For a straight actor to successfully play a gay character is not as easy as one might think. Not everyone can pull a Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain, a River Phoenix in Private Idaho, or even a Robin Williams in The Birdcage. When I see a movie about gays with a straight lead and director and it fails, I often wonder how the voice would have been different with a gay director or gay actor. Would Cruising be the same film if the director were gay? Here are just a few gay characters played by straight actors that we all could’ve lived without.

Will Smith wasn't a terrible actor in the 1993 film Six Degrees of Separation; however, it was obvious he was a little green for the role. Smith played the role of Paul, based on the true life story of David Hampton, a con man who managed to convince many people he was the son of Sidney Poitier. The character of Paul was openly gay and was represented as such in the 1990 stage play.

When Will Smith signed on to do the role, director Fred Schepisi begged Smith to do a kissing scene with another man. Smith adamantly refused saying a male kiss would "gross out" his fans. Over ten years later, Sir Ian McKellen, who played the role of Geoffrey Miller in the 1993 film, blasted Smith, saying his remarks were homophobic: "He thought he was saying something very individual but what he was actually confirming was that he's got the disease so many people have - homophobia." There were also rumors that Denzel Washington urged Smith to not do the kissing scene. For me, the refusal to kiss another man completely ruined Smith's already shakey performance and it's definitely a gay role I could've done without. Will Smith later said he regretted not doing the kiss.