Buddy flicks are often rom-coms in disguise, especially when mind-altering substances are involved. Who among us isn’t looking for an excuse to let go of inhibitions and embrace some familiar warm buns? While the BFFs in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle claim to crave dubious fast food, it’s clear their true affections also waft in another direction.
Sure, the eponymous protagonists sniff out weed and women, but they also chase their dreams — and a deeply homosocial bond with each other.
There’s already so much that was gay about this movie upon its 2004 release. And in light of Kal Penn’s recent revelation that he is gay, engaged, and (hopefully) plans to invite me to his “big ass Indian” wedding, Harold and Kumar has assumed a deep, meta-textual queer resonance. Yes, this might be the edible talking. But these are also facts based on highly scientific analysis of the film.
The stoner comedy, which spawned two sequels with a potential third on the way, is pure of premise. When two friends, played by Penn and notable snack John Cho, get high and set off in pursuit of steamed meat, antics ensue. But the movie also smartly confronts stereotypes lodged at Asian Americans, detailing social dynamics many of us actually encounter, like parents who staunchly steer us toward medical school (raises hand) or assumptions about our work ethic.
And because Asian American men are often feminized by dominant culture, a bunch of meatheads keep joking that Harold and Kumar are gay for each other. The duo also engages in no-homo humor themselves, and the vibe is ribbing rather than intolerant. The joke isn’t that Harold and Kumar might be gay, but that only a mouth-breather would make that assumption.
It’s a sly distinction that sets the movie apart from others of the era that leaned into gay panic for cheap laughs. And the movie’s queer bona fides are ever more obvious in retrospect, regardless of Penn’s newly carved place in the gay Hollywood Mount Rushmore of my mind.
Below, allow me to present the case for admitting Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle into the queer cannon.
X content
This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.
Chris Meloni knows a thing or two about stacked buns, and he’s hiding in plain sight in Harold and Kumar. The Law & Order: SVU star and renowned zaddy icon plays a boil-covered handyman who rescues the boys when they spring a flat tire. Even when covered in prosthetics, including an actively oozing neck wart, Chris Meloni is hot. There is no disguising it. The friends are about to get jiggy with his hot wife when Meloni’s character walks in and proposes a foursome. Not taking him up on the offer is clearly their biggest mistake.
The How I Met Your Mother star famously plays a hypersexualized version of himself in Harold and Kumar. He steals Harold’s car and later speeds past them flanked by topless women sticking out of the sunroof. That’s after he licks the front seat and tells them he’s craving “fur burgers” (he’s hitchhiking and high on ecstasy). Looking back, there’s a playful juxtaposition between the heightened, absurdly womanizing Harris of Harold and Kumar and the Harris who came out as gay two years after the movie was released. Harris also reprised his role in both sequels.
Even NPH’s unbridled libido is no match for Kumar’s love of weed, the real central queer romance in Harold and Kumar. When he fatefully encounters a ginormous bag of bud at the police station, Kumar daydreams their entire life together, for better (yes, he makes love to it) and worse (their marriage has its problems). Seeing the way Kumar looks at weed, one knows true love is possible and comes in infinite forms, conformity be damned.
After Harold and Kumar get carjacked, they stumble upon a cheetah that escaped the local zoo, tame him with cannabis, and ride him through the darkened woods. While we in no way condone toking with an animal, or saddling one that is not meant for such purposes, this sequence is gay as hell in the best ways. Two men astride a jungle cat, the wind whipping their hair until a branch knocks Harold out cold? Those are called queer rights, pussycat.
Kumar also licks Harold awake from an unconscious dream about his love interest, saying he figures Harold would wake up if he “did some gay shit.” It’s another meta instance of no-homo humor that pokes fun at the idea of gay panic rather than mining it directly for laughs.
When Harold and Kumar steal the truck of their punk nemesis, they find a mixtape filled with Sapphic hits and wind up belting along to Wilson Phillips. The chorus of “Hold On” doesn’t just distill what they’ve learned on their way to stuff beef down their throats, it’s a queer anthem for the ages. “Don't you know, things can change / things’ll go your way,” the chorus asks. “Can you hold on for one more day?” Thanks to this edible, and the gay (as in happy) meal that is Harold and Kumar, my answer today is yes, I can.
Get the best of what’s queer. Sign up for them.'s weekly newsletter here.
