TV REVIEWS : Gay Comedians Are Showcased in ‘Out There’

It may feel liberating for the lineup of comedians that come out, as it were, before the nation on “Out There,” TV’s first all gay men and lesbian comedy special (airing at 10 tonight on Comedy Central), but for the viewer grown weary of the canonization of victimhood, or group play as art, the hour is mostly a trial.

Host Lea DeLaria, dressed in a double-breasted dark blue suit, no shirt, bobs before us like a cross between Rosie O’Donnell and Lou Costello jumping to MTV, and at one point yells a punch line to the audience, “I have a vagina!!!” Thanks for sharing, Lea.

That should give you an idea of the general level of self-righteous aggression and reverse sexism that characterizes most of the rest of the show (HIV-positive Steven Moore takes revenge on a Southern redneck in a bar by offering, “Hey, Goober, can I have a sip of your beer?”). Whatever happened to subtlety and wit? Sorry, wrong era.

Bob Smith delivers a classically pared down observational routine on being a gay boy that could play anywhere, and Pomo Afro Homos and Joan Jett Black offer a bright and breezy sendup of the Home Shopping Network (Black’s tresses, we’re told, are from Jane Fonda’s post-”Barbarella,” pre-”Klute” period). But the rest of the lineup is either locked in attitude or laminated in self-parody. There is no there “Out There.”

For masochists awaiting their own special, and until then, the show repeats Saturday at 1 a.m., Sunday at 11 p.m. and Jan. 1 at midnight.