‘We Need Our Triumphs’: Queer Comics Take Center Stage in New Netflix Doc ‘Outstanding’
Page Hurwitz knows funny. The longtime director and producer has spent her two-decade career in Hollywood working on some of the biggest and boldest comedy productions and stand up sets from comics like Wanda Sykes, Tiffany Haddish, and Michelle Buteau. But over the years, she noticed a history playing out in front of her eyes — one she wasn’t sure the average person was aware of.
“While comedians don’t set out to be activists or cultural leaders — their goal is just to make people laugh — queer comedians happen to to shift the culture along the way,” Hurwitz tells Rolling Stone. “It’s important to not only tell the personal narratives comedians share, but also put them within the historical context.”
Her answer? The new documentary Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution, which follows a slew of LGBTQ+ comics through a historic night of comedy at the Hollywood Bowl, and a step by step history of how queer comedy has evolved in the past 100 years. Intercutting interviews with performances, personal meetups between comedians, and archival footage, the documentary dives deep into influential queer figures in the comedy world, and how their individual careers pushed LGBTQ+ movement forward. It also features performances from Eddie Izzard, Joel Kim Booster, Mae Martin, Billy Eichner, Wanda Sykes, and Bob the Drag Queen .
Rolling Stone caught up with Hurwitz to discuss the heavy lift of charting queer comedy’s history, and why she thinks this film is so important at comedy’s current cultural moment.
How did you decide you wanted to create a live show and filmed special to be part of this documentary?
I wanted to make a documentary for a long time about the history of queer stand up and its impact on the culture. I thought it was an important story to tell, because queer comedians have been so important in the march toward queer liberation. I pitched this in 2019 and I when I pitched it to Netflix, I wanted it to be dynamic. So I thought, “You know what? It would be great if we put together a standup show,” and [bring] together as many trailblazers and emerging voices as possible and get them all on the same stage and let that serve as sort of this really energized spine of the film. And it just took on its own life.
What were you determined to make sure came across on screen?
We need our celebrations. We need our triumphs. And ultimately the film is a lesson in perseverance and resilience. It’s about time and celebrating all of these incredible queer comedians who, no matter what was thrown at them, just kept going. And and I think we need those stories.
With so much queer history often relegated to the sidelines, what was the most interesting or shocking thing you learned while making the film?
There’s so many things that I love about it, but it’s hearing the stories that you don’t know, especially about people you think you’ve heard everything about already. I really wanted to tell stories that were going to be new for audiences. I think we tend to look at things through a 2024, lens and it’s important to remember what came before, who came before, how this history was made. When we were researching and we were finding all of this great material that Lily [Tomlin] had done in the Seventies, especially the Star Spangled Night for Rights concert, it was remarkable. We were able to get one of only two copies of that concert that exists today.
So for you, as someone who’s kind of lived and breathed this programming in all of these different iterations, what’s so special to you about the documentary in particular, and why do you think it’s so important for this to come out right now?
I think it’s important right now, because it is sort of this reminder of the resilience of the human spirit, and particularly in the queer community and with queer comedians. At times it has almost seemed Sisyphean — as we take a step forward, it feels like we take 10 steps back — but ultimately we’re making progress. For example, anti trans rhetoric, we’ve seen this before. It’s a pain and it’s really annoying to keep doing it, but we’ve managed to overcome it each time, whether it’s the Lavender Scare or Anita Bryant or homophobia during the AIDS crisis. I think it’s important for us to remember, so that our stories are not just mired in trauma. So we can also celebrate our triumphs.
Where do you hope Outstanding will live in the culture in the years to come?
If I could have anything happen, I hope we have so much progress in the next 10 years that [Outstanding] will seem quaint. No, of course, time marches on. So I hope that it can be a great resource for people going forward. And also, there’s myriad ways to tell the same story. So someone may come out with a documentary next year saying, “You know what, I want to tell it this way.” And that’s good too. I think the more of our stories that we tell, the better.