'Will & Grace' Broke Ground for Gay Reprentatn—Can It Do It Aga? | GQ

‘WILL & GRACE’ FANS ARE STILL UNSURE IF ERIC MCCORMACK IS GAY REAL LIFE

Everyone remembers the basics: bt iends Will, a gay man, and Grace, a straight woman, live and love Manhattan wh their quirkier iends Jack and Karen. Mutchnick and Eisenberg dated real life, and then beme close iends after Mutchnick revealed he was gay. She also told Kg that McCormack didn't origally want to play a gay character.

Actor Sean Hay, who portrayed openly gay character Jack on Will & Grace, didn't e out real life until five years after the show end. More recently, Hay has revealed that he's "ashamed and embarrassed" he stayed the closet for so long when he might have ma a difference young gay people's liv by g out sooner. Fellow executive producer David Kohan and producer-director Jam Burrows agreed, notg that the show had troduced and normalized gay people for a swath of the public.

WILL AND GRACE STAR CONFIRMS HE’S GAY

In fact, when the show was first pched, the ia was that would revolve around three sets of upl, one of whom was a gay man and a straight woman who lived together. Like Will and Grace, Max and Ja were an em their younger years, only for him to e out as gay when they were both at universy.

A lot of actors were the nng for the tle charactersAmong them, apparently, were John Barrowman, who claimed he was turned down for the role for not beg gay enough. Several big nam appeared on the show before they land their biggt TV rolNeil Patrick Harris and Sean Hay Will & GraceNBC via Getty ImagYears before How I Met Your Mother me along, Neil Patrick Harris appeared as an “ex-gay” Will & Grace, while a pre-Grey’s Anatomy Patrick Dempsie played a love tert of Will’s an early season. While other gut stars were already A-list gay insMadonna and Megan Mullally Will & GraceNBC via Getty ImagJa Jackson, Jennifer Lopez, Sir Elton John and, of urse, Cher (twice!