AE: Would you not admit what happened is extraordinary given that Brokeback Mountain had won everything else?
RE: But there is a precedent for that. The Color Purple, which went into the Academy awards with eleven nominations and it got no Oscars.
AE: But leading up to that it had won barely anything else.
RE: You remember what movie won that year? Because it was really a slap in the face of black people. Out of Africa which is a movie about a great white huntress. Color Purple was nominated in eleven categories, won a Golden Globe award [Whoopi Goldberg won Best Actress, Out of Africa won Best Picture], won a DGA award, won National Board of Review--
AE: But again it didn't have the same scope of awards or critical as Brokeback Mountain. The only thing The Color Purple had was the most nominations. Brokeback's
awards and acclaim, combined with the general homophobia in society,
that strikes gay people as, “Wow! This is really suspicious that it
lost.”
RE: To some people, it seemed for The Color Purple
to have eleven nominations and win nothing was odd. Especially when a
great white huntress, as I call her, wins. So when you ask me how Brokeback Mountain falls into historical patterns, The Color Purple
was wiped out like that right before we had the explosion of great
African-American films and directors--Spike Lee, John Singleton, Boys in the Hood, Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X.
I believe if it did nothing else--and I believe it did a lot of things--Brokeback Mountain
opened up an enormous area for dramatic material that has been
approached tentatively by Hollywood . So now a studio executive looking
at a movie with a gay theme is no longer going to have to ask if it can
gross sixty or seventy million dollars. You know, by the time Brokeback
is done—domestic, foreign, DVD—it will have grossed 300 hundred
million, so it will have been a big, big hit. So it has historical
importance that way. It is the picture that opened the door.
AE: So you think like The Color Purple, this heralds a new era for gay films.
RE:
Quite possibly. There are a lot of gay directors working in Hollywood,
but not on gay themes, or frequently on gay themes. Now maybe that's
because they can't get them financed, but now maybe they have some
scripts they've been trying to get bought for years, now they'll find a
market for them.
AE: Stepping back from the Brokeback
controversy for a moment, as a gay man it seems Hollywood makes films
that tend to have a homophobic undertone with a lot of stereotypical
performances—
RE: I perceive that a lot.
AE: You would say that is an accurate perception that Hollywood doesn't treat gays and lesbians particularly fair?
RE:
Well, it does and it doesn't. One of the things that every group wants
is for their group to turn up on the screen. For years and years,
Asians said “How come nobody is ever Asian? How come the cop, the
pharmacist, or the telephone operator isn't an Asian or black?” So the
first step is acceptance in supporting roles, the second step is the
acceptance of the group in leading roles. It used to be thought that an
action picture should have a black co-star, but a white star. You don't
need that anymore. Now you get action movies where the two leads are an
Asian and a black. That's all happening and for gay people that is
going to be happening too.
AE: That is happening with movies like Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang.
RE: What you're going to see in years to come, and Brokeback Mountain
is going to be important in its development, is a broadening out and
deepening of characters that are gay. The next step, I think, is more
acceptance of homosexuality among actors, because I do think it is true
that many actors are afraid to reveal they are gay.
AE: How long before Hollywood/America can accept a gay man in a romantic leading role?
RE:
That would only be fair because we've had closeted gays in heterosexual
roles and maybe we've had closeted gays in gay roles for all we know.
AE: And we've certainly had openly heterosexual men in gay roles.
RE:
That's the standard. Oh, it's Robin Williams, so we know he's okay. I
think that the first time it happens they'll think they're going to get
resistance, but they won't get it. But first you have to give me the
hypothetical actor that is homosexual and will play a heterosexual
role. But right now if you think of openly gay men who are romantic
leads, I'm left with Rupert Everett, and he's getting a little old. You
gotta have a guy who looks great. I don't know how long it's going to
take. I don't think it will take Hollywood as long to cast a gay man in
a straight role as it will for the gay man to come out.
AE: You just think a gay man will be too afraid too risk everything to take that role?
RE:
I think it's so. It's going to take somebody with some courage to say,
“I am gay.” Now where is that actor? Isn't it very possible that [Actor
X, a current star] is gay, but won't come out? [Actor X] always has
these roles where they are always by themselves in the world and has
these roles where they are best friend, role model, or guru or plays a
criminal. But [Actor X] isn't about to come out and probably won't,
even though it isn't much of a secret.
AE:
It's that whole Ellen DeGeneres phenomenon. That had to be the worst
kept secret. Before she officially came out you could have gone into a
grocery store in Dubuque, Iowa , and they would have known she was gay.
RE: And then when she came out it was total acceptance. Her show is very popular among all demographic groups.
AE: She is now. I would say she went through a definite backlash period.
RE:
But her backlash period was complicated by her relationship with Anne
Heche. Somebody said to me they thought it was very interesting that
this show [the Oscars] didn't have a single gay presenter, and I said
to them “What about Lily Tomlin?” and they said, “Oh, I always forget
she is gay. She's been gay for so long that I didn't think about it.” I
thought it was an interesting answer. They looked right at Lily Tomlin
and didn't see any gay people on stage. That's important.
AE: I think that is like that with Ellen. You don't look at her see a lesbian. You just see Ellen.
RE:
And you get black actors who are not seen as black. I'm going to out
somebody in a different way. Vin Diesel is black, but he plays an
Italian American character in the new Sidney Lumet film where he's got
the lead. And it's a brilliant performance. It's based on [Rudy]
Giuliani's attempt to try the mafia in New Jersey. It's called Find Me Guilty.
He's the key character in the entire movie, and he's just fabulous. And
he's always said, “I don't want to get into my ethnic background. It's
just not relevant.”
AE: And hopefully one day soon it won't be relevant if an actor is gay. Thank you for taking the time to talk with us, Roger.
RE: My pleasure.
