In the two decades since Noah’s Arc premiered on Logo, it has not only become a touchstone for Black gay men, it’s also cemented its place in television history as a groundbreaking, one-of-its-kind television series.
Launched on the fledgling LGBTQ+ focused network in October 2005, the show centered on the lives and loves of screenwriter Noah Nicholson (Darryl Stephens) and his tight knit circle of besties, Alex (Rodney Chester), Ricky (Christian Vincent), and Chance (Doug Spearman). Noah’s Arc was series creator, writer, and director Patrik-Ian Polk’s direct response to the utter lack of thoughtful, nuanced depictions of out and proud Black gay men’s stories in film and TV, and the series spoke volumes to a demographic that had largely been ignored by Hollywood up to that point.
The show’s two-season run may have been short, but it’s had a long and meaningful afterlife, not only in the hearts of fans, but also in a 2008 follow-up film, Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom and a 2020 reunion special, Noah’s Arc: The ‘Rona Chronicles (filmed during the pandemic).
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It’s been a while since we’ve had a chance to catch up with Noah and the crew, but that’s about to change! Later this month, Paramount+ and Showtime are premiering an all-new feature length film, Noah’s Arc: The Movie, catching up with the characters in 2025 and marking the show’s 20th anniversary.
In the run-up to the new film’s premiere, we’re looking back at Noah’s Arc and digging up some fascinating facts about the groundbreaking series.
1. The series originated as an independent web series.
Series creator Patrik-Ian Polk originally envisioned Noah’s Arc as an independent web series. He and the show’s cast filmed three shorts, which he later edited together to create a short film. When Logo picked up the show, Polk reworked and reshot the original shorts for the series’ two-part pilot.
2. Polk based characters in Noah’s Arc on his friends.
“When this show started, my career as a filmmaker was about not seeing myself anywhere on screen. Not seeing any of my friends anywhere on screen,” Polk said in 2020.
Frustrated by that lack of representation, he wrote characters that reflected his own experiences and those of people in his life. Economics professor Chance Counter (Doug Spearman) was based on Polk’s real-life best friend, a tenured college professor who was dating a man with a child at the time.
“That’s what it was about, and that’s what all of my original work has been about: Where are we on the screen?” Polk said. “I want to see myself, and I certainly don’t want a young Black gay person of color to have no representation and not see themselves and have no idea of what their life can be.”
3. Noah was at least partially based on Polk.
“He’s a hopeless romantic, which I am hopelessly romantic,” Polk said Noah in 2020. But he also put a lot of his own experiences as a Black gay screenwriter trying to make it in Hollywood into the show’s title character. “When I created Noah, it was about wanting to show the life of a creative and how it’s ups and downs, it’s not always financially rewarding, it’s a struggle.”
4. Darryl Stephens wasn’t the first Noah.
When Darryl Stephens auditioned for the initial web series, the lead role of Noah Nicholson had already been cast. Stephens originally read for two other roles: Ricky Davis — who he described as “the Samantha of the group, the slutty one” — and an employee at Ricky’s shop.
5. Stephens didn’t think he was ready to play a character like Ricky.
Stephens felt he was better suited for the shop clerk role. “I figured I could play the store clerk better, because I don’t think I had tapped into my slut at the point in my life, my personal inner slut,” he explained in 2017. He ended up landing the role of Duane, the shop clerk, who the actor described as “sexy, but in his own sort of like kinda homo-thug way. I figured I could do that. I was amped!”
6. Polk decided to reshuffle the cast before filming began.
About a month before filming on the web series was scheduled to begin, Polk told Stephens he was thinking about recasting some of the roles. The actor said in 2017 that he immediately assumed his character of Duane had been cut. Instead, Polk offered him the title role.
7. Stephens wasn’t the only candidate to play the part of Noah.
Christian Vincent, who would ultimately go on to play Ricky, also auditioned for the role of Noah.
8. Noah’s Arc wasn’t the web series’ original title.
Both Stephens and Polk have said that the original working title for the project was “Hot Chocolate.” The main character’s name changed at some point during its development from Jermaine to Noah.
9. The show’s title has layers.
Of course, the title Noah’s Arc is a play on the familiar biblical tale. But “Arc” isn’t just a reference to progression of the title character’s story. As Polk told GLAAD IN 2022, it’s also an acronym for the other three main characters. “Once I settled on the name Noah, I already had Alex and Ricky,” he explained. “But the other character was originally called Solomon. It hit me that if I changed Solomon to a ‘C’ name, then I could call the show Noah’s Arc…and that’s how Solomon became Chance, so I could rename the series Noah’s Arc.”
10. A vocal issue initially forced Stephens to pitch his voice up to play Noah.
Looking back on the series in 2023, Stephens explained that speaking in a higher register as Noah was a character choice that was also born of necessity in Season 1.
“When we shot that show, I was going through something vocally where I had more control over my voice in a higher octave,” he said. “So, it was actually a choice to put my voice in that octave for the character, but also I had more strength vocally in that place.”
After the issue resolved itself, he continued to speak in Noah’s distinctive higher register for consistency in Season 2. However, he largely abandoned that in 2008’s Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom, speaking for the most part in his natural voice.
11. The role of Trey was recast while the web series was still filming.
Shaun T appeared in the second installment of the original web series as Trey Iverson, Alex’s longtime partner, but was replaced by Gregory Keith in the third webisode. Keith continued to play the role in the Logo incarnation and its subsequent spin-offs.
12. Noah’s Arc was Logo’s first original scripted series.
When Logo launched in June 2005, its programming primarily consisted of reality shows, docuseries, syndicated sitcoms, and movies. Noah’s Arc premiered the following October, becoming the fledgling LGBTQ+ network’s first original scripted show.
13. One character got a major reinvention for the Logo incarnation.
The role of Junito was completely reimagined. The version of the character played by Carlos Tineco in the web series was a go-go dancer “with an ass that would make JLo jealous.” By the time Wilson Cruz first appeared as Junito in the sixth episode of the Logo series, the character had been reconceived as a doctor.
14. Viewers initially took issue with the characters’ “flamboyance.”
In a 2023 interview, Stephens recalled the show getting blowback early in its run for its depiction of Black gay men who skewed more effeminate. For the first few months, he said, “it felt like the majority of what we were hearing was actually not positive. It was disappointment in the flamboyance or the femininity of the characters. It was umbrage around the just sort of fabulosity and how there wasn’t enough inclusivity in terms of the spectrum from masculine to feminine of the main characters.”
Stephens put it more bluntly in a 2022 interview with GLAAD: “Truth be told, when the show dropped in the fall of 2005, there had been a contingent of Black gay men who felt like the show’s main characters were ridiculous and didn’t honestly depict the down-low/straight-acting culture that was so prevalent in gay spaces back then. They felt like centering ‘four flaming queens’ on a show about Black gay men was like airing our dirty laundry.”
15. The series tackled that femmephobia head on.
Stephens said in 2023 that the response to the show’s comparatively effeminate characters shifted dramatically after a Season 1 episode in which his character confronts boyfriend Wade for trying to butch him up around his straight friends.
“People who experienced that sort of marginalization in their own lives, feeling like they were too effeminate to be taken seriously by their family or their friends, and seeing that character be the sort of hero, the romantic lead changed the entire conversation for them,” he said.
Stephens has also cited that episode as one of the show’s most impactful. “I think Patrik’s decision to so candidly address [femmephobia] got a conversation started that led to a seismic shift in the Black gay culture’s celebration of unapologetic femmes,” he told GLAAD.
16. Polk wrote and performed original songs.
In addition to writing and directing every episode of Noah’s Arc, Polk also contributed original songs to the show’s first and second seasons, as well as the 2008 follow-up movie, Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom. Polk also wrote and performed every song featured in the show’s 2020 reunion special, Noah’s Arc: The ‘Rona Chronicles — with one very notable exception…
17. Janet Jackson was a fan.
In a 2016 interview, Polk was asked to name the proudest moment of his career. “Getting a phone call from Janet Jackson telling me that she watched Noah’s Arc and really, really liked it,” he said. The singer also gave Polk permission to use her 2015 song “Gon’ B Alright” as the theme for the show’s 2020 reunion special.
18. Noah’s Arc has given Polk access to all the divas.
“There is not a Black female music superstar — rap, pop, R&B, whatever it is, and even some of the non-Black ones — there’s not one of them that I cannot get to,” Polk said in 2020, “Because they all have at least one Black gay man in their immediate circle — and usually more [than one] — and all those Black gay men are Noah’s Arc fans!”
19. Wanda Sykes proved she was a fan by quoting one of the show’s catchphrases to Polk.
The series creator explained that he first learned that Sykes was a fan of the show after she posted about it on social media. “She responded to a Noah’s Arc post or something,” Polk said. “And I wrote her back and said, ‘You ain’t seen no Noah’s Arc!’ And her response was one word: ‘boogina.’ And I lost it!” Sykes went on to appear in the 2020 reunion special as Noah’s mother — and received a Daytime Emmy nomination for her performance.
20. The series influenced some of today’s biggest LGBTQ+ Black and brown film and TV creators.
Polk has said that Pose executive producer Steven Canals, The Chi creator Lena Waithe, Dear White People writer-director Justin Simien, and Moonlight screenwriter Tarell Alvin McCraney have all cited Noah’s Arc as having influenced their work. “All these wonderful young Black, brown, queer artists who are doing all this amazing work, and they all point to Noah’s Arc,” Polk said in 2020.“Steven literally said, ‘You were the blueprint.’ Lena Waithe was like, ‘Oh my god, I can’t believe I’m finally meeting you!’”
21. There still hasn’t been anything else like Noah’s Arc.
The series is widely recognized as the first of its kind: a scripted television series entirely focused on the lives and loves of Black gay men. While it paved the way for shows like Pose, which centered trans women of color, and for Black LGBTQ+ representation generally, nearly 20 years after its premiere, there has not been another series devoted exclusively to telling the stories of Black gay men on American television.
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