Seriously, dude, it was a joke: Fox canceled the straights-play-gay reality show Seriously, Dude, I'm Gay before it aired. Was it a hoot, or was it homophobic? You won't get to find out.

When Fox Television shelved its two-hour reality special Seriously, Dude, I'm Gay just days before it was scheduled to air, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation declared a victory.

Seriously, Dude was seriously homophobic, insisted the media watchdog organization. The show--in which two seriously straight guys have to spend a week in West Hollywood trying to win $50,000 by convincing everyone they know that they are gay--embodied "some ludicrously sophomoric notions of what it is to be gay," GLAAD's entertainment media director, Stephen Macias, declared, even going so far as to suggest that should Fox air it, the network could put gay people "in harm's way."

But the out gay men behind the show are furiously crying foul. "It's unfortunate that a group as well-intentioned as GLAAD is going to set themselves up as censors and judge what other people should be allowed to air or see," says comedy writer and occasional Advocate contributor Christian McLaughlin, the creative consultant on Seriously, Dude. "Our primary purpose was to be funny, but if people actually got to see the show, they would probably be more tolerant of gay people in the future."

"I am gay; I have a boyfriend; I live in West Hollywood; I have gay friends," says Seriously, Dude executive producer Ray Giuliani. "The idea that I would do something I would consider homophobic is crazy. [The contestants] walked away learning something about what it feels like to be a gay man in the middle of a straight world."

"GLAAD should have no problem with the show because gay people do not come across negatively in any way," says Jackie Beat, the famed drag queen, who appears in Seriously, Dude in his male guise as one of the contestants' "mantors." "What they don't see is that it's obviously poking fun at the straight dudes."

The competitors, one a 22-year-old student from Florida, one a 28-year-old salesman from Massachusetts, certainly get to voice their prejudices in the show while undertaking challenges such as coming out to their best friends or going on a gay date. "I feel like I'm trapped in gay hell" was one comment; "Going on a dale with a gay man is my ultimate nightmare" was another, and both expressed fear that they might be touched inappropriately by their mantors.

Contestant Larry Anderson, the salesman, is now living in Los Angeles and pursuing an acting career. He admits he is shocked that Fox dropped the show. "I think the show showed that the stereotypes people have aren't true," he says. "I realized that there is no way to act gay; you are just your normal self. That definitely came out in the show." He says his experiences on Seriously, Dude as well as living in Los Angeles have freed him of the negative stereotypes he previously held to be tree.

"Are the two guys homophobic?" asks Giuliani. "Yes, but that's the way people think. That's how people are. Ignorant. I have no problem saying what really happens when a straight guy moves into a house full of gay guys." Moreover, says Giuliani, what could be more delicious than the idea of two straight men being thrilled that a jury of gay men (dubbed "a jury of their queers" in the show) think that they are gay?

"We were not intending to cure cancer or win a Nobel Prize or even an Emmy," notes McLaughlin. "The whole thing is a joke, but the notion that it is hateful and dangerous, as GLAAD said, is absurd, especially when I think of all the gay and straight talent involved in the show."

Anderson says that some of the footage shot between him and his mantors ended up on the cutting room floor. When he comes out to his best friend in the show, he says, it may appear callous, but the conversations he had with his mantors beforehand made it more meaningful. Only they didn't make the final cut.

Macias remains adamant that Seriously, Dude had a "faulty premise from the start." "When we saw it everyone at GLAAD was equally mortified," he says. "it wasn't that we could suggest adjustments: The whole tiring was problematic."

GLAAD requested a meeting with Fox's entertainment president Gall Berman, but on May 26, just hours after the meeting was scheduled, Fox announced that it was pulling the show from its lineup and replacing it with a screening of American Pie 2.

So what went on behind the scenes at Fox during the controversy? While the official line was that the show was canceled due to "creative issues," an inside source at the network suggests that the GLAAD intervention was welcomed at Fox, where executives believed the gay reality phenomenon was on the wane after the flop of Playing It Straight and dwindling ratings for Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

"As an artist and performer, I am not a big fan of GLAAD," says Beat, "but it would be a mistake to say that GLAAD is the only reason it didn't make it on the air. Fox was clearly not madly in love with the show, and maybe they felt like they'd seen it all before. If any good can come from this, it is that we're getting to the point where maybe gay and shocking isn't good enough. First you've got to be good."

Goodridge is U.S. editor of Screen international.