Warning: spoilers ahead for The Last of Us episode 3.
Several The Last of Us viewers have claimed that in the discourse over whether straight actors should be able to play gay characters on screen, Nick Offerman is an ‘exception to the rule’.
In episode 3 of the HBO and Sky TV show based on the video game series of the same name, the Parks and Recreation actor stars as Bill, a hardened survivalist who relishes in being left on his own at the start of the pandemic.
A few years after the outbreak, he meets a man called Frank (Murray Bartlett) who’s striving to survive in the wilderness, with the pair eventually falling in love and living a full and loving life together into old age.
There are frequently debates over whether or not straight actors should be cast in gay roles, with It’s a Sin creator Russell T Davies saying in January 2021 about casting for his Channel 4 drama: ‘I’m not being woke about this… but I feel strongly that if I cast someone in a story, I am casting them to act as a lover, or an enemy, or someone on drugs or a criminal or a saint… they are not there to “act gay” because “acting gay” is a bunch of codes for a performance. It’s about authenticity, the taste of 2020.’
The Big Bang Theory star Jim Parsons, who publicly came out as gay in 2012, previously said: ‘There’s definitely this spectrum: I think the fight, as it were, is not about having only gay people play the gay parts but to ensure that all parts are open to all actors,’ while Colin Firth, who played a gay man opposite Stanley Tucci in the 2020 film Supernova, said: ‘I don’t have a final position on this. I think the question is still alive. It’s something I take really seriously, and I gave it a lot of thought before doing this.’
After watching the third episode of The Last of Us, many viewers admitted that they’d been left sobbing by Bill and Frank’s beautiful love story, with some calling for the actors to both win awards for their stellar performances.
While The White Lotus star Murray is gay, Nick has been married to Will & Grace star Megan Mullaly since 2003.
‘Nick Offerman is the only straight man I’m okay with being cast as a gay character. He is the exception to the rule,’ one person tweeted after watching the latest instalment of the post-apocalyptic series.
‘Congratulations to Nick Offerman for officially joining Stanley Tucci as the co-president of the “Cis Straight Dudes With A Lifetime Pass to Play Gay Characters” club after this episode bc wow I’m still crying,’ another wrote.
TV writer Nick Lehmann claimed that Nick ‘changed his mind about straight actors playing gay roles’, with another person remarking that while ‘it would have been nice for both Frank AND Bill to be played by a gay actor… Offerman was PERFECT’.
One viewer stated that The Last of Us episode three ‘was yet another example’ of ‘Bury Your Gays’ – a trope in the media relating to the deaths of LGBT+ characters in stories who may be depicted as being expendable to the plot – as well as an example of straight men playing gay men.
However, they also added: ‘It was beautifully done, and deserves any and all the awards.’
Another person wrote: ‘Also let me be VERY clear: If/when Nick Offerman wins an award for this I will not be complaining about a straight actor winning an award for playing gay him and Craig Mazin talked about making sure they did the work to portray this in an honest and respectful way.’
While speaking to Metro.co.uk and other media about his role in The Last of Us, Nick said that in popular culture, he hadn’t often seen couples like Bill and Frank ‘represented’.
‘It really goes a long way toward espousing the permission to all of us that if there’s another human being you should be allowed to love one another, regardless of how you fit in conventional couple templates,’ he said.
He added that in the ‘small conservative town’ where he grew up in the Midwest of America, ‘they wouldn’t allow the story to be told if they could vote’.
‘And the Bills and Franks are like, “But we live in this town, county, state, country, world.” I’m just very grateful that we’re not just part of the same old storytelling, but trying to tread new ground,’ he stated.
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The Last of Us is available to watch on Sky and NOW, with new episodes released on Mondays.
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