On Sunday, Tom Hardy summarily dismissed a reporter who introduced the subject of Hardy’s sexuality to a TIFF press conference. Hardy, who was promoting Legend, was aghast to see the subject switch so abruptly and on such an unnecessary tangent. The journalist attempted to resurrect a years-old interview where Tom alluded to experimentation. Hardy saw this diversion as irrelevant, and he curtly dismissed the reporter.
Now that a few days have passed, Hardy spoke with Entertainment Weekly about why he shut down the reporter’s off-topic question. Hardy expressed distaste for the invasion of his privacy during a press conference:
“That really, really annoyed me. It was just the inelegance of being asked in a room full of people. Now I’m happy to have a conversation, a discussion, at a reasonable time about anything. I’m confident in my own sexuality, and I’m also confident in my own being and talking about any issue you want to talk about it. But there is a time and a place for that.”
Hardy felt that the question, posed by a reporter from an LGBT outlet, was geared strictly for the purpose of sensationalism:
“I found it very humiliating for somebody to decide that on his dime and his time, to openly and inelegantly pursue a line of questioning which I could only sense at the moment – which was quite awkward – that it was zeroing in on a reaction from me that would become a topic of discussion that had nothing to do really, really to do with what was there. It’s so important to the LGBT [community] that people actually feel safe about their sexuality and are able to speak freely and not be stigmatized or feel like they are being pointed out. Why point me out, assuming that I’m gay because I’m ambiguous about it, which I’m very clear if you look into what I’ve said in the past.”
Hardy emphasized how — during the heat of the moment — there was no proper answer to the journalist’s question. The reporter appeared to want Hardy to “come out of the closet,” but Hardy says, “I’m not in one.” He also realized that any number of responses could have painted him as homophobic. All of this upset Hardy, who feels “like I’ve let people down,” but maintains that discussing his sexuality in an off-topic forum was unnecessary.
Hardy further expressed his point in a lengthy interview with The Daily Beast, where he hammers home his exasperation at the “inelegance” of the journalist’s “disrespectful and counterproductive” approach. The piece is worth reading in full, but to summarize, Hardy called the question “rude.” He admitted struggling not to ask the guy, “I’m sorry, who the f*ck are you?”
Once again, BOOM.
(Via Entertainment Weekly)
