T elevision has come a long way when it comes to its portrayal of gay men and women, LGBT themes and the entire spectrum of orientation. In the past, gay characters, like many minority characters, were portrayed as the comic relief. Billy Crystal's legendary performance in the edgy series Soap was more or less played for laughs. The same is true of early forays into gay themes. "Jack Tripper" wasn't gay in Three's Company, but his pretense was also comical.
After those early efforts, television seemingly turned to more realistic portrayals, or at least, common ones, in the form often of television movies about coming out, the struggles of identity and acceptance. While more serious, these too tended to continue the pattern of gays and lesbians as the "other."
