S P O I L E R S , O B V I O U S L Y.
Fans of Brooklyn 99 are celebrating the comedy series' 99th episode, which contained a wonderfully queer revelation: Rosa Diaz is - as many predicted - bisexual.
The emotionally-guarded, notoriously private New York detective, played by Stephanie Beatriz, confirms her bisexuality to Charles Boyle (Joe Lo Truglio) after he hears a woman call Rosa 'babe' over the phone.
Boyle asks who she was speaking to and Rosa initially tries to brush it off, before relenting and telling him she is bisexual and dating a woman.
According to , the 100th episode will "explore Rosa’s story in greater depth, emotion, and humour as she sets out to share the news with those closest to her."
In an with Beatriz, she confirmed that it was her own "nonchalant" coming out as a bisexual woman earlier in the year that helped create the storyline for Rosa.
"There’s a great episode [season 1’s 'The Vulture'] where Jake and Rosa mention Tonya Harding, and Rosa off the cuff says, 'Yeah, she’s thick,' as a compliment to Tonya. Ever since the episode, which was pretty early on, I thought, 'Oh, Rosa is not heterosexual. She’s much more open to being bi or queer than I would have thought before'.
"And then it was a little while later that I and this last season before we started shooting, [co-creator] Dan Goor and the rest of the writers had each of the actors come in and talk about ideas that they had for the arc of this year or things they’d like to try. I pitched a bunch of stuff and that was one of the things that I wanted to come in with as a pitch, but to my surprise, they already had it in their brains when I got in the meeting."
The actress also confirmed that the writers took a lot of advice from her, when writing these scenes for Rosa - particularly emphasising the use of the word 'bisexual', for representation and visibility of bisexuality.
"That’s the main thing that I thought was so wonderful from Dan Goor — his inclusion of me in the process of developing the story. I was really touched by him and the other writers, Carly [Hallam] and Justin [Noble], they used me as a resource quite a bit: I met with Carly once, I met with Justin to talk about the story line, Dan and I talked extensively about it. That was really meaningful and special to me that they weren’t just saying, 'We want to tell the story and let’s go tell it. No, let’s find someone who’s bi. Oh, guess what? The actress who comes out as bi also happens to be bi. Let’s talk to her about her own experience and bring this into reality.'
"Not to say that my story is the same as Rosa’s at all. It’s not. But there were things that we wanted and thought would be really important — like the word itself: bisexual. To me, that’s an important word in my coming out."
Fans of Brooklyn 99 are overjoyed with the official (and for some, long-awaited) coming out of Rosa Diaz:
