We pulled apart the script materials, the investor deck, the kickoff call transcript, and the actual canon of queer film coverage in 2024 to 2026. Here are ten distinct angles, four of them recommended as primary, and a four-tier outlet map of 152 verified or inferred targets to pitch them to. The goal is festival programmer awareness ahead of the May 8 TIFF window — and a press footprint that travels with the film through October.
Four primary, six alternate. Primary angles carry the broadest legs across outlets; alternates are best deployed for specific writers, beats, or follow-up waves.
Most gay love stories blame society, the family, the love interest, or the closet. In Between is the rare gay romcom that says the obstacle to the love story is the protagonist's own self-rejection — and asks whether you can fall in love with someone before you've made peace with the fact that you exist.
A "husky" gay man has not been the romantic protagonist of a wide-release gay romcom since Big Eden in 2000. In Between makes the bigger gay leading man the camera's subject, not the camera's joke — and makes the love story about him, not around him.
Krystal Joy Brown stars in the Merrily We Roll Along live capture premiering on Netflix December 5. While that film opens, her own producing project — a queer indie romcom about self-acceptance — is making its festival run. This is the Broadway-to-indie pipeline that nobody's mapped yet.
In a year when Hollywood is gutting creative jobs to AI, In Between hired a human for every creative seat — every writer, every actor, every editor, every composer. The film's medium is its message: human stories, made by humans, for humans.
Ted Hope coined "nondependent" at Sundance 2026 for a new model of indie filmmaking — self-funded, audience-built before distribution, creator-owned. In Between is exactly that. They Indiegogo'd, leafleted gay bars to fundraise, and are building an audience email list before festival selection so they can prove demand to distributors directly.
In an administration actively rolling back LGBTQ+ protections, the smallest political act is also the most stubborn — falling in love and laughing about it on screen. In Between is not a political movie, but the act of making it is.
In Between treats mental health like a real thing inside the love story, not as the love story's punishment. Nick deals with depression and intrusive thoughts on the way to falling in love — not to ennoble him, not to make him tragic, just because that's what's actually happening.
Beau is the British Adonis Nick has been told to want — and the moment he gets him, Beau starts treating him as a shameful secret. The film's emotional core is the specific, devastating experience of being wanted in private and refused in public by the person you most wanted to be seen with.
Julian Burzynski (3M TikTok), Aaron Goldenberg (1.1M TikTok), and Nicole Sky are not stunt-cast; they are working actors whose audiences came with them. In Between built its cast for cultural reach, not just craft credits — and the result is a queer indie that has a built-in distribution channel before it's even premiered.
The In Between team is Atlanta-based — Nicholas, Juli-Ann, half the cast, Eric Cappuccio. Atlanta has been a tax-credit production city for years; what's emerging now is a queer indie creative scene that lives there year-round, makes its own work, and isn't a Hollywood satellite.
If we're picking two angles to lead with for the next 30 days, this is what we recommend. Hold the others for sequenced waves.
"The Romcom Where the Villain Is You" is the angle every other angle stems from. Use it for the core press release, Substack essayists, and long-form essay outlets across all four tiers.
"Bigger Gay Men Don't Get the Love Story" as the second pitch wave for body-image, LGBTQ+ representation, and Tier 3 outlets. This is the angle that gets community shares.
"The Anti-AI Indie" as the industry-trade pitch. This is what gets Filmmaker, MovieMaker, IndieWire industry desk, and Hammer to Nail to take a meeting.
Hold Angle 03 (Krystal / Broadway) for the November/December push when Merrily Netflix premieres. Hold Angle 07 (mental health) until Trevor Project is in motion. Use Angles 5, 6, 8, 9, and 10 as outlet-specific variants when a writer's beat fits.
Sourced via web research on public bylines, About pages, masthead pages, Substack profiles, and personal sites. Full contact paths and email addresses live in the internal research files (not on this site).
Grassroots NYC writers, Substack essayists, queer film podcasters, neighborhood blogs, college papers. The bottom-up tier. Where festival buzz starts.
Critics, reporters, and programmers' favorite trade writers who actually attend and review films at TIFF, NewFest, OutFest, Frameline, Inside Out, Palm Springs. Their coverage signals legitimacy to programmers and distributors.
Independent film magazines, mid-tier queer press, theater/Broadway crossover, culture long-form, Atlanta press, indie podcasts, body-positivity press, queer-Asian press. Carries weight without the trade gatekeeping.
Variety, Deadline, Hollywood Reporter, IndieWire industry, Screen International, NYT, New Yorker, Vulture, LA Times, Rolling Stone, Out, Advocate, them., NPR, Guardian/BBC. Beyond the existing one-name-per-outlet starter list.
Per signed SOW: 20 press targets and 15 outreach emails per month. We sequence so the May 8 wave hits the highest-leverage contacts first and the rest stack against the festival calendar.
The Yearning (NewFest community partner), Aidan Wharton (Fire Island/Bros credit), Murtada Elfadl (NewFest programmer + Variety critic — double purpose), Marc Zinaman, NewFest submission by May 5, plus the existing Tier 4 contacts already on Elle's starter list.
Hunter Harris (Hung Up), Joe Reid + Chris Feil, Coleman Spilde, W42ST (Hell's Kitchen), Hell Gate, Brooklyn Paper, Drew Burnett Gregory's Substack. Tier 1 grassroots + Tier 2 critic-circle.
Filmmaker, MovieMaker, Hammer to Nail, Anne Thompson at IndieWire (Anti-AI angle). Aubrey Gordon, Da'Shaun Harrison, Tagg, Pride Source/Q Syndicate (body-pos angle).
Festival critic circle (Tier 2) reactivates around TIFF/NewFest dates. Theater press for Krystal angle as Merrily Netflix promo cycle starts in November. NYU + Columbia student arts press once school resumes.
Five locked spokespeople (per signed SOW). Each angle has a recommended lead. We don't route press to anyone outside this list.
Five answers before the first email goes out. We hold all outreach until you confirm.
Once you lock the answers, we'll refine the two lead angles into a one-page pitch with headline + opening paragraph for each, build the May 1–7 outreach list inside our SOW caps (15 emails / 20 targets), and send everything for your final approval before any outbound goes out.