Julianne Moore ‘deeply hurt’ by ‘clickbait headlines’ claiming she regrets playing lesbian in queer classic The Kids Are All Right
Julianne Moore said she was “deeply hurt” by claims she regretted her lesbian role in The Kids Are All Right. (Roy Rochlin/WireImage)
Julianne Moore is “deeply hurt” by headlines claiming she regrets playing a lesbian character in queer family classic The Kids Are All Right.
Moore, 59, was responding to media write-ups of an interview with her published in Variety on Thursday (July 30) marking the 10-year anniversary of the iconic film.
Moore, a longtime advocate for LGBT+ rights, starred in the acclaimed movie 10 years ago alongside Annette Bening, Mark Ruffalo, Mia Waskikoska and Josh Hutcherson.
Headlines yesterday claimed that Moore “regrets” taking on the lesbian role in The Kids Are All Right, which was among the first mainstream movies to show a same-sex couple raising children.
Naming film-industry website IndieWire and its news editor Zack Sharf, Moore wrote on Twitter and Instagram yesterday: “I was deeply hurt and disappointed by your headline.”
The Oscar-winning actor continued: “It was a privilege and an honour to work on The Kids Are All Right and I said as much in the Variety interview I gave. You guys ran a headline that misrepresents my interview just for click bait.”
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Julianne Moore: Gay director could “feel” her gayness.
The Kids Are All Right was directed by gay filmmaker Lisa Cholodenko, who defended the decision to cast the straight actors because she could “feel their gayness”.
“I’ve thought about that a lot,” Moore told Varety ahead of the film’s 10th anniversary. “Here we were, in this movie about a queer family, and all of the principal actors were straight. I look back and go, ‘Ouch. Wow’.”
She continued: “I don’t know that we would do that today, I don’t know that we would be comfortable.
“We need to give real representation to people, but I’m grateful for all of the experiences that I’ve had as an actor because my job is to communicate a universality of experience to the world.
“The idea that, rather than othering people, we’re saying we’re all the same. Our humanity is shared.”
Also controversial was the fact that Moore’s character had an affair with her sperm donor, played by Mark Ruffalo.
Moore said she understands why this didn’t sit right with some viewers, but believes the storyline was justified as it depicts a more “fluid” sexuality.
“I can see why people took issue with a lesbian character having an affair with her sperm donor,” she said.
“On the other hand, I think that Jules’ character was someone described as being very fluid, sexually and personally. She was floating, in the sense of her entire identity — as a woman, as a person, in her career.”
