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Boy Erased Star Lucas Hedges Comes Out As 'Not Totally Straight'
"I recognize myself as existing on that spectrum," said the 21-year-old.
Lucas Hedges opened up about his sexuality in a vulnerable interview with Vulture.
Hedges, who recently starred in award-winning films Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Lady Bird, and Manchester by the Sea, is coming to the big screen again this November in gay conversion therapy camp film Boy Erased. Hedges plays Jared, the son of a Baptist preacher who is outed as gay to his small town and is forced into a church-supported gay conversion program.
"It’s a story about shame," said Hedges on the film, "which felt to me like the governing factor of my life and my childhood."
The 21-year-old then recalls a story from his adolescence of developing a crush on a boy at camp. "I had this compulsion to confess all my thoughts to my mother, any bad thought I had...I felt terrible about it. I remember her being very comforting, and she understood that something was distressing me, and she said, ‘You don’t have to go back to camp today.’"
Hedges dissects his sexuality a bit more. "In the early stages of my life, some of the people I was most infatuated with were my closest male friends. That was the case through high school, and I think I was always aware that while for the most part I was attracted to women, I existed on a spectrum."
Hedges goes on to recall his sixth-grade teacher discussing the broad range of sexuality. "I felt ashamed that I wasn’t 100 percent, because it was clear that one side of sexuality presents issues, and the other doesn’t as much. I recognize myself as existing on that spectrum: Not totally straight, but also not gay and not necessarily bisexual."
Boy Erased comes out in theaters November 2. Read Lucas Hedges' full Vulture interview here.
Taylor Henderson is a PRIDE.com contributor. This proud Texas Bama studied Media Production/Studies and Sociology at The University of Texas at Austin, where he developed his passions for pop culture, writing, and videography. He's absolutely obsessed with Beyoncé, mangoes, and cheesy YA novels that allow him to vicariously experience the teen years he spent in the closet. He's also writing one!
Taylor Henderson is a PRIDE.com contributor. This proud Texas Bama studied Media Production/Studies and Sociology at The University of Texas at Austin, where he developed his passions for pop culture, writing, and videography. He's absolutely obsessed with Beyoncé, mangoes, and cheesy YA novels that allow him to vicariously experience the teen years he spent in the closet. He's also writing one!
