave the movie feeling that he is going to live happily ever after with the new friend.I feel the movie is great because it takes a situation than we've all seen many times in movies about heterosexuals and switches it to the gay life.
The fact that this object of affection is another man throws an interesting twist that makes the audience realize that there is very little difference between gays and straights.
Very thoughtful, the wisecracking Billy spends the entire movie trying to figure out if Gabriel (His love from afar) is gay or straight.
Aptly described by its producer as a trifle, this is a cheerful little romantic comedy about a gay photographer (SEAN HAYES) who fantasizes about what it would be like to connect with a gay hunk (BRAD ROWE) who seems to be leading him on in a homo-erotic relationship that Rowe prefers to keep platonic.
Nothing really new has opened up food for thought.By turns, sad, wistful, funny, irreverent, with a cast full of what we call misfits (and rather shallow ones at that), it fails to do anything more than pass the time as the kind of interesting little gay trifle that gains sympathy for Sean Hayes' character.
Makes its point by having strains from Max Steiner's "Now, Voyager" as part of the background score.Certainly not for everyone, but amusing enough to please fans of SEAN HAYES who will no doubt like seeing him in a more restrained role than the gay man he played on "Will and Grace".
BRAD ROWE is a bit stiff as his fair-haired dreamboy (and would-be lover), lacking the ability to create any sympathy at all for his character by the film's end.
billy's Hollywood screen kiss was an excellent film and an awakening to people that gay people and straight people are all the same and just want to find love.
sean hayes played billy very well and put across his character in a funny sort of way.
if you don't like sean hayes you will still like this film because it is a comedy/romance and it portrays gay relationships.
BHSK is about a young man, Billy (Sean Hayes), who is a photographer and all he wants is true love.
But the thing is...Billy doesn't know if Gabe is a homosexual or not.Well I won't tell you the rest or give away anything but I will tell you this: This film is so great that you don't even pay attention to the fact that Billy is gay - you just wish he would end up with Gabe.
I know it may be a little extreme but hey...I love Sean Hayes and this movie..
Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss is an uplifting gay film that appeals to both heterosexual and homosexual audiences.
The movie starts out with a poloroid montage of Billy's early years, the sound effect of the camera got a bit too tiresome after the first 20 times!!
Aside from the heavily gay overtones, (musicals, drag queens, homo sex orgies, j/k) it was a romance movie of a different color, urr maybe of a queer color.
It's just a really nice, cute movie with a universal theme (developing a crush on a friend) and some hysterical drag queens performing various acts throughout.
Not every gay man acts like Jack, and in this movie, Billy is more of the serious type.
This movie certainly took me back to my youth as a young gay man trying to find romance, in a culture where youth and beauty usually wins out over true romance.The story follows Billy, of the title, a young aspiring photographer looking for success and love in LA.
Dis-satisfied with being the "other woman" in his current relationship, Billy "discovers" Gabriel (Brad Rowe) at a coffee shop and asks him to model for him for a new project.
Paul Bartel goes *way* over the top playing a Bruce Weber like photographer, openly and contempuously laughing at the people who purchase his "art" (the character obviously is doing it just to be near stunningly handsome, near-naked men that are young enough to be his grandchildren) and the character of Whitey was just plain annoying.However, despite some of the cliches, Hayes' performance reveals the splendid sense of comedic timing we would later see in his supporting role on "Will and Grace"; he often puts Brad Rowe to shame in their scenes together, Rowe often seems a  stiff and wooden next to Hayes, often looking like he just doesn't "get it".Overall the movie's a cute piece of fluff, a nice popcorn date movie..
I doubt that this film was intended to make any serious social commentary other than, perhaps, that gays are quite capable of poking fun at themselves.The movie was funny and amusing.
Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss is a delightful film that should be seen and enjoyed by gays and straights alike..
A Little Lacking in Credibility, But Still Fun. It's a little hard to imagine that Billy's project of recreating "screen kisses" with gay guys would really fly, but the movie still has a lot to commend it.
Hayes, is very appealing--so much so that you can FEEL all that anxiety when Gabriel agrees to spend the night and tumbles into Billy's bed.
Tellingly, the most vivacious character in the whole film is a straight woman (fetchingly played by Meredith Scott Lynn) and the only man-to-man kiss on display is played for a cheap laugh.
"Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss" is by far the best film in its genre.
Unlike most Q-cinema films that leave you with a bittersweet ending and a sinking feeling in your stomach, this film turns into a very sweet love story with a twist ending that encompasses the qualities of both a hilarious comedy and a touching romance-drama.
The film opens with a witty narration by Billy like something you might see in "Jeffrey," but slowly develops into something deeper and more meaningful, and ends with a sweet scene that is very uncommon of this genre.
Hayes.The one drawback is that the object of Billy's affection is played by the handsome but rather dull Brad Rowe..
Sean Hayes plays the title role as a gay man who makes his living
Rowe gives a great performance of a sexually confused man who could probably get anyone he wants in the straight or gay world.
The story here is of a gay artist/photographer looking for a satisfying and loving relationship played by Sean Hayes.
6 Months before Sean Hayes became a household name in "Will & Grace" he got great reviews for this film.
In this film Sean plays Billy.
When Billy comes up with the idea of recreating iconic screen kisses from Hollywood movies (such as Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr's in From Here to Eternity) using drag queens in the female roles.
Hayes) is a photographer working on a series of pictures featuring recreations of movie kisses, with drag queens playing the female roles.
While Billy is openly gay, Gabriel says that he is straight and even claims to have a girlfriend.
If you love Sean Hayes then you'll love Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss.
Its just a great movie that talks about a gay guy looking for love and he finds like the love of his life but he doesn't know if he's gay or not.
This very nicely photographed film is not going to go down as a great classic.But it is entertaining with very likable characters.Actor/Director Paul Bartel (Eating Raoul, Scenes from the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills) has a good role as a gay photographer.The fantasy movies that run in Billy's head are very nicely done.
I found the movie charming, and the character of Billy especially so.
The odd bits of drag and performance art were just annoying filler.Sigh.I will say that the "connection" between Hayes' and Rowe's characters does work and the scene where they are in bed together is played very well.
(For those who haven't seen the movie, don't get too excited about the idea that there is a bed scene between them -- it's a good scene, but not what you're thinking.)But, as at least one other reviewer has pointed out, the way that their relationship is left -- specifically the way Rowe's character behaves in his last scene, simply doesn't fit with how he's behaved (or what we've been told) before.
What is missing are mature writers and directors (and I realize that "mature" in Hollywood means, at most, 35 but even that would be an improvement) making films about gay life when it has moved beyond the issues that pertain either to the coming-out/lost loves of early adolescence period or to the lives of gay men during the screw-around and party and try to get a boyfriend stage..
Sean Hayes, a gay unhappy in love (can we put that stereotype to rest PLEASE?) photographer falls in lust (understandably) with handsome, hunky Brad Rowe.
This movie tries (too hard) to appeal to gay and straight audiences and ends up doing neither.
The acting is pretty good (especially Rowe), but the movie is just bad.
While out for coffee with straight girlfriend Meredith Scott Lynn (as George, short for Georgiana), Hayes admires model-perfect waiter Brad Rowe (as Gabriel).
Later, he meets Mr. Rowe at a shallow party and offers the young hunk a job modeling for a series of photographs he's taking of beautiful young men kissing drag queens...Not to put this film too far down, but it fails if we're supposed to question whether or not Rowe's character might be gay or bisexual.
Most of the time, "Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss" plays like a "gay film".
Still, the music and dream sequences add an exceptional charm, both celebrating and lifting us out of the genre.******* Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss (1998-06-04) Tommy O'Haver ~ Sean Hayes, Brad Rowe, Richard Ganoung, Meredith Scott Lynn.
"Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss" is a small 1998 film about a gay photographer (Sean P.
Hayes) who falls for a young Brad Pitt/Robert Redford type waiter named Gabriel (Brad Rowe) but isn't sure if he's gay, straight, or undecided.
He uses Gabriel as a model for some of his photographs, which are re-enactments of famous movie scenes, and tries to figure out where he stands.There are some nice performances and neat touches in this film, including some fun drag numbers by Mr. Dan and Billy's dream sequences.
The best scene in the film is a bed scene between Billy and Gabriel, strictly PG-13, that says more than pages of dialogue ever could.The late Paul Bartel plays an older, successful photographer, and Days of Our Lives fans will recognize Matthew Ashford as his boyfriend.
Hayes is the best thing about this movie..
I recommend this movie to anyone, gay or straight, who has had an unrequited love.
This is a delightful little film that will appeal to a mostly young gay male audience.
Poor Billy just couldn't get his true love on side - a familiar tale that many gay guys could relate to only too well, especially when they fall for that elusive straight boy in the neighbourhood.Billy played a cute role, the story was basic yet sweet.
Sean Hayes' talent made the film "doable," but thankfully he has gone on to a better role, though still steotypical, in Will and Grace..
With Sean Hayes (from the inexplicably popular "Will and Grace") as Billy; and Brad Rowe as the dream..
I scanned the comments to see if this had come up, but unfortunately it had not.Richard Ganoung, who plays the older friend who does in fact plant the titled kiss, starred in one of my all-time favorite (and rarely seen) gay movies.Ganoung was the male lead of 1986's Parting Glances.
He went from being the youthful object of affection to the older man longing for his younger friend.Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss can't hold a candle to Parting Glances, which also features early work from Steve Buscemi and Kathy Kinney before her Drew Carey fame.I highly recommend getting the video and watching both films to see the different ways gays and relationships are portrayed.Ratings.....
"Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss" is something I think gays have been missing for a while; that is, a simple, fluffy, light-hearted, funny love story.
This isn't a complicated film, and if you're looking for a movie that gets all angst-filled and dramatic with its portrayals of gay relationships, this isn't it.
This film has some clever material in it, including the mini-movies that Billy sees in his head.
What would had been interesting, and ground breaking, would had been if the Brad Rowe character had turned out to be straight and he and Billy would have continued to be close and loving friends.
I am not even suggesting a happy ending (I think the only gay-themed movie with a satisfactory ending is "Beautiful Thing"), but the one we got left the audience (who didn't pay, at the screening I was at), numb..
The story revolves around Billy (Sean Hayes) and his infatuation with a seemingly straight man named Gabriel (Brad Rowe) who he meets at a coffee shop and convinces to do some modeling.
Before long a more famous photographer on the L.A. scene, Rex Webster (Paul Bartel) is threatening to swoop down and take him away from Billy before he gets to finish his photo shoot.Much of the film is consumed with Billy's self-doubt about his relationship with Gabriel  is he merely engaging in "fantasy projection" of his desire onto an apparently straight man (who assures us at every opportunity that he has a "girlfriend in San Francisco") or has he fallen in love with the improbably handsome busboy?
Since this was one of Bartel's last roles that's kind of disappointing.I did enjoy Hayes' work, I thought it was fine within the limits of what he was given for the character.Not really a terrible movie but really just not funny enough to be worth it..
I suspect the screenwriter attempted to do a combination of all of the above and simply failed to come up with a smoother and more logical ending.Brad Rowe plays the role of the handsome hunk Gabriel, a painfully stereotypical butch-boy character that most gay men can only fantasize about.
But he, quite predictably, turns out to be an insensitive, flake who toys with the emotions of his rather average-looking admirer, Billy, a gay victim-of-unrequited-love stereotype played quite well by Sean Hayes.All through the movie, Gabriel keeps us guessing about his sexuality, from his troubled relationship with his girlfriend (whom we never see), to his homoerotic lead-ons with Billy (especially in the bedroom scene), and to his hanging out with a really goodlooking guy and girl at the Catalina sioree.
At the end of the movie we want to feel sorry for Billy, his having been dumped by Gabriel for a super goodlooking guy.