DAYS Shocker — Massey Abruptly Fired from Top Role in Drama

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Chandler Massey as Will Horton. The two-time Emmy winner was let go last week.

Well, this is interesting. Not good interesting, but interesting nonetheless. This is why I hate the networks….

Two-time Emmy winner Chandler Massey filmed his final scenes as Days of Our Lives’ gay heartthrob Will Horton on Friday, Aug. 23 — only he didn’t know they were his last until he was summoned at the end of his work day to the office of Greg Meng, the soap’s co-executive producer. During this meeting, Meng informed Massey, who had been planning to depart the NBC soap when his contract expired in December, that he would have to leave immediately because a replacement had already been hired. Massey exited the studio sans fanfare — no farewell party, no goodbyes, no nothing — and sources close to the young actor say he was devastated and in tears. His last episode will air on or around Dec. 31. Days has yet to announce the name of Massey’s replacement, who won’t begin work until after the soap returns from a two-week production hiatus in September.

via TV Guide

Recent Post: Massey Leaves Iconic Role as Will Horton

Remembering Bayard Rustin

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Bayard Rustin, prior to the 1963 March on Washington. |Image: AP via BuzzFeed

Really great piece this morning on BuzzFeed about Bayard Rustin, the architect of the 1963 March on Washington, which occurred 50 years ago today.

Rustin, the piece argues, has been mostly ignored by history because of his refusal to hide his homosexuality, even then, and his Quaker faith and temperament, which caused him to forswear all violence.

President Obama will posthumously bestow the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Rustin this year.

 

One First Word

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Me, on Facebook this morning….

The view from here: Bashar al-Asad is gassing his own people and we’re about to intervene militarily, Putin and Friends have made Russia one of the most scarily anti-gay places on earth but the IOC is not moving the Olympics because, like the jews in 1936, we don’t care enough about the homos we’re sending, journalists’ families are being harassed by governments because of the Snowden leaks, the entire Western portion of the country is on fire, the Do-Nothing Congress is gearing up for another utterly meaningless fight on the utterly meaningless debt ceiling, Pakistan, the Taliban, Iraq, Iran, fracking, Keystone XL, AQAP…. and if you listen to the American “news media” you would assume that the only two stories happening in the world are Ben Affleck being cast as Batman and how Miley Cyrus lost the plot at the VMAs.

Some days, everything annoys me. This is one of those days.

And so it goes.

Takei to Receive Leadership Award for LGBT Advocacy

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The extraordinary George Takei. Who better to receive this award? No one that I know of. |Image: Examiner

 

The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force announced iconic Star Trek actor and LGBT advocate George Takei will be the recipient of the organization’s 2013 National Leadership Award, reports the Associated Press.

via George Takei to Receive Leadership Award for LGBT Advocacy | Advocate.com.

Massey Leaves Iconic Gay Role as Will Horton

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Outlets covering gay entertainment news and those covering soap operas had plenty to write about Fri., Aug. 23, when, in a surprise move, two-time Emmy winner Chandler Massey announced that he had filmed his last scenes as Will Horton on the venerable NBC sudser Days of our Lives.

The story of Will Horton (Emmy winner Chandler Massey, left) discovering himself and his love story with Sonny Kiriakis (Freddie Smith) has been achingly slow, but powerful performances by the duo have overshadowed the typically tepid plotting.

AFTERGLOW. Sonny Kiriakis (Emmy nominee Freddie Smith, right) will find a strange new bedfellow in the new year when an as yet unannounced new actor takes over the role of partner Will Horton (double Emmy winner Chandler Massey, left) on the NBC daytime drama Days of Our Lives.

The 22-year-old Massey had announced his intentions to leave the role earlier this year when he won his second consecutive Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Younger Actor. He has said that he intends to finish college, which was interrupted during his freshman year when he won the role of Will Horton on DOOL.

“I’m done. It’s bittersweet, Massey is quoted as saying on The Backlot. “These four years have been so amazing I’ve built a family here. I’m so grateful to NBC and everyone for these amazing four years. It’s been my privilege and honor to work there.”

Massey was let out of his contract several months early for a variety or reasons. While originally saying that they would not recast the role, producers have now indicated that storylines have dictated a recast.

While many current fans of the show have taken to social media decrying the decision to recast, Massey — the fifth actor to play the role — has been vocal in his support of a recast for some time.

“I think it’s a good move [to recast],” Massey said in The Backlot piece. “I’m biased because I fell in love with Will and Sonny and I want Will and Sonny to be together.”

I agree with him. I fell in love with them, too. But, recasts have always been a part of the life of a continuing drama. After all, excluding babies, 12 actors assayed the part of Tom Hughes on As The World Turns from 1960 until Scott Holmes became “lucky 13” in 1987, staying with the role until the series ended in 2010. There’s hardly a role on a soap that has not been played by another actor at one time or another.

There’s no doubt about it: I will miss Massey, but I do believe that it’s more important that DOOL continue to tell this story and I hope a recast indicates that they tend to do just that.

There are plenty of young people, struggling with their sexuality that need to see other young gay people in a committed relationship to show them that it can be done — insane gunmen, unintended pregnancies, annoying and sometime borderline psychotic parents, drug dealing cousins, perjury, hot architects and Stefano DiMera aside — and that you can come home each night to the loving embrace of Sonny Kiriakis and his fabulous hair.

Thanks, Mr. Massey, for sharing your gifts with us. Your impact on the landscape has been indelible.

Because of DAYS’ shooting schedule, Massey will likely be seen as Will through December.

Other Recent Posts:
More Sands Through the Gay Hourglass — Revisiting and Revising
Like Sands Through the Gay Hourglass: Ticked Off at American Dramas. Again.
Charm of DAYS’ Gay Supercouple “Cannot be Denied”
Chandler Massey Takes Home Second Emmy
Daytime Emmy Q and A: Freddie Smith

NPR Says Julia Child Was Wrong — Um, I Don’t THINK SO!

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Julia Child Was Wrong: Don’t Wash Your Raw Chicken, Folks : The Salt : NPR.

I’m open to being proven wrong, but I think this is a lot of bloody hokum. The comments are more prescient than this article.

If there was, in actuality, an epidemic of food borne illness from washing poultry, there would be more of a hue and cry about it. The fact is, the reason there is so much wrong with food today is because modern agribusiness has done a fine PR job convincing us that this the CHICKENS’ FAULT and not the fault of the MASS PROCESSING AND SLAUGHTER INDUSTRY.

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Sorry, NPR. Julia Child was never wrong. Image|Paul Child/PBS

Solve the problem by (A) buying your chickens from an organic farmer/butcher or (B) not eating chicken. Telling you not to wash a chicken is like telling you not to wash e coli-ridden bagged lettuce, which you shouldn’t be buying either. HOW HARD IS IT TO RIP UP LETTUCE, PEOPLE?? I’m done ranting, I’m going to go wash a chicken.

I’ve been called out on my near-reverance for the late Ms. Child more than once, but I’m here to tell you, if you study cooking, if you study food, if you study kitchen technique, you will never find a better teacher.

I’m a pretty fine home cook, if I do say so myself. Julia Child taught me how to be fearless in the kitchen and how to marry flavors and, most importantly, how to cover up mistakes with good humor and an extra bottle of wine.

My advice, always, to fellow mortals: don’t fuck with Julia Child.

Simon Pegg Decries the Need For Bromance

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Pegg, Star Trek’s new Scotty, and his cuddly BFF, Nick Frost, want to know what’s wrong with two guys showing affection. Damn good question.


Simon Pegg spoke with WTF with Marc Maron and decried the idea of a bromance, but for all the right reasons. “You can be affectionate with each other, you can love each other and it doesn’t have to be some – you know, and even if it does turn into something, which it didn’t, then it’s okay… We always sort of flinch at this “bromance” buzzword that’s come up – there’s no equivalent for women, because it’s not weird if women are friends… because of this homosexual terror that straight guys have, it’s ridiculous. Now there has to be this word for it, and it’s crazy. It’s totally sad.”

via Meme: Simon Pegg Decries the Need For Bromance, Sir Elton Takes Us “Home Again,” Is Peter Capaldi The Last Doctor? – thebacklot.com.

‘Harry Potter’ Star: Hollywood Gay Casting ‘Ridiculous’

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“If you are a romantic lead, there is a perception — I don’t know if it is true or not — that you will no longer be cast as straight people,” [Jason Isaacs] told the Telegraph. “Even when casting gay roles, there is a tendency to cast straight people, so they are lauded for their transformation. It’s ridiculous. The notion that a gay actor can’t seem like they are in love with a woman on screen is so patently absurd I can’t believe it still exists.”

via Jason Isaacs, ‘Harry Potter’ Star: Hollywood Gay Casting ‘Ridiculous’.

I couldn’t agree more. Of course, I looked at the photo and went, “Who in the hell is Jason Isaacs in Harry Potter?” That’s because Jason Isaacs is this guy:

jason-isaacs-la-premiere-of-bully-01He’s Lucius Malfoy!

I know, right?

Astonishing what a little slap and a blonde wig’ll do for ya!

GLAAD Looks at Gay Visibility in Hollywood Films – thebacklot.com

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HollywoodVineGLAAD Looks at Gay Visibility in Hollywood Films – thebacklot.com.

GLAAD has previously released annual Network Responsibility Index reports on LGBT visibility in television, but this marks the first time they’ve provided an analysis of movie studios. And what they found in this first report is not good.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the most homophobic place in America is (metaphorically speaking) the corner of Hollywood and Vine.