Andrew Scott says Barbie film connected with gay men who grew up concealing dolls

Jody Coffey

“I think there’s an awful lot of gay men who understood”

Andrew Scott, 46, has opened up about how the Barbie movie resonated with ‘an awful lot of gay men’ who felt they had to conceal their desire to play with the iconic Mattel doll growing up but felt they couldn’t.

During an interview with Soho House, the Dublin-born actor delved into discussions around fashion, sexuality, and the experience of wanting to explore style as a young person, as well as Soho House’s editorial director Teo van den Broeke’s new memoir, ‘The Closet‘.

Speaking on the Greta Gerwig film, Scott says he thinks a lot of gay men would’ve understood the urge to play with dolls but felt restricted against doing so.

“With the Barbie movie that came out, I think there’s an awful lot of gay men who understood, it was like ‘Oh, I really wanted to play with that’. But then somebody would come in and I’d drop that doll.”

In 2013, the Fleabag actor opened up about his sexuality with The Independent and said that being gay is ‘just a fact’ and not something he wanted to ‘trade on it’ due to his private nature.

He went on to reflect on the lack of LGBT representation he felt as a young person and the knock-on effects it can have on identity and self-esteem. Scott also shared that cultural references such as music, clothes, and television are all ‘incredibly important’ for this reason.

“I think there’s something about when your very identity is being questioned. Certainly when we were growing up, I think maybe, to a lesser extent now, I hope so.

“But there was no representation, so you’re providing yourself with an identity, and you’re attracted literally to things that are bold because you feel so insecure about the way you are. So actually, to be able to be bold is a really wonderful thing. And I think sometimes clothes or music or even television or those early cultural references are so, so incredibly important to us.”

The Sherlock actor, who plays Jim Moriarty, also explained that being bold with fashion, even when it can seem ‘ridiculous’, can be ‘wonderful’.

“Of course we have to be sort of cautious about trends, but there’s something about jumping into trends that I think is kind of wonderful that you go, ‘well, this is ridiculous’. But the idea of kind of jumping into it going, ‘Yeah, I’m going to do that’, then you look back at stuff and you think, ‘Oh my God, I jumped wholeheartedly into that’.

“And it’s just something very present-minded about sort of getting involved with something and knowing actually that it’s slightly ridiculous and there’s something kind of playful about it.”

Teo van der Broeke’s newest memoir is now available to purchase on Amazon.