Warning: SPOILERS for The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Season 4, Episode 4 – “Interesting People On Christopher Street”
John Waters’ guest spot in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4, episode 4, debunked two theories about Midge Maisel’s (Rachel Brosnahan) new gossip columnist enemy and Susie Myerson’s (Alex Borstein) sexuality. A few months after Mrs. Maisel was fired from Shy Baldwin’s (LeRoy McClain) tour, Midge now works as the emcee at The Wolford, a New York City strip club. Meanwhile, Susie was able to find a new apartment that doubles as the office of her fledgling agency, Susie Myerson and Associates. But Miriam’s chance meeting with a character played by John Waters answered a couple of questions about Midge and Susie.
In The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4, Midge learns a Daily News gossip columnist named L. Roy Dunham is targeting her with hit pieces. Dunham still hasn’t been introduced on the show but speculation was that the muckraking journalist would be played by one of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4’s guest stars. Meanwhile, Midge (and the audience) have always wondered why Susie has never had a romance or even a significant other. Midge’s diminutive manager hasn’t expressed sexual interest in men or women. After the sudden death of Jackie (Brian Tarantina), the manager of the Gaslight and Susie’s boss/friend/roommate, in Mrs. Maisel season 4, episode 3, Midge decided to find out whether Susie is interested in women. Her investigation led Mrs. Maisel to Christopher Street in Greenwich Village as she searched for a particular lesbian bar she wanted to take Susie to, which is where she met John Waters’ character.
John Waters’ character didn’t introduce himself by name to Midge but the closing credits of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4, episode 4, “Interesting People On Christopher Street,” list his name as Lazarus. Taking this at face value, it eliminates John Waters as the actor playing L. Roy Dunham, who a preoccupied Midge wasn’t enraged about in Mrs. Maisel season 4’s third and fourth episodes. With Waters as Dunham debunked, this leaves the likeliest suspects to play Midge’s gossip columnist enemy as Gilmore Girls actors Milo Ventimiglia and Kelly Bishop, who are still to come as guest stars in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4.
After Lazarus pointed Midge to the lesbian bar she was looking for, Mrs. Maisel brought Susie there, and Myerson quickly deduced why her client took her to such a place. To Midge’s credit, she was quick to assure Susie that it doesn’t matter to her if she’s gay, just as Miriam was empathetic when she discovered Shy Baldwin was gay in Mrs. Maisel season 3 (before Midge inadvertently outed him on stage at the Apollo). But Susie took umbrage at Midge prying into her personal life and she stormed out of the gay bar without confirming if she is a lesbian or not.
Taking Susie’s reaction at face value, she may actually not be gay. It’s also possible Susie is simply unsure about what her sexual stance is, and, since Mrs. Maisel season 4 is set in 1960, the language and gender understanding didn’t exist in that era for Susie to declare herself asexual or non-binary if that’s what she is. It’s true Susie hasn’t shown any attraction towards men and Myerson has commented on Midge’s beauty in the past, but not in a way that covets her sexually. It may be that Susie has somehow never taken the time and necessary introspection to determine what she is for herself. Regardless, Susie used her frustration at Midge to begin a proper launch of Susie Myerson and Associates so that she can fulfill her dream of being a great success in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 4.
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Season 4 streams Fridays on Amazon Prime Video.
