WATCH: Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade Makes History With First-Ever Same-Sex Kiss
The "Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade" made history on its 92nd birthday by showing on live TV the first-ever same-sex kiss featured in the parade.
The kiss came during a performance from the Broadway musical "The Prom."
"Actors, including leads Caitlin Kinnunen and Isabelle McCalla, burst out of the theater and into the streets for Macy’s big holiday parade Thursday," Entertainment Weekly reports. "Closing out their performance of the big number, Kinnunen and McCalla shared a kiss on live television, which appears to be the first same-sex kiss in the parade’s history."
Producers of "The Prom," Bill Damaschke, Dori Berinstein, and Jack Lane told EW in a statement that they were grateful to Macy's and NBC for allowing the kiss to air on live TV and were proud to have been the ones chosen to make history.
"Broadway’s The Prom is grateful to Macy’s and NBC for their acceptance and inclusivity of a community and a story that is about acceptance, tolerance and love," the producers said in a joint statement. "These are some of the themes reflected in our musical comedy and we are very proud to be the very first LGBTQ kiss on the Thanksgiving Day Parade."
"The Prom" cast member Josh Lamon expressed similar pride on Twitter. "The first #LGBTQ kiss in the Parade’s history," he announced. "We here at @ThePromMusical have never been so proud. #LoveIsLove."
"The Prom" tells the story of high schooler Emma (Kinnunen) who faces rejection and scorn by her small-town Indiana neighbors when she wants to take her girlfriend Alyssa (McCalla) to the prom.
Susan Tercero, executive producer for Thanksgiving parade, told EW the musicals chosen to perform on live TV reflect "what’s really happening on Broadway."
"We like to be able to debut the best of Broadway, but we also like to show those viewers what they want to see," she said. "They typically like to see a show that they know and love like My Fair Lady. But then you have shows that are really relevant that are new to Broadway, like Mean Girls. Then you have Summer: The Donna Summer Musical, which everyone will recognize every single song from that show, and it will be a celebration of Donna Summer herself."
The "Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade" is not the first family event to break history on live TV with an LGBTQ Easter egg. In 2014, the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade featured a same-sex wedding on one of its floats. It was the third wedding ceremony ever performed live at the parade — the first being in 1989, which was then considered the "most widely witnessed wedding in American history." The second wedding took place in 2013 as part of a contest conducted by Farmers Insurance before Proposition-8 had been struck down by the Supreme Court. Farmers Insurance had planned to repeat the contest for the 2014 float but instead opted to honor teachers.
