Queering the Grand Tour with TV's Rob and Rylan
By Thomas Gibbs
One of the greatest struggles as an art history student is finding a way to share your passion without just talking at them for hours or dragging them around dry, dusty museums. Luckily last year the BBC produced Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour, the perfect way to ease your philistine family into the world of fine art. The premise is simple: 200 years on, two stars recreate Lord Byron’s grand tour. Along the way they meet artists, tour guides, and historians passionate about Italy’s history, and its present.
Both hosts are now firmly established on the British cultural scene, and usually referred to with the prefix ‘TV’s’ (as in TV’s Rob Rinder and Rylan, appearing in pantomime near you). That’s the term we use for celebrities who haven’t really done much but seem to keep hanging around. The reason they hang around, of course, is that they’re very charismatic, and it is the two hosts that elevate Rob and Rylan’s tour above the average travelogue.
Rylan Clarke (left) and Rob Rinder (right) pose in Venice. Image: BBC.
In a situation mirroring many a student holiday I have been on, Rob is an art-lover, passionate about seeing all the finest culture Italy has to offer, Rylan meanwhile is there for the food... and the men. However, this rather cliché dynamic is enhanced by the genuine friendship and trust the pair share, Rylan is willing to give Rob’s galleries a chance, and – in every art historian’s dream scenario – he ends up enjoying it (‘going to a gallery, and staring at a piece of art, isn’t as boring as I thought it would be… I’m getting it’).
Rob, for his part, undergoes something of a transformation too. Aided by the art, the climate, and a fair dose of red wine, the pair start to open up about their struggles with their mental health, why they hold their passions, the dark side of celebrity, and the painful divorces the two of them both recently suffered. The whole affair is presented as a healing opportunity. When Rylan arranges for Rob to conduct the Four Season’s in Vivaldi’s home church of Santa Maria della Visitazione, the tears in his eyes are genuine. The real key moment of the first episode, however, is when he agrees to join The House of Serenissima drag collective in a drag walk through Venice. Rob insists on wearing a masquerade mask, and both hosts reflect on the historical rule-breaking such masks allowed, but his real reasons are quickly made apparent as an Italian youth starts shouting homophobic abuse at the group.
Rob and Rylan (centre back) pose with The House of Serenissima drag collective in front of the Bridge of Sighs, screencap from Episode 1. Image: BBC.
The show engages, in a way few travelogues do, in the political issues shaping modern Italy, and especially with the position of LGBT people (a camp into which both presenters proudly fall) after the election of the far-right Brothers of Italy party in 2022. This something that came up repeatedly in conversation with artist friends when I was last in Italy, and its nice to see the BBC engaging with real issues in what could otherwise be quite a fluffy TV show.
The art history is decidedly amateurish: ‘For years, civilisation was in like a dark age. Here they re-found culture, they re-found art, they re-found themselves.’ explains Rob, uncritically, as they stare over a Florentine vista. However, primitive comparisons like those between Donatello and Michelangelo’s Davids perfectly walk the line of being accessible, without being patronising.
I certainty still learnt a lot from the pair’s narration, for example that Florence was such a hub for gay grand tourists that ‘Florenza’ became a slang term for a gay man. Following in the footsteps of Thomas Patch, the 18th century English artist who most famously portrayed Florence’s raucous lifestyle, the pair head to a gay bar to drink and dance the night away. They don’t shy away from history’s rough edges, telling us about the Ponte de Tette (Bridge of Tits) where the Venetian Doge paid prostitutes to expose themselves in order to lure homosexuals away ‘from sin against nature.’ Despite this, the series has a remarkably wholesome tone.
A moment of vulnerability as the pair pose for Sophia’s life drawing, screencap from Episode 2. Image: BBC.
Fundamentally, this is a series about the transformative power of art. At a life drawing class, Rylan jokes ‘unlike the cicerones of Grand Tourists, ours is in bondage gear’ but the local artist, Sophia, explains that this reflects how we get ‘tied up’ in our conceptions of nudity. Deftly weaving contemporary art with the history of nude painting the pair engage in a debate we’ve all had before but which proved quite novel to my family. This pair move beyond a cheap imitation of John Berger however, when they’re asked if they are willing to pose. Rob has his shirt off in seconds, but Rylan hesitates. For all his outward confidence, he explains, he has long struggled with body image, and online harassment. There’s no judgement in the director’s portrayal of these very real issues and it is quite refreshing to see male vulnerability and mental health being discussed on television.
If I had to pick, that would be my word for this series: refreshing. The presenters’ genuine friendship shines through, and the show has that special quality of feeling like a real lads’ trip – not a contrived television programme. Unlike Top Gear or the ilk though, the producers have something to say. For all its lightness, Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour is actually a touching tribute to queer male friendship, the art serves as an important facilitator to that relationship.
The resulting programme is wholesome, openly queer, and astoundingly good fun. If you can make it to the end without impulsively booking flights to Italy, you’re a far stronger man than I am!
Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour is available for free on BBC iPlayer. A second season, which will see the pair tour India has recently been commissioned.