When former Will & Grace costar Sean Hayes came out as gay last fall, it wasn’t exactly earthshattering news; most people had assumed as much. However, Hayes had been studiously coy about his sexuality up to that point, and it would be wrong to confuse his flamboyantly gay character, Jack, with the actor playing that role. Still, he was awfully good at it… (Plus, he does a mean impression of Cher.) In any case, when he finally came out at an award ceremony in L.A., he could not have been more apologetic: “In my mind, my lucky break was inextricably tied to me thinking that I had to stay in the closet in order to keep moving forward. Looking back at my choice to stay silent, I am ashamed and embarrassed.” Okay, he did it for career reasons; but one wonders: perhaps it was the very flamboyance, the stereotypical gayness, of Jack that made it so hard for Hayes to come out. For one thing, he wanted to avoid being typecast: I may be gay, but I’m not that gay. And hey, he wants to be thought of as a good actor, and playing Jack if you are Jack isn’t exactly a stretch.
