Maybe this post is just for me, because I adore Ben Whishaw. Other people adore him too, but he’s not really scandalous or all that gossip-worthy. The most attention he’s ever gotten was last year when he married his partner in a civil ceremony and subsequently “came out” as a gay man. That was a minor controversy because the UK papers got a hold of Ben’s civil partnership paperwork and sort of “outed” him, although to be fair to the UK press, he was never really closeted and his publicist confirmed the news. All in all, it was a pretty uneventful coming out, but that’s good too. Ben’s well respected and in-demand as an actor no matter what. No one cares about his sexuality. Anyway, since then, Ben has been keeping a low profile… because he ALWAYS has a low profile. But he’s got a new movie (Lilting) coming out, so he did one interview and it’s making the rounds. Some quotes:

Ben on being cast as Q in Skyfall: “I’m very non-techy. I don’t even have a computer. But there’s something very appealing about that character. I was surprised to find myself in that kind of film, a big film, with such a big audience.”

“Coming out” to his family: “I did have to. It’s a phrase I’m not entirely comfortable with, but since it’s the only one we have… My experiences were not dramatic. No walking around the block. And everyone was surprisingly lovely. I hadn’t anticipated that they would be, but they were.”

Identifying with the gay character he plays in Lilting: “I identify with the character in Lilting in as much as I had a lot of fear in doing it [coming out] for a long time. And who can say why? I’m not sure I know. But it takes courage and people have to do it in their own time. It’s hard to have a conversation with people you’ve known your whole life about a very intimate thing. It’s massively weighted with all sorts of stuff, whatever the wider world is saying. It’s an intimate and private and difficult conversation for most people.”

Coming out is hard: “It is hard, I applaud anyone who does it. There is so much tension around doing something like that, that maybe you’re not quite thinking rationally. You can say absurd things because you are in a panic.”

[From The Sunday Times, via The Independent & the Mirror]

Wow, he actually answered some personal questions and he did it with grace. I’m glad everyone was “surprisingly lovely” about it. The most controversial thing to me is that he doesn’t own a computer?!!? How can someone in the “first world” not own a computer?!

Oh, and you know that terrifying Paddington Bear movie that they’ve made with Jim Broadbent and Nicole Kidman? The CGI bear looks like he came straight out of hell and Colin Firth’s posh voice coming out of the bear wasn’t helping matters. It was like Paddington Bear was a furry assassin, a killing machine in bear form with an icy voice. Well, Ben Whishaw is the new replacement voice for the bear. That should be an improvement. Ben has a lovely, sweet voice.

Photos courtesy of WENN.