Tales of the City

Created by Lauren Morelli

2019

Keywords: Sexual diversity, gender diversity, conjugal relations, friendship, LGBTQ+ rights

For: adults and teens

Trigger warnings: nudity, homophobia, transphobia

Description: A middle-aged Mary Ann returns to San Francisco and reunites with the eccentric friends she left behind. “Tales of the City” focuses primarily on the people who live in a boardinghouse turned apartment complex owned by Anna Madrigal at 28 Barbary Lane, all of whom quickly become part of what Maupin coined a “logical family”. It’s no longer a secret that Mrs. Madrigal is transgender. Instead, she is haunted by something from her past that has long been too painful to share.

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Netflix’s series Tales of the City is a continuation of Mary Ann and her tenants’ adventure. The audience got to know them with the series of books (1978-2014) written by Armistead Maupin and with the mini-serie in 1993, 1998 and 2001. The 2019 version offers a logical continuation for the characters embodying multiple sexual and gender identities, and for their romantic and sexual adventures. It creates a connection with their past. This version is not as revolutionary as the previous ones; the 1993 version was introduced in the middle of the AIDS crisis and talk without taboo homosexual and lesbian romantic and sexual relations. This version attempts to bridge the gap between two generations that sometimes misunderstand each other: one hit by the AIDS crisis and eager for social equality, the other living in the age of the “politically correct” and defying the notion of gender.