Openly gay actor Richard Chamberlain
has advised gay Hollywood actors to remain closeted.
Chamberlain was outed in December of
1989 by the French women's magazine Nous Deux. He officially
announced he's gay at the age of 69 in his 2003 memoir Shattered
Love.
The actor first found fame as a teen
idol on the 1960s television show Dr. Kildare. In the 80s, he
appeared in several popular television miniseries, including The
Thorn Birds and Shogun.
Chamberlain is currently playing an
HIV-positive gay man in ABC's Sunday night drama Brothers &
Sisters.
The
veteran actor recently told gay glossy
The Advocate
that being gay in Hollywood puts an actor at a disadvantage.
“There's still a tremendous amount of
homophobia in our culture,” he said. “It's regrettable, it's
stupid, it's heartless, and it's immoral, but there it is. For an
actor to be working is a kind of miracle, because most actors aren't,
so it's just silly for a working actor to say, 'Oh, I don't care if
anybody knows I'm gay' – especially if you're a leading man.”
“Personally, I wouldn't advise a gay
leading man-type actor to come out.”