Sean Hayes talks to The Advocate about being openly gay: “I am who I am. I was never in”

Well, better late than never.

Sean Hayes has, for the first time, publicly discussed being a gay man in an interview with The Advocate. He seems a bit grumpy about it because the magazine had been hard on him in the past about not being public with his sexuality.

He may not be as flamboyantly gay as his television alter-ego Jack on Will & Grace but he is gay and has acknowledged that as he prepares to make his Broadway debut in Promises, Promises.

The cover story explains that once Hayes began to play Jack, everyone wanted to know if he himself was gay and how he felt about playing a gay character. Faced with the very real prospect of jeopardizing his chance at landing straight roles down the road, he started reciting stock answers, variations on what he told the Detroit Free Press early on: “When I play a gay character I want to be as believable as possible. And when I’m playing a straight character I also want to be as believable as possible. So the less that people know about my personal life, the more believable I can be as a character.”

Hayes never pretended to be something he wasn’t like walking some pretty woman down the red carpet or faking a straight relationship.

While he was a riot as Jack, I think his being so tight-lipped made it difficult for gay fans to embrace him.

“I believe that nobody owes anything to anybody,” Hayes says in the interview. “Nobody owes anything to anybody. You are your authentic self to whom and when you choose to be, and if you don’t know somebody, then why would you explain to them how you live your life?”

Then he makes this point: “I feel like I’ve contributed monumentally to the success of the gay movement in America, and if anyone wants to argue that, I’m open to it. You’re welcome, Advocate.”

The four years since Will & Grace have allowed Hayes to reevaluate things. “I was anxious to get back to my life before Will & Grace,” he says. “You do need that time to find who you are again. Who am I without this? With fame you can’t help but lose yourself. You want to be the one who says I’ll always remain the same, but it is humanly impossible to disallow fame to change you.”

He opens up just a tad about his personal life: “I spend time with a special someone in my life,” he says. But after years of being burned, he won’t say another word about him or the quiet life they lead. “That’s it. That’s all I need,” he says. “I don’t need events. I don’t do a lot. I live my life like an 85-year-old man. I’m just quiet. It’s fantastic.”

To read the entire article, go to Advocate.com.