Ewan McGregor defends gay role in upcoming Netflix movie Halston – as new trailer drops
"I don't want to sound like I'm worming out of this"
Words: Jamie Tabberer; picture: wiki/Netflix
Ewan McGregor has defended playing a gay character in the upcoming Netflix movie Halston.
The Trainspotting star will play fashion designer Roy Halston Frowick in the new biopic, out 14 May. (The first trailer for the film dropped this week, and can be watched below).
Explaining in a recent The Hollywood Reporter about how he arrived at the decision to take the role, the star harked back to an HR roundtable in which Pose‘s Billy Porter said in 2019: “If ‘flamboyantly’ wasn’t in the description of the character, no one would see me ever for anything. Straight men playing gay — everyone wants to give them an award.”
“I haven’t walked in Billy Porter’s shoes”
Referencing Billy’s remarks, Ewan told the publication: “I hear the discussion and I respect both sides of it, I really do. I haven’t walked in Billy Porter’s shoes. I don’t know what it’s like to lose out parts when you might feel it’s to do with your sexuality. So I can only respect his point of view.”
The star – who also played a gay character in 2009’s I Love You Phillip Morris – continued: “If it had been a story about Halston’s sexuality more, then maybe it’s right that gay actors should play that role. But in this case — and I don’t want to sound like I’m worming out of this, because it’s something I did think a lot about — I suppose ultimately I felt like it was just one part of who he was.”
Halston rose to prominence in the 1970s and died of AIDS-related cancer in 1990 at the age of 57.
Ewan is also known for roles in movies like Doctor Sleep, The Impossible and Moulin Rouge!
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