Popnography
Matt Bomer Gives Serious Face in 'Magic Mike'
The out gay actor says he doesn't want to be called a 'gay' actor
June 28 2012 4:55 PM EST
February 05 2015 9:27 PM EST
jerryportwood
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Matt Bomer may not have that many lines in Magic Mike (although he does clock a few more than his college pal Joe Manganiello, who plays Big Dick Ritchie), but he gives some serious attitude in his silly get-ups. At one point he's dressed as a Richard Gere-esque Navy dude a la Officer and a Gentleman. Then, in another scene, he dons some doctor duds to hump a gal on a gurney. As he recently explained to Marc Malkin over at E! Onlineabout that scene,"Channing [Tatum] told me, 'You have to use the stretcher and just get up on this girl and grind your junk in her face. But this girl was not going to just sit there and be ground upon. She started licking me in all kinds of special places and we just kept going...It was one of those situations where you were in an environment where moral parameters are not the same as they are if you're doing a political drama. You just sort of have to say yes to everything and embrace it."
Bomer came out quietly in a speech earlier this year and has two children with his longtime partner, Hollywood publicist (and No. 46 on Out's Power List) Simon Halls. And since then hasn't really spoken much about being gay. He explains to Malkin, "I never really endeavored to hide anything," and he goes on to explain that, "What we really have to do is stop the adjective before the job title--whether it's 'black actor,' a 'gay actor' or 'anything actor.' Everybody thinks that equality comes from identifying people, and that's not where equality comes from. Equality comes from treating everybody the same regardless of who they are. I hope the media and the press catches on to that because it's time to move out of 1992."
But Bomer does seem to be aware of the importance of actors being out of the closet. As he tells Malkin: "I had somebody from the military approach me a few weeks ago just saying how this helps people, affects people. It brought me to tears."