Ask the Flying Monkey (August 5, 2008)

Have a question about gay male entertainment? Ask the Monkey!

Q: I just saw Mamma Mia! and find myself wondering about Colin Firth's other gay roles. Please tell me he has some.-- Hannah, Cheshire, CT

A: Colin Firth didn’t play gay in Another Country (1984), his film debut, but he was the dreamy Marxist friend of a gay dissident, played by an equally dreamy Rupert Everett. A few years later, Firth did play a gay in an excellent (but very disturbing) psychological thriller called Apartment Zero (1989).

Colin Firth (right) starred with Hart Bochner in Apartment Zero

As for the other Mamma Mia! leading men, Dominic Cooper played a “heteroflexible” character in The History Boys (2006) (in his briefs no less), and Pierce Brosnan played a bisexual man in The Matador (2005) as well as in James Bond (just kidding).

Dominic Cooper (left) in The History Boys
& Pierce Brosnan in The Matador

Oh, and this is totally unrelated, but Christine Baranski is God.

Q: I finally got to watch HBO's In Treatment starring Gabriel Byrne. One of the patients he treated was a fighter pilot played by Blair Underwood. Blair's character seemed to have some issues with his sexuality (not to mention his father). His character then dies in a crash that maybe was an accident, maybe suicide. So here is my question, Monkey. Was Underwood's character gay? Was that why he killed himself? – Gordon, Milwaukee, WI

A: “I don’t know if he was [gay],” Blair Underwood tells AfterElton.com. “People ask, ‘Did he commit suicide or did he have an accident [in] his plane?’ It happens off-camera, so it’s up to the viewer.”

It was precisely this ambiguity that appealed to Underwood about the role. “I knew from the first episode and saw his friend Daniel that this might be a possibility,” says the hunky actor. “But I tell you when we shot it, one of the things Rodrigo [García, a director on the show] said is, ‘He’s not [necessarily gay].’ It’s obvious to make that choice, that he is and that he was having trouble with that. I thought it was more interesting if he was very genuine when he said, ‘I hang out in [the gay] community because they don’t ask anything about me.’”

Still, says Blair, who clearly relished the acting challenge, the character was not in touch with himself. Being gay “didn’t fit into his mind, his world, what he was socialized to think. So in shooting it, the whole time, it wasn’t until the very end that we played with that possibility, and that took it down a whole other path.”

Q: I’ve heard Joan Rivers tell the same joke a couple of times — that Tom Cruise was there for the birth of his child with Katie Holmes, but was he there for the conception? How come Joan Rivers can call Tom Cruise gay, but when other people do it, he sues? – Boy Brad, Portland, MN

A: The Flying Monkey is no expert, but the difference is that, when it comes to slander and defamation, our laws give wide berth to humor and satire. Basically, you can say almost anything if it’s clear you’re not being “serious,” but instead trying to make people laugh.

“We comedians can always say, ‘I was just kidding,’” comedian Bob Smith tells the Monkey.

The caveat? The satirical or humorous intent really does have to be communicated clearly — which it definitely is when Joan Rivers is on a stage doing a set of jokes. (But memo to Tom Cruise: when Joan Rivers tells the same joke as a guest sitting on the couch of a talk show? You might have an opening there.)

Tom Cruise might have better luck suing Joan Rivers for “invasion of privacy.” But here he’s in a bind too because public figures, which Cruise definitely is, are considered by the courts to be newsworthy and discussion-worthy — which means they’re not allotted much of a sphere of privacy. The Monkey, with his legions of fans, knows just how poor Tom feels.

Next Page! Heteroflexible rock stars and the hot men of Sinchronicity!