Scroll To Top
Arts & Entertainment

Harry Styles on Getting Comfortable With His Sexuality & More 

Harry Styles on Getting Comfortable With His Sexuality & More 

Harry Styles performing
Photo by Joseph Okpako/WireImage via Getty Images

Harry Styles recently opened up about his sky-rocketing career, secretive relationship with Olivia Wilde, and speculation over his sexuality.

Support The Advocate
We're asking for your help to continue our newsroom's important reporting. Support LGBTQ+ journalism by contributing today!

Harry Styles is giving fans exactly what they want in a touchingly honest cover story interview with Rolling Stone.

In addition to a mega-successful music career and growing resume as an actor, Styles often sparks conversation for one other topic -- his sexuality.

"I've never talked about my life away from work publicly and found that it's benefited me positively," he told the magazine. "There's always going to be a version of a narrative, and I think I just decided I wasn't going to spend the time trying to correct it or redirect it in some way."

Though Styles has made headlines for his relationships with women in the past -- like with Kendall Jenner, Taylor Swift, and currently, Olivia Wilde -- the "As It Was" singer has never publicly labeled his sexuality. He even told the publication that he's actually never been in a "public" relationship with anyone.

"Sometimes people say, 'You've only publicly been with women,'" Styles said. "I don't think I've publicly been with anyone. If someone takes a picture of you with someone, it doesn't mean you're choosing to have a public relationship or something."

The musician noted that often times "other people blur the lines for you," understanding that private matters rarely remain private for figures like himself. The public's interest in his romantic life (which borderlines obsession) often lends to a necessary "conversation" that wouldn't normally happen so quickly in a relationship, he shares.

"Can you imagine," he says, "going on a second date with someone and being like, 'OK, there's this corner of the thing, and they're going to say this, and it's going to be really crazy, and they're going to be really mean, and it's not real.... But anyway, what do you want to eat?' "

Styles and Wilde first made headlines for their unexpected whirlwind romance on the set of Don't Worry Darling, a psychological thriller set to hit theaters this fall. Wilde acts as director, while Styles stars as the male lead, Jack, opposite Florence Pugh.

For the first time in a public interview, Wilde opened up about her boyfriend, touching on hardships they endure as a result of Styles' fan base. She calls the toxic social media comments the "antithesis" for which he stands.

"I don't personally believe the hateful energy defines his fan base at all," Wilde told Rolling Stone. "The majority of them are true champions of kindness."

In addition to his highly-anticipated thriller, Styles is turning heads for his upcoming role as a closeted gay policeman in the romance period piece My Policeman, also premiering this fall. Though, Styles clarifies, as much as the film is about a gay couple, it's about love, above all else.

"It's not like 'This is a gay story about these guys being gay,'" Styles said. "It's about love and about wasted time to me."

He added, "I think everyone, including myself, has your own journey with figuring out sexuality and getting more comfortable with it."

"It's obviously pretty unfathomable now to think, 'Oh, you couldn't be gay.' That was illegal."

In Styles' eyes, the film is unique to most portrayals of gay love stories, as it brings a sense of rawness rarely seen on the screen.

"So much of gay sex in film is two guys going at it, and it kind of removes the tenderness from it," he shared, adding that director Michael Grandage wanted to show a gay relationship for what it often is -- "tender and loving and sensitive."

Stonewall Brick AwardsOut / Advocate Magazine - Jonathan Groff & Wayne Brady

From our Sponsors

Most Popular

Latest Stories

Cara Glass