Big Gay Picture Show

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema and more

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema & more

Harry Potter’s Evanna Lynch Says She Doesn’t Want Anti-Gay Trolls Anywhere Near Her

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evanna-lynchIrish actress Evanna Lynch (who’s best known for playing Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter movies), has long been known as a big supporter of gay rights. It was no surprise then that after Ireland’s historic vote to legalise gay marriage, she took to Instagram to say, ‘Back home for a few days and Ireland is looking more spangly than ever✨💞 Now every day in Ireland can freely be a Fab Gay Day if you want it to be!! Proud to be part of the generation that made sure same-sex marriage was legalized yesterday!!’

However as is bound to happen on these occassions, her support unleashed the anti-gay trolls who decided to vent their hate by posting “nasty, scathing and downright cruel” things about her comments.

Evanna wasn’t about to take it lying down though, and so decided to write an open letter on Facebook, where she says, “I am making a special request to all of you today in light of an ugly instagram thread that is really bothering me. Simply, if you are someone who perceives homosexuality as ‘disgusting’ or ‘fucked up’ or ‘unnatural’, will you do me a kindness and please unfollow me on all social media platforms. And then block me. If I was someone who wanted to devote her life to fighting this fight to expand people’s minds on the definition of marriage and to break down people’s prejudices towards homosexuality I would probably encourage this constant antagonistic debate and I would invite the radicals to do verbal morality battles with me. But this is not my life’s purpose, it’s just life as I see it, something I endorse and the nasty, scathing and downright cruel remarks just Wear. Me. Out. I believe in always promoting a positive message and I don’t want your poison all over my carefully curated wall of light and positivity.

“And let me be very clear and say people’s ‘beliefs’ have nothing to do with this. It is your attitude and the way you choose to react. Please don’t for a second pin the intolerance and hatred you spread on ‘religion’ for no religion endorses the darkness you’re spreading. It is possible to not like the idea of homosexuality, to find it a wholly alien, uncomfortable concept and to NOT impose this view on the people it affects and above all to NOT shame people for the way they are. Coming from Ireland, I am friends with a lot of people who handle their oppressive views on other people this way. I admire the grace with which they struggle to reconcile their beliefs with this changing society, and their respect for other humans. I have so much respect for these people, even though I will always consider their views misguided.

“If you can’t handle this concept then kindly LEAVE my page. There are other fiercer, more articulate, more outspoken and more controversial figures who lead the LQBTQ+ community and will gladly engage in fiery debate with you, will be fueled and energised by your anger and vitriol even and I ask that you go to them to wrestle verbally with your conflicting beliefs. I cannot deal with this kind of venom, and more to the point it is wasted energy on your part to put it here.

“And on a not-unrelated note, why are you following me? I think it’s safe to assume that the majority of you on here clicked ‘like’ on account of my portrayal of the character ‘Luna Lovegood’ in the Harry Potter films (Mackenzie Price fans…gosh, I am sorry but you’re a bit off track here). The clue is in the name, people! Luna Lovegood’s love is a GOOD kind of love. It is not conditional or possessive or needy or demanding. It doesn’t fall apart the moment you expose a piece of yourself that is unconventional or even unbecoming. Luna is a character who accepts all people and creatures in all forms, loves them for exactly what they are and who is constantly in awe at the diversity, strangeness and newness of each being she encounters.

“Did you ever wonder why she stares openly, unblinkingly and for uncomfortable periods of time at people? It’s because she is literally falling in love with an odd shaped freckle on their nose, the quirky way they pronounce ‘asked’, the uncontainable awkwardness they can’t hide for a beat longer under such loving scrutiny. And lastly the only way Luna can be quintessentially Luna is because she loves and accepts herself fully. If Luna were to condemn and villify such an intrinsic human thing as our sexuality and see ANY colour of it as wrong she would not sit so comfortably within herself and she would not be who we know and love. Luna is someone who has always taught me to love myself and I don’t know what you are doing on my instagram, facebook or twitter helping others feel awful about the way they are. If you are one of the people who bred hate or revulsion or shame on my instagram post today then you clearly haven’t thought very deeply about what I or Luna Lovegood represent and it’s time for you to unfollow.”

It’s one of the things that I’ve always loved about Evanna, in that she seems to so much embody Luna, a character many lovers of the books thought would be impossible to cast until Lynch came along.

But if you’ve ever wondered what it would look like if the actress did hate the gay, watch G.B.F., where she plays a teen who takes it upon herself to save he school for Christ and stop gay going to the prom. But lets leave things with Evanna’s cheery initial Instagram post: [Read more…]

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Patrick Stewart Reminisces About His Flamboyant First Gay Role, In 1994’s Jeffrey

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patrcik-stewart-jeffreyIn the mid 1990s the film Jeffrey seemed fast on its way to becoming a gay classic, but since then many seem to have forgotten about it (indeed it’s been out of print on DVD in the UK for years). For those who do know it though, one of the most memorable things is undoubtedly Patrick Stewart’s incredibly flamboyant Sterling.

It was the first gay role Stewart had ever played, which he took on shortly after spending seven years cementing his stern manliness and sci-fi god credentials in Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Now Patrick has been reminiscing about the film with DNA magazine, and how liberating it was. He says, “Jeffrey was the first. It was 1994 and we had just wrapped the seventh and final season of Star Trek and I said to my agent, ‘Find me a job. I don’t care what i is but let it be as far removed from science fiction and outer space as possible!’ And very shortly he rang me and said, ‘I’ve got it! There’s a movie they’re making called Jeffrey…’ I had seen Paul Rudnick’s wonderful play here in New York and I met with the director.

“I think that was my first time playing an openly gay character and I enjoyed it immensely. Having led a life in the theater, I had been in the company of homosexual men and women from [the time I was] a teenager. It was familiar and completely normal. When we were prepping for the movie, the production designer said he wanted to have lots of photographs around Sterling’s apartment — of them on holiday and with friends and so forth — so how would you feel if you and Bryan [Batt] and Steve Weber [who played Jeffrey] go off and walk around the West Village. It was a Saturday afternoon during a hot summer, so without quite knowing exactly where he was with his camera we spent a couple of hours just hanging out and it was the loveliest experience. Liberating. And intimate. And fun.”

Jeffrey itself is a comedy about a gay man who decides that with the spectre of AIDS all around him, he should become celibate. But in true rom-com fashion he then immediately meets his perfect man, and must come to terms with his fears if he’s ever going to find love.

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Is Brad Pitt A ‘Picky’ Bisexual? (Probably not, despite new magazine claims)

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brad-pittHere’s one you can almost certainly shove in the ‘bullcrap’ file, but if you’re gullible enough to believe everything that US tabloid Star Magazine says, Brad Pitt is bisexual – complete with a pic of the star on the cover and a quote it would seem he almost certainly never actually said!

Star went to the highest sources for its story – LA-based ‘artist’ and alleged ‘Hollywood insider’ Sham Ibrahim (no, we don’t know who he is either, or indeed whether he’s even ever met Brad), who wonderfully contraditorily declaims, “I don’t want to define Brad Pitt’s sexuality, but whatever it is, he’s into guys.”

It also appears Pitt is a difficult man to please, as Ibrahim has made-up/heard-on-the-grapevine scurrilous details of a planned hookup between Brad and porn star Cameron Fox. Imbrahim says,“When [Fox] got there, an assistant met him in the lobby and took him to a room. Sure enough, there was Brad Pitt. Brad took one look at him, gave him a thousand dollars and asked him to leave. Cameron wasn’t as attractive as he appeared to be in his pictures. I guess Brad has picky taste.”

Now is it just me, or is the idea that Brad would have to pay for sex a claim too far? And there’s also the fact that Sham (yes, we noticed the name too) picked a porn star who is sadly deceased, and so cannot say whether there’s any truth to it or not.

Star says Angeline Jolie is more than happy with all this and they have an open marriage arrangement, which allows Brad to head off for horny times with guys. Apparently he’s been doing it foe over 10 years!

Who knows, perhaps it’s true (there are already plenty saying they’ve known for years, but who probably wouldn’t have said that yesterday), but I wouldn’t put even the tiniest bet on it – and whatever his sexuality, Brad’s sure shown his support for LGBT causes over the years.

That said, I would be willing to put a fairly large bet that Sham Ibrahim is looking for ways to get a bit more famous in any way he can.

brad-pitt-bisexual-cover

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Carol Picks Up Queer Palm At Cannes, With Rooney Mara Sharing Best Actress For The Lesbian Drama

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carol-cate-blanchett-rooney-maraIn what isn’t particularly surprising news, Todd Hayne’s Carol, starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, has picked up the Queer Palm at Cannes, given out anually to the best LGBT-themed movie screening at the fest.

As the lesbian-themed drama was one of the frontrunners for the festival’s biggest prize, the Palm d’Or, it would have been more of a surprise if it hadn’t won the Queer Palm.

The Queer Palm’s jury noted though that while Carol made a very strong showing at Cannes, it was one of the few films at this year’s festival to include overtly gay representation. As a result they gave a special mention to The Lobster – starring Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz in a fable about people who risk getting turned into animals if they fail to find the perfect mate in 45 days – even though it doesn’t contain anything explicitly gay at all. However as it ”ridiculed absurd social norms and conventions related to sexual relations,’ the jury decided to give it a nod anyway.

Carol lost out on the Palm d’Or itself, which went to Jacques Audiard’s Dheepan,  movie about three people who pose as a family in order to escape the Civil War in Sri Lanka. However Todd Hayne’s did have something else to cheer, as Rooney Mara shared the Best Actress prize for Carol with Emmanuelle Bercot, who was honoured for Mon Roi.

Carol is about the relationship between two women in 1950s New York. One is a young department store clerk, Therese (Rooney Mara), who dreams of a better life, and the other is the older Carol (Cate Blanchett), who is trapped in a loveless marriage. However Carol’s husband (Kyle Chandler) begins to suspect what is happening. Playwright Phyllis Nagy wrote the screenplay adaptation.

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Jane Fonda Says She Once Mistakenly Assumed Warren Beatty Was Gay

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warren-beatty-youngNowadays Warren Beatty is known for being one of cinema’s greatest ladies men, but it appears he didn’t always come across that way to everyone, as while talking to W Magazine, Jane Fonda says that at one point her gaydar went a bit wonky as she thought he was gay.

And as a blow to his manhood, her assumption didn’t come from looking at him from afar, but was partly due to a 1959 screen test they had together where it appears his kissing didn’t convince her of his love of the ladies. She says of the test that they “were thrown together like two lions in a cage and kissed until we had practically eaten each others’ heads off.”

She admits she doesn’t remember much else about it, but adds, “I thought Warren was gay. He played piano, and all his friends were gay.”

She’s not completely wrong either, as it’s known that his friendships with gay playwrights such as William Inge and Tennessee Williams helped his early career and his transition from the stage to Hollywood, although with the likes of Annette Bening, Natalie Wood, Joan Collins, Julie Christie, Madonna and Diane Keaton as notches on his bedpost, it seems clear his reputation as a ladies man isn’t undeserved.

Fonda was being interviewed about her new Netflix show Grace & Frankie, which sees her and Lily Tomlin playing women dealing with the fact their husbands (Martin Sheen and Sam Waterston) have both come out of the closet and run off with one another.

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The New Hedwig Has Been Chosen In The Form Of Taye Diggs

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taye-diggsEvery few months it’s time to announce a new actor to play the title role in the Broadway production of Hedwig And The Angry Inch, and now it’s happened again – and they haven’t disappointed. We’ve had Neil Patrick Harris, Andrew Rannells, Michael C. Hall, John Cameron Mitchell and currently Darren Criss, and next up it’s time for the former Mr. Idina Menzel, Taye Diggs.

While Diggs is best known to many for his roles in TV’s Private Practice and Murder In The First, he has a great musical theatre pedigree, having first really been noticed as part of the original cast of Rent (and it’s quite scary that he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day since then) and also appeared in the likes of Chicago (both on stage and in the movie version). However this will be his first Broadway role since briefly appearing in Wicked 12 years ago.

Diggs is the first African-American actor to take on the role of the East German title character, who was left with an angry inch after a botched sex change operation that she had in order to get into the US with her American GI lover. Hedwig then started dating young Tommy Gnosis, who left her behind when he took her music and became a rock star – leaving her understandably bitter (but still very funny), and ready to recount her tale for the audience.

Taye has signed up for a 12 week stint in the show, starting July 22nd.

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Cate Blanchett’s Lesbian-Themed Drama Carol Tipped For Cannes Palm d’Or

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Carol-cate-blanchett-slideThere have been mixed fortunes for films at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, with Gus Van Sant’s Sea Of Trees, starring Matthew McConaughey, being met with boos, while Todd Haynes’ lesbian-themed Carol, starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, is getting huge buzz.

Variety is already saying the film may be one of the frontrunners at next year’s Oscar, remaking that early reaction to the movie ‘were some of the strongest of the 2015 Cannes Film Festival’.

Many are backing that sentiment, with Sasha Stone of Awards Daily commenting, “Weinstein is right in saying ‘Carol’ has the stuff. I think Hollywood will finally give Haynes the directing nod he so richly deserves. Rooney’s movie as much as Blanchett’s. Exceptional in every respect.”

Indiewire’s Anne Thompson meanwhile tweeted, “Blanchett & Mara carry Todd Haynes’ 50s lesbian romance Carol with glamorous allure. Strong contender for awards @cannes15 & beyond.”

The BBC meanwhile says the movie is ‘tipped for Cannes glory’.

While the film has been getting a brilliant response, Blanchett herself has stepped forward to clarify comments that many (incuding ourselves) took to suggest she was bisexual.

In a piece published in Variety last week, when asked about whether she had had relationships with women, Cate answered “Yes. Many times.” However it turns out this wasn’t all she said.

At a Cannes press conference she noted, “From memory, the conversation ran, ‘Have you had relationships with women?’ And I said, ‘Yes, many times. If you mean I’ve had sexual relationships with them, the answer is ‘No’ – but that obviously didn’t make it to print.

“Call me old-fashioned but I thought one’s job as an actor was not to present one’s boring, small, microscopic universe but to make a psychological connection to another character’s experiences. My own life is of no interest to anyone else. Or maybe it is. But I certainly have no interest in putting my own thoughts and opinions out there.”

Carol is about the relationship between two women in 1950s New York. One is a young department store clerk, Therese (Rooney Mara), who dreams of a better life, and the other is the older Carol (Cate Blanchett), who is trapped in a loveless marriage. However Carol’s husband (Kyle Chandler) begins to suspect what is happening. Playwright Phyllis Nagy wrote the screenplay adaptation.

It’s due for release in the US in December, which should set it up nicely for a strong Oscar run.

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Matt Bomer Joins The Magnificent Seven Remake

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matt-bomerThe remake of The Magnificent Seven has certainly picked up speed in the last few weeks, with director Antoine Fuqua filling up the cast with all sorts of interesting names. Now he’s added another, as Matt Bomer has joined the movie, according to THR.

The Seven themselves will be Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Luke Grimes, Wagner Moura, Byung-hun Lee and Vincent D’Onofrio, who are hired by a young woman (Haley Bennett), to protect a town and it’s nearby gold mine from a wild west villain and his henchmen (which includes Jason Momoa).

Bomer has signed up to play Bennett’s husband, so there’s a good chance he’s going to be in some mortal peril.

The movie is due to start shooting soon with a January 2017 release set.

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Nicole Kidman Joins John Cameron Mitchell’s How to Talk to Girls at Parties

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nicole-kidman-john-cameron-mitchellNicole Kidman is set to reunite with her Rabbit Hole director, John Cameron Mitchell for How To Talk To Girls At Parties. Mitchell is going back behind the camera after a turn in the Broadway production of Hedwig & The Angry Inch, the show he created in the 1990s and which helped make his name.

However How To Talk… is a little different from Hedwig’s tale of a transsexual East German musician, although it keeps the punk vibe, as it’s based on a short story by Neil Gaiman, from his collection, Fragile Things. Variety described the movie as being ‘in the spirit of Romeo and Juliet, but instead of Montagues and Capulets, it is punks and aliens. This is the story of the birth of punk, the exuberance of first love, and the universe’s greatest mystery of all: how to talk to girls at parties.’

Elle Fanning was previously announced for the movie, and as well as Kidman, she’s also just been joined by Ruth Wilson and Matt Lucas.

The film is currently looking for buyers at Cannes, with the hope of shooting in the UK this Autumn.

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Cate Blanchett Coyly Suggests That She’s Bisexual

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Cate-BlanchettCate Blanchett isn’t one to go into great detail about herself. In a new Variety profile about her role in the upcoming film Carol, she doesn’t even want to talk about how she prepares for a part, merely saying, “Do I have a process? I don’t know. There are certainly things perhaps that I don’t want to identify.”

However when talking about the fact Carol is her first lesbian role, she does suggest that perhaps she’s not completely new to relationships with women, as when asked about this being her first time, she answers, “On film – or in real life?”

When pressed on whether this means she has had relationships with women in the past (she is currently married to a man), she doesn’t have a huge amount more to add, but does say, “Yes. Many times.”

It seems she doesn’t have a time for labels, as she says that when considering what her character in the film would be considered, she says “I never thought about it. I don’t think Carol thought about it.”

The long-gestating Carol is an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1952 novella The Price of Salt, which follows the relationship between two women in 1950s New York.One is a young department store clerk (Mia Wasikowska) who dreams of a better life, and the other is a woman (Blanchett) trapped in a loveless marriage. Playwright Phyllis Nagy wrote the screenplay adaptation.

Todd Haynes, known for previous LGBT-themed work such as Velvet Goldmine and Far From Heaven, directs. He previously worked with Blanchett on his unusual 2007 Bob Dylan biopic, I’m Not There.

It’s well worth reading the full Variety piece, which talks about how Carol got to the screen, this history of Highsmith’s book (which was controversial enough on its initial release that she wrote it under a pseudonym), as well as the issue of both female and gay centred stories in mainstream cinema.

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