Neil Patrick Harris recalls how he was forced to come out as gay
Neil Patrick Harris has opened up about the moment he felt he had no choice but to publicly come out as gay, revealing he feared becoming a 'target' amongst chaos-causing internet users.
The How I Met Your Mother star, 53, caught up Jamie Laing this week for an episode of the British TV star's Great Company podcast, as he reflected on his sexuality and his relationship with husband David Burtka.
Asked by the show's host if coming out as gay in November 2006 was a 'tough moment' given how high-profile an actor he was, Harris replied: "No, it was an inevitability at the time.
The US star went on to explain that he had already been dating Burtka before he auditioned for the sitcom that made him a household name.
Advert
"I'd started dating David, who's now my husband, David Burtka, well before I auditioned for How I Met Your Mother, and when I got the job, everyone on that show knew David, knew that we were a couple."
The pair had actually begun dating in 2004.
But, as Harris recalled, this was a time when celebrity gossip sites were increasingly interested in speculating about stars' sexuality, leading him to live in fear that he'd one day be targeted.
"There were bloggers on the internet that you would go to to read the salacious 'try to guess who this actor is that's gay and in the closet' types of comment," he looked back. "And so, there was a fear that I would be the next target on that."
The father-of-two said that fear had already begun to affect how he and Burtka navigated their relationship in public, spurring them to attend the same events together, but arriving separately.
"David and I would go to movie premieres together, but I would walk the carpet, and he would go around the other side of the photographers because we weren't a couple," Harris said, claiming they were able to justify keeping their relationship private at the time.
"We could justify it and say, 'That's our private life', which it was, and we don't need to parade stuff around and ask too many questions," he explained.
"'I'm here for work, I have a career, and so does he', which was all very true."
But he eventually realised the arrangement could make Burtka feel as though he was 'less than'.
"If I'm getting to walk a carpet while he's skulking behind, right?" Harris added.
The star claimed the speculation eventually became much more difficult to ignore after a comment was attributed to a publicist about his sexuality, in which it was claimed he wasn't 'of that persuasion'.
"That turned into a 'that's weird for him to say because we know that he's gay, why is he doing that?'," he continued. "And so, then it became, well, I'm going to have to say something to get ahead of this story.
"Because I don't want to be coming out in reaction to 'if anyone has any information on Neil Patrick Harris', and 'have you ever slept with him?' and 'please come forward'. You know, those stories."
So Harris, alongside his then-agent and publicist, decided to take control of the narrative by crafting a statement 'that was authentic to me, and that was really truthful', which was shared in November 2006.
He told PEOPLE at the time he was 'a very content gay man living my life to the fullest'.
The following year, he and Burtka made their first joint red-carpet appearance at the 2007 Emmy Awards.
In the years since, they've also welcomed twins Harper Grace and Gideon Scott via surrogate together, and married in a private ceremony in Italy.
But despite knowing his coming out statement was truthful, Harris admitted he was still frightened about what could happen afterwards.
"So, we released that statement, and I think, at that point, I was a little scared [of] what would come from that, like, what stigma would come from that," he told Laing. "At that time, you know, there were people who'd plant 'God hates f**s' on lawns of people. So, it had potential to be a bad week."
Thankfully, the backlash he feared never came.
"None of that transpired. There was indifference at best," Harris said. "There were a lot of people before my coming out that had a much harder time, and that, I guess, paved the way for me to be able to come out."
He lastly joked: "I was a little bit offended that more people weren't surprised; I expected a little more, like, 'What? Him? He's so masc!'.
Topics: Neil Patrick Harris, Celebrity, US News, LGBTQ,
Rhianna Benson