‘Fellow Travelers’: Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey Open Up About Their Decades-Spanning Queer Political Drama

In their new show, Fellow Travelers, Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey tackle a decades-long political thriller, with a hidden romance at the center of it all.

“Fellow Travelers is about two people who meet in the ’50s, and the course their connection takes over the subsequent decades,” Bomer says in Showtime’s behind-the-scenes look at the new limited series, which is based on the book of the same name by Thomas Mallon.

While Mallon’s book sets the romance between Bomer’s D.C. fixer Hawkins Fuller and Bailey’s up-and-coming staffer Tim Laughlin firmly in the McCarthy era, the show starts in the ’50s, but then progresses throughout the next 40 years, tracking the on and off pair through the Lavender Scare, the free love era of the ’60s, the Vietnam protests of the ’70s and the AIDS scare in the ’80s.

“It’s amazing to study four decades of queer culture, so that we can hopefully understand ourselves a bit more,” Bailey marvels in the clip.

The transformation of the eras shines in the costuming, makeup and production design, and the cast admits to being blown away by the level of detail given to each era.

“So much of the detail of this world, to make it timeless, is through the creative teams and the design,” Bailey shares. “Queer culture blooms like a flower, and that’s exactly what you get to see in terms of the monochrome colors of the ’50s, through to the ’80s where there’s sort of this neon pop of color.”

Allison Williams, who plays Lucy Smith, Hawkins’ increasingly suspicious partner agrees, saying, “Fiction against a historical background has a way of just making it live and breathe in you, in a way that other art can’t.”

A contrast to Bomer and Bailey’s characters’ relationship is provided by Jelani Alladin as Marcus Hooks and Noah J. Ricketts as Frankie Hines, a black queer couple who are put through extra levels of scrutiny and violence for their relationship — particularly Frankie, who is a drag performer.

“I’ll never forget walking down the hall in my black dress and having the seas just part for my entrance,” Ricketts recalls. “Then I got how powerful drag is, and why we do it.”

For Fellow Travelers‘ four leads, all queer men in real life as well, the series is an important piece of art, as well as historic culture — and not just because of what it reveals about the past. 

“It’s what I consider conscious content,” Ricketts says. “Not only is it dramatic and entertaining, it also touches on themes that are still present today.”

Fellow Travelers premieres Oct. 27 on Showtime.

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