Veteran Straight Directors Whose Work Has Improved Gay Visibilty (And Some Whose Hasn't)

Anthony Minghella

Anthony Minghella jumped onto Hollywood's A-list when he directed 1996's The English Patient (for which he took home a Best Director Oscar), an acclaimed adaptation that featured a minor gay romantic subplot.

With 1999's The Talented Mr. Ripley, Minghella presented a thriller that was fraught with homoerotic imagery (Jude Law in a bathtub, anyone?) and an underlying sexual tension between Law and Matt Damon. Minghella could have presented Damon's Ripley as a throwback to the murderous queers of old Hollywood , but under his guidance, a tremendous air of pathos surrounds Ripley's character. Even when Ripley's acts include murder, Minghella's sympathetic handling of the character almost makes you hope that he'll get away with it.

Mike Nichols

Mike Nichols began his filmmaking career directing gay icon Elizabeth Taylor in out playwright Edward Albee's scathing drama Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Throughout his career, he has not lost that controversial edge and has included gay characters two more times, each portrayal offering windows into gay life while being tailored for a wide audience.

Nichols' 1996 remake of the 1978 French film La Cage aux Folles (renamed The Birdcage ) was met with mixed reviews in both the mainstream and gay press; it was, however, lauded by GLAAD for "going beyond the stereotypes to see the character's depth and humanity." The film notably starred a top-of-his-game Robin Williams and a then-closeted Nathan Lane as a gay couple who meet the conservative parents (Gene Hackman and Dianne Wiest) of their son's (Dan Futterman) intended bride (Calista Flockhart).

Nichols' gay-inclusive work also includes HBO's AIDS-related miniseries Angels in America by out playwright Tony Kushner, which deftly dealt with the issues surrounding being gay in America during the 1990s. Nichols not only snagged an Outstanding Director Emmy, but the drama won 10 Emmys overall and was also the most watched made-for-cable movie in 2003. Both the play and the miniseries were watershed moments in how American entertainment dealt with gay issues.

Ken Russell

Ken Russell broke the cinematic taboo of full-frontal male nudity in 1969's Women in Love, which included a scene where the two male leads wrestled naked. This heralded the arrival of a director who was not adverse to including sexuality, even that of a gay nature, in his films.

The 1970 film The Music Lovers, a biopic of Tchaikovsky, told of the composer's plight as a gay man living in a country that prohibited homosexuality. 1975's rock opera Tommy featured Elton John as "The Pinball Wizard" and Tina Turner as "The Acid Queen" — not one, but two gay icons in one movie. Salome's Last Dance (1988) detailed the exploits of famed gay author Oscar Wilde, who attends a surprise performance of his play Salome staged in a brothel.

Russell has also acted in films, and in 1990's espionage tale The Russia House (starring Sean Connery and Michelle Pfeiffer), he played a gay British intelligence officer.

Paul Schrader

Paul Schrader's filmmaking resume is filled with sexually charged flicks. In some instances he has woven complex portraits surrounding the hidden nature of homosexuality, in effect telling audiences it is better to be true to yourself than to deny who you really are.

The Comfort of Strangers (1990) stars Christopher Walken as Robert, a closeted gay man who can only express his longings for the same sex through violence. With his wife, Caroline (Helen Mirren), he befriends a younger couple played by Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett, pulling them into a web of deception in a series of not-so-coincidental meetings.

2002's Auto Focus depicted the slow descent of TV actor Bob Crane, late of Hogan's Heroes, into making home-made pornography. He is aided and abetted by John Carpenter (Willem Dafoe), who, while he sleeps with women, is clearly enamored of Crane in more than a platonic sense. While Carpenter is oversexed, so is Crane, and nothing special is made out of the same-sex attraction.

Schrader also directed 1980's American Gigolo, which had the honor of being the first motion picture to feature a major star (Richard Gere) doing full-frontal nudity, something noted by generations of gay fans.

Schrader's next film, The Walker, scheduled for release later this year, stars Woody Harrelson as a long-in-the-tooth male escort who happens to be a gay man.