Sex and the City actor claps back at homophobic response to his latest gay character
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – AUGUST 03: Actor Jason Lewis at the NBCUniversal Summer TCA Press Tour at The Beverly Hilton Hotel on August 3, 2017 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images)
Sex and the City actor Jason Lewis has spoken out against Christian lobbyists who have lashed out at his new TV series because his character is gay.
In supernatural drama Midnight, Texas, Lewis plays fallen angel Joe Strong who has a half-demon husband named Chuy (played by Bernardo Saracino). And despite the fact that the show features witches, vampires, shapeshifters, ghosts and weretigers, it’s his role that religious extremists have had the most issue with, according to Lewis.
Not that he’s willing to entertain the backlash, that is.
Speaking in an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Lewis – who is perhaps best known for playing Samantha Jones’ long-term love interest Smith Jerrod in Sex and the City – said that he enjoys “working on a show like this, especially in the [political] climate of such intolerance because [we] kind of to get to poke fun at that a little bit.”
Calling out the haters, he continued: “Yeah, cool, be intolerant of us and see how well that goes for you.”
Lewis even drew parallels to his black-and-white attitude towards prejudice to his character’s, saying: “Joe is a little over the petty sexual concerns of the average human being.
“He’s been around too long (being 1000-years-old) to look at somebody through such narrow values and assess them.”
Based on the book series by ‘True Blood‘ author Charlaine Harris, Midnight, Texas follows the inhabitants of the titular small town as they try to create a safe haven for anyone who might be considered ‘different’ while simultaneously fending off outside threats such as wild biker gangs, shady strangers and questioning police officers.
Lewis (L) and Bernardo Saracino, who plays Lewis’s onscreen husband Chuy, in ‘Midnight, Texas’ (NBC)
It isn’t the first show to see Lewis play a gay man on the small screen. From 2007 to 2009, Lewis starred as closeted actor Chad Barry opposite The Americans star Matthew Rhys’ character Kevin Walker in family drama Brothers & Sisters.
Talking about that role to Blackbook recently, he noted: “In Brothers & Sisters, I played a person who didn’t know where it was okay for him to exist.
“I think that’s definitely brought up in Midnight, Texas too, but I don’t think that’s the sum total of what Joe’s reality is – because I don’t know what they’re gonna write for season two.
“But the guys been around for [thousands of years] so there’s a lot of other things that have weighed on that kind of creature’s mind.”
Lewis is perhaps best known for playing Jerry ‘Smith Jerrod in ‘Sex and the City’ (Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images)
Also starring Jessica Jones‘ Parisa Fitz-Henley, Orphan Black‘s Dylan Bruce and I Killed My Mother actor François Arnaud, Midnight, Texas‘ second season premieres in the US on NBC on Friday 26 October. It will kick off in the UK on 1 November on Syfy.
