Producers of the upcoming television
series Star Trek: Discovery on Tuesday announced that they had
cast the show's gay character.
Anthony Rapp, who originated the role
of Mark Cohen in the Broadway musical Rent, will play
Lieutenant Stamets, who is described as “a fungus expert and a
Starfleet science officer.” Stamets is the franchise's first
character who is openly gay from the start. (Lt. Sulu was revealed
to be gay in this year's film Star Trek: Beyond.)
(Related: George
Takei says Star
Trek: Beyond's
gay Sulu didn't go far enough.)
In
a 1997 interview with Oasis
Magazine, Rapp described his sexuality as queer,
saying that while he has been in “love with women” he considers
himself to be “primarily homosexual.”
Discovery is the first original
series for the nascent CBS streaming service CBS All Access.
CBS All Access also announced that Doug
Jones (Hellboy, Falling Skies) has joined the cast as Lt.
Saru, a Starfleet science officer and a new Star Trek alien
species.