BET, Fox, CBS
Awards Season is upon us, which basically means it's time to talk about all of the shenanigans we've endured from previous awards shows.
The 2024 season has already seen some queer love (and some queer snubs), both in the awards categories and at the actual awards shows themselves. Although it may seem weird to think some queer megastars haven't really displayed much PDA on the red carpet, it actually doesn't happen that often.
Regardless, queer love at awards shows has been a thing for about 20 years now since Madonna shared a kiss with Britney and Christina (which we will talk about in juuuust a moment), and we're hopeful that 2024 is just a glimpse into how much more of it we can expect in the future.
For now, check out these 10 best queer kisses shared at awards shows over the last 20 years.
Believe it or not, it has, as stated above, in fact been MORE than TWENTY years since Madonna pre-broke the internet by sharing a dual kiss with fellow pop icons Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. This was the kiss heard, seen, felt, and put on repeat around the world, and it was all anyone could talk about at the time as far as "scandals" and what "should" be allowed on TV. This was also the first time any type of same-sex kiss was captured during an awards show like this, so we're grateful to Queen Madge for making it happen.
We all know Lil Nas X knows how to stir some controversy and get people talking, which was exactly what he did at the 2021 BET Awards when he leaned over and kissed one of his backup dancers. Considering he's admitted that much of his debut tour was inspired by Madonna, it's likely this kiss also derived from the iconic moment mentioned above. Regardless, this was just Lil Nas X being sexy and rebellious in only the way hcan do, and we wouldn't have him any other way.
Before Nas X, American Idol runner-up and frontman for Queen, Adam Lambert, was also not one to shy away from any controversy, proudly displaying his gaydom from the moment we met him. In 2009, after his season of Idol wrapped, Lambert performed the hit song "For Your Entertainment" off of his debut album at the American Music Awards. Toward the end, Lambert leaned over and kissed his bass player, which he said ABC threatened to sue him for.
When Poor Things won the 2024 Golden Globe for Best Musical or Comedy, two of the movie's stars, Mark Ruffalo and Ramy Youssef, had an awkward embrace that ended up becoming a pretty hot kiss. In the clip above from Entertainment Tonight, Youseff admitted that his mouth "was going toward his mouth," and Ruffalo finished the sentence for him by saying, "And then mine went into his." Ruffalo has also describe the kiss as "hot," and we do have to say we agree.
Just a week after Ruffalo and Youseff shared a smooch, over the the Emmy Awards, The Bear co-stars Matty Matheson and Ebon Moss-Bachrach shared a passionate kiss during Matheson's acceptance speech for the group winning Best Comedy. In the Access Hollywood clip above, Matheson said Moss-Bachrach was "sneaky," though he didn't seem overly upset about the interaction.
Now on to an actual queer couple, shall we? At the 2024 Emmy Awards, Fire Island star Joel Kim Booster shared a kiss with his video game producer boyfriend John-Michael Sudsina. First of all, this couple is just too cute for words, and we're going to file them away into the "should be illegal for being so hot" category. Secondly, we're stoked that these boyfriends are able to be loud and proud like this at an awards show, especially considering that little tidbit about Lambert getting threatened with a lawsuit for doing the same thing. Now that we're just casually accepting male intimacy -- with the 2024 awards season at the forefront for these types of interactions -- we're just hopeful that society as a whole starts to get with it and get over it.
Back in 2022, fiancées Kristen Stewart and Dylan Meyer shared a kiss while walking the red carpet at the Oscars. The couple still remains engaged, and had previously announced their engagement a few months prior at the end of 2021. No controversy struck anywhere over this kiss, which could also elude to the misogyny that still runs rampant within Hollywood, where female-on-female interactions have been more "accepted" and viewed as "sexy" as opposed to man-on-man. Still, we're happy anytime we see some PDA from queer couples, so controversy or not, we're not mad about this one.
In one of the more unlikely places to spot a gay kiss, we'll land on the 2021 Country Music Award when The Brothers Osborne took home the award for Vocal Duo of the Year and brother T.J., who had just come out of the closet, kissed his boyfriend Abi Ventura for the world to see as his brother, John kissed his wife, Lucie Silvas. The best thing about this was, even though there was a little bit of shock considering the conservative listeners who tune in to country, it's mostly just viewed as two brothers sharing a kiss with their loved ones over a shared excitement at winning a great award. Considering the brothers took home the same award for the Grammys a few months later, the kiss didn't seem to hurt their reputation, and T.J. continues to be a beacon making changes in the country music industry when it comes to queer acceptance.
Speaking of totally unexpected, let's talk about Christian Bale for a moment and the double gay kiss he had at the 2016 Critics Choice Awards. When Bale won the Best Actor award for his role as Michael Burry in The Big Short, he first shared a kiss with his wife, which is pretty standard. Not as standard was him leaning over to kiss director Adam McKay -- twice -- followed by an additional kiss with screenwriter Charles Randolph. As soon as he hit the stage to offer his acceptance speech, he started out by saying, "That was such a lovely makeout session with my wife and with Adam and Charles. We all really got to know each other very well on this film."
Anybody else here for some BTS scenes that delve a little deeper into this?
Last but not least, we have PRIDE's very own Ricky Cornish, who went viral for basically kissing everybody at the 2023 GayVN Awards red carpet and effectively awakening the jealousy from every gay man around the world. As Cornish tells it in his own words after describing how each star kisses, he admitted that Max Lorde was the best one, despite some people preferring to watch him kiss someone else. Check out the first video that went viral above, followed by the compilation Cornish put together of the experience below.
