Nora Ephron talks to The Advocate about ‘Julie & Julia” and how Miss Child felt about gay people

Nora Ephron has been doing all kinds of press promoting Julie & Julia which she wrote and directed and I find myself reading many of them because she gives smart and thoughtful answers. One of the better chats is with Brandon Voss for The Advocate – especially since it touches on Julia Child’s homophobia. Here is that exchange as well as Ephron’s thoughts on whether gay actors should come out or not.

Q. Julia Child, later in her life, spoke beautifully at a 1988 AIDS benefit sponsored by the American Food and Wine Institute. But Laura Shapiro’s 2007 biography, which referenced many of Julia’s own letters, brought to light her previous love-hate relationship with the gay community. Sure they were buying her books and watching her shows, but she was afraid of gay men taking over the cooking industry and making the profession less attractive to straight men. She expressed pity for lesbians and called gay men “fags,” “homovipers,” and “pansies.” Now here we are discussing a film celebrating her life and work. Should we forgive and forget her arguably harmless homophobia simply because it was another time and, well, because she’s deceased?
A. That’s an interesting question that I couldn’t possibly answer for you, but Julia was wrong about many things. When Meryl was very seriously involved in stopping the spraying of apples with Alar in the ’80s, she wrote to Julia Child, hoping that Julia would support the cause because that would’ve meant a huge amount. Julia wrote her a very snippy letter back, saying that she didn’t care about or believe in that. To her the whole organic food thing was just not even worth bothering with. But she changed her mind about that and admitted she had been wrong. One of the good things about Julia is that she did know that she had been wrong about things, and I know she knew she was wrong about her homophobia. It’s an interesting question of how we judge people whose politics we find reprehensible. There are people who still don’t forgive Thomas Jefferson for having slaves. I believe that Julia Child was homophobic out of ignorance, but she became very good friends with lots of the gay men in the food business and forgave them all for being in the food business. It was a business that was not necessarily welcoming to newcomers, but everyone fell in love with her in a big way, and many of them were gay. Her career was launched by Craig Claiborne at The New York Times, and she was practically adopted by James Beard.

Q. Out directors Don Roos and Todd Holland recently advised gay actors to remain closeted for the sake of their careers at OutFest. As one of Hollywood’s most celebrated directors, what are your thoughts on the subject?
A. Well, I think people should do exactly what they want to, but I would never judge anyone, especially an actor, for staying in the closet. Getting cast in a movie is hard enough without throwing in the additional possibility that someone would turn you down because you were known to be gay. But it’s no question that if more actors were willing to come out, then it would make life easier for everyone. So it’s a very tricky question. It’s hard to tell somebody what they ought to do about something that’s essentially private in a real way but needs to be public for political reasons. You know, I love seeing that Ellen DeGeneres, whom I love, is now a spokesperson for, what, a moisturizing cream? I don’t even know what it’s for, but she’s basically being used in the same way they use whoever those other models are. She managed to get through a time where coming out seems to have cost her, and now it just doesn’t matter.

Another great interview by Brandon Voss!