Shouldn’t LGBT Celebrities Only Use the Closet for Hanging Clothes?
Dear Hank:
My gay friends sometimes talk about celebrities that they say are gay or lesbian and “in the closet.” Does anyone really need to lie about sexual orientation these days? Elton John certainly hasn’t suffered from being publicly gay. There’s the country singer, Chely Wright, who’s a lesbian. Ellen DeGeneres has had a top-rated show. And I’m betting Neil Patrick Harris is doing okay with his career. Why would a gay or lesbian actor or singer go to all the trouble to hide who they are sexually? Can’t celebrities just use the closet for hanging clothes?
Ina Armario
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Dear Ina:
So you’re asking me if Tom Cruise is gay? Don’t know. Haven’t slept with him. And seriously, he’s so not my type (I like ’em edgy and have a thing for shaved heads).
I won’t discuss here the personal issues that gay and lesbian people grapple with as they come to terms with their sexual identity. (Although I welcome questions on the subject). When and how to tell Mom and Dad, and Gramps and Grandma, is a whole other story.
Thankfully, in the past few decades, we’ve reached a point where coming out as a gay or lesbian performer has fewer consequences. (By the way, I wouldn’t use Elton John as an example. There’s no closet big enough to hide his queer vibe.) But that doesn’t mean there are no consequences. Chely Wright, in a moving documentary titled “Wish Me Away,” acknowledged that coming out had some negative impact on her singing career.
And if you take a look at a list of out actors put together by the online movie database IMDb (794 as of the writing of this column), you probably won’t be familiar with most of them. Also, it’s unlikely that any of them could command the $20 million or so that Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Johnny Depp are said to get for major films.
So what’s the risk in coming out for a Tom Cruise or a John Travolta, if either is actually gay? I’d argue that, in a world where “celebrity” trumps talent, the risk for an actor is disappointing fans engaged more by their fantasies about him or her than by his or her acting skill. How many barely post-puberty girls would go ga ga for Justin Bieber if he said the Selena Gomez fling was all a ruse, and he really has the hots for Zac Efron or Taylor Lautner? How many straight guys would shell out $14 for a seat at the Arclight to watch Jennifer Aniston if she said her real heartthrob was Rosie O’Donnell?
That’s not an issue for Ian McKellen or Harvey Fierstein, whose looks clearly aren’t why producers hire them. We’ll see going forward whether sexual orientation is a career issue for Luke Macfarlane or David Burtka.
The risks are less obvious for Broadway performers (note on the IMDb list that a significant number of out male performers are on Broadway). Being gay poses little risk to a Broadway career because the audiences generally consist of gay men and Midwestern tourists visiting New York City for the first time who’ve never heard of Neil Patrick Harris and still think Anderson Cooper is straight.
A good sign that coming out is less and less likely to be front-page tabloid fodder is the fact that more and more celebrities reveal their sexual orientation casually (probably with coaching from pr whiz Howard Bragman, who artfully coached Chely Wright). My buddy Michelangelo Signorile, in an article for Huffington Post almost ten years ago, described the celebrity coming out these days as just a passing revelation by an actor who says that he or she (or they!) has never been in the closet.
Gaily yours, Hank
(Out since 1987, and still not a celebrity!)
Questions you can’t bring yourself to ask your gay friends and neighbors? Send them to Henry@WEHOville.com. (And we love questions from LGBTQAI, etc., folks too).
