"He’ll choose to reveal himself in the work he does, in the way he interprets characters, in the way he chooses the characters he wants to play.”
Mey RudeLee Pace isn’t here for fans and media who demand that actors come out, and he isn’t afraid to say it.
In a new interview for Vulture, Pace opened up about his many acting roles, his motivation and inspirations, and what it’s like to be a queer actor in Hollywood before you “officially” come out.
When Vulture asked Pace about his coming out, he answered that he never thought he was “in.”
“I never felt like that was a choice I made. But the media has a way of talking about things,” he said about long-standing rumors about his sexuality. “I feel strongly, and did then as I do now, that I reserve my right to contain multitudes, and I would wish the same for all other actors. I reserve my right to explore all the different facets of humanity through my work and in my life.”
Then Pace brought up Heartstopper, and how he relates to young star Kit Connor.
“It’s so, so good,” he said about the show. “And one of the actors faced a similar Tower of Babel about the whole thing. It’s absurd. I look at him, and he’s so great in the show, and all I think is, I want to see what else you do. I want to see all of the people you inhabit in your career.”
“I actually don’t care about anything else,” he continued. “I don’t want to know it; it’s none of my business anyway. I’d rather take your word for it than some kind of hot take on it, you know? He’ll choose to reveal himself in the work he does, in the way he interprets characters, in the way he chooses the characters he wants to play.”
Earlier this year, Connor, who is 18 and plays a bisexual teen in the Netflix show Heartstopper, had said that he didn’t want to label his sexuality. When he was later spotted holding hands with a female co-star on a different project, fans accused him of “queerbaiting,” or pretending to be gay so that fans would watch his show.
Connor doesn’t owe his sexuality to anyone other than himself, and especially as a teen, he shouldn’t have to make public statements defining himself. However, shortly after he deleted his Twitter, he came out as bisexual.
“Back for a minute,” Connor wrote in a tweet. “I’m bi. Congrats for forcing an 18-year-old to out himself. I think some of you missed the point of the show. Bye.”
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