Rami Malek won the award for Best Actor at the 2019 Academy Awards for his portrayal of gay rock star Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody.
Diversity and difference swept the 91st Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Awards last weekend; more actors of color and women won Oscar statuettes than ever before. It was also, for better or worse, a successful night for “gayface.” Unlike blackface and yellowface, that old, mercifully long-abandoned Hollywood habit of putting white actors in the roles of black or Asian characters, gayface, its casting of LGBTQ characters by non-LGBTQs, has persisted.
It’s a contentious subject. Some argue on the side of the artist’s craft—that lofty notion of an individual’s creative ability to portray those nuanced, compelling and complex LGBTQ personalities. Taking a more honest tack, others criticize the Hollywood establishment’s process that has consistently denied such roles to out actors in deference to box-office realities and, by doing so, stalled not only individual careers but the progress to equality itself.
In fact, beyond the mainstream, there were dozens upon dozens of LGBTQ-relevant films produced worldwide in 2018. They packed marquees (mostly at LGBTQ film festivals or art-house cinemas) full of dramas, comedies, documentaries and biographies. American works, Love Simon, The Miseducation of Cameron Post or Boy Erased (with its high-profile cast) played limited but successful runs. Of the foreign films (and there were many more of those), the Brazilian Tranny Fag won a Teddy Award at the Berlin Film Festival.
But, while the gayface debate continues, one might concede for the moment and settle into the reality that time will tell. It’s rather like the National Colored Baseball League’s parallel universe as a professional sports organization existing alongside white Major League Baseball. Eventually, it evolved with integration until its talent was recognized for its own sake, and no one particularly cared who appeared on the field.
Meanwhile, back at the Oscars, actor Billy Porter set the tone, gracing the red carpet in a voluminous, black velvet Christian Siriano tuxedo-topped evening gown. Award nominees for Best Leading or Supporting Actors included seven cast not as a gay character but simply as a character who happened to be gay. They appeared in films that rose to the level of the Academy’s attention with multiple Oscar nominations, and among those were major winners.
Green Book took Best Picture. A “changing hearts story” set in the segregated South of the 1960s, its plot focused on a black gay musician (played by Mahershala Ali) chauffeured by an Italian American tough guy; Ali won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Best Actor went to Rami Malek for his portrayal of gay rock star Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody, a biographical film that wound up receiving more Oscars than The Godfather.
Olivia Colman received her statuette for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her role as Queen Anne in The Favourite, a film about a lesbian love triangle between the British monarch and two of her female courtiers. And, of course, although not in an acting category, Lady Gaga, who identifies as bisexual, won an Oscar for Best Song for “Shallow,” the theme from A Star is Born.
In gayface or otherwise, the LGBTQ profile at the 2019 Oscars was historic and inspiring, adding a heap of glitter to Tinseltown.
