Clips: MELROSE PLACE - 1/1/1996 - "Holy Strokes" - Matt and Alan

THIS WEEK IN QUEER TV HISTORY
MELROSE PLACE: "Holy Strokes" - 1/1/1996, Fox
In his early years on the show, the gay regular character Matt (Doug Savant) spent most of his time as a sexless, dateless sounding board for straight friends' problems. We were to believe that a young gay guy living in West Hollywood (of all places) could never find a date or even get laid. In later years, he had a series of brief romances that involved amazingly little touching, which stood out as odd on an an otherwise libidinous prime-time soap.
This episode, during Matt's romance with actor Alan Ross (Lonnie Schuyler), was one of the few times it seemed he might have some sort of stable love life with a guy who wasn't trying to kill him, kidnap him or frame him for murder. The relationship didn't last long.