Mr Humphri, a gay in who was hated by Gay Liberatn | London Eveng Standard | Eveng Standard

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John Inman, who died last week, will always be known for his tchphrase 'I'm ee'. The 'gay' word was never ed by Inman or anyone else. It was all a b, er, mp

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MR HUMPHRI, A GAY IN WHO WAS HATED BY GAY LIBERATN

After s of mp stereotyp on film and TV, gay culture is not only mastream, says Philip Hensher, but is boomg. He salut Doctor Who, The Wire and Glee, but wonrs why has taken so long for homosexualy to bee unexceptnal * mr humphries gay *

Vio: John Inman, who died yterday a London hospal at the age of 71 after a long battle agast liver disease, was probably rponsible for raisg the profile of the homosexual male to s hight level sce the heyday of Osr, ironilly, theTV role for which he will always be remembered furiated the activists of Gay Liberatn. ' - as the sort of meang sexual stereotype they were fightg to years after the seri end, members of the Campaign for Homosexual Equaly monstrated outsi theatr where Inman happened to be the star of Are You Beg Served? ' - as the sort of meang sexual stereotype they were fightg to years after the seri end, members of the Campaign for Homosexual Equaly monstrated outsi theatr where Inman happened to be appearg.

(Print Obama clared Omar to be his favoure character the seri, and was a popular choice) s, no televisn drama, not many ensemble films, and few novels wh pretensns to be socially extensive n do whout a gay character or two, and if some of the are pafully stereotypil, others are hont and nvcg.

A young person growg up gay n fd a meangful reflectn of how he feels at the multiplex and long-nng popular or fay TV seri whout too much difficulty. Dick Emery's character Clarence, Litenant Gber 'Allo 'Allo!, and the mp personas of Larry Grayson or Charl Hawtrey are all directed at one particular dience: the dience which had never knowgly associated wh a gay person. The number of people the morn world who don't know a gay person mt be vanishgly 1970, was an exceedgly brave act to "e out", to announce to iends, fay and acquatanc that one was homosexual or lbian.

MOVE OVER, MR HUMPHRI: THE CHANGG FACE OF GAY CULTURE

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I would say that, Bra, the gay or lbian person who liv a life of ncealment and ceptn is much ls mon than the past, and fewer and fewer people unr 50 even unrstand the reasons for livg like this. Stereotyp uld be staed the 1970s bee most people watchg a s or a drama were not at all likely to know what a gay person was like. That go for both straight and gay viewers: many people who knew themselv to be gay also felt themselv solary their ndn, or a member of a small and beleaguered muny.

The real-life gay people most Brons uld regnise or intify would almost certaly be the on nformg to the most predictable stereotyp. There were perfectly ser attempts to pict gay people and relatnships of the perd, however, which see nothg wrong pictg gay people exclively terms of mp. A Tham televisn seri of 1976, The Crezz, about a Wt London middle-class crcent, now long fotten, ma a big impact on me wh s ank acunt of a gay uple among the neighbours.

(The gay-themed episo is entled "Bent Doubl": you uldn't get that past the pliance-wallahs who n broadsters the days). And of urse there was the magnificent 1975 dramatisatn of Quent Crisp's tobgraphy, The Naked Civil Servant, also produced by Tham, which should monstrate s disarmg accuracy that those glamoro stereotyp were not, fact, whout any basis was wrong wh the imag of gay people were not that they were sultg, nor that they were accurate, nor that they were unfunny. Over and over aga, talkg to gay people who grew up the 1970s, you hear the view that they knew they weren't like Mr Humphri, but had no ia, om televisn or films, what sort of person they might grow up to be.

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