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Articles
The Jason Priestley Interview
by Michael Szymanski
February 18, 1998
Get the inside scoop on gay icon Jason Priestley as he talks about his starring role in Love and Death On Long Island, the debut feature film from British gay director Richard Kwietniowski.
Go to the PQ Online Cinema and watch Kwietniowski's 1991 short, The Cost of Love, in QuickTime and RealVideo.
Love and Death on Long Island
Jason Priestley slouches in his chair and sucks from his Marlboro Light, looking more dashingly James Dean-ish than Brandon in "Beverly Hills, 90210" ever has. He fiddles with his silver lighter as he contemplates the question. "Does it bother me if people think I'm gay?" Priestley winces his deep blue eyes and takes another drag. "I don't know. If people think I am gay, yeah, hey that doesn't bother me. Not at all. What would people think? To me I am such a heterosexual guy. It doesn't even, I don't even think about it."
It comes with being a celebrity, especially a teen icon. He's too cute, he's too nice, he must be gay. Rumors follow Priestley a lot. There's the Luke Perry-and-Jason love triangle story when they lived as roommates a brief time, their bar-hopping and dancing together and the speculation of the size of Priestley's surprising appendage during the nude pool scene in Calendar Girl. Priestley puts on his best lispy whiny whisper, "There used to be rumors about me and Luke. Jason and Luke were at a rave last night. They were kissing in the corner. I don't hear so many anymore." He giggles.
"But I did see the funniest thing I have ever seen in my life," he laughs as he describes it. "My sister brought me this card and it was like a greeting card and on the front of the card there was a five-by-seven picture and someone had taken the Dylan doll (Perry's character) and the Brandon doll and put them so the two dolls are kissing. The two dolls are making out in the doorway!" Priestley's eyes are in full wrinkle as he laughs hysterically. "It's the funniest thing I ever saw in my life. I said, 'This is huge! This is classic!' And both of them had their sleeves rolled up -- and the outfits! It was perfect. It was the funniest thing I ever -- both their arms are wrapped around each other and there heads are, oh god, it's very funny."
He composes himself. He takes another drag of his cigarette. "I'm having fun with this interview," he smiles. "It's nice to be able to relate." In Cannes at the film festival reporters grilled him about whether his role in his latest film as a movie star stalked by a bisexual journalist would turn Priestley into an icon in the gay community. "Gosh, I thought I already was," Priestley smiles.
He's far away from his home base near Beverly Hills because he's giving a dozen private interviews in his penthouse hotel room at the Toronto International Film Festival promoting his dark, quirky, delightful film Love and Death on Long Island, opening soon nationwide. Despite pouring his third cup of coffee and filling half an ashtray with butts, the skinny devastatingly seductive actor is finally letting his high- coiffed hair down. He has known this interviewer for years -- sharing cigarettes in the bathroom of an AIDS fundraiser, hanging out at the racetrack when he's driving, visits to the "90210" and Calendar Girl sets, watching him play hockey at charity events, going to the premiere of his most underrated work Coldblooded and bumping into each other at many Hollywood parties. Suddenly, he's talking about fashion, he compares his just-tailored Hugo Boss jacket with this reporter's blue Boss jacket. He likes the shoes.
Priestley's a Virgo, turning 30 this year, and usually a bit self-conscious. Now, he is alone in the room without a publicist and is suddenly fearless about answering the tough questions. What does he do when guys come on to him? "Um, That doesn't really happen to me," he says. "I am not really in situations where that does happen." Aw come on, that's impossible. Guys must come on to him all the time. "OK," he admits, "Sometimes. If it does happen it's fine, but it's not my thing. But, it doesn't upset me at all." Would he handle it tenderly, much like his character does in the film when the older journalist professes his love? "Oh absolutely. Absolutely," Priestley says, proud of his breakthrough film role. "No. It's not like, 'Hey man fuck you, get away from me.' It's more like, 'Hey, thank you but I am not interested.' "
If he were closeted, would Priestley come out? "I think it's great now that we seem to be in an era where it's OK to be gay and I think that the society in North America has had more of a problem with it than any other society," Priestley pontificates. "I think the moral majority and religious right have been shrinking and having not quite as loud a voice in America, and all of a sudden people are coming to their own realizations going, `Joe down the street is gay and he's a great guy.' "
Priestley puts on his best Southern red-neck voice. "I think that when we don't have these people from the moral majority standing up and saying, `These homosexuals are going to burn in hell for what they're doing' then all of a sudden I think people will come to their own realizations that `Wow, I have a lot of friends who are gay and they are all really nice people and I really like spending time with them.' I think that people are coming to that realization all by themselves and I think that that's what is making it OK."
This reporter recalls chatting with "90210" producer Aaron Spelling about all the closeted actors he works with on his shows and how he's encouraging them to come out of the closet now. Spelling wouldn't reveal who. "Of course it's Jason and Luke, I know it," Priestley says.
But could a guy come out and still play a leading man? "That's a good question," Priestley ponders. "Can Ellen now go back and play a heterosexual woman in a movie and have people watch it? I don't know. I would hope so. (He pauses.) I would hope so." The actor has talked to closeted actor friends many times, recently at a dinner. "It's got to be horrible to lead that double life," he says. "I can't imagine what that is like. I can't, that's got to be just not much fun at all. But if a male ever came out and said, `Yes I am gay' would the world accept him then in heterosexual roles? The answer to that is: I don't know. I think it has yet to be seen."
In an interview with In Magazine from London, openly gay director and writer Richard Kwietniowski says he cast Priestley specifically because he was a heart-throb on television, and he wanted the actor to spoof his own persona. "He's handsome to everyone, and he got the self parody and took it further," Kwietniowski says. "I wanted to make this a love story, it doesn't matter if the two characters are men."
In fact, it becomes Harold and Maude if they were opposite sexes, Priestley points out. "I love how the John Hurt character is discovering love for the first time, even though he's been married," Kwietniowski says. "It's like buying a porn magazine for the first time, like being a teenager for the first time." Kwietniowski says it took almost four years to get the project made, and his co-producer finally admits that the director's sexuality perhaps delayed the project. "People are afraid there's propaganda or a hidden agenda somewhere," Kwietniowski says. "I have two other screenplays, and there's some gay content in them, and people say it's hard to tell real stories with gay content. Oh, of course you can make Oscar Wilde or plays like Bent into films because they're proven hits, but not a true, real story." The point of his film, Kwietniowski says, is to make the audience feel, "Oh fuck, I relate to this feeling of being a fish out of water, of being vulnerable, of saying `I love you' when there's no turning back."
Priestley says his character may have it in him to be bisexual, but rejects the older man's advances. "My character of Ronnie was very sensitive about it," Priestley says. "He didn't slap Giles, he didn't just go, `Hey fuck you man' and walk out. I think that Ronnie had a lot of caring and compassion about him."
Meanwhile, Priestley is looking for caring in his own life, after breaking up with a long-term girlfriend recently. Almost whining, he says, "My relationship ended about four months ago man which was devastating, it was tough and I don't think I'm still completely over it."
So he does a 45-minute workout routine every morning: skip rope, hit the heavy bag, speed bike. Then, driving a GT1 race car takes a lot out because it's up to 140 degrees in the car. Things are changing for him at "90210" now that everyone's moved into the Walsh House. It's kind of a Melrose Walsh House Place. Priestly knows, "Someday it's going to end and I'll miss the people. Hopefully we'll stay in touch and continue to be friends."
Meanwhile, the rumors fly. The latest was when visiting his father for a night at home in Vancouver where he grew up. "There was this story that I had been at this bar picking up chicks and I was having dinner with a woman and another woman came in to the restaurant and yelled `How many women can you sleep with in a week?' and slapped me. And the girl I was having dinner with stood up and said, `You dog' and walked out and the two girls left together leaving me alone in the restaurant. I found that very comical."
It didn't happen. His dad found the story on the Internet and faxed him with a note: "When did you find time to squeeze all this in?" Priestley smiles. "He thought it was very funny. He thought, 'Wow, my son, all right. He's with me all night, he had about four hours without me and he squeezed in eight women, that a boy!' "
Don't call him Brandon
By Amy Reiter
Jason Priestley talks about playing a bisexual rogue in "Die Mommie Die," the car crash that nearly cost him his life and the mixed blessing of his "90210" fame.
Nov. 4, 2003
Talking to Jason Priestley is a little like talking to that sweet, good-lookin' jock we all remember from high school. The actor, now 34 but best known for playing young Brandon Walsh on that '90s show -- that is, Aaron Spelling's now-classic "Beverly Hills 90210," is polite and even bouncily enthusiastic, particularly if the conversation turns to sports, but is clearly uncomfortable thinking too hard or talking too long about himself and his career.
Salon interviewed Priestley during a junket for gender-bender Charles Busch's strange, satirical faux-noir "Die Mommie Die," in which the former TV star plays actor Tony Parker, who is said to have an "11-inch dong" or, as one character puts it, the "biggest cock this side of the San Andreas fault" and who carries on simultaneous affairs with a mother (Busch), her daughter (Natasha Lyonne) and her teenage son (Stark Sands). As the well-endowed Parker, Priestley utters lines like "You can't disregard me like one of your false eyelashes" with admirably solemn conviction.
"Die Mommie Die" -- a curiously campy choice for such a hunky, lunky, mainstream guy -- was Priestley's last film before the dramatic August 2002 race-car accident that almost took him out of commission altogether. While taking practice laps at the Kentucky Speedway, the die-hard driver crashed head-on into a wall at nearly 180 mph and suffered a spinal fracture, a closed head injury, a broken nose and broken bones in both feet. He says he's now completely recovered.
And hey, even after a full day of interviews, Priestley does look healthy, fresh and frisky, shifting around on a chair in a New York hotel suite. He later confesses that he'd much rather have spent the day indulging his latest passion, wakeboarding. He wears a tan suit and sea-blue shirt (no tie), his hair is lightly frosted blond, his facial hair (a Van Dyke) is trimmed just so, his skin is tan and unblemished, and his teeth are super-white and super-straight. His famous blue eyes zoom around the room's accumulated beigeness, as if seeking an escape route. His publicist has ruled questions about "the accident" totally, completely off limits, but after a few minutes of actor talk, Priestley can't help bringing it up himself.
Q: What made you want to play a bisexual rogue like Tony Parker in "Die Mommie Die"?
A: As an actor I seem to be drawn to characters more than anything else. And Tony Parker, to me, was just one of those characters that was so interesting and so different than anything I'd ever played before that I really jumped at the opportunity to play him. I just knew that he was going to be so much fun -- that, in that mid-'60s bad actor way, it was going to be so much fun to play those scenes -- that I jumped all over it.
Q: Do you tend to pick your roles based on what you've done previously and with a sense of where you want your career to go?
A: I sort of try not to repeat myself. I find that it's more interesting not to repeat myself. Maybe that has to do with the fact that I played the same character for 249 episodes on TV and that sort of repetition -- maybe I'm rebelling against that type of repetition. I've always tried to play very different characters in the movies I've chosen.
Q: Do you think the blatant sexuality of the character and bisexuality of the character was a risky choice?
A: Not at all. I don't think so. I thought it was fun. I thought it was great.
Q: Well, I imagine that, at one time, playing a character that dedicatedly -- albeit campily -- participates in both gay and straight sex, might have been considered kind of a risky choice for an actor. When a mainstream, popular actor like you takes this kind of role, does that indicate something of a change in how people are reacting to gay roles on the screen?
A: I think so. I mean, if you look at the success of "Will and Grace" and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" and of many types of entertainment that classically have been labeled as "gay," they're much more mainstream now. I think that speaks well of us as a society, that we're much more accepting of other things and other ideas and not so judgmental of people that are maybe a little bit different than us. I think it kind of gives you hope for the world, doesn't it? Maybe a little bit?
Q: Of course. When you took this role, was it a conscious decision to say, "You know what? I can afford to do this now"?
A: It never entered my mind that I was doing anything other than that I was playing a really good character in a great movie. It was never even a concern or a worry or anything.
Q: That's great to hear. What was the actual experience like, working on the film?
A: It was great. It was a great place to go to work every day. Mark Rucker, the director, made it a really, really fun place to go and be creative and to do really fun things and the rest of the cast -- it was such a talented ensemble -- we really all had a great time sort of finding the levels of the scenes.
Q: What was the biggest challenge you encountered while making it?
A: There was nothing particularly challenging. It was really enjoyable. Usually in a movie there'll be one or two scenes where you go, "Oh man, I'm really dreading doing this scene" or "Oh God, I can't believe I'm doing this," but there was none of that on this movie. During rehearsals there was a lot of laughter, but obviously when the camera was rolling we had a lot of work to do, so we just got down to it.
Q: So were there silly, wacky things going on, on-set?
A: We didn't have time. We shot this movie in 18 days, so there was no time for high jinks or anything. We just had to [slaps thigh three times] get to work.
Q: Did you base your portrayal on any specific actors or characters?
A:Yes. Tony Parker was a little Tab Hunter, a little Sterling Hayden, a little Charlton Heston and a little Bill Shatner.
Q: Did you do any research? Watching old films in the genre?
A: No, I'm very familiar with the history of film and with the actors that came before me. And as I was reading the part and finding the character, those were the guys that I leaned on and emulated here and there. I took little bits here and there and made a strange melaaaaange.
Q: And what about --
A: I'm still trying to find a movie where I can just play Van Heflin, because he was awesome. I'm just trying to, like, find that one role where it's like, dude, this is Van Heflin, and then just do it. I don't know. One of these days.
Q: You've been doing some work in the theater -- "Side Man" on the West End with Edie Falco, and this is a very theatrical movie. Charles Busch, who wrote "Die Mommie Die" and stars in it, is primarily a stage actor. Do you feel like you have to prove that you're a serious actor after having been on TV for so long?
A: Yeah, well, that's the battle. Anytime you're on a show like "90210" that was so popular, and so popular with the young people, a lot of people just want to write you off and dismiss you -- "Aw, that's that guy from that fucking show" -- and they don't want to take you seriously. So yeah, you really have to work hard and prove your mettle as it were, all over again. That's just the way it is. People like to categorize everything and everyone. It's very easy to categorize all of us people from "90210" and say, "Oh, those are those kids from that show," whereas I'm 34 years old, you know, and I'm not a kid anymore. Nor was I then; I was a full-grown adult just playing a young person on television. And sometimes it's an uphill battle, but it's one that I fight every day. It's just the way it is.
Q: Do you think you'll ever get to a point where you can stop fighting that battle?
A: At some point I hope I will, where that sort of negativity and negative view of me will end, but I have no control over that. All I can do is what I can do and all I can do is keep working in interesting movies and keep playing interesting roles to the best of my ability.
Q: Do you feel like it's all negative? I mean it's opened doors for you ...
A: It's also closed a lot of doors for me. I mean, a lot of people look at me and all they choose to see is that I played Brandon Walsh on television and that's their thing, that's fine.
Q: You played hockey for a long time. Are you still playing?
A: I just started about a month ago. Obviously my feet were broken so badly in the crash that it took me a while to get back on the ice.
Q: Do you still have a lot of physical effects left over from the crash?
A: No. None whatsoever.
That's amazing!
A: Yeah. I'm fine. Totally fine.
Q: This was the last movie you made before the crash, right?
A: Yeah, we wrapped this movie about seven weeks before the hit that I had. It was my last movie before race season. Because I said to everybody, "Look, guys, I'm racing this year and I've got to take 15 weeks off to go race." And I was third in the championship when I went in. Goddamn it!
Q: Are you going to go back to racing?
A: No, no, I'm not.
Q: You're not? Because you were saying for a while that you thought you might.
A: Well, I was thinking about maybe doing some testing this winter, but no.
Q: Do you feel like the accident changed your perspective?
A: Well, you can't go through something like that without it changing you somewhat. I mean, I know a lot of people, when they go through something like that, they find God or they find religion or they find an acoustic guitar, whatever they find. It changed my perspective on things a little bit, but it really didn't change me on the whole. A little bit, it slowed me down a little bit. Made me a little more choosy about where to expend my energy and where to spend my time.
Q: Do you think it will affect the way you choose roles?
A: Yeah, I'm more careful now about the roles that I choose and the reasons that I choose them. Sometimes in the past I would take movies where I was like, "Ah, whatever, I'll just go to work." Whereas now, if it's not something that I really want to do, I don't do it. I'd rather just stay home. Because time is precious.
salon.com
JASON PRIESTLEY ON HIS CROTCH, BUSCH AND KISSING A GUY IN DRAG
by Brandon Judell
January 2, 2004
John Hurt drooled over him in "Love and Death on Long Island." Now Charles Busch hungers for his kiss (and his crotch) in "Die, Mommie, Die." The rest of us have been palpitating over him ever since he made his first milkshake on "Beverly Hills, 90210."
Yes Jason Priestley, 32, is still as lovable as ever, even after his recent car crash. In fact, he still looks prettier than most of us who haven't been in car crashes. Is that fair?
The young man decided to let his hair down with Charles Busch and director Mark Rucker by his side the other day at the Regency Hotel
Q: Now, Stanley Tucci had to play someone with a small penis in "The Streets of New York." He said it caused him no problems. Here you have to play someone with an extremely huge penis. Was it a stretch for you?
[Priestley laughs]
Like in "Boys Don't Cry," Hilary Swank went to bed with a dildo.
Priestley: Uhhh. ...No, really. Tony Parker was the role I was born to play. I've been researching it my whole life.
Busch: It seems like this whole thing about your dick is in every paper because of this film.
Priestley: Yeah, yeah. No, no. It started with Details magazine, actually, when i was living Toronto.
Rucker: It's been wispered about for years, but now it's in the forefront.
Priestley: [Yelling] Now it's all come out!
Busch: There are shots of you [naked] in "Calendar Girl."
Priestley: Yes, that's right. That's right.
Busch: On the internet, too. There you can sort of see things a bit. ...
Priestley: It was a nice warm day out in Los Angeles. Fantastic.
Q: [To Charles] When you were writing this screenplay, did you envision someone like Jason playing the part?
Busch: I have a tradition of handsome leading men. Thomas Gibson was my love interest in "Psycho Beach Party"-- eventually there will be a line beautiful goyish guys that make love to me on camera. Jason was an awesome lover. I give him high marks.
[Priestley laughs]
Q: So was Jason more Kris Kristofferson or Omar Sharif?
Busch: Well, they're a little old for me, but I think Brad Pitt is a good comparison.
Priestley: Oh, you're very kind.
Rucker: You should get abs like Brad.
Q: Charles, when you won best acting award for Sundance for "Die, Mommie, Die," did Robert Redford kiss or anything?
Busch: We're lovers. No, I've actually never met him, except when I was very young-- I was his receptionist for a temp work, and i was sent over there, and the messenger came over delivering his aviator glasses from the optomologist around and i put them on. So I've seen the world through Redford's glasses. It's a lovely place.
Q: So Jason, Why did you want to do this film?
Priestley: It's the oldest story in the book--it was the script. I wasn't hip to the Charles Busch phenomenon yet. I got the script, read the script, and the script was so wonderful, and the character of Tony was such a departure in a lot of ways, unlike much of the crap that i get offered every day. It was a refreshing opportunity to play this guy. I signed on right away, then the whole Charles Busch thing, and that made it even cooler. The whole thing was just... It was bitchin', man. It was bitchin'.
Q: How excited were you to kiss Charles?
Priestley: Well, Charles...
Busch: I was all freaked out.
Rucker: Charles was really nervous. Jason and I were like "I hope this isn't going to be awkward. This could be a real good thing."
Busch: It was my first on screen kiss...really!
Rucker: Jason took charge and said,"We'll do it like this. I'll go there; you go there. All right, let's go!"
Priestley: Doing what I did for as long as I did, obviously you get very used to it, to kissing women on-screen. "So Charles, left or right? OK, great! here we go." It's all very technical after a while.
Busch: For you maybe.
Q: [to Jason] Did you call Tab Hunter to see how he did it with Divine?
Busch: Hey I'm a little more attractive.
Priestley: Did he kiss Divine?
Busch: Yes, in "Polyester."
Priestley: I didn't know that.
Q: By the way, do you think you're helped or hurt by your longtime TV image?
Priestley: It can be a help at times and a hinderance at others. I think sometimes the fact that I was on such a popular show with young people allows alot of people to just dismiss what I do and not want to entertain the notion of including, they do because of what i've done before. That's fine. That's thier thing, and there's nothing I can do about that.
Q: Can you talk about you accident? Did it give you a new outlook on life?
Priestley: Not really. A little bit, but nothing much.
Q: Did you find God?
Priestley: No, I didn't find God. I'm not a hippie. I'm just me still.
Gay.com
You Don't Know Jack on 'Tru'
March 25,2004
Jason Priestley's a bundle of energy on the phone, talking in rapid-fire about his new Fox gig.
Viewers will remember that Priestley once ignited another Fox show,"Beverly Hills 90210," and now the network honchos hope lightning can indeed strike twice.
Priestley appears tonight as a mysterious drifter who wants to work at the morgue, but the primary thrust of tonight's episode is getting viewers up to speed with the main character Tru (Eliza Dushku), her family and the mystery surrounding the death of her mother.
Which is good news for the people who haven't gotten a chance to testing the "Tru" waters yet. Despite the hockey name and derivative nature, this series is about a young woman who can speak to dead people--and often restore their lives after reliving the past 24 hours in "Groundhog Day" fashion--is a ripping good drama.
That's something Priestley has known for a while.
"I'd been a fan of the show before they asked me to come on ," says Priestley on a shooting break. "Fox kept sending me pilots, becouse we've been talking about me coming back to series TV, but 'Tru' was the only one i thought was really interesting."
Drawn to the pulsating action and visually engaging nature of the show, Priestley says he watched the show from the beginning when it premiered last fall and felt he could fit in.
He will play Jack Harper, a new forensic attendant who will work alongside Tru. According to the press material, Jack carries a dark secret that may impede Tru's ability to save those who die before their time.
While Priestley says he can't divulge the nature of his character on the show, he does say that Jack has a definite purpose.
In tonight's episode, viewers--if not Tru--discover who murdered her mother. Tru was a child when a stranger came into her home and shot her mother while Tru cowered in a closet. In earlier episodes, we learned that Tru's mother had the same gift of hearing the dead speak--and changing the day so that they could live. But there's always a price to be paid for meddling.
Tonight, the first sequence of events has Jack applying for the job and not getting it. But when Tru changes history by saving her stepmother (Laura Leighton, another Fox alum from "Melrose Place"), Jack's suddenly in.
And he doesn't seem like a nice guy to me.
"Jack's an interesting guy,"Priestley says, making sure he doesn't reveal too much about the character. "We spell out the reason why he's there in the final episodes, and it's pretty cool."
New viewers should step aboard this wild ride now.
"I'm really digging it and if people watch this show closely, they'll be able to see some slight indications of who Jack is and why he's there," Priestley says.
Jack reveals that he was once dead for more than three minutes. Strangely enough, on Aug. 11, 2002, Priestley also came close to death during a race car accident. In fact, Priestley was technically dead for about 45 seconds.
"I actually checked out," he said in a 2003 interview with Barbara Walters. "And for some reason I got sent back. I got returned."
Interviewers were warned by the publicist setting up the interviews not to talk to Priestley about the accident. But when I met Priestley face to face in January during a press party, Priestley looked none the worse for the traumatic incident.
Now, he simply says that he met with the show's producers and fleshed out the character using alot of his own input. One assumes that means the checking out incident.
"I've always enjoyed television. It's a medium where the pace of work and intensity isn't for every actor," says Priestley, who has been doing films, suck as the independant flick "Die Mommie Die," since his "90210" days. "But for the kind of person I am, I like going to work with the same people everyday, working 15 hours a day. I've been away from TV for five years and for me, it's really fun and refreshing to be back."
Priestley adds that he enjoys doing almost every form of acting.
"I would enjoy doing a West End play. I would enjoy doing another independent film," Priestley says. "I tend to respond more to characters, so whenever a great character comes up, whether it's in TV, film or theater, I'm there."
timesstar.com
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