Billy Dee Williams, best known for his role as Lando Calrissian in the ‘Star Wars’ franchise, is addressing the rumors of him being part of the LGBTQIA+ community.
The 86-year-old actor spent nearly 80 years both on screen and on stage, but he also spent most of his life in the arts industry, even beginning life as a painter.
Now, for the first time, the ‘Star Wars’ actor is letting down his walls fully as he is opening up about his decades-long career in his memoir, ‘What Have We Here?’
Did Billy Dee Williams Attended Secret Gay Parties?!
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When promoting his new memoir, Williams addressed those rumors that he was part of the LGBTQIA+ community, which many said could have ruined his career.
The actor says he was always comfortable hanging out with members of the LGBTQIA+ community — and admitted to attending secret gay parties in the Metropolitan Opera’s basement.
“It all seemed very normal to me,” he shared of that time in his life. “I was around it all of my life, so I never really gave it much thought.”
When promoting his book, he spoke of those rumors, claiming they never bothered him. “I’ve been called a ‘Closet Queen,” he told Page Six, adding, “But, I don’t pay much attention to any of that.”
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This comes a few years after Williams, who was the first Black character in the ‘Star Wars’ universe, referred to himself as a “colorful” person.
“I think of myself as a relatively colorful character who doesn’t take himself or herself too seriously,” he told Esquire at the time, adding, “and you see I say ‘himself’ and ‘herself,’ because I also see myself as feminine as well as masculine.”
LGBTQ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign then took to social media to congratulate Williams for “coming out and living your truth as gender fluid.”
However, the ‘Star Wars’ actor later clarified his comments, claiming that he was actually talking about “men getting in touch with their softer side of themselves.”
“There’s a phrase that was coined by Carl G. Jung, who was a psychiatrist, who was a contemporary of Sigmund Freud, and they had a splitting of the ways because they had different ideas about the…what do you call it? Consciousness. Unconscious. It’s collective unconsciousness,” he told The Undefeated.
Billy Dee Williams Says He ‘Identifies As A Man’
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“But he coined a phrase that’s, ‘Anima animus.’ And anima means that is the female counterpart of the male self, and the animus is the male counterpart of the female,” Williams continued. “
He then clarified, “So, that’s what I was referring to. I was talking about men getting in touch with the female side of themselves. I wasn’t talking about s-x, I wasn’t talking about being gay or straight. People should read [Jung]. I mean, it would be an interesting education for a lot of people.”
He then said“he identifies as a man” and that he is “not gay.”
Billy Dee Williams’s new memoir, ‘What Have We Here?’ is out now.