Irish comic Oliver Callan has announced
he's gay.
The 30-year-old Callan appeared on
RTE's Saturday Night Show to discuss charges he was
homophobic, which arose from a sketch he performed last March on the
same show.
He told host Brendan O'Connor: “Let's
get one thing straight, I'm not homophobic, I'm gay.”
During his previous appearance on the
show, Callan had done an over-the-top impersonation of Senator Davis
Norris, who was running for president at the time and is openly gay.
Under the guise of a campy Norris, Callan suggested that footballer
Paul Galvin, who is pursuing a fashion career, was gay.
“The thing I'm most looking forward
to [as president] is the All-Ireland finals, when I stand erect! My
stylist Paul Galvin will be there – Paul Galvin Klein as you know –
but we don't know what side of the stitch he's hurling from do we?”
Callan screamed. “But you see he won't join me on the canvass.
He's refusing to join me on the canvass because he says he prefers
silk or skinny denim – skinny denim is a nightmare for erections.
But anyway, people wonder why he's so good at fashion. Pretty clear
to me, it's all the years he spent in the closet.”
Galvin complained to the network,
describing it as “excruciating” to watch Callan's performance.
“Paul Galvin claims he felt it was
excruciatingly difficult to watch me poke fun at his fashion sense,”
Callan said on this week's show. “Straight men should not be
insulted to be sent up like a gay.”
He added that his sexual orientation
wasn't a big deal: “I'm not singing I'm gay and proud. I'm saying
I'm gay and I don't give a shit and neither should anyone else.”
(The video is embedded in the right panel of this page.)