The upcoming 22-hour TV drama Queer as Folk, which debuts on the Showtime cable network on Dec. 3, will shatter numerous taboos about the depiction of sex on television, the New York Times reported today (Monday) after viewing the opening two-hour episode Thursday night at a premiere in New York co-sponsored by the Gay Men's Health Crisis and Showtime.

The episode, it said, features numerous explicit depictions of gay sex. "We pushed this as far as we could go," Tony Jonas, a former president of Warner Brothers TV and an executive producer of Queer as Folk, told the newspaper. "In a way, it's a giant step for cable."

The series, based on a controversial British drama by the same name, has drawn expressions of envy from several network TV producers and sneers from others, the Times indicated, citing several network and cable execs who told it that Showtime was treading a path between daring and sensation for sensation's sake with the series.

Source: Studio Briefing