Equity: The Tangled Webs We Weave

'When Antony Sher started acting with the pioneering Gay Sweatshop theatre company in the 70s, he managed to stay in the closet. "I look back and blush," he said. "We all agreed to do it on the basis that it was stated that not all the performers were gay so you didn't know who was and who wasn't.
"Then, in the mid-80s, when I did the British premiere of Harvey Fierstein's Torch Song Trilogy I still wasn't out. I was doing press interviews about this great gay play that I felt so strongly about for a specific reason and I wasn't saying it – it was an astonishing waste of energy. But that's the kind of tangle you get into if you're not out."

Alex Needham talks to Antony Sher in The Guardian on the start of a new campaign by Equity - I Won't Pretend - to support actors who come out. 
This has evolved out of a survey by the actors' union that suggested many are still closeted in their professional lives.
That so few leading actors are out seems far more farcical and tragic than the media obsession with gay footballers. 
The article concludes with a suitably Wildean paradox from Sher;
"When you see any great performer, you sort of see into that person's soul. Your sexuality is profoundly a part of who you are. I think it's very difficult to really reveal yourself in that exquisite way if you're trying to hide part of yourself."

Update: Sher and the boyfriend Greg Doran do How We Met in The Independent On Sunday.
Think I'll have to add Mr Sher to my little list of the weekend broadsheets' Favourite Gays.