Janet Mock attends the ‘Pose’ New York Premiere at Hammerstein Ballroom on May 17, 2018 in New York City. Photo : Theo Wargo ( Getty Images )

(Editor’s note: spoilers of the Sunday, July 8 episode to follow.)

If you’re not watching Pose yet, you’re missing out on one of the most groundbreaking moments in television, as the largest cast and crew of LGBTQIA+ talent, especially trans women of color—both on screen and behind the cameras—have been assembled to revisit the ballroom scene of the late 1980s (which, unfortunately, gained notoriety in tandem with the HIV/AIDS crisis).


One of the tremendous talents recruited for the Pose writers’ room was bestselling author and transgender activist Janet Mock. Mock, who is also now a producer on the series, made television history on Sundaynight by becoming the first black trans woman to direct a television episode in her directorial debut.


Episode six of the series, titled “Love Is the Message,” also had the distinction of being the first truly musical episode of Pose, which is billed as a “dance musical” drama in the tradition of ’80’s hit Fame. As Pray Tell (played by Broadway legend Billy Porter) and Blanca (MJ Rodriguez) belted out a duet of “Home” from The Wiz (which Mock fought to include in this episode) to a room full of AIDS patients—including Pray Tell’s dying lover, Costas—the series hit upon a moment of profound poignancy, seamlessly merging the fantasy world of the ballroom scene with the terrifying reality of the AIDS epidemic.

I’m never trying to have our characters discuss