Source: BBC News, InTheNews.co.uk
Alan Cumming told Detour, "It's quite a good kind of thing for skinny people" when photographers want to take naked pictures of him.
photo: AlanCumming.comActor Alan Cumming told the BBC that the media's attitude to homosexuality is keeps gay actors from coming out.
The 43-year-old X-Men 2 star said, "I don't think the people that go see films care that much -- the media make it more of a deal and it's made into controversy."
Cumming's comments followed a complaint from Stephen Fry that he had been pigeonholed by casting directors since coming out.
And Torchwood star John Barrowman has said it is "just sad" that some actors lie about their sexuality to protect their chances of securing work.
But Cumming, speaking ahead of the British launch SciFi Channel TV series Tin Man, a revamp of The Wizard of Oz, denied that pigeonholing was a fact of life for gay actors.
"Some of them do, but lots of straight actors get pigeonholed in various roles," he said.
Cumming, who married his partner Grant Shaffer in a civil ceremony last year, said he hasn't tried to hide from the media.
"I'm quite outspoken in the media about what I perceive as a civil rights struggle that gay people in America are still going through," he told BBC.
Cumming added: "There is a lot of homophobia in the world - but in Hollywood definitely."
Website InTheNews.co.uk points out that Cumming's remarks are at odds with those of fellow actor Rupert Everett who claimed last year that Hollywood was "like al-Qaida".
"After a certain age you can be gay. Before that it's not only not good, it's impossible," he told the Times newspaper.
"Hollywood is a place that pretends it's very liberal but it's not remotely."
Everett had said in his autobiography Red Carpets and Other Banana Skins that he had been told by the head of MGM studios that he was turned down to play the romantic lead for Sharon Stone in a film because "to all intents and purposes a homosexual was a pervert in the eyes of America and the world would never accept me in the role and therefore MGM would never hire me".
Full article: BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Media 'keeping actors in closet'
Gay actors kept in closet by media, says Alan Cumming | InTheNews.co.uk