Matt Damon Finally Talks About His Sexuality-It’s been Appreciated!
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s meteoric rise to fame with “Good Will Hunting” left behind a trail of tabloid speculation about their possible “bro-mance.” Damon, an avowedly straight man, did not address those rumors – until now.
“I never denied those rumors because I was offended and didn’t want to offend my friends
who were gay,” Damon said, “as if being gay were some kind of f--king disease. It put me in a weird position in that sense.”
The speculation about Damon’s sexuality has decreased in recent years, as had the public shaming of openly gay individuals, Damon noted. Although there is still progress to be made, Damon is happy with the recent advancements gay people have made in the public arena
“(T)he fact that Anderson Cooper and Ellen DeGeneres can come out so beautifully and powerfully, and it’s a big f--king deal that it turns out nobody gives a shit,” Damon told Playboy magazine.
Damon discussed other issues pertaining to homosexuality because he is slated to portray Liberace’s lover Scott Thorson in the upcoming biopic “Behind the Candelabra.”
“If Liberace were alive today,” Damon said, “everybody would love his music and nobody would care what he did in his private life. Like with Elton John.”
But Liberace was unfortunate to have lived in a less accepting era.
“These two men were deeply in love and in a real relationship—a marriage—long before there was gay marriage. That’s not an insignificant thing,” he said.
Gus Van Sant, the openly gay filmmaker behind “Milk” and “Good Will Hunting,” actually approached Damon about performing in “Brokeback Mountain” alongside Joaquin Phoenix. But Damon had just finished “The Talented Mr. Ripley” and “All the Pretty Horses.”
“Gus, let’s do it in a couple of years,” Damon told the acclaimed director. “I just did a gay movie and a cowboy movie. I can’t do a gay cowboy movie now.”
Damon also thought that Heath Ledger, the actor who landed the role, was “magnificent.”
He also intends to bring respect to material because of the subject’s importance, as Ledger had in “Brokeback Mountain.”
“We both (Damon and Douglas) have a lot of gay friends,” he said, “and we were not going to screw this up or bullsh-t it.”
mwalsh@nydailynews.com
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