Josh O’Connor admits ‘mixed feelings’ about playing gay roles as he prepares for his latest one
Josh O’Connor has opened up about playing gay roles (Getty Images)
British star Josh O’Connor has revealed his “mixed feelings” about playing gay, ahead of his latest queer role.
O’Connor, who appeared alongside Zendaya and Mike Faist in Luca Guadagnino’s raunchy tennis drama Challengers, is set to appear opposite Gladiator II heartthrob Paul Mescal in gay WWI drama, The History of Sound.
He also appeared in the queer romance, God’s Own Country, in 2017, in which he played a repressed gay farmer who falls in love with a farm hand. Despite this, the star told Vanity Fair that he wasn’t “100 per cent sure” how he feels about playing gay characters.
“It’s a really difficult subject,” he said. “The truth is that I will read a script and what affects me, affects me. The History of Sound is a film about many things.
“For instance, it’s about grief [and] companionship. It’s also about music, about what happens in life when you fall in love with someone, and maybe that connection is broken.
“The other character from God’s Own Country was someone who was unable to love and be loved. A character’s sexuality, a character’s background, where they’ve grown up, their dynamic with their family, these are all aspects to any character, so I take those as seriously as I would any other aspect.
“But to be totally truthful, I’m not 100 per cent sure how I do feeI. I have mixed feelings.”
The History of Sound is based on a set of interconnected stories by Ben Shattuck, and details of the film were first announced two years ago. Director Oliver Hermanus has previously said that the two stars were “on fire” during shooting.
There is no release date yet for the film although it is expected some after the Cannes Film Festival in May.
O’Connor, who also starred in British TV period drama The Durrells, is said to be working on a yet-to-be-named Steven Spielberg film, opposite gay Rustin and The Color Purple star Colman Domingo.
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