Susie Bright’s Journal

Susie Bright’s Journal

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Susie Bright’s Journal
March 6 Expert Witness: Gossip
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March 6 Expert Witness: Gossip

Straight Actors in Queer Roles, Cockfighting and Kung Pao Chicken Have More in Common Than You Think, and Joyce Carol Oates is a beautiful know-nothing

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Susie Bright
Mar 06, 2023
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March 6 Expert Witness: Gossip
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“Should straight actors play queer roles?” Bitch, PLEASE.

Remember the goose bumps when this came out? Gordon Warnecke and Daniel Day Lewis in My Beautiful Laundrette. ©Sportsphoto/Allstar/Channel 4

It’s time again to rend our garments for the Oscars!

Smart young media things ask: “Should straight actors be allowed to play queer roles?”

I answer: “What makes you think any of ’em are straight?”

Ha!

My serious replies are deeper, as you’ll see in my still-timely interview with NME reporter, El Hunt:

“Actors want to play all the great roles, they don’t want to be held back. It is the nature of any actor,” she says. “Sure, they understand the civil rights impact of seeing a gay [bankable] celeb playing an important homo role, sure. There’s only a couple. But actors’ true wish and freedom would arrive if we lived in a world where your personal life didn’t matter. —Where ‘gay’ could play straight, and ‘straight’ could play gay, and only the performance counted. That would be real freedom.…

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