kevin nash: the "big sexy" speaks on gays in wrestling - outsports.com
kevin nash: the "big sexy" speaks on gays in wrestling - outsports.com
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kevin nash:
wrestling's gay-friendly champion
by
cyd zeigler. jr.
outsports.com
discuss this article
for some
reason, it is surprising to talk to a professional wrestler
who is completely gay friendly. the stereotype of over-masculinized
men throwing each other around the ring and bashing each
other with fold-up chairs doesn't inspire images of
thoughtful, compassionate intellectuals. but for kevin nash,
a.k.a "big sexy," one of the most popular wrestlers over the
last 15 years, his gay-friendly attitude comes from
education and a love of his family.
as a
wrestler, the 7-foot nash has held the wwf championship, wwf
intercontinental championship and wwf tagteam championship
with the then-world wrestling federation. in the late
nineties, he was part of the new world order, with scott
hall and hulk hogan, which helped the world championship
wrestling swipe much of the wwf's ratings thunder. now with
total
nonstop action wrestling, nash is presently recovering
from shoulder surgery, spending a lot of time at his home in
florida with his wife and son.
outsports talked with nash about gay characters in
wrestling, gay wrestlers, and the "big sexy's" gay family
members.
outsports: professional wrestling has a pretty long
history of including
gay-acting characters. why do you think characters like
gorgeous george and adrian adonis and
goldust and lenny and lodi have been so popular?
kevin
nash: i think the flamboyancy, because most of those
characters are kind of flamboyant characters, i think that
wrestling as a whole is such an escapism for a lot of people
that it takes it to another level, to escape even further.
os:
when lenny and lodi started acting effeminately, glaad
stepped in and threatened turner, and turner pulled the
characters. one of the things they said was that characters
like lenny and lodi are somehow bad for gay people. what do
you think of that?
nash:
to me, it's such an exaggeration. it would be one thing if
it was a docudrama, and we were trying to depict something
that was real life. but it's such a tongue-in-cheek industry
as it is. i was one of the writers when that lenny and lodi
thing was going on. and the storyline was going to be that
eventually, because they were both orphans, eventually they
were going to find out that they were brothers. that was
where the storyline was going. everyone thought these guys
were lovers, because they kept making reference to this
closeness that they felt. and i was really offended because
turner succumbed to glaad. we were going to do an end-around
on everybody. it would have been like, "who said they were
gay? we aren't depicting these guys as gay. we're depicting
different scenarios; you're the ones who said they were
gay."
os:
so you were trying to turn the stereotype on its head?
nash:
we were trying to. and then they didn't let us do it.
our standards and practices guy, i'm quite sure he was gay.
he sat in our booking meetings. we ran everything by him and
he knew where the storyline was going, and he didn't have a
problem with it.
bob mould
was also in our creative room at the time. and he's gay, and
he was one of the writers.
os:
do you think that kind of thing had a chilling effect on
creating gay characters?
nash:
i think so. all of those home improvement shows have the
macho guy, the chick, and the gay guy. every one of them. i
was watching one the other night, and the gay guy said,
"what's wrong, you don't think i can operate a power tool
because i'm … short?" it's ok for him to make a joke of
everything, but if the other big macho guy would have said
something like that, everyone would have been up in arms.
it's such a grey line where you can go to in society. and
glaad's strong. it's one thing if they go in and slap you on
the wrist. they came in and said, "we're going to contact
your advertisers." it's hard enough to get advertising on
wrestling.
os:
so you had gay people aware of what was going on?
nash:
absolutely. and i think because there were gay people in the
creative meetings, we were very aware of where we could go.
i just wondered if there was a gay nascar driver, how that
guy would get over. if wrestling is "good-ole-boy", there's
only one thing more "good-ole-boy" than wrestling, and
that's nascar. you can't tell me one of those guys isn't
gay.
os:
chris kanyon has made claims that he was let go by the
wwe because he was gay. and i've heard guys like ric flair
say it was because chris wasn't a good enough wrestler. do
you have any insight into that?
nash:
i don't know what happened up there. kanyon is very
talented. his persona was never really strong, but as far as
fundamentally doing the wrestling, there's really nobody any
better. but he just never had that look. he had good size.
the bad thing about chris was that he was best when his face
was covered over, when he was mortus. one of the top
creative guys for vince, pat patterson, has been openly gay
for years. so i don't think him being gay had much to do
with him being released. they probably just didn't like him.
os:
so there are people in professional wrestling who are openly
gay or are at least known to be gay?
nash:
yes.
os:
does it matter to you if one of the guys you're wrestling
around with on a mat is gay?
nash:
it doesn't to me.
os:
do you have any gay friends or family members?
nash:
oh yeah. i lost a first cousin to aids. i've got members of
my family who are gay.
os:
when we talk to athletes in team sports about having gay
teammates, we keep hearing they don't want to shower with
them. do you share showers with other wrestlers?
nash:
yeah, but it's kind of different because you shower as
the event goes on. the first match of the night would go out
and wrestle, and then they come in and shower. it's kind of
a shower-in-shifts thing. when you finish your segment, you
go in and shower. it's not like there are 55 guys in
football, but there are five or six guys in there.
os:
does it matter to you if a gay guy is looking at you naked?
nash:
no, as long as he's looking and approving.
os:
you seem very
educated and gay-friendly on these issues. where does that
come from?
nash:
number one is just that, education. i've got gay
friends. i've been around gay people my whole life.
intolerance is just ignorance. that's all it is. god forbid
if some gay people move into your neighborhood: curb appeal
will be nice and the property value will double. god forbid.
[homophobia] is just prejudice like anything else.
os:
how do you think you'd react if one of your longtime
wrestling colleagues, for example
scott hall, came out to you?
nash:
that's an ongoing angle that i think scott and i could do is
if, after all these years, people find out that hall and
nash are actually gay. the disco inferno. it'd be the
biggest thing. for all these macho guys to find out nash and
hall are gay.
os:
some of these guys who play gay characters are gay. how does
that play off, with kevin nash the person being straight,
but kevin nash the character being gay?
nash:
when goldust did it, i think a lot of guys got creeped
out about it. the part i played in "the
longest yard," where i took some estrogen and became a
little more feminine, i've had friends go, "dude, how can
you do that?" and i say, "well, i read the script and it was
funny." i was doing a comedy and i read the script and none
of the guys wanted to play that part.
os:
why is that?
nash:
it's just the homophobia. that's the way i look at it.
os:
thanks for taking the time, and thanks for having such a
great attitude about gay issues.
nash:
like i said, when you have family who are "alternative
lifestyle," it's not that big of a deal. it's just part of
our family. it's no big deal.
_________________
tna wrestling airs every thursday night (9-10 p.m.
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spike tv is available in 90 million homes and is a
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