The Queer Business of Casting Gay Characters on U.S. Television

Abstract

Casting for gay roles in U.S. television occupies an important space within media production studies because it exposes the patterns involved with who is allowed to work within the culture industries. Drawing on literature on casting, queer labor and personal interviews with casting directors, this article explores the ways casting functions as a practice that doggedly works within ``best actor{''} discourses that insulate the television industry from charges of deliberately failing to cast gay actors in projects. Ultimately, this article centers the import of queers' ability to fashion their own self-images and re-asserts the specificity of gayness as an identity category. This article also exposes the three-tiered discursive spiral in which casting is bound: defensive truth, subterfuge and queer possibility.