May 30, 2008  |  By: GREG MARZULLO  | COMMENTS     

Flowing fabrics, anonymous sex, couture, heaps of shoes and the tried-and-true friendships of best girlfriends — of course, we’re talking about “Sex and the City.” Gay fans everywhere will be queuing up to catch the long-awaited film, which opens May 30, although some might want to check theaters before heading out. Many area multiplexes, including Georgetown, Gallery Place and Regal 10 Bethesda, are already selling out opening day screenings.

Starting in 1998, the series about four single (and sometimes not) women living in New York became a runaway hit that spanned a total of six seasons and ended in 2004. Not surprisingly, the girl-power story, which came with regular doses of hot men, amazing clothes and gay BFFs, became a gay cultural icon.

“I think that on some level gay men identify with the friendship between the four women,” says Stephen Tropiano, the founding director of the Ithaca College Los Angeles Program and the author of “The Prime Time Closet: A History of Gays and Lesbians on Television.”

The show’s (and movie’s) creator Michael Patrick King is gay, and a gay sensibility is written all over the storylines of the series — some cultural critics have even suggested that the four women are just archetypes of gay men.

However, Tropiano offers a different reason for the affinity between characters and their gay fans — the way women and gay men talk about and deal with sex and emotions.

“We’re probably a little bit more open, much more than straight men are,” he says, adding that many television shows and films are written “to appeal very much to heterosexually defined emotions.”

GAY ‘SEX’ ADDICTS also saw themselves, and their relationships with their straight girlfriends, in Carrie’s gay best friend Stanford (Willie Garson) and Charlotte’s wedding planner, stylist and friend, Anthony (Mario Cantone). While these characters are somewhat peripheral in the series and the film, that doesn’t seem to be so much of a slight to gay characters as it is narrowing the show’s focus to the women.

“As much as gay men are marginalized, I think the straight men are also not extremely fleshed out,” Tropiano says with a laugh, citing Carrie’s eternal love interest Big as the perfect example. That character’s fear of commitment and desire to be with the heroine fueled six seasons of (sometimes tired) plotlines.

Deep cultural analysis aside, let’s not forget that part of the show’s gay sensibility was its sumptuous visual sense and its ability to capture the ethos of turn of the 21st-century New York, including the post-Sept. 11 blues.

“[The show] focuses on things like fashion, consumerism, materialism, the shoes that a lot of gay men are interested in,” says Tropiano, acknowledging that there’s more than a grain of truth to the stereotypes about gay men.

“There is this sort of crossing over so much now of gay culture into mainstream culture. I think about all the reality shows that have to do with being able to dance, being able to cook, dress well, decorate — there’s this cottage industry. I think that this show and film is probably not hesitating about trying to tap into that at all.”

‘Sex’ and marriage

Ten long years have passed since the “Sex and the City” girls captured gay hearts everywhere with their musings on living single in the Big Apple. No topic was taboo (remember Mr. Funky Spunk?) and no dress was too outrageous.

With a brilliant opening montage that quickly recaps the journeys of the four leading ladies, the film “Sex and the City” quickly brings fans and neophytes up to speed, simultaneously letting the viewers know that our heroines are wrangling with the challenges of adulthood — love, marriage, stability and identity.

However, before you worry that this is a down-in-the-mouth flick about fabulous girls who go boring, there are plenty of shoes, hats and bolts of eye-popping fabric mixed with one-liners and hot asses to keep the tone of the film as glam-tastic as humanly possible.

Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker, who unbelievably seems more beautiful than ever) and longtime paramour Big (a frequently touching Chris Noth) are apartment hunting, and given Big’s big bank account, they settle on a gorgeous penthouse. During their search, they decide to tie-the-knot, and very quickly, a quiet affair turns into a guest list of 200, a Vogue wedding shoot (culminating in a Vivienne Westwood gown that, as Carrie says, “could bring a wedding tear from even the most unbelieving of women”) and the renting of the New York Public Library as the venue.

In the midst of all this, Miranda (Cynthia ...