Actor Ian McKellen said in a new interview that allegations of sexual misconduct against Kevin Spacey and director Bryan Singer may not have happened if they weren’t “in the closet.”
“Most of them were in the closet,” Ian McKellen said of gay men who have been accused of sexual misconduct in the #MeToo era.
“Hence, all their problems as people and their relationship with other people,” he continued. “If they had been able to be open about themselves and their desires, they wouldn’t have started abusing people in the way they’ve been accused.”
Indeed, both Kevin Spacey and Bryan Singer have been accused of sexual misconduct with men and possibly with underage victims.
McKellen, who is himself openly gay, also told the QueerAF podcast that he is “waiting” to be accused of misconduct.
“Well frankly, I’m waiting for someone to accuse me of something, and me wondering whether they’re not telling the truth and me having forgotten.”
This isn’t the first time the X Men actor has expressed some eyebrow-raising thoughts about the #MeToo movement.
In 2017, McKellen said that he when he was starting out in the entertainment industry, many women would openly offer directors sex in exchange for roles.
“I hope we’re going through a period that will help to eradicate it altogether…but from my own experience, when I was starting acting in the early Sixties, the director of the theatre I was working at showed me some photographs he got from women who were wanting jobs,” he said, continuing, “some of them had at the bottom of their photograph ‘DRR’ — directors’ rights respected. In other words, if you give me a job, you can have sex with me.”
“That was commonplace from people who proposed that they should be a victim. Madness,” the 79-year-old said. “People have taken advantage of that and encouraged it and it absolutely will not do.”
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