#pride issue

Amandla Stenberg

for Mission Magazine // Pride Issue

Are her -

Are her t-

Are her titties covered by two black hearts?!?!!?!

EW's annual Pride issue.

Top row, from left: Janelle Monáe, Freddie Mercury, Kate McKinnon, Ricky Martin, John Waters, Dan Levy; Middle row, from left: Ellen DeGeneres, Rock Hudson, Laverne Cox, Lily Tomlin, Kristen Stewart, Lil Nas X, George Takei, Ryan Murphy, Cynthia Nixon, Marlene Dietrich; Bottom row, from left: RuPaul, Elton John. ILLUSTRATION BY JACK HUGHES FOR EW

How do you gin up a celebration in the midst of a global pandemic? For our annual Pride issue, EW editors turned to the power of art.

Our June cover is always a salute to LGBTQ entertainers. But this year we were faced with some pretty daunting hurdles.

We had big dreams: To bring Pride festivities home to an audience an unable to participate in big parades and parties, and to pay homage to Hollywood’s LGBTQ storytellers — past, present, and future.

But marking the month with some big, elaborate, social distance shattering photo shoot was definitely out.

So, we teamed with London-based illustrator Jack Hughes to create a totally different kind of EW cover — one that pays tribute to the central role LGBTQ artists have had in Hollywood from its very beginnings.

Our inspiration came from the great murals and magazine covers of the 1920s and 1930s. And sort of like a mini-WPA, which employed artists across the country during that time period, we wanted to put the spotlight on talented artists at a time of great economic hardship.

The cover — and indeed our entire Pride cover package —was created in collaboration with LGBTQ illustrators in an effort to make the Pride experience richer for folks stuck in their homes (even the portrait for my editor’s letter is a work of art — by the great Michael Hoeweler).