The documentary Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist and Rebel, claims that the 83-year-old media mogul was an early gay-rights advocate, according to Pinknews.co.uk. In 1955, shortly after founding Playboy, Hefner published a short sci-fi story, The Crooked Man, in which homosexuality was the norm and heterosexuals were persecuted. In response to angry letters, Hefner wrote, “If it was wrong to persecute heterosexuals in a homosexual society, then the reverse was wrong, too.”
Actor George Clooney was confronted by a gay fan at the Venice Film Festival, according to E! Online. Clooney was answering questions about his new film, The Men Who Stare at Goats, when a man stripped to his underwear and asked, “I am gay, George, and I think I am in love with you. … Please take me. May I kiss you, please. Just one kiss?” Clooney apparently turned the man down, saying, “It’s hard when you take a big chance and it doesn’t really work.”
Talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres, 51, will replace Paula Abdul on American Idol, according to People magazine. DeGeneres will start after the audition round, which features celebrity guest judges such as singers Mary J. Blige and Victoria Beckham. DeGeneres said Sept. 9 that “I’m going to have a day job and a night job. This is so exciting for me.”
X-Factor, a Marvel’s Comics’ series, features a same-sex kiss between characters Rictor and Shatterstar in the latest issue, according to Advocate.com. It’s one of the first gay kisses in a mainstream comic. However, writer Peter David said that, regarding Rictor’s sexuality, “I don’t see the point at this juncture in spelling it out—not because of any sense of homophobia or anything like that but out of a sense that I think it’s more entertaining and more thought-provoking if we keep it ambiguous.”
POSSIBLE PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD! Rumors are running rampant around the set of Sex and the City 2, according to Advocate.com. Us Weekly has reported that Big (played by Chris Noth) and Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) actually split—but she discover she’s expecting. Other publications are reporting that Carrie’s gay friend, Stanford (Willie Garson) will marry Anthony (Mario Cantone). The film is slated to premiere next May.
Jodie Foster may be single again. According to a SheWired.com item, Foster’s girlfriend, Cynthia Mort, has reportedly left Foster to take up with former partner Amanda Demme. And to show just how linked Hollywood can be, Demme is the niece through marriage of Jonathan Demme, who directed Foster in Silence of the Lambs.
Swayze dies