Sporting boyish good looks and disarming talent, Eric Millegan has quickly becoming one of TV's hottest character actors. As Dr. Zack Addy on Fox's Bones, Millegan dons a lab coat and sports a vocabulary that gives Stephen Hawking a run for the money. In doing so, he has quite possibly earned the title of prime time TV's sexiest geek.

But beyond his acting chops, Eric Millegan is a gay actor who was out long before T.R. Knight or Neil Patrick Harris. He heads the growing list of prime time actors who are openly gay and play straight characters who American viewers love just the same. AfterElton.com recently talked with him about his decision to be openly gay, his take on the Isaiah Washington controversy and which gay actor he'd like to work with.

AfterElton.com: You've been out professionally for quite some time. When did you make that decision and why? 
Eric Millegan: I did a movie called On_Line in which I played a gay role. It went to Sundance in 2002. There's a gay brunch there, and the On_Line people wanted to send me. I knew that they were going to ask if I was gay, and I thought, "Yeah, that's fine. I'll do that." The Advocate and Out magazine interviewed me then, and Out named me Hottest Up and Coming Gay Actor of 2003.

AE: Were you out to your friends and family at that time?
EM: I came out to myself and the people around me in 1993. I had a summer stock job and I fell in love with a guy, but I still didn't consider myself gay. I thought I was just in love with him. But he really broke my heart and so I thought to myself, "Well, maybe you are gay."

AE: Was there ever a time that you regretted coming out?
EM: No. It feels totally great to be out. When I came to Los Angeles, people told me to lie about my sexual orientation and lie about my age, and I thought, "Nope. I'm going to be open about my sexual orientation."

It felt so great to get this job playing a straight character knowing that I was totally open about being gay. If I had tried to be closeted, I always would have thought I only got the job because I was in the closet. I'm on a TV show; people know I'm gay; people know I have a partner; and I don't feel like my career is being affected.

AE: Are there any openly gay actors who inspired you?
EM: I'm not sure if Nathan Lane had come out yet, but Rosie O'Donnell, Ellen DeGeneres, of course. Will & Grace was already popular so there was a gay character on a mainstream show. There were certainly people out. But you know what it really was … I remember going to my agent and asking, "Is this going to be OK?"

And he said, "I don't think that your being out is going to change anything because of the kinds of roles you're going to play," because I get the quirky kind of character roles as opposed to, say, action hero. If he had said, "Yeah, it is a problem," then maybe I would have stayed closeted, so my agent definitely made a difference with that.

AE: It seems like your experience as a gay actor has been pretty positive. Do you think there is a still a bias against openly gay actors in Hollywood?
EM: I'm having a great time doing Bones, and I feel very grateful that I can be out and have a TV show and have the success that I'm having. But I hadn't really been tested before I came out. I always wondered: What if someone had come up to me and said, "OK, we're going to give you this major film role; you're going to get paid five million dollars, but we need you to be closeted." Would I have been able to have principles like I've had if the stakes were higher? Would I have had the guts to come out? I don't know. It's easier to have principles when it's not hurting your career so much.

AE: As an actor and a celebrity, you're used to being in the public eye. How much info about your private life do you think fans deserve to know about? Is it fair for the general public to want to know which celebrities are gay?
EM: I think it's a private and personal situation, and I don't know how I feel about people going out of their way to out people who are closeted. I certainly think it's just better if you're out so you can end that and you don't have to deal with rumors. I think if I was in the closet, people would already be speculating about me. One good thing about being out is that you can just end that. You don't have to deal with the rumors.

AE: Still, many actors have been outed professionally … Lance Bass and Neil Patrick Harris, fairly recently. What's your stance on outing?
EM: I do get a little pissed off at people being closeted because they think it's going to help their career. Somebody who I knew in New York who everybody knows is gay, and who has a boyfriend, did some interviews where he was talking about how he knew if a girl was right for him. I was kind of pissed because you don't have to do that. You don't have to be closeted for your career.

AE: Have other gay actors or gay fans spoken with you about whether or not they should come out?
EM: Yes. I get emails from people who tell me, "You've really inspired me because you're out there as a TV actor and you're openly gay."

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