Turn on the television on Wednesday night and ABC will show you three young children and their breeder parents driving a Toyota Sienna – and an A-list gay couple with adopted Vietnamese baby girl driving the ever-so-hybrid Toyota Prius.
If you are alive today, product placement is so important, be it GROWLr, Grindr or the Great Gazoo. Since the pilot episode, Toyota wisely chose to strike a deal with Modern Family for their cars that appear in every episode, which is more often than gay legend Nathan Lane appears as the fussy queen and BFF Pepper Saltzman.
Not everyone, however, felt this arrangement worked for the hit show, as evidenced by Brian Steinberg of Business Insider. Modern Family’s brain trust was taken to task for promoting Toyotas during the nasty recall of 2009-2011, when vehicles appeared to have unintended acceleration. Even NASA ultimately found that there was no defect with Toyota’s design, but jury awards grew and it became a PR nightmare. Indeed, thinks got ugly and looked dark, but you’d never guess today that it crimped Toyota’s style or appeal. Everybody’s favorite television stereotypical A-list couple, Cam and Mitch, is still driving a Toyota and loving every gay moment of the ride. (Well, I think the girlz are still in Toyotas, but I haven’t watched yet this season.)
I couldn’t help but be inspired, as is often the case when Cam and Mitch tease my gay spine, or Sofia Vergara stirs up my Latin-peppered soul. Hmm. Bears, Latinos, comedy? Time to go to Texas.
Texas Bear Round Up (TBRU, as the ursine set calls it) happens every year in Dallas right around Spring Break. Over 2,000 big men with big appetites converge for four days of G-to-X-rated fun. When you’re hauling that much of a payload from leather bar to hamburger stand, there is no time for an underperformer. I got a brand-spanking-new Toyota Camry Hybrid XLE Sedan, one of the higher end trims to go with the brand spanking that the night would eventually become. I asked Amy for something sturdy but fun, peppy buy roomy, practical yet splashy. I also ask for the same thing in a lover, but fortunately for the Dallas Bears, Amy was better able to accommodate my desires.
What’s so gay about the Toyota Camry? (On cue): Everything! But really, it really is. Style, fun, pep, chic, flair …. The list goes on and the complaints are few. The Camry is still one of the most stolen in cars in America. You know you’re hot when everyone is trying to pinch you, even in broad daylight.
There really is nothing new for the 2014 Camry. It got the full makeover in 2012 and it is still working the runways and the midways with the same dazzling chic of Michelle Obama. To be sure, she changes her look more often, but the Toyota Camry is still reinventing itself without having to pay Beverly Hills salon prices. (In all fairness, the First Lady rocks J. Crew, and honestly, how few people can do that?)
Obviously, I am into gushing and gushers, but in a nutshell, here’s what’s great and gay about the Camry:
Style: This car is elegant without needing DeBeers or Donatella to make it stunning. All for around $35K is indeed a purr-fect theft – but without the cat suit.
Roomy: I got five bears into this car and there was still plenty of room for backpacks, groceries and even a couple of cases of Shiner Bock, a Texas beer. To be sure, straight guys carry more baggage, starting with their golf clubs and purchases for their wives that need a couple of muscle breeders to pick up, throw down and install to fit.
Parking: The crowd may be tight in Dallas, but the parking is even tighter. The Camry can slip into any Kum n’ Go slot quicker than you can say “tell me your name again, buddy.”
Tech Savvy: Toyota understands that as a Gay-on-the-Go, you need your devices. All that can be handled through the dash, and even Cher can’t interrupt when that dreamboat from Adam4Adam – who just might Meet (You) in St. Louis, marry you in Minnesota and make you get a job in Mecklenburg – comes calling.
(Note: Unless you like a Big Bang Sheldon Cooper challenge, stay away from the optional Entune integration system. It’s clearly capable, but it is rather confusing. After a few attempts at oneness with the satellite universe, I was longing for my tape deck.)
As with most Toyotas, Lexuses and Scions, you will look great in this car. If you do eat or sip in your car, wiping up after an oral orgasm has never been so easy. Across the board, reviewers love – and have always loved – the Toyota Camry. All those straight guys with golf clubs can’t be completely wrong, can they, Green Hornet?
To be sure, Toyota is definitely giving Subaru for a run its money as the gay automotive brand. Gosh, when you have something compact, sexy, comfortable and sleek, who wouldn’t want to get inside it?
Cam and Mitch will go nuts when Toyota comes out with a Camry trim where the trunk opens up into a five-star dining table.