Tag Archives: Wanda Sykes

Queer Female Stars Push For Further Visibility At This Years Emmys

The Emmys are almost upon us, but before Sunday, Sept. 17 rolls around, we wanted to take a look at the female queer stars who we think deserves to win.

This years nominations include, Samira Wiley who is nominated for the first time for her riveting performance in the disturbingly brilliant Hulu adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.

Lily Tomlin, is up for best lead actress in a comedy series for Grace and Frankie.

Evan Rachel Wood scored a nod for her performance in the series Westworld, a role for which also saw her take home the Critics’ Choice Award.

Kate McKinnon is up for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for SNL, an award she also won the previous year, which should make her a frontrunner.

Ellen Page‘s Gaycation With Ellen Page is nominated for best unstructured reality series.

Laverne Cox and Shannon Purser (of Stranger Things) are both up for Best Guest Actress in a Drama.

Jamie Babbit is up for outstanding director in a comedy series for her episode of Silicon Valley.

Jane Lynch got a nod for best actress in a short form for Dropping the Soap.

Wanda Sykes is up for Best Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for the show “Black-ish”.

And Lena Waithe scored a writing nomination for her “Thanksgiving” episode of Master of None.

There are also a number TV shows with queer characters were up for nomination too.

Master of None, Modern Family, Veep, The Handmaid’s Tale, RuPaul’s Drag Race, Portlandia, SNL, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, House of Cards, How to Get Away with Murder, Ray Donovan, Transparent, Orange Is the New Black. Brown Girls, One Day at a Time.

Even Black Mirror‘s ‘San Junipero’got a nomination for best TV movie.

I don’t know about you, but we’re thrilled that queer women are finally being recognised as actual talent by the mainstream media tycoons.

Stephen Colbert will host the Emmys on Sunday, Sept. 17 on CBS.

Kate McKinnon’s ‘Carol’ Parody Is Everything We Needed Today

During Saturday’s Independent Spirit Awards, hosts Kate McKinnon and Kumail Nanjiani debuted a pre-taped parody of the award winning Carol and it’s everything we needed today.

McKinnon takes on Cate Blanchett’s role in Carol and Nanjiani plays her waiter in a hilarious sketch.

Find out what happens when McKinnon meets Rooney Mara at Lezzie’s, where all the lesbians (including Wanda Sykes and Jane Lynch) go for their ‘clandestine glove lunches’.

Watch and laugh

Wanda Sykes Discusses Coming Out

Watch as out comedian Wanda Sykes discusses how she never meant to come out at a Prop 8 rally in 2008.

Talking on The Meredith Show, she says she was called on stage by organisers as she had been vocal about her support for the anti Prop 8 campaign, but she didn’t intend to come out.

However the timing was just right. She married her wife Alex Sykes in 2008 just before Proposition 8, the law that banned same-sex marriage in California, was passed.

Although afterward her speech, she says people treated her like a Unicorn because, at the time, there was very little visible representative of the African American people in LGBT community.

“It just came out. I had just gotten married. So instead of speaking as a supporter, I was speaking as one of the victims. It just happened. I didn’t even think about it… We continued with the rally and by the time I got to the hotel, I’m looking at the CNN scroll and it says, ‘Comedienne Wanda Sykes: I’m proud to be black and gay’ and whatever, I was like, ‘Oh lord. What the hell just happened?’ It was crazy.

It was funny though, because especially being an African-American celebrity who’s out, it was like they started treating me like a unicorn. We’ve never seen one of you before! It’s like me and RuPaul. I guess that’s it.”

Wanda Sykes

Wanda Sykes On The Ellen Degeneres Show – We Love these Two Comedic Greats

Wanda Sykes dropped by The Ellen DeGeneres Show this week, and our two favourite lesbian comics couldn’t help but make us laugh. Watch and enjoy…

The Growing Number of Lesbian & Bi Celebrities – Here are Our Top 20

Coming out can be tough enough when its too a few, but coming out to millions… Takes time. In the past it was considered a potentially career-ending acknowledgment, now growing number of celebrities have come out with relatively little fanfare.

Here is a list of 20 Out and Proud Lesbians Celebrities…

1. Jodie Foster

Jodie Foster ended years of rampant media speculation when she casually came out of the closet while accepting her Cecil B. Demille award at the 2013 Golden Globes.

“I already did my coming out about a thousand years ago, back in the Stone Age. In those very quaint days when a fragile young girl would open up to trusted friends, and family, coworkers and then gradually, proudly, to everyone who knew her.”

2. Gillian Anderson

The “X-Files” actress revealed she’s had numerous relationships with women in a 2012 interview with Out magazine. The 43-year-old mother of three, who’s long enjoyed a sizeable lesbian fan-base, told Out that she first had a relationship with a woman while still in high school, after moving from her native England to suburban Michigan.

3. Raven-Symone

Raven Symone came out via Twitter in early August 2013 after long-term speculation surrounding the actress’ sexuality. She confirmed the subtle coming out by retweeting of her followers congratulating the star.

“I am very happy that gay marriage is opening up around the country and is being accepted. I was excited to hear today that more states legalized gay marriage. I, however am not currently getting married, but it is great to know I can now, should I wish to.”

4. Meredith Baxter

In December 2009 Baxter, most famous for playing Elyse Keaton on ’80s sitcom “Family Ties,” went on the “Today Show” and told Matt Lauer that she was a lesbian. Baxter said,

“Some people would say, well, you’re living a lie and, you know, the truth is — not at all. This has only been for the past seven years.”

Meredith Baxter

5. Cynthia Nixon

Star of ‘Sex And The City’ was out-ed in 2004 when the NY Daily News and the New York Post reported she was living with another woman in September 2004. Nixon half-heartedly confirmed the rumours…

“My private life is private… But at the same time, I have nothing to hide. So what I will say is that I am very happy.”

Cynthia Nixon

6. Kelly McGillis

Kelly McGillis, known as who starred opposite Tom Cruise in “Top Gun,” revealed she’s gay on lesbian website SheWired.com.

McGillis, who was married twice to men and has two daughters, said…

“It’s a part of being true to yourself. That’s been a challenge for me personally.”

7. Sara Gilbert

Sara Gilbert, who’s best known for her role on “Roseanne,” officially came out in 2010. At that time, she was getting ready to launch “The Talk,” a daytime talk show which focuses on parenthood and families, so Gilbert felt compelled to acknowledge her sexuality.

“I don’t ever really think of things as out or in. I just think I am who I am, and when topics come up that are appropriate, I’ll talk about them and share when it seems right.”

8. Joanna Johnson

“Bold and the Beautiful” star Joanna Johnson became daytime soap opera’s only active “out” actor when she said she was a lesbian in May. Johnson said she feared coming out would prohibit her from getting acting roles. Johnson is now married to L.A. club promoter Michelle Agnew, with whom she has two children with.

9. Lady Sovereign

In May 2010 the British rapper came out in Diva magazine.

“Magazines would always ask about it but [questions about my sexuality] would get stopped by my publicists. It was my choice, too, because I was a bit worried about it but now I don’t really give a shit. You can’t hide away forever. It’s just stupid and now I’ve come out I feel a lot more comfortable with myself. But it was a bit scary back then because some people do have horrible opinions.”

10. Kristy McNichol

In January 2012 Kristy McNichol, who was beloved for playing Buddy Lawrence in the ’70s show ‘Family’, for which she won an Emmy, and later Barbara Weston on the “Golden Girls” spin-off “Empty Nest,” revealed she is a lesbian because she is “approaching 50” and wants to “be open about who I am.”

McNichol also cited the wave of antigay bullying stories for coming out, hoping to help bullied LGBT youth who need support.

11. Chely Wright

Country singer Chely Wright came out in May 2010.

“There had never, ever been a country music artist who had acknowledged his or her homosexuality… I wasn’t going to be the first.”

But she changed her mind and said of her decision, “Nothing in my life has been more magical than the moment I decided to come out.”

12. Amber Heard

Amber Heard, 26, came out while attending GLAAD’s 25th anniversary party. She has starred in movies like as “Pineapple Express” and “Zombieland.”

“I personally think that if you deny something or if you hide something you’re inadvertently admitting it’s wrong. I don’t feel like I’m wrong.”

Amber Heard

13. Denise Ho

Hong Kong’s fourth annual LGBT Pride Parade in November saw beloved Cantonese pop star Denise Ho come out as a lesbian. This announcement made her the first mainstream female singer in Hong Kong to say she’s gay, according to several Hong Kong media outlets.

“As a celebrity, I think I have an obligation, a duty to stand forward for the sake of love and equality.”

14. Portia de Rossi

Portia de Rossi had been out to friends for quite some time, but she told the entire world in the fall of 2005 in interviews with Details magazine and The Advocate.

“I’ve had my years of being not open, many years of it… It’s an honor for me to do this; it’s just nice to be asked.”

Portia de Rossi

15. Heather Matarazzo

The actress, perhaps best known for her role as tormented teen Dawn Wiener in the film “Welcome To The Dollhouse,” came out in August 2004 by telling the NY Daily News about falling in love with Caroline Murphy:

“I met the person I’m so madly crazy in love with…She’s not famous yet. She will be. She wants to do musical theater and stage, which is not as demoralizing as the movie business is.”

16. Rosie O’Donnell

The comedian and talk show host came out by revealing “I’m a dyke!” during her stand up act at the Ovarian Cancer Research benefit at Carolines Comedy Club in February 2002.

17. Ellen DeGeneres

DeGeneres came out in 1997, both in real life and on TV in 1997, on her sitcom Ellen. The ‘Puppy’ Episode, featured a who’s who of Hollywood, including Oprah Winfrey, Demi Moore, Billy Bob Thornton, and Laura Dern as Ellen’s love interest. DeGeneres’s character became the first openly gay prime time lead character on television.

18 . Melissa Etheridge

Melissa Etheridge came out in January 1993 during the Triangle ball, the first ever ball thrown for the LGBT community during a president’s inauguration, in this case Clinton’s.

“I didn’t even think, Oh, I’m going to come out here…It was, ‘Gee, I’m really excited to be here, and I’m really proud to have been a lesbian all my life.’ And a big cheer went up through the whole hall, and k.d. [lang] came out and hugged me. I remember walking back, and my friend said, ‘I think you came out!'”

19. Maria Bello

Maria Bello recently revealed that she is in a longtime relationship with a woman named Clare. The actress, who officially came out in an op-ed piece for the New York Times, wrote about her experience telling her son about the relationship.

“Whomever I love, however I love them, whether they sleep in my bed or not, or whether I do homework with them or share a child with them, ‘love is love.'”

20. Wanda Sykes

Comedian Wanda Sykes revealed her sexual orientation at a Prop. 8 rally in Las Vegas in November 2008, telling the crowd…

“You know, I don’t really talk about my sexual orientation. I didn’t feel like I had to. I was just living my life, not necessarily in the closet, but I was living my life. Everybody that knows me personally they know I’m gay. But that’s the way people should be able to live their lives. I’m proud to be a woman. I’m proud to be a black woman, and I’m proud to be gay.”

Showbiz’s Late Lesbians

It takes some lesbians a little bit of time to figure out that they are lesbians. Their suspicions might start with a few “signs” at school – they don’t fancy boys and/or they might feel attracted to a best female mate. Intolerant friends and family might dissuade them from expressing their true sexual identity at that age, but when they get older they realise they are free to be who they want to be.

Here are four famous showbiz women who took a bit of time to realise that they were queer.

Kelly McGillis, actress

She was one of the iconic faces of American cinema in the 1980s, her credits including Top Gun, Witness and The Accused. After a failed marriage in the early ’80s, McGillis settled down with a girlfriend, despite wrestling with guilt that her lesbian persuasion was somehow morally wrong. Things went terribly wrong in 1982 when two men burst into her house and sexually assaulted her and her girlfriend. Her reaction was to descend into drink and drugs, but she did emerge out the other end when she started making regular appearances on the lesbian TV show The L Word in 2007. Since 2010 she has been happily married to music company exec Melanie Leis.

Wanda Sykes, comedienne

Wanda Sykes admits to having queer urges in her childhood, but felt socially pressured to repress them. She did eventually come out at the age of 40 after a seven year marriage to the record producer Dave Hall, with whom she has two kids.

Maria Bello, activist and actress

Maria’s “modern family” consists of her beloved son, a close friendship with her ex-husband and a romantic pairing with her long-time friend Claire Munn, whom Maria only realised she was in love with when she was 45 years old!

Carol Leifer, writer and comedienne

Here’s another celebrity who didn’t realise she was a supporter of Sappho until early middle age. After dating such high profile gents as Jerry Seinfeld, Carol Leifer fell in love with her now-partner Lori Wolf when they were both in their early 40s.

Which Lesbian Celebrity Relationship Most Mirrors Yours?

We often live vicariously through the ups and downs of famous relationships. And we have to admit; we are all obsessed with the flamboyant (and even the tame) details of celebrity couples. Celebrity couples have triumphs and agonies, successes and failures with marriage and divorce. Although fame highlights the lives of the stars, most don’t pretend to be poster children for successful relationships.

Yes, these popular partners are people too, and yes, their lives actually parallel our own, at least when it comes to love. So, what Lesbian Celebrity Relationship mirrors your own?

Perhaps from the examples of others we can learn to balance our own prosperous partnerships. While the lives of others may always intrigue us, it is clear that Hollywood love affairs simply mirror those of us who are not in the public eye.

Bridging the Age Gap

Several stars are romancing their elders and still going strong. Wanda Sykes and wife Alex share a 10-year age difference, while Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi note a 15-year deviation. It’s true, generational gaps must appear at times in these age-blind cases, but it’s a good sign that these lovers can look past the superficial number of years on Earth. May–December couples must beware of the parent-child relationship, but can also delight in the complementary blend of age’s experience with the vigour of youth.

Low-Profile Partnerships

Healthy celebrity coupledom is sometimes attributed to a pair’s ability to keep low-key about the ins and outs of their durable interdependence. It’s evident when celebs put their relationship and family first, before their careers. A couple who seem to exhibit the successful low-profile formula is Jane Wagner and Lily Tomlin. These couples seem to focus on their family, their values, and their work together both on and off the stage.

Crazy Connection

Passionate pairs have always been the most fun to watch, but rather than proving true love, these types of poisoned lovers act more often as enablers than saviours. The truth is, while opposites may attract, they usually get converted. The relationship of Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson exhibited a maniacal love affair that drips with drama. Michelle Rodriguez and Cara Delevingne also have had their own share of public scandal. Perhaps your mate isn’t partaking in illegal affairs, but your partner’s behaviour may be just as toxic.

Stealing the Spotlight

Being eclipsed by a loved one who enjoys widespread professional success can sometimes be hard to take without resentment and jealousy, but some squeezes are happy being the wind beneath their sweetheart’s wings. We defer back Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi, Ellen is the mega star and her lady, the stunning eye-candy. Allowing your other half to shine in the spotlight while taking a backseat exhibits confidence, trust, and your sincere wishes for very best for your dearest.

Where the heart is… The Plight of LGBT Homeless Youth

Comedienne Wanda Sykes said in one of her routines that…

“It’s harder being gay than it is being black. It is, because there’s some things that I had to do as gay that I didn’t have to do as black—I didn’t have to come out black! I didn’t have to sit my parents down and tell them…”

The absurdity of the parallel can be great fun, but the results are often not. The home and family is one of the first, most important, and (in certain cases) the only support system available to young people.

Homophobia and trans-phobia in those homes can very suddenly take that away. An incomplete education can make it difficult for any homeless youth to find work and support themselves, and being LGBT as well comes with particular challenges that remain unrecognized and unaddressed.

According to the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the National Coalition for the Homeless (both non-profit organizations based in the United States of America), 50% of LGBT youth between the ages of 13 and 24 years who openly identify as such to their families, receive a negative reaction.1 In a 1987 study, 26% of those who came out were cast out from their homes by their own families. As of 2007, between 20% and 40% of homeless youth are LGBT. Adjusting for the statistic that between 3% and 5% of the U.S. population identify as LGBT, we can consider that homelessness affects the Stateside LGBT youth to a disproportionate amount.

As the foster care system and homeless shelters are designed for heterosexual and cis-gendered people, this isn’t a simple matter of more LGBT youth availing of these “safety nets”. Many of these systems keep to a basis of gender segregation housing, and many of the people involved in the system, supposedly meant to help, carry the same hostility that would often have put LGBT youth out of their homes in the first place. More than one-third of LGBT homeless youth were violently assaulted in the care of social services2.

As a result, many LGBT youth feel safer living on the street than in a foster home or shelter, but according to the National Runaway Switchboard, LGBT homeless youth are a full 7 times more likely than heterosexual homeless youth to be victims of a crime3, and 58% percent are sexually assaulted compared 33% of their homeless straight peers4.

While homeless youth regardless of sexual orientation are at a high risk of developing emotional disorder and mental illness, the additional pressures of LGBT discrimination in society can trigger and sustain an even greater need for counseling and therapy among LGBT homeless youth on issues specifically applicable to LGBT youth.

The solutions are as simple as the issue—which is to say, it’s not. We need funding, leadership and volunteers, to implement shelters by LGBT people for LGBT people. We need organizations to sustain this development. We need awareness, and the ability to fight discrimination at any and every level. LGBT youth need as many people as possible in the world to open their hearts and make room for them in it. Home is, after all, where the heart is.

Image source

1 Ray, Nicholas. (2006). Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth: An epidemic of homelessness. New York: National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Policy Institute and the National Coalition for the Homeless.

2 Thompson, S. J., Safyer, A. W. & Pollio, D. E. (2001). Differences and predictors of family reunification among subgroups of runaway youths using shelter services. Social Work Research, 25(3).

3 Ray, N. op. cit.

4 Uwujaren, Jarune. “Some Facts About Homelessness Among LGBTQ Youth.” Everyday Feminism. Everyday Feminism Magazine, 28 Feb. 2013.

Lesbian Favourites Wanda Sykes and Ellen DeGeneres

Lesbian favourite Wanda Sykes visited The Ellen Show to talk about dinner time at her house with her wife and twins.

The insight into the comedian’s personal life was a nice one to see. Even with all of her visible roles, Wanda Sykes has always been highly protective of her family and personal life. Sykes married her beautiful French wife – Alex, during the brief period in which California allowed same-sex marriage; the couple held a small ceremony for close family and friends in Palm Springs. However, when California’s Proposition 8 passed in the November 2008 election, banning same-sex marriage, Sykes decided to lend her celebrity to the cause of marriage equality. After discussing it with Alex, Sykes came out in a speech at a rally in Las Vegas. Since then, Sykes has stayed involved in the political effort to restore same-sex marriage rights in California.

In May 2009 Sykes was selected to perform at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in the first year of Barack Obama’s presidency. In addition to being the first African-American woman to fill the role, she was also the first openly gay person, either male or female. There seems to be in no danger of Sykes giving up her biting, personal style of comedy any time soon:

“I love doing stand-up, because it gives me the freedom to say what I really want to say. I think that’s why it’s my favorite thing to do,”