Dexter Hemedez and Allan Ibanez | Stay / 2023

sending him back home

by Douglas Messerli

 

Dexter Hemedez and Allan Ibanez (screenwriters and directors) Stay / 2023 (TV miniseries, 7 episodes)

 

Stay, a limited TV series of only 7 episodes, is a truly delightful offering that features mostly Asian actors, the lead, Andre (performed by actor/singer/internet sensation Sebastian Castro,* who himself is of Philippine heritage), a young man from the Philippines who is traveling for the first time to the US having just won an award for a short film; with Korean-American Ellis Cage (actor/vocalist/playwright) playing Joshua, a young man living in Los Angeles of Korean background, and drag queen, born and raised in the Philippines, Bombalicious Eklaver as Andre’s dearest friend back home.

     Staying at a fairly expensive motel, Andre, who had planned to immediately return home, has his head turned by a shyster who claiming to be a Hollywood Producer, promises the boy that he will meet all of his favorite stars, and cons Andre out of $3,000, half of the money that Andre’s mother has entrusted to him from her life’s saving for his Los Angeles visit. Meanwhile, looking for a cheaper flat, he meets up with Joshua, who insists upon a sum of money, paid in advance, which Andre no longer has.

 

    Despite Joshua’s determination to drive a hard bargain, we see he’s a soft spot, and he allows Andre a two-week stay on a floor mattress, while he sleeps in the bed. And before long, he has cut his own hours short in a liquor store in order to provide a part time job for the naïve Andre. Meanwhile, to make ends meet, he also works as a taxi driver, keeping the fact for a while from his new roommate.

     Both men throughout the series, in fact, keep secrets which helps cause confusion, given Joshua’s cold demeanor and Andre’s puppy-dog like fidelity and faith. And it doesn’t take long before their personality traits cause chaos.  

    In reaction to a xenophobic customer who tells him to go back to China, Andre is beaten; later overhearing his gushing goodbye to his “bestie” Besh, Joshua mistakenly thinks that Andre has a boyfriend back in the Philippines, despite his current flirtatiousness with his current roommate.

     What we gradually discover is that Joshua in some respects has been as as naïve as Andre, having helped a previous young immigrant, Ivan (Jeff Chen), remain in the US by marrying him only to discover a year into their “marriage” that Ivan had been having an affair for several months with another man.

    Andre, who by this time has a crush on Joshua, discovers that his roommate has had that other “affair” only when Ivan stops by the liquor store to return a T-shirt that Joshua has supposed given to a charity and that he had given Ivan for their anniversary.

    As quickly as they resolve what even they describe are situations that arise because of cultural misunderstands of the “lost in translation” variety, the roommates Andre and Josh find themselves facing new dilemmas, despite their growing love and respect for each other and their attempts through cooking to help fill their stomachs and make their way into each other’s heart.

     Andre’s mother, who is now working as a maid in the Middle East, is less startled to hear that her son has now less than half of her life savings left, than she is that Andre is attempting to remain in the US without papers which might allow him to work, let alone with no green card—truly hot political topics today which even the series’ creators could not have foreseen.

     After seeing a lawyer, Andre becomes convinced that all will be well if only he can convince Joshua—whom he has already fallen for and who, in turn, agrees that he “likes” Andre—to marry him, the only problem being, as I mentioned above, that Joshua is still married and that despite the way Ivan has treated him, he admits that he is still having a difficult time getting over his past love affair.

    He insists that Andre return back to the Philippines where he at least can write films, convincing him that he has no room any longer in his heart for another lost immigrant, and there is no longer room for the boy in his bed to where Andre has graduated. Yet both young men take their leaves of one another in tears and utter sorrow, with Andre returning home in a deep depression that even the wise Besh can’t pull him out of.

    She, however, insists he write an angry email to Joshua, which he does, only to erase it and, for the first time, realize just how selfish he has been, recognizing how much Joshua had given up for him just to allow him to survive, and realizing that Joshua was actually calling out for help, truly needing his love at a time he felt it necessary to push his roommate away.

      The sad ending has led almost all the enthusiastic viewers of this series to call for a second season to allow these two cute charmers to work it out. But obviously the writers/directors weren’t given the funds or approval to continue what they described as a mini-series from the start.

     But they do provide us with a great many clues to possible alternative endings as Andre finally writes a feature film which is scheduled to premiere in New York, and Joshua assures him he will be in attendance. Whether the two still have the magic of love between them is debatable (when Andre calls Joshua is on his way with two friends to the WeHo [West Hollywood] gay bars), but they do still at least have a chance to put their lives right and come together as the couple those who watched this series recognize them as destined to be.

       If at times these episodes remain light fare, in the just seven half-hour shorts Hemedez and Ivanez have also briefly dealt with issues of immigration, xenophobia, cultural confusion, the transitoriness of many gay relationships, the difficulties of being gay in a still often homophobic world, as well as the general dangers inherent in any large and culturally diverse city like Los Angeles. The streets may be glistening—and in these directors’ hands the metropolis of LA never looked more beautiful—but we recognize for all there is betrayal and more serious dangers around every corner—and I haven’t even mentioned the fact that Andre’s father, who when Andre previously discovered his whereabouts in Los Angeles had e-mailed him, changed Facebook accounts, refusing to even acknowledge his son, having left Andre’s hard-working mother as a US military man even before Andre was born. When Andre accidentally encounters him on the street, asking, “Don’t I know you,” the bully, out for a morning run, pushes him to the ground.

     It seems amazing, given what Andre has learned about this great city, that he still might wish to “stay,” but then that is what love does to one, isn’t it?

       This is all pretty strong stuff for a genre in which Andre keeps referencing as Asian K-Pop and Boy Love cinema.

 

*I review some of Sebastian Castro’s music videos in these pages.

 

Los Angeles, July 5, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (July 2025).