Culture

Derren Brown: I wonder if I could ‘turn a straight man gay’ for a TV show

Feb 18 2013
Written by Joseph McCormick

Derren Brown has said in a new interview that he would be interested in creating a television show on which he would attempt to make a straight man gay and a gay man straight, as a way of tackling sexuality through his work.

In an interview with the Gay Times for its April issue, the openly-gay illusionist reflected on coming out as gay, not wanting to get married, and talked about his upcoming “stripped down” show.

On the idea of trying to change the sexuality of two men from straight to gay and gay to straight, for a television show, he said the show might happen.

He said: “I was thinking about this the other day, would there ever be a show on that, it would be interesting wouldn’t it – take a gay guy and make him straight and a straight guy; make him gay. Maybe.”

In 2011, he said that before he came out in 2008, he spent time with the Living Waters movement, which offers healing to those with “same sex attraction”.

Discussing his decision to come out as gay, he said: “I ended up developing a fiercely independent eccentric persona for myself in my twenties that I just largely avoided that big discussion in my life, and delayed it. ‘It’ being the big, or not-so-big, deal of coming out.”

Earlier in February, Derren Brown joined the ranks of politicians and celebrities who had come Out4Marriage, in support of equal marriage.

In his video, he said: “I think that, despite that if you are married or in a civil partnership it may not make that much difference to an individual, it does matter, that little thing that it’s a bit of a B choice, that you only had choice B open to you and that choice A is somehow for other people. That does seem wrong.”

He said that both he and his partner had said that neither of them wanted to get married, but he said that may change in future.

“Neither of us ever wanted it or had ever spoken about it beyond going ‘Do you wanna get married? No? Me neither’. So, much like the difference between marriage and civil partnership, we’ll just have to wait and see how that pans out”, he said.

He also went on to talk about his new show, Infamous, and said: “The previous shows, we’ve always had a sort of template in mind, and after five or six of those, we’re dispensing with that template. Which is scary in some ways and exciting in getting the creative juices flowing in other ways.

“The show’s going to have a slightly more stripped down feel. The thing that crosses my mind is that it’s more like an acoustic set. So it makes sense having a title slightly more focused on me rather than Victorian grandeur”

April’s issue of GT featuring the full interview with Derren Brown is available from Wednesday 20 March.