‘Single Parents’ star Jake Choi comes out as sexually fluid
The US actor says he was forced to confront his sexuality after playing a gay man in 2015's 'Front Cover'.
By Will Stroude
Words: Will Stroude
Single Parents star Jake Choi has come out as sexually fluid.
The US actor, who stars in the ABC comedy series about a group of single parents alongside Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester, told Very Good Light that he considers his sexuality to be a “grey” area.
Choi revealed that he identified as straight until playing a gay man in 2015 romantic drama Front Cover made him reflect on his own sexuality.
“When I shot the movie I identified as straight – that’s how I was conditioned”, he said.
“Now, I identify as fluid.”
The New York-born star went on: “Back when people questioned if I was gay after the move, I was like, ‘no, no.’ But after I did Front Cover, it made me think. A lot. Am I really living my truth? Am I really free? Am I still kinda, swimming upstream?
“Every day I would think. What does it mean when I’m talking to a guy and connect with him emotionally with intimate energy?
“Maybe it’s not just sexual but it could be. Maybe, shit, I’m attracted to everything. Maybe it’s more feminine or more androgynous.
“I realized yeah, I’m fluid. It’s not black or white. It’s grey.”
Choi, who has also made several appearances in US TV comedy drama Younger – a show which stars another sexually fluid actor, Nico Tortorella – admitted that society’s assumption of heterosexuality had “conditioned” him not to question his own sexual orentation.
“Ever since I was young, all the images you saw around you, or at least for me, was catered towards heterosexuals” he explained. “Very cis, very heterosexual.
“I was an athlete. When you’re an athlete everything is hypermasculine and hetero.
“That’s where you think you’re supposed to be and everything else is abnormal and you’re not supposed to do that.”