Neil Patrick Harris joins Ruby Rose, Anderson Cooper and Melissa Ethridge on the covers of Entertainment Weekly‘s annual Gay Pride issues, available June 7th.
Here’s what the group, including Wilson Cruz and Janet Mock, had to share with the mag:
Anderson on coming out publicly: “I just published it on a website of a friend of mine, Andrew Sullivan, and that was it. It was actually funny because I was in Africa shooting something when it was published and I didn’t realize I was in a place that had absolutely no cell phone service for three days. But as soon as I got to Johannesburg, my phone lit up. And I’d realized I’d forgotten to tell my mom I was making this announcement. I’d come out to her a long time ago, but she was like,’Oh, you could’ve given me a heads up!’”
Ruby on the evolution of terminology used to describe LGBTQ+ people: “When I got cast as a lesbian in Batwoman, I didn’t know that being a genderfluid woman meant that I couldn’t be a lesbian because I’m not a woman— not considered lesbian enough. My initial response was ‘Pfft!’ And then I was like, ‘Wait. Let me just figure this one out. How do I right this wrong, because if someone out there is upset by this, I need to know why and how to fix it.’ That’s when I sort of said, ‘I’m a woman that identifies as a woman. I’m not trans. But if being gender fluid means that I can’t identify as a woman at any point, then I guess I can’t be that.’ Maybe I need to make up another term, one that doesn’t step on any toes. One where I can be fluid in my gender, but also a lesbian, because otherwise I’m not sure what I am.”
Neil on why he came out publicly: “I was dating my now husband [David Burtka] and I realized it was most disrespectful to him to go in the car to an opening of a movie and then I would go down the carpet and he would go with our publicist, behind where the camera guys were and we’d meet up at the end. And it just felt disrespectful. All that said though, I don’t think that anyone should be told when anything is supposed to happen.”
For more from the group, visit EW.com.
