Dawson’s Creek star Kerr Smith kisses and tells all on iconic moment in gay history
Jack and Ethan’s kiss on Dawson’s Creek (YouTube)
Dawson’s Creek actor Kerr Smith has opened up about what it was like to be part of that iconic gay kiss on the hit show.
Smith’s character Jack came out over the course of two episodes in 1998 and shared a kiss with another man. It was the first kiss between two men on US television.
“We were the first ones to do that,” Smith told TooFab.
“It was a crazy experience back then and you’re right, look at every single show now, it’s pretty amazing.”
Dawson’s Creek gay creator Kevin Williamson wanted to take Jack ‘down a different avenue’.
The actor said that he first found out what was in store for his character when screenwriter Kevin Williamson took him aside and said they wanted to take Jack “down a different avenue”.
“Obviously, he always had the intention of making one of his characters gay, he was still in the closet at that point too and every character in Dawson’s Creek is an extension of Kevin Williamson,” he said.
I remember calling up everybody I respected and said, ‘Hey, should I do this?’ Doing the first male-male kiss, I remember it was intense. I’m glad we did it and it was part of history.
Kerr said that his storyline was “largely Greg Berlanti’s”, the show’s gay executive producer.
“I remember calling up everybody I respected and said, ‘Hey, should I do this?’ Doing the first male-male kiss, I remember it was intense. I’m glad we did it and it was part of history.”
Cast of Dawson’s Creek (Columbia/TriStar International Television)
Smith – who is now 47-years-old – made his debut on The CW’s hit show Riverdale earlier this week where he plays a school principal.
Greg Berlanti met ‘resistance’ in gay kiss.
Berlanti previously opened up about the gay kiss on Dawson’s Creek in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, and said he was met with “resistance” when he suggested the storyline.
“When we did the Jack kiss on Dawson’s Creek, everyone was tentative. But I took over the show, and that was an important thing to me. If we were going to bring the character out, it seemed silly to me that he couldn’t kiss.”
He also revealed that he was prepared to quit the show if he was not allowed to proceed with the gay storyline for Jack’s character.
Meanwhile, in a separate interview with the same publication earlier this year, Berlanti revealed that he was blocked from casting gay actors in straight roles early in his career.
Bizarrely, the people blocking him were gay execs.
“Early on in my career there were gay execs and gay casting people who were the least likely to let me cast an actor they knew was gay in a straight part.
“These were the individuals who knew how important it would be,” he added.
