Julianne Moore on De-Gayed

Continuing a conversation she had in the February issue of The Advocate, Julianne Moore talked with BlackBook about the perceived de-gaying of her new film, A Single Man.

Moore, who was regrettably shut out of an Oscar nomination for her work in the film, talks about director Tom Ford putting a stop to the use of a poster that made A Single Man look like a romantic comedy vehicle for Moore and Colin Firth.

“There was an initial poster that had a shot of Colin and me lying down together, and Tom was the one who said, ‘No, I don’t want that poster.’ It made A Single Man look like a romantic comedy, which it’s most certainly not. He’s the one who changed that poster.”

She goes on to say she thinks studio executives regularly under estimate movie audiences and that the film should speak for itself. De-gaying it is a mistake, she says, but playing it up as some sort of gay event movie isn’t good either.

“I was talking to somebody at The Advocate recently and he said, ‘Tom Ford has been saying that it’s not a gay love story.’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s because he’s been saying that it’s a universal love story.’ The minute you start to reduce something by saying, ‘It’s gay,’ or, ‘It’s straight,’ it becomes niche. You ghettoize it by saying that it only belongs in one place. That’s what’s so remarkable about A Single Man. It’s really about love and loss — period.”

Read the full interview here.