Chris, best known for his roles on Private Practice and Veronica Mars, recently weighed in on the topic on stereotypical gay characters when discussing a gay couple in his new film Beside Still Waters.

‘I get very frustrated at how LGBTs are portrayed in movies and on television,’ Chris tells Rage Monthly. ‘Often times, they’re just broad, foppish, loud caricatures.’

In the film, which is Lowell’s directorial debut, a gay couple is among those in a group of old friends who gather at one of the friend’s childhood home after the death of his parents.

What follows is a night full of drinking, dancing, laughter, secrets, sex, drugs, mischief and regret.

Lowell was mindful about stereotypes when it came to the gay characters.

‘I wanted to have a character in the film that went against those tropes,’ he says. ‘On top of that, I didn’t feel it necessary to explain why he “has to be gay,” which is something, for some stupid reason, that film and television seems to think they need an explanation for.’

Comments

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4 Remarks

1. January 6th, 2015 at 2:49 pm
   Larry says:

   I’ll have to agree with Chris on this one. And it’s for the same reasoning for why I couldn’t get upset about Tuc Watkins recent observations about the gay sterotype on Modern Family. I’m gay, not flamboyant but pretty much a “macho” type. I suppose what I get upset about is that “straights” seem to better respond “gay” with being flamboyant. It seems more acceptable to a “straight” audience because it differentiates “them” from “us”. I really would appreciate the broad media to represent the variety of gay people -and not only the ones that a straight audience already identifies us with.

2. January 6th, 2015 at 4:26 pm
   Daniel Lewis Frommherz says:

   Thanks for your comment Larry you are spot on with your observations. So many of the TV and movie watching straight culture have been programed to believe simply what they have been told by whoever told them what the LGBT community is all about. Flamboyant, suicidal, child rapists you name it someone out there somewhere will find a way to simply think that they are better than our community and they probably won’t change until more of us show them who we really are.

3. January 7th, 2015 at 2:16 pm
   Sam says:

   Bravo Chris Lowell and Tuc Watkins for speaking up. Many cable and independent channels already has a history of offering non-stereotypical characters while major network TV is still lucratively mining a La Cage casting formula.

4. January 8th, 2015 at 8:03 pm
   Cool Curt says:

   I have to go the other way on this topic once again. Even with Tuc Watkins, who feels as Chris does, I just don’t agree because for several years and in the ‘Golden Age’ of cinema there were gay characters that you knew instantly that their role in the film or on TV wasn’t for anything but some kind of comic relief or some way of letting the audience know that being gay or being different was exactly what it was, different and a bit odd and awkward.
   Then some time passed and something happened and gay people weren’t out-of-the-woods just yet because gay character were still gay characters and were written not from a gay view-point at all.
   Then there was this shift in Hollywood and beyond but mainly this shift was taking place first in other parts of the world. It seemed as though gay characters, gay story-lines weren’t cheesy or written for just laughs alone but there were actual characters that the LGTBI community could finally identify with. Gay character were finally being written and even played by actual gay actors but even with that, it wasn’t seen just yet as healthy or positive but it was almost seen and viewed at being gay at your risk. Which is almost like thinking differently about Rednecks, White trash and even people that are considered extremely ‘Ghetto’ (ghetto fabulous), for years and years those were stereotypes that were literally taken out of context but in reality, there are people that identify with rednecks, white trash and ghetto-fabulous. You know that these examples are literally now big business and where the powers-that-be in Hollywood wouldn’t dare write a movie or script with the characters being anything but redneck, white trash and ghetto, now that is all that you see.
   In the past couple of years with actual people in the entertainment business not shying away from being out and proud, more projects aren’t just gay-friendly or include gay characters but the gay stamp of approval is in every inch of framework. Not only is the projects including LGTBI characters and actors but writers, directors and many of the folks behind-the-scenes, are now taking active roles in many of the projects that are coming out and letting the world finally know and realize that being who you are is way more important, than what others think they know about you. LGTBI characters aren’t being tossed into the small box that at one time everyone wanted to throw us (I write that with pride) in. You have to understand that if it wasn’t for many of those alleged “meaningless” parts and sometimes even colorful characters from yesteryear, that would appear in movies, TV shows and other projects, the Who’s Who of entertainment wouldn’t even have a foot to stand on or with. A great example of this would be Paul Lynde (R.I.P.), who was literally an American treasure in his own right and even when he wasn’t finding work on the big or little screen, he worked steadily and made a name for himself, being his authentic-self, all the time. No one never talked about him being openly gay but it was always implied and that seems pretty sad all around but it didn’t do anything but made him even more accessible. No one wants to be the joke but if your actually telling the joke, then you want people to laugh along with you and not at you. Paul was always telling the jokes and not being laughed at but actually being laughed with. Now the Paul Lynde’s of the business are getting roles and projects because they are gay and active being in the LGTBI community and back then Paul Lynde was a literally a party of one.
   However, he would literally blaze a trail that he wouldn’t live to see.
   Was Paul Lynde a stereotype? Of course he was but the reason why the world has so many colors, shapes and sizes is because we are all different but seeking the same things at the end of our day and that is people in our lives that love, respect and want us to be happy.
   There were many LGTBI people in positions that could have came out years ago but really who is willing to risk their livelihood for the next man? Now you have those people in your midst and they are awesome folks like Chris and Tuc and a slew of others in the business of show and I couldn’t be more proud and honored to have them being visible and even talking openly about this subject. However it seems to be a broken record at times because all gay men aren’t rugged and tough but all aren’t prissy and quaint either. I can’t speak for anyone but myself but I know that most of us fall somewhere in the middle and then there are some that are the extreme ideal of both.
   Think of the legendary TV show ‘Leave It To Beaver’ and the character of ‘June Cleaver’ which was played by the incredibly beautiful and talented, Barbara Billingsley. Do you really think that there weren’t housewives across the globe freaking out because this woman always had breakfast, lunch and dinner made on time?
   She always looked amazing and a hair was never out of place or she never looked rest-broken. June not only kept her husband happy (he was amazing handsome and dapper, Hugh Beaumont) but ran the house that on the surface looked ‘white gloved’ cleaned daily. It was a caricature of a housewife and the family. I think that June Cleaver wasn’t a part wrote to make anyone feel bad about being a mom, being wife but that is how someone felt when they came up with the show.
   Most moms went into overdrive trying to achieve everything that June would portray and others were so anti-June that it was borderline abuse happening.