Writer Russell T. Davies has said that
as a gay man he worries about the rise of Disney+.
Best known for Queer as Folk
(BBC), Doctor Who, and Cucumber, Davies, 57, questioned
why Disney's streaming platform, Disney+, scuttled gay teen drama
Love, Victor to Hulu, which it also controls, and what that
move means for LGBT content.
Davies made his remarks during an
appearance at the virtual Edinburgh TV Festival.
“Can I just say my one negative worry
is the rise of Disney actually,” Davies said. “I love a Disney
show. I love a Disney film. I love these things, but that is a
giant.”
“Disney+ is barely a year [old] and
it is vast already. It's already started charging for your live
action Mulan, so you can see the money rollercoaster towards it. And
my great worry with huge monoliths like that is it's family oriented.
It's family friendly.”
“[Disney+] had a series called Love,
Victor, which is a television spin-off of the film Love,
Simon, which is a gay series. They moved it on to Hulu. They
commissioned it and developed it, then they moved it.”
“Disney is out to buy all of these
companies and will keep buying them. And then, as a gay man, I'm
sitting there going, 'Well, where's my content?'”
Davies added that of the 3,931 hours of
content Disney+ launched with, he could “watch the gay content in
half an hour.”
Davies had praise for platforms such as
BBC, Netflix and HBO.
“From my point of view, I'm looking
for gay material, popcorn stuff like Stranger Things – what
a great lesbian character in the last series. It's very, very
exciting,” he
said.