Playing It STRAIGHT

Dynamic young stars have broken out in queer roles. Should their own sexuality matter?

- David Canfield

AFTER HIS SEXY period drama Mary & George premiered in the spring, Nicholas Galitzine decided to finally speak his truth. The London native had made a name taking on risqué queer material, playing a closeted bisexual teenager in 2020's The Craft: Legacy before breaking out in the gay romance Red, White & Royal Blue last year. In Mary & George he advanced up the monarchy and seduced an actual king.

Now Galitzine was entering his internet heartthrob era-he'd be wooing Anne Hathaway in The Idea of You shortly after Mary & George-and the time had come for him to come out, 2024-style.

"I identify as a straight man, but I have been a part of some incredible queer stories," he told British GQ. "I felt a sense of uncertainty sometimes about whether I'm taking up someone's space, and perhaps guilt." The question of who gets to play what role gets trickier with every viral headline.

Before social media, the topic wasn't nearly as controversial, but over the past decade there's been pressure on Hollywood to reckon with its dismal track record of embracing LGBTQ+ actors. In 2018 Darren Criss won an Emmy for playing a gay serial killer in The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story, then vowed to stop playing queer characters: "I want to make sure I won't be another straight boy taking a gay man's role."

This past June, Sean Penn took issue with the changing climate, telling The New York Times that he wouldn't be allowed to play gay trailblazer Harvey Milk today, despite winning an Oscar for 2008's Milk: "It's a time of tremendous overreach.

It's a timid and artless policy toward the human imagination."