"[PROJECTOR WHIRRING]" "[MAN CLEARS THROAT]" "♪ ♪" "MAN:" "Impact Partners presents... ♪ ♪" "A Think Thorpe/Little Punk production." "♪ ♪" "A film by David Thorpe." "[LIGHT, UPBEAT MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "Do I Sound Gay?" "Yes, I think you do sound gay." "Not as much as I do, but.." "Yes." "Ah, no, en Frances no." "In English, I don't know." "Yes." "Not at all." "MAN:" "Really?" "It's your tone, which is, like, intellectual, so people can read it as gay." "I would have just, maybe, lumped you in the artsy-fartsy." "You sound creative." "You have, like, the "S" in the front of the mouth, which is part of the gay-man stereotype." "There is something slightly melodic." "I think it's the nasality." "I would definitely rate you as a metrosexual." " No." " Not at all?" "No." "You sound like a human being, male." "♪ ♪" "[SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE]" "It's, perhaps, more the fact that I'm gay as well so I kind of pick up on that." "You don't sound, like, gay maybe because I'm steeped in gay." "You could sound gay if you... if you wanted to made..." "make it a very, very... cast a very wide net." "We enunciate." "[LAUGHS]" "And if that's gay..." "Muah!" "[SIGHS]" "It's gonna be a beautiful day." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "This is me, David." "I'm a writer, I live in Brooklyn, and I live alone." "[CAT MEOWS]" "Well, not totally alone." "[WHIRRING]" "Recently, I split up with my boyfriend, and he moved out." "Okay." "I'm so excited about today." "[CAT MEOWS]" "I don't know, it's exciting to think, like," ""Okay, I'm taking control of this problem that... that is really bugging me,"" "and, um..." "I don't know." "Like, I feel like it might make me a different person..." "Which would be cool, because I'm not totally satisfied with the person that I am." "All right." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I'm not satisfied because I'm in my 40s and still single." "I'm not the most confident person at the moment..." "Which might be why I've become obsessed with sounding gay." "[INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "Right after the breakup," "I escaped to a gay beach town on Fire Island to drown my sorrows." " So I had a friend come in..." " Oh, my God!" "You will not believe what happened to me the other night." "He was like, so where we gonna go tonight?" "[BOTH SPEAKING AT ONCE]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "It was a Friday night." "The train was packed with loud, chattering gay men." "Get me to the front of the line." "I will kill you." "And there was this, like, magical tutu that popped out from, like, nowhere." "Okay, so I'm stuck there with this guy at the end of the car..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "The darkness amplified the shrillness of the voices around me." "He was like, "Hey, girl." "You look fierce."" "And I was like, "Me?"" "And he's like, "Yeah, you."" "Wrap it up, I've got stuff to say about my grandma." "They only have this place..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I started to feel repelled." "There was this girl there, and she's, like, a little tragic..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Why did we all insist on sounding like a pack of braying ninnies?" "And I had to like rush downtown.." "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "She was walking and I was like, "Oh, my God, like, totally hurting me with chai."" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I didn't choose this gay voice." "Why would I?" "My mother is driving me absolutely crazy." "I mean, she has had the same dowdy haircut..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Who could respect, much less fall in love with an old braying ninny like me?" "[SCREAMING] Stop!" "[PENSIVE MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "I think it's that way." "[BEEPING]" "♪ ♪" "[BUZZING]" "♪ ♪" "[BUZZING]" "[TELEPHONE RINGING]" "DAVID:" "Willem Dafoe," "Gregory Hines," "James Gandolfini, the great Joey Mclntyre from New Kids on the Block, and, of course, Tony Danza." "Well, this room is definitely very reassuring that... that I couldn't be getting better help." "Although, it does make me feel like I'm learning how to act." "DAVID:" "Hi, how are you?" "Hi David, I'm Susan Sankin." " Nice to meet you." " Thanks so much." " Yeah, you too." " We're gonna go this way." "Okay, great." "So as you and I are speaking, I'm going to be doing a phonetic analysis of your speech." "Just speak the way you typically would, as if you were speaking to a friend." "Okay, uh, sorry I'm a little nervous so I hope I talk normally, but, uh, I'm sure I will." "Um, so yeah, I mean, as I've mentioned to you on the phone, um, I hate the way I talk." "I'm a little mystified as to why I talk the way I talk." "It's almost like my voice shuts down when I'm nervous, particularly if I have fear about just making myself visible as a gay person." "Like, all of this sort of stops moving and..." "Okay." "People code-switch a lot." "So if you see a young..." "perhaps a young little girl who's three years old playing with a doll, well, when it's time for that doll to go to bed, they use their parent voice." "They lower their pitch." "They use the stern voice." "So what happens sometimes is, when people do a lot of code-switching, they get bogged down in it and they forget what they used to sound like or what the opposite side was." "I didn't..." "I've never really thought about it that way as just being a part..." "we do so much code-switching, and I feel like I'm all over the map, and sometimes my voice comes out one way, and sometimes it comes out the other way." " And I'm like..." " Mm-hmm." " What's my real voice?" " Mm-hmm." "I will confess I'd love to, like, learn how to sound straight." "Like, I think that just a normal, unremarkable way of talking, like, it..." "I just... it would be nice to be able to speak like that." "All right." "I have a great picture of what's going on with your speech..." "Okay." "Good." "And also what you hope to accomplish." "Okay." "So what I hear is a little bit of nasality." "Mm-hmm." "I feel like I sound so nasal, and so many other gay men sound incredibly nasal, and, like, I think it's one reason people find too many gay voices at once kind of grating because of that nasality." "Yeah." "You do do a lot of up-speak." "You end up..." "you always end up up." "Even if you're making a statement, you're ending up up here." "Sometimes it's the holding onto speech." ""Phone, so, alone, no."" "Okay?" "You just hang on that." "So we're going to keep it short." "So just try Oklahoma." "Oklahoma." "Ocean." "Ocean." "Au gratin." "[LAUGHS]" " You threw me with that one." " Au gratin." "A little French." " You threw me with that one." " Okay." "Okay." "Sorry." "Au gratin." "Um..." "Uh, au gratin." "Good." "I see that your work really lies in terms of your rhythm and intonation, the sing-song pattern, and in finding the voice that's comfortable for you, that will work for you." "So that you can code-switch, but volitionally." "So that you're not getting stuck, you have a go-to voice." " I would love a go-to voice." " All right?" "Excellent." "Thank you so much." "It was a pleasure, David." "You know, when she showed me how I speak, um, you know, when she showed me how my "O" sounds, like "O-o-o."" "You know... that's..." "I don't think that's really particularly how I want my Os to sound." "I don't know that anybody really wants their Os to sound that way." "Oakling." "Oakum." "Oatmeal." "Oaxacan." "Obang." "Nice." "The obese ogre owes Mrs. O'Malley some oatmeal." "Harry married Kari and committed hara-kiri." "I wonder, when all the gays start to marry, if they're gonna start committing hara-kiri after they marry." "Tilapia." "Tilapia." "Halibut." "Roberto was aglow that the fish was local." "And a bargain, to boot." "My pants have a jam stain." " Hi." " Hello!" " How are you?" " Good." " Hi." " How are you?" " Good." " Hi." "Okay, tall drinks." "Yeah, they look beautiful." " Cheers." " Cheers, queers." "Eyes." "[LAUGHS QUIETLY]" "Mmm." "Mmm." "I asked one of our mutual friends..." "Yeah." "Who sounded the gayest of all of us that she knows..." " And I won the award?" " And you won." "ALBERTO:" "I think that Sam is a more performative person." "[SAM CHUCKLES]" " No, I do." " Yeah." "I just think that's... that you are." "So when she says that Sam is... you know, sounds gayer than most of our friends," "I mean, I think we have other friends that I'm not gonna name that also sound pretty gay." "So... and I don't think that they sound less gay than Sam, honestly, so..." "Where do you rank yourself?" "I mean, I..." "I would say" "I'm just one..." "one shade lighter than you." "Probably around 3, but maybe I... maybe I'm delusional." "DAVID:" "So do I sound gay?" "When you say it like that, you do." "[LAUGHTER]" "Okay, let me rephrase the question." "[DEEPLY] "Do I sound gay?"" "Do you guys think I sound gay?" " Yes, I do." " Yes." "But I don't think it sounds as bad as you think it sounds." "So, um..." "DAVID:" "It's interesting that you chose the word bad." "[LAUGHING]" " It's true." " What do you mean bad?" " No, I don't mean it like that." " You said bad." "Sorry, I don't mean it like that." "SAM:" "He said it." "He said it." " No, he said the word bad." " I know." "SAM:" "I'm saying you challenged him." "I didn't challenge you." "I have the impression that you think it sounds bad." " That's why I said that." " Right." "Um, but yeah, I don't think it's, like, this off-the-charts thing that you have the impression that it is, you know." "But when you say bad, you mean something negative, obviously." "Yes, but I mean I..." "I interpret David's feelings about this and the feelings around this whole project as bad." "You know, like..." "I mean, he has negative feelings about his voice, about the perception that it creates, so I just..." "And you don't feel that at all, yourself?" "I have, you know, sort of a generic self-loathing that is created around my gayness, you know." "But... if my voice is part of it, then it might be, but I don't think I could sort of say it's the only thing, you know, or the main thing." "Is your voice part of it?" "Sure, it's part of it." "I think I feel out-of-sync with my voice and uh, uh..." "And, at least, it seems to me like that it's anxiety about sounding too gay." "So, okay, let's see what it's like to not sound gay, and maybe I'll feel more in-sync or maybe I'll have some idea of what my voice should sound like, so..." "But you could also argue, like, why don't you just accept how you sound?" "What's wrong with you?" "I mean, 'cause I think, you know, for myself, or you, for other people, it's like, when I think about it on a rational level, it's like, there's nothing wrong with you." "There's nothing wrong with my voice." "This is my voice." "This is who I am." "It's a beautiful thing." "We have never talked about this idea until you brought it up." "I don't know anybody else that I've talked to about it, either." "You know what I mean?" "So I think there is this thing, obviously, that we all are aware of that hasn't been spoken of." "I mean, this is a thing... maybe this is, like, the elephant in the room that you've been talking about." "[INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "I've been uncomfortable with the way that I've sounded for years, but it's like, there's nothing I can do about it." "DAVID:" "Do you think you sound gay?" "Mm, no." "I hope not." "I'm used to hearing my voice now." "When I would first hear it," "I, quite frankly, would be appalled." "A lot of times when I hear myself, like, in a video," "I'm very self-conscious, and I think, "Oh, my God, I sound so gay."" "DAVID:" "Did you ever listen to yourself and think, "God, I sound gay"?" "Um..." "I'd have to..." "I'd have to say..." "if I told you no, I'd be lying." "It's an incredibly stunning, rude awakening." "MAN:" "Please leave a message, okay?" "You see I..." "I don't sound like that." "No, that's how you sound." "In our society, men belong to a certain status, and the women, they belong to a certain status, and the men's status is the highest status." "If I'm in a hotel and I call the front desk, they always say," ""We'll have that right up to you, ma'am."" "And I think, "Really?" "Do I really sound like a woman?"" "I don't..." "I just..." "I don't think I sound like... a woman." "I think I sound like a very small man." "You know, like..." "like, this high." "It took me three years to find a boyfriend." "People don't want to date a feminine guy that sounds gay." "I don't like when somebody sounds gay, like, sounds very feminine." "I don't like it." "It's just a turn-off." "Why don't you like it?" "I don't know, because I feel mens are mens and womens are womens." "He totally started pouring chai down my throat, but it went, like, everywhere;" "it went from, like..." "Literally, okay?" "This one guy's complaining..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "We don't talk about it, but some gay men are afraid that their voices sound too effeminate." "When I don't have confidence in myself," "I'm no different." "I'm afraid that my voice repels other gay men..." "Not to mention the world." "MAN:" "We know exactly what you're about, Mr. Limbaugh." "LIMBAUGH: [LISPING] What am I about, sir?" "Tell me, Mr. New Castrati." "Just exactly what am I about, sir?" "Morgan said, quote, "If his son was gay," ""he better come home and talk to him like a man" ""and not... he mimicked gay in a high-pitched voice..." ""or he would pull out a knife and stab that little N-word to death."" "MAN:" "A Ross County student who says he was bullied and beaten for being gay is speaking out for the first time since this videotaped beating went public." "Why do you talk like a girl?" "Why do you walk like that?" "You're so weird." "If I saw two guys blowing each other... and I don't know why I'm watching them do it... but if I just happened..." "[LAUGHTER]" "I would be respectful to them." "I would... you know," ""Hello, gentleman."" "Whatever, you know." "But if one of 'em took the dick out of his mouth and started acting all faggy and saying annoying faggy things..." ""You know, people from Phoenix are Phoenicians,"" "or something like that.." "[LAUGHTER]" "I'd be like, "Hey shut up, faggot."" "[LAUGHTER]" "[SHOUTING] Faggot!" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I know that gay voice." "BOTH: "You're not supposed to use those for that."" "Shut up, faggot." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I talk like that sometimes." "Like, I would never call a gay guy a faggot unless he's bein' a faggot." "But..." "BOTH:" "You know, "People from Phoenix are Phoenicians."" "Or somethin' like that." "I'd be like, "Hey..."" "BOTH:" ""Shut up, faggot."" "[SHOUTING] Faggot!" "[PROJECTOR WHIRRING]" "[SOFT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I fought for decades to embrace being a faggot." "♪ ♪" "I know I should just accept myself as I am." "♪ ♪" "But, even now, this voice thing still plagues me." "♪ ♪" "I'm embarrassed to say this, but, you know, sometimes somebody will say, "I didn't know you were gay."" "And it's like, why does that make me feel good, you know?" "♪ ♪" "And I hate myself for thinking that, and I think..." "Um..." "Yeah, It's very disturbing." "I thought I was beyond that." "What's the problem if somebody assumes that I'm gay when I open my mouth?" "Like, why do I have a problem with that?" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Is it any wonder" "I can't shake the idea of changing my voice?" "Let's see." "Oh, cat, cat, cat." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "What are the advantages of sounding gay?" "♪ ♪" "[BUZZING]" "At the moment, all I can think of are the disadvantages." "♪ ♪" ""At the top of a hill in Laurel Canyon..." ""At the top of a hill..."" " Good morning, David." " Hey." " How are you today?" " Good." " Great to see you." " You too." " Come on in." " Thanks." "Mind." "Riot." "Dying." "Ide." "Was that too long?" "SUSAN:" "No, you were good." "Ide." "Arise." "Dynasty." "♪ ♪" "[UPBEAT MUSIC]" "[CHEERING]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Just as I'm struggling to sound less gay..." "New York legalizes gay marriage." "♪ ♪" "Gay Pride takes place just days later." "♪ ♪" "The grand marshal happens to be Dan Savage, one of my heroes." "Dan!" "Dan!" "Dan!" "DAVID:" "Why do you think so many gay men are so self-conscious about sounding gay?" "A lot of gay men are self-conscious about sounding gay because we were persecuted for that when we were young." "You know, when you're young and closeted and trying to pass, you police yourself for evidence that might betray you, and it's how you walk and how you talk." "Those two things... and so a lot of gay men carry that into adulthood." "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "When I was in high school, I... when I first started going through puberty," "I had a really, really effeminate personality." "Like, I watch old family movies and it's actually really, really painful for me to watch because I was really, really effeminate." "And that's the first time that I got attacked for being gay because of how I sounded." "DART:" "Your teenage years, especially your early teenage years, are all about survival, and so I remember changing my voice or trying to sound less gay just to survive high school, and it's kind of sad that it happened that way." "That's my grandma's angel." "It used to be in the hallway of our house all the time, right in front of the door." "DAVID:" "When did other kids start making fun of you for the way you talk?" "Well, when I was in third grade, people started making fun of the way I talked, and that's when the bullying started." "Why do you talk like a girl?" "Why do you walk like that?" "My voice was high." "I had, like, the little girl whatever accent." "I would be sitting there talking to my friends." "People would just walk by:" ""Faggot."" "MAN:" "The video is difficult to watch." "A Unioto High School freshman pummeled by a classmate, while others stand by and do nothing." "[CLAMORING]" "GIRL:" "Mr. Goff, there's a fight!" "DAVID:" "Do you think you get picked on more 'cause you're more effeminate?" "'Cause I'm different, and I'm not afraid to be." "I'm comfortable in my own skin." "I'm a diva." "They, like..." "they don't like that." "Zachary, why don't you step out for a minute?" "Why?" "'Cause I want to tell him something." "I don't get to hear nothing." "BECKY:" "He has his moments where..." "The diva is just his thing." "In front of people, he's always so happy and giddy and..." "But he can't hide from me." "I see the pain." "I know it's there." "Many gay adolescents are absolutely right to be very worried about how they sound because it draws violence." "DAVID:" "It's nice to see that you're, like, a survivor." "Yeah, Destiny's Child" "[DAVID LAUGHING]" "DAVID:" "And, uh... wait." "Which... doesn't Christina..." "what's the Survivor song?" "♪ I'm a survivor ♪" "That's Destiny's Child." "DAVID:" "That's Destiny's Child." " Fighter." " Fighter." "DAVID:" "♪ Thank you for making me ♪" "BOTH:" "♪ A fighter ♪" " Yeah." " I love that song." "Me too." "[SOFT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I don't remember what I sounded like growing up." "♪ ♪" "I've sort of blocked out my childhood." "♪ ♪" "I grew up in the Bible Belt in the 1980s." "♪ ♪" " Wow, look at all these." " Ha!" "♪ ♪" "DAVID:" "Okay, what am I looking at here?" "Wait, wait." "You don't know who this adorable child is?" "DAVID:" "No." "[CHUCKLES]" "♪ ♪" "[LAUGHING]" "♪ ♪" "I should look at these more often." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Back then, homosexuality was evil and the cause of a new plague called AIDS." "♪ ♪" "THURMOND:" "Homosexuals practice sodomy." "You do admit homosexuals practice sodomy, don't you?" "Yes sir." "THURMOND:" "And that's against the laws of many states, isn't it?" "Sir, I..." "I don't know..." "THURMOND:" "And against the court of..." "HELMS:" "There's nothing gay about these people." "Engaging in incredibly offensive and revolting conduct that has led to the proliferation of AIDS." "♪ ♪" "Nobody was openly gay." "I mean, nobody was... adults weren't openly gay in... in at that time period." "Um, I mean, probably more particularly where we lived." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "In middle school, I started to get called a faggot." "JOSH:" "That was a particularly vicious insult at the time." ""Faggot" was always delivered with, like, an extra oomph." "Like, no, I really mean you're a faggot." "[LAUGHING] You know what I mean?" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I knew what he meant, and I knew what a faggot sounded like because gay people did exist on TV." "MAN:" "Who's generally better-looking?" "A fairy or a pixie?" "[LAUGHTER]" "Looks aren't everything." "[LAUGHTER]" "I, uh..." "I'll go for the fairy." "[PIANO TUNE PLAYING]" "I hope I didn't leave anybody out." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "How did I know they were gay?" "Just listen to how they talk." "I'm gonna play that part again..." "BOTH:" "So you can all shout "Hey," okay?" "♪ ♪" "ALL:" "Hey!" "The only way I can get my wife interested in romance is if I dress up like a..." "BOTH:" "Blank." "Look at Liberace." ""Oh, Jesus," you know." ""Oh, I swear."" "And Truman Capote, you know." "They all have that voice." "You know what I mean?" "What is the nearest thing, in physical sensation, to an orgasm?" "BOTH:" "And I came up with the idea that it was sneezing." "[LAUGHTER]" "[APPLAUSE]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Like the rest of America," "I was spellbound by these queer celebrities..." "MAN:" "Gee, you should have your own show." "I have." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "But I knew it was taboo to resemble them in any way." "♪ ♪" "I cleaned up my act, and I stopped getting called a faggot." "DAVID:" "So I was really shy as a kid, uh, and I... partly because I was gay, and I was like, "I'll just be quiet, and no one will know that I'm here,"" "and, you know, I knew I wanted to fit in." "When you were a kid or an adolescent," "I had no idea you were gay." "Never... it never occurred to me that you were gay." "Like, I never even thought in those terms." "And I never thought of you sounding like that." "♪ ♪" "BETH:" "We've had this conversation off-camera before, but no, you did not sound gay then." "DAVID:" "Yeah." "Do I sound gay now?" "Yes, you do." "[LAUGHS]" "DAVID:" "Were you surprised when I came out of the closet?" "I was flabbergasted." "You always seemed very normal to me." "♪ ♪" "We never dealt with anything like that." "[PROJECTOR WHIRRING]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I'll never know for sure what I sounded like growing up." "There's no hard evidence." "♪ ♪" "I don't have any recordings of my voice." "Just these Super-8 films my grandfather shot." "♪ ♪" "How and when did I learn to sound gay?" "♪ ♪" "Where does my gay voice come from?" "♪ ♪" "Every one of us is presented with lots and lots of models of what language should sound like." "So we hear men, we hear women, we hear kids our own age, we hear adults, we hear older adults, and in all of these interactions, we have, uh, you know, different opportunities" "to emulate different aspects of those people's speech." "My father worked on the railroad, and he and my brother got along, and my brother always wanted to talk to my dad or go to the workshop, and I loved staying inside reading, helping my mother bake," "and secretly listening to her phone calls with her girlfriends, and that, to me, was... was fun, and so guess who sounds gayer?" "[QUIET BEEPING]" "Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition..." "SMYTH:" "I'm interested in how sexual orientation affects the way people make little differences in the way they pronounce speech sounds." "DAVID ON RECORDING:" "Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth, on this continent..." "T..." "T..." "T." "So, normally, we'll say..." "someone will say "continen."" ""Continen."" "N...n... with no release." "And you said con... continent." ""T."" "Did everyone get that?" "I said "continent-uh."" "The clearest, most ladylike gay one." "Micro-variations are tiny differences in pronunciations, like the difference between, "ss" and "ss."" "Two different versions of exactly the same sound, but different people pronounce them different ways." "SMYTH:" "Gay-sounding men are using clearer vowels." "Vowel durations are longer." "Ss longer." "Ls clearer." "Overarticulating the Ps, Ts, and Ks." "♪ ♪" "These things all add up to the same phenomenon that's been observed with women versus men, on average." "So I'm subtly making my... my gay choices?" "Yes." "Yeah, it's fascinating." "Perhaps you picked this up when you were young by listening more to women than to men, by giving more weight to the cues you were getting from female speakers than from male speakers." "Mm-hmm." " For some reason." " Mm-hmm." "People make fun of me because I lisp." "Really?" "Such a lot of fuss over a few extra Ss." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "What about that whole lisp, sibilant S thing?" "I have such a problem with pronouns." "How many Ss are there in the word pronoun?" "How'd you like to kiss my ass?" "That's got two more Ss in in it." "How'd you like to blow me?" "What's the matter, your wife got lockjaw?" "Faggot!" "Have you got it?" "ALL:" "Yesss..." "Sounds like steam escaping." "His name is James." "Not Jim." "Not Jimmy." ""Jamesss."" "I get it." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I had speech therapy for a lisp as a kid." "So did lots of other gay men I know." "When I think back about..." "you know, as a kid, while I say that I didn't necessarily sound gay," "I actually had a lisp." "I had a speech teacher, a Mr. Horischka, um, who, through school, who helped me." "I had a little lisp." "He was a big queen helping many a little Long-Island faggot to sound less gay." "I had a lisp, and so... it would be "bessst" if I talked like "thisss."" "And I was so young at the time." "It was only later that I realized, wait a minute." "Like, everybody in speech class was gay." "Like, everybody that they brought into that room." "It was like "future homosexuals of America."" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I've always thought that my lisp had something to do with being gay." "But Ben thinks I'm grasping at straws." "There is absolutely no evidence that gay men lisp." "I think we're going after these frontal and lateral misarticulations, and it happens that, you know, a subset of gay men... gay men that are very aware of their sexuality and very interested in, kind of," "the trajectory of their development... sort of remember these and attach a kind of social significance to them." "[SPEAKING INDISTINCTLY]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Ron thinks that back in the day, some gay men who allegedly lisped just had a feminine-sounding S." "I think that, maybe, it was true in my generation that there was a lot of, uh, confusion between fronting a T-H sound... an S into a T-H sound..." "and just sounding too feminine." "Mom asked me to ask you if you there's any mail for us here by mistake." "MAN:" "What?" "Mom asked me to ask you if you there's any mail for us here by mistake." "Nope, not a clue." "She wants the Brady's mail, Larry!" "They say things like "Girl," and "Sister,"" "and, "What's her problem?"" "Makes you think." "Hmm." "So the "th" is a phonological delay." "The "sss" might be identified by a speech language pathologist or by the parents as gender-inappropriate." " Oh, that's fine." " Say "sense" now." "SMYTH:" "Listeners perceive a gay-sounding voice as a feminine-sounding voice." "This is indicative of a stereotype, a cultural stereotype." "People want gay men to be like women, and maybe they picked up on the fact that many characteristics of gay-sounding voices are feminine characteristics." "But they've got it all wrong, because a lot of those gay-sounding voices are from straight guys." "[INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "MAN:" "Danny, they're just coming in with the first pallet." "Uh, and we need two of these, that I'll take..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "People think my straight friend Chris sounds gay." "We need a chard, a red cabbage, and two strawberries." "As one friend put it, my voice is all treble, no bass..." "I guess." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Did you hear that S?" "BOTH:" "All treble no bass..." "I guess." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I probably modeled my speech after the women I was close to growing up." "♪ ♪" "Chris probably did the same thing." "CHRIS:" "Most of my life, before I was 12," "I lived on an ashram, so I grew up, largely, around lots of women." "♪ ♪" "Hey, come on." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "My gay friend Matt grew up close to his four jock brothers." "He's the straightest-sounding guy I know." " Right." " Hut!" "MATT:" "See how butch I was?" "[LAUGHS]" "My family, I feel like... you know," "I, pretty much, was formed like every one of my other brothers." "I did everything that they did." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I admit I would love to sound like him." "MATT:" "The whole family was sports." "It was about..." "BOTH:" "Um, watching sports." "Uh, Thanksgiving was planned around halftime." "♪ ♪" "All right." "WOMAN:" "You ready?" "In our study with 25 men and 46 listeners, the average accuracy in guessing the man's sexual orientation correctly was only about 60%." "WOMAN:" "Whoo!" "SMYTH:" "So 40% of the men were misclassified by the listeners." "Either gay men who sound straight or straight men who sound gay." "What is sounding straight?" "DAVID:" "[LAUGHS]" "It's a great question." "I don't think there is such a thing as sounding straight." "Because, uh... well, people have said I sound straight, and I'm not." "Some of the gayest people I know are straight, and some of the butchest men I've ever met are gay." "So, in some ways, never assume." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "If I was using these typically-female micro-variations as a kid, how had my family not picked up on it?" "Why didn't they think I sounded gay?" "So, first of all, in considering your own story," "I'd bounce the question back to you and say:" "are we talking about the difference between" "Columbia, South Carolina, and New York City?" "If so, then we could just as easily be talking about a community in which it's simply taboo to allow the mind to associate a particular voice with a particular sexuality." "Or it could be something as simple as, we are talking about groups of people who didn't have a big store in their memory of, you know, this is what a gay man sounds like." "Whereas, in New York City, someone could say" ""Oh, yes, definitely you are..."" "and, never having lived in New York City," "I don't know this to be true, but someone could say, "Oh, yes, you are definitely part of the urban gay intelligentsia."" "Stretch." "Stretches." "Zzz." "Calm down." "Too much... too much partying happening here." "Got to be more "ssstraight."" "Straight." "Not hardest, hardest." "On the other hand, I do think, what the fuck difference does it make if I..." "If I say "say" or if I say "say"?" "Um, you know, it's what I have to say that matters." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "They say old habits die hard." "I'm starting to think they might be right." "And thus ends the first exhausting" ""S" practice-uh." "I'm struggling a bit with my speech." " Um..." " Okay." "But, I think, for..." "I think there's good reasons." "Um, speaking in this standard, confident way requires confidence and requires the feeling that I'm telling you something." " I'm not asking you." " Right." "And just the last month has just been, like, a difficult month in my life, and..." "Mm-hmm." "In what?" "Uh, in my... in my life." " Go down." " In my life." " Thank you." " Right." "And so I've found myself, in my mind, kind of reaching for the speech, uh, tools, but not able to use them." "The Life and Times of Porgy and Bess." "The four-time Tony-winning... she's won four Tonys?" "Let's try again." "♪ ♪" "One of the guys... guys... wants to know how to tell the driver to go fast." "Another suggests he..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Ever since gay marriage passed," "I keep getting ambushed by wedding announcements for freshly scrubbed, perfect, happy gay couples in the Sunday paper." "[MELANCHOLY MUSIC]" "[SNIFFS]" "I really shouldn't read "Sunday Styles."" "Those two guys are probably miserable." "I'm sure they're cheating on each other..." "Will do so, and..." "All right, but they really didn't seem like it." "[SIGHING] Sigh." "[LIGHT MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I decide it's time to bring out the big guns." "♪ ♪" "There's Leonard Bernstein about to punch me in the stomach." " Oh, really?" " Yeah." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "This is Bob Corff." "He's a former Broadway leading man and well-known voice coach, famous for helping people sound less gay." "♪ ♪" "MAN VOICE-OVER:" "I'm on my way to meet a man who helps actors hide the telltale signs of a gay sexuality." " Hello." " Hello." "How are you?" "I do have people who come to me, uh, to ask to sound less gay." "I would say it's probably between 20 and 50, a... a year." "DAVID:" "Yeah." "Oh." "That's a healthy number." "Yeah." "CORFF:" "Mostly, the men, whether they're gay or not, have to sound straight." "Whoo-whee!" "Yeah!" "I'm getting tired of your dumb-ass missions." "[LAUGHING]" "CORFF:" "It's an interesting view because, in this business, a lot of the casting people, a lot of the producers are gay, and even they won't hire somebody because the people in middle America will not be able to accept that." "Ugh, look at sweatpants guy." "This is a $90-million aircraft." "Steward, 21-18 that guy." "Excuse me, Mr. Sweatpants." "We're gonna need to check that bag." "I can only play a very specific type of gay guy because if it's a gay guy that's actually, like, a meaty role, like, a straight actor will play that, and if it's a gay guy that's "great, awesome body,"" "well, I can't play that." "So I just play the sad, self-hating, bitter queens." "[BOTH LAUGHING]" "And how do you... how do you feel about being cast in that role?" "You know, Ruth Buzzi used to say," ""I'll take those ugly girl roles, 'cause I get to work."" "So I'm going to give you an exercise right here..." "[DAVID CHUCKLES]" "That I think will be helpful." " Okay." " Okay." "I want to teach you the standard American melody." "The good speakers, the people who are leaders that get people to do what they want them to do..." "Mm-hmm." "Have a pattern, which is this:" " I'm right." " Mm-hmm." "I'm always right." "And what I want you to do is go like this:" "up, down." "Okay." "Up, down." "No you went, "Up, down."" "One, two." "What's the first number?" "One." "And what's underneath it?" "Two." " Are you sure?" " Hello." "You're going, "Hello!"" "Hello." "You're going, "Hello!"" "Up, down." "U-P spells what?" "Up." "Are you sure?" " Stop it." " Mm-hmm." "Stop it." "You're going, "Stop it."" "Okay." " Stop it." " Stop it." "Right." "I was never trained to be aggressive." "I was never trained to be authoritative." "It's hard for me to be like, "It's over there."" "But... but... no, that was actually pretty good." " Was that good?" " It was." "So... but that's if you want to have that power." "[LAUGHING] Mm-hmm." "When you hear it, you'll go, "Oh, gee, it's not as aggressive as it felt to me."" "Mm-hmm." "Mm-hmm." "I would recommend my Speakers Voice Method, which is the blue CD." "Okay." "That is going to give you more of a chest resonance instead of being, "Mm-hmm,"" "up here like that, you get down into your body." "Mm-hmm." "It's gonna really strengthen and lower your voice." "[PLAYFUL INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "When I'm in LA, I always stay with my pal Kayla." "KAYLA:" "All right, so what should we talk about?" "Okay, I'm gonna sit like a..." "more like a straight guy." "Okay." "Yeah, that's good." "That's good." "I'm gonna try to put some of my straight lessons to work here." "Have you been taking straight lessons?" "Yes;" "I've been going to a speech therapist." "Where do you want to go out to eat?" "[LAUGHS]" "Well, I love this restaurant." "Some fabulous French food." "It's like, if I have to express an opinion, it's so..." "Do you like Italian?" "I do like Italian." "'Cause there's a great Italian place, like, two blocks from my house." "Okay, the "likes," gots to go." "[QUIETLY] Shit." "That's very "teenage girl."" "It's true." "Okay." "I know, 'cause it doesn't sound like me, right?" "[LAUGHING] No, it sounds like you." "It sounds too much like you." "Get your money back." "[BOTH LAUGHING]" "[CHIMING]" "CORFF:" "Your voice can change and I'm gonna show you how right now." "[INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "Say to an imaginary someone on the other side of the room," ""My name is..."" "Give your name." "My name is David Thorpe, and I'm going to have a powerful, authentic, and dependable voice." "Here's a wonderful tool, something to give your voice power, strength, and authority." "In this country, men use the standard American melody more than women do because it gives them a completion." "But it's great for everyone, men and women." "Now try it with me." "Hi, how are you?" "Hi." "[CHUCKLES]" "Hi, how are you?" "Which is weird because it sounds more like" "I'm telling you I've arrived rather than asking you how you are." "Hi, how are you?" "I don't care." "CORFF:" "Good." "Try it again." "This, this, this..." "[CLEARS THROAT]" "This is an embroidered pillow." "This is a trivet." "Those are my Birkenstocks." "This is a cat's ear." "This is a cat's..." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "As it turns out," "I'm not the only one who's thought about being a standard American." "Hi, how are you?" "When I'm speaking with my family, who is a southern black family," "I'm like, "Hey, how y'all doin'?" ""Oh, mom, I miss you." "I'm so hungry." "When are you gonna feed me?"" "That's the way I grew up speaking." "My accent went away when I started working in television and I started listening to my voice, and I realized that, you know," "I didn't necessarily like the way it sounds when it's on tape." "It sounds a little bit lazy, and maybe that's a stereotype." "Maybe that's part code-switching, and maybe that's part of fitting in." "Like, my father went to very great lengths to rid himself of an Asian accent." "He had a deep sense of shame after being deported and then always felt like he was trying to catch up and be American and be truly American." "It really made me feel the same way, like, really determined to not be considered Korean and not... not have the imprint of homeland, and... and so, um, you know, it... it really goes underneath." "You know, all of that... that kind of self-hatred and anxiety really gets shoved under, and it can last for generations." "Covering is a phenomenon where individuals who belong to stigmatized groups still make an enormous effort to keep that stigma from looming large." "This is Lady Gaga." "YOSHINO:" "Gays have to cover in a myriad of ways because sexual orientation is not a visible attribute." "The voice is, you know, the tell is..." "The voice is what might actually give away to somebody who otherwise would not know the fact that an individual is gay." "You know, I work in a very conservative, pretty straight-laced kind of place." "At times at work, do you try to, sort of, talk less gay than you might?" "I think I try to just be as neutral as possible." "I try not to crack too many funnies." "I try not to camp it up at all." "You know, I think I try to be as straight... not straight, meaning..." "I can't pretend that I'm straight, but meaning I try to just sort of say what I need to say and say it in a very neutral way and try to make it very clear and concise and then move on." "Mm-hmm." "Hmm." "DAVID:" "So have you ever felt that kind of pressure to cover?" "[SIGHS]" "That's really a tough question because I'm sure that I have, subconsciously..." "But I don't feel that I have to speak a certain way around white people," "I don't think I have to speak a certain way around black people," "I don't think I have to speak a certain way around gay people, and it gets me in trouble a lot, because I don't do it." "But now that the jury has reached its verdict, one that everyone must accept, it's time now for some tough love..." "I will..." "I have friends from home." "Quite honestly, some of my relatives will go," ""My gosh!" "You sound like a white guy."" "[SINGING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Of everyone I know," "I think my choreographer friend Miguel covers the least." "DAVID:" "One of the things I'm doing is working with a speech coach to learn how, essentially, to sound straight." "What do you think about the fact that I'm doing that?" "Here you are, you've come out of the fucking closet, you've, like, done the therapy, you've done all the things, and then you're still, you know, changing the way you are." "You're still changing how you sound or your... how you look, to satisfy some fucking invisible value that is so stupid in a way, really." "[SINGING CONTINUES]" "MIGUEL:" "I mean this thing of hyper masculinity is such a conscious performance in gay male culture all the time, everywhere you go, you know, and... and it just feels so oppressive, at times, actually, to me." "It feels so ungenerous and so unloving." "[SINGING CONTINUES]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID:" "Why do you think gay men sometimes reject other gay men for sounding gay?" "[SIGHS]" "Misogyny." "They want to prove to the culture that they're, you know, not not men, that they're good because they're not women." "Not like women, they don't want women, they don't want to sleep with women, they don't want to act like women, and then they'll punish gay men who they perceive as being feminine in any way." "Why do you think... why do you think, when we get in bed, that we like to hear that super-masculine voice?" "Because we like what was awful to us." "[LAUGHS]" "No, you know what I mean?" "It's kind of like..." "Stockholm syndrome?" "Yeah, it's kind of like..." "I don't know, you like what..." "it's wrong." "It's, like, sick." "We're gay, and we're attracted to men, and we're attracted to masculinity, and we don't want to hear a woman's voice in bed." "And so if something sounds similar to that, it's not gonna be as much of a turn on." "Dude, that was fuckin' awesome." "You just ate their inside center for breakfast." "I mean, come on, man, get your ass up here on the table." "Let me rub that out for you." "[MOANING]" "Oh, yeah." "Gay men like hypermasculinity, uh, because a masculine voice, like a construction-worker helmet, is the lingerie of gay-land." "[DEEPLY] "Yeah, take it."" "Yeah!" "Yeah!" "It's always funny when you watch like, uh, pornography, you know." "And, you know, there will be these two guys and then one of them will..." "one of them will say, you know, "Take it, bitch."" "Oh, we need a sun roof." "And I think, well, that just ruined everything, you know." "That just ruined everything because you sound like me." "[LIGHT MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "My grandmother's 95th birthday celebration is a welcome relief from everything." "DAVID:" "Are you ready, grandma?" "Grandma, happy birthday!" "DAVID:" "Yeah, Gil, can you wave with your hand there?" ""Hi, Grandma."" "Happy birthday, Grandma." " Carmen, look at me." " Happy birthday!" "DAVID:" "Will you give me a wave, Grandma?" "Thank you." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "To my surprise, both Gaby and Gil identify exactly when I started to sound undeniably gay." "I was privileged to really get to know you my freshmen year in college, which was when you were coming out, and I actually noticed this transformation." "I mean, September of 1993, you sounded like a straight boy, uh, from an academic family in South Carolina, and by May, you were sounding pretty gay." "DAVID:" "Interesting." "Okay." "I didn't know this happened to me incrementally." "You were consciously or unconsciously exaggerating it for a while as you were sort of coming to terms with your identity, et cetera, that's for sure." "♪ ♪" "Right when you first came out, you were sounding super-queen, and it reminded me of when I first came out." "I went and bought a black leather jacket." "It was a signal, and, uh, it reminded me of that." "That, like, you had put on this voice, kind of." "DAVID:" "My voice was my black leather jacket?" "Yes." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Later, I found out that my childhood pal Michelle also noticed my college transformation." "MICHELLE:" "I remember talking to you and going," ""God, his voice has changed."" "To me, it actually felt like you were trying to advertise that you were gay." "And it..." "I was, like, a little annoyed 'cause I was like, "Well, you didn't speak that way three years ago."" "It bothered me that your voice had changed." "I didn't' give a shit that you were gay, but it bothered me that you changed your voice." "DAVID:" "Yeah." "I mean, I guess I'm getting used to it." "Like, if I had known you and you always spoke this way," "I wouldn't think about it." "It would just be you." "DAVID:" "Yeah." "But the fact is, you know, for 17 years..." "It was a different you." "DAVID:" "Yeah." "And so, for me, this was, like, an imposter's voice when I first started speaking to you." "I didn't..." "I didn't feel comfortable with your voice." "[JAZZY MUSIC]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "In college, I finally found the courage to come out." "♪ ♪" "I don't remember consciously trying to sound more gay." "♪ ♪" "I do remember aspiring to the role of the witty, aristocratic homosexual." "♪ ♪" "I had spent so long feeling scorned." "It was time to scorn back." "♪ ♪" "MARGARET:" "There is a kind of idea that when you talk in a gay voice, you're talking down to somebody too." "That you... there is this theory that gay men have to hold themselves in higher regard." "I remember people telling me that I talked like a sissy." "Well, what I was doing was, I was trying to talk like the little rich boys on television shows." "Would you care for a martini, Mr. Babcock?" "Well..." "Dry or extra dry?" "And so, yes, I was a young, working-class boy, but I was trying to talk above my demographic status." "♪ ♪" "Stir, never shake." "Bruises the gin." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I was too naive to know that by embracing an upper-class voice," "I was embracing a well-worn stereotype." "[PLAYFUL INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "Well, for goodness sake." "I'm all atwitter." "I just can't wait to tell everyone that Alex didn't give him the air." "[LAUGHS]" "Well, what do you think of her?" "Simply divine, my dear." "Simply divine." "The pansy was always sort of a shorthand for gay men without having to spell it out." "BARRIOS:" "The visual shorthand was the first thing, but the voice almost always followed it up." "Well, I don't know anything about that..." "MAN AND DAVID:" "But you don't get it into your dancing." "That's what I said the other day to the dear Countess of Twickenham..." "The pansy was a very, kind of, wise, knowing character." "You could see it, I... or hear it as something to emulate because he did seem to kind of be on top of most situations." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I grew up in your typical middle-class suburb, but my voice tells a different story." "You sound educated and cosmopolitan and refined." "So if you think about that in the context of our culture... you're a man who sounds educated and cosmopolitan and refined... that's gonna equal gay for most listeners." "DAVID:" "Well, I get told that I'm kind of languorous." "Like, I draw out my vowels." "Oh, yeah, because then..." "because you have the time to because you are, um, in the class of society which allows you to linger over things like vowels and..." "[CHUCKLES]" "I mean, I never just ask why." "It's, "Why?"" "DAVID:" "Exactly." "But... but it's to give it more emphasis too." "Why?" "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "BILL:" "Like, your way of speaking to me connotes, like, the subtext of, like, the learned gay character." "DAVID:" "And so do you feel.." "So I'm still the learned gay character that I always was." "Yes." "Yes." "You're still nailing the learned gay character." "DAVID:" "Thank you." "Thank you." "I'm..." "I'm trapped in that role." "I mean, there are worse roles to fill than a learned gay character." "You're not, like, the... you're not the evil gay character." "DAVID:" "But, see, sometimes I worry that I sound like the evil gay character." "Well, I mean, we all have our moments." "It's the same obvious pattern, Laura." "If McPherson weren't muscular and handsome in a cheap sort of way, you'd see through him in a second." "Whereas, in the '30s, gay characters were seen, maybe, a little more peripheral and harmless." "Uh, starting with Clifton Webb and Laura, you can see where they really start becoming more dangerous." "Murder is my favorite crime." "MAN AND DAVID:" "I write about it regularly." "BARRIOS:" "Snide, supercilious, superior." "He's so clearly gay, it's sort of this torturous jealousy." "Is he jealous of the male character or of the woman character?" "But he does it all kind of through his voice as much as anything else." "DAVID:" "And he played a killer, correct?" "BARRIOS:" "From the 1940s on, a lot of gay characters either get killed or are killers, and a lot of that begins with Laura." "♪ ♪" "[GUNSHOTS]" "[WOMAN CRYING]" "♪ ♪" "MAN AND DAVID:" "[GROANING]" "Good-bye, Laura." "Peter Pan will be blasted out of never land... forever." "Captain Hook was sort of a Clifton-Webb-type character, and so there was this and Peter Pan, and it kind of got carried across, uh, the next decade to The Jungle Book." "I thought perhaps, you were entertaining someone up there in your coils." "Coils?" "BARRIOS:" "And, of course, Shere Khan is evil." "After Shere Khan, you get a few more of... of the male characters." "Oh, my dear Bartholomew," "I'm afraid that you have gone and upset me." "You know what happens when someone upsets me." "Perhaps I can divine a solution to this thorny problem?" "Oh, I shall practice my curtsy." "These voices of the Disney villains, uh, which sort of have gay or proto-gay qualities to them, if you think of very, very young children, you know, they could be growing up with the idea" "that, uh, real evil or villainy, uh, can be connoted by a gay man's voice." "Well, as far as brains go," "I got the lion's share but when it comes to brute strength..." "I'm afraid I'm at the shallow end of the gene pool." "[ZAZU SIGHS]" "There's one in every family, sire." "Just really quickly, I want to say" "I had a breathing breakthrough this morning, and I think I'm starting to feel how to raise and lower my diaphragm." "Ah, 1, 2, 3, 4." "No." "Uh." "[CAT MEOWS]" "Shh!" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Susan and Bob's exercises are supposed to make me sound more standard, but I just find myself in awe of how my voice works." "Vah, vah, vah." "♪ Resonation ♪" "♪ Throat, larynx, the middle of the throat ♪" "I'm gonna be moving that larynx up and down and all around." "Apparently, my stomach has decided to get in on the action and, um, develop a strong, powerful authentic voice of its own." "[STOMACH GROWLING]" "[SPEAKING INDISTINCTLY]" "So maybe a breakthrough." ""Breakthrough-ooh-ah."" "Yoo-who-aa-o." "Yu-whao-o-o!" "Whoo-waa-ha!" "I am a speaker." "DAVID:" "So, um, have you guys noticed that my voice has changed at all?" "Uh, is that a trick question?" "[BOTH LAUGH]" "No, I haven't." "I don't know." "Not really." "Maybe when you were practicing your exercises with us." "When were you practicing... when was he practicing his exercises with us?" "After he went to the speech therapist." "Oh, I mean he..." "I thought you were just sort of demonstrating how it worked." "I never..." "I didn't think that was practice." "Right." "DAVID:" "You didn't think it was real?" "I just thought you were telling us how... how it worked, but I didn't know that that was..." "DAVID:" "So you didn't notice, like, any change at all?" "No change in pitch, no..." "I noticed a change in your spirit." "[ALL LAUGHING]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Sam and Alberto know me as the person in these pictures." "♪ ♪" "After college, like thousands of gay men before me," "I ended up in New York, where the three of us met." "Come on." "Come on, crabbies." "Come on, you crabbies." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "We forged our gay identities together." "Let me see some crab!" "[GRUNTING]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Sam and I once had a public access show about our obsession with women's tennis." "Alberto shot the show, which also featured Miguel." "You're just making me crazy!" "I can't work like this." "I can't work like this!" "[PEPPY MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "CHO:" "If there is a bunch of people who hang out together, they tend to, sort of, sim... similar language, similar tone of voice, similar phrases." "Men can learn how to sound gay from being with gay men." "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "One, two." "Whoo!" "♪ ♪" "When people are really putting on a show, when they're acting very gay on purpose for fun," ""camp speech" is what we call it." "This may not be the person's natural voice, but I can say, "Well, why don't we go there?"" "Dinner is served." "I'd make somebody a good wife." "I could entertain." "Kiss me quick." "I'm Carmen." "Very exaggerated performance." "Conscious performance of acting like a drag queen or acting like a famous movie star who's a woman." "That kind of thing." "Oh, the man had arrived, but it was so crowded" "I had to sit on Pinocchio's nose." "[ALL LAUGHING]" "Then he proceeded to tell me the weirdest story." "I said, "Pinoch, you know, that's not the truth, but lie, you little devil, lie."" "Wayland and Madame along with Paul Lynde and someone like Rip Taylor, who used to come on The Tonight Show a lot, uh, they kind of mainstreamed the whole idea of camp." "♪ ♪" "What's this?" "This, my dear boy, is Beethoven's fifth." "[SINGSONG LAUGHING]" "I call them the ambiguous queens of prime-time TV." "[LAUGHING]" "Who are you?" "You, with eyes that burn like the desert sun." "The greatest sheikh in all Arabia." "Why are you wearing that earring?" "Because I'm a very chic sheik." "[LAUGHTER]" "That's why the call me Florence of Arabia." "Paul Lynde, in 1976, was on television almost 200 prime-time hours in the season." "He was bigger than, uh, John Wayne." "MAN:" "When a man falls out of your boat and into the water, you should yell, "Man overboard!"" "Now, what should you yell if a woman falls overboard?" "Full speed ahead!" "[LAUGHTER]" "It was never said nor it would have ever been said that he was gay, but between the way he said his lines and the quality, the content of his lines, you knew." "And you know, for years, he was considered the funniest person on television." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "When I was a kid, I was terrified that I might sound like any of these flamboyant queens." "Mom, I could have been a huge tennis star if you'd only pushed me a little harder." "What do you mean I didn't like the sun?" "I love the sun." "Those shoes were hideous!" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "As a freshly minted gay man," "I learned how camping it up could be liberating." "When I started doing The Howard Stern Show and I used the simple... you know, he does some outrageous things or makes some outrageous statement, and sometimes, the only retort to that is," ""Oh, my!"" "George, it's simple and easy, and you can do it in your pajamas from the comfort of your own home." "Oh, my!" "Consciously or not, we still, uh, use parts of these voices and these images in our everyday lives in our persona, uh, without knowing." "Cheers." "Eyes." "DAVID:" "So you feel like you perform your gayness more than I do." "And your voice is part of that?" "I don't think about it as, "I'm performing my gayness."" "I think about..." "I'm being, like, fucking hilarious with my voice." "[LAUGHTER]" "And it sounds really gay!" "General hilarity." "[LAUGHING]" "And it sounds really gay." " I mean, I don't know." " Yeah." "I mean, yeah, sometimes I think, like, "I'm gonna camp it up, and..."" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Sam is more comfortable with himself than I am with "performing being gay."" "But he's also been married for years to a great guy." "Ditto Alberto." "♪ ♪" "SEDARIS:" "Hugh..." "Hugh, my boyfriend, we've been together for 22 years." "Now, Hugh does not sound anything like" "I wanted my fantasy boyfriend to sound like." "You know?" "But I love him, and I wouldn't... that's all part of the package." "I could identify sounding gay." "I think, from..." "I think the first time" "I heard my voice recorded." "I was shocked." "I was a little kid." "I sounded like Shirley Temple." "[LAUGHS]" "But he can also fix everything." "You know, he could redo the wiring in this house." "He can solder the pipes together." "He can..." "You know, so really, on the masculinity scale, he wins." "You know, even the... even with that voice, he still wins." "[LAUGHING]" "BRAD:" "One of the things that I loved about George is he loves me for who I am, and my voice comes as..." "comes as part of my package." "And, at times, I've thought it's..." "It... it's not a good thing to have this kind of voice." "But George has reinforced, over the decades that we've been together, that, you know, who..." "who the hell am I... who are... who the hell are they to critique me for my voice?" "So I've gotten used to it." "♪ ♪" "Hugh could beat me." "He could set me on fire while I was asleep." "I will never, ever leave him." "You know what I mean?" "Because I do not ever want to be single again." "Like, I don't ever want to have to go on a date again." "I don't ever want to have to set foot in a gay bar ever again." "None of it." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Putting aside the terror of being single," "I can see that the men in these happy couples didn't ask each other to change." "♪ ♪" "Instead, they became more themselves." "It's that insecurity that you have in yourself that makes you conscious of the way you sound." "This is an issue that should be discussed." "People should become aware of the fact that we are pioneers in... in our time in changing societal perception of what it means to be gay." "ALL:" "Gay, straight, black, white!" "Marriage is a civil right!" "Gay, straight, black, white!" "Marriage is a civil right!" "TAKEI:" "In 2005, Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed marriage equality." "I was still closeted." "But on... on..." "on the 11 o'clock news," "I saw young, gay kids, men and women, marching on Santa Monica Boulevard..." "[CROWD CHEERING]" "And I felt I needed to speak out, and my voice needed to be authentic." "And so that's when I spoke to the press for the first time as a gay man." "DAVID:" "So the fearlessness of those young... of those young people inspired you..." "Exactly." "DAVID:" "To speak out." "[CROWD CHEERING]" "♪ ♪" "Whoo!" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "George is right." "It is inspiring to see that some young people are able to be and sound like themselves." "And the world is listening." "Hey everyone;" "my name is Tyler, and if you don't know me by now... spoiler alert..." "I'm gay." "Shocker, I know." "If you could be any Disney character, boy, girl or animal, who would it be?" "I would probably be Jasmine from Aladdin so that I could sleep with Jafar." "If two people love each other and want to prove it by putting a ring on it, let those bitches do it." "Does it matter, like, if they're the same gender?" "[CAT MEOWS]" "Hi, how are you?" "Damn." "I'm like a didgeridoo... ♪ ♪" "Oh-o-o-o... ♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Finally, after months of training my voice, everything falls into place." "♪ ♪" "My name is David Thorpe, and I'm going to have a powerful, authentic, and dependable voice." "So I have to say" "I just listened to my empowerment sentence, and I feel like it sounded kind of awesome." "Um, I was pretty far from the camera, and I sounded loud." "I mean, not loud." "But I sounded full and round and clear." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I felt so emotionally disconnected from my voice... from myself." "♪ ♪" "I wasn't sure who to be or what to sound like." "♪ ♪" "ZAZU:" "There's one in every family, sire." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "It never occurred to me that I was physically disconnected from my voice... from myself." "♪ ♪" "Maybe I didn't go to Susan and Bob to sound less gay." "♪ ♪" "Maybe I was just trying to reconnect." "♪ ♪" "[VOCALIZING]" "♪ ♪" "DAVID:" "Do you notice any difference in my voice, uh, since I saw you in LA?" "Yes; it's lower and deeper and more confident." "Yes, definitely." "You know I was trying to sleep and I, and... and, you guys... you..." "all three of you were talking..." "Sounding masculine." "No, but your voice was sort of, like, coming through the ear plugs." " It was, like, this very..." " Yeah." "[DEEPLY] It was like..." "I mean, it still sounded like a lady talking." "[LAUGHING]" " A handsome lady." " Uh-huh." "DAVID:" "A lady with a beard." "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "People with AIDS under attack!" "What do we do?" "ALL:" "Fight back!" "People with AIDS under attack!" "What do we do?" "ALL:" "Fight back!" "[INDISTINCT CHATTER]" "That was pretty good, right?" "I definitely couldn't have done that before." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "I found a stronger voice..." " Cheers, thanks for coming." " Cheers." "[GLASSES CLINK]" "To you." "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "But eventually, I stopped doing my exercises." "Wow, this looks really, really good, though." "Yeah." "Bon appétit, bitches." " Thank you." " Thanks." "SAM:" "So your voice didn't change, but you did." "You know, my voice did change." "Like, I... my voice definitely got stronger." "But the gay did not change, and..." "That ain't changing." "That ain't changing." "Are you still doing it?" " No, I stopped doing them." " Right." "Because..." "I don't know." "For some reason, I'm able, now, to... to, like, hear my voice and hear how distinctive it is." "Mm-hmm." "Literally, like, the sound of your voice is shaped by the shape of your body." "So no... you know, that's why people... we all sound different, you know?" "Like you were saying, it's the specificity of you." "It's, like, who you are." "Your voice is who you are." "It's from your body, it's from your personality, and we love that." "ALBERTO:" "Mm-hmm." "I mean, I still feel self-conscious sometimes about sounding gay." "I would imagine you do too." " Sure." " Yes, of course." "I don't know if that will ever change." " Right." " Yeah." "I don't think it's possible for that to ever go away, though." " Yeah." " Right." "And that's both sad, and also I... but I feel like" "I know how, now, to..." "to push that away to get back into that head space of, like... rah, rah, rah!" "Like, sound gayer, be gayer, go gay!" "You know, like..." "You want to raise your fists in the air and... and march down the street." "You also want to feel like you can be..." "SAM:" "Normal." "ALBERTO:" "I don't think, every single day," "I want to be with my fists in the air with that." "And we, so we negotiate that, like, every day." " Right." " Right." "ALBERTO:" "In every circumstance." "Right." "Every minute." "Mm-hmm." "Right." "You know, I think that one of the reasons why we're so concerned with what our voices sound like is that we're taught that your voice is who you really are." "[PROJECTOR WHIRRING]" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "My voice was such a mystery to me." "♪ ♪" "But I've pretty much answered all my questions." "♪ ♪" "For many gay men..." "That's the last vestige." "That's the last chunk of internalized homophobia is this hatred of how they sound." "What's wrong with sounding like you are who you are?" "Sounding like a gay man?" "Having a gay voice?" "♪ ♪" "I want to find some of..." "some kindred spirits." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "We all have insecurities that are hard to put aside... ♪ ♪" "But I've come a long way, and I'm not the only one." "If I do sound gay, you know, bring it on." "I would feel self-conscious about sounding straight, since I'm not." "I love my gay voice." "Like, I don't have to come out to anyone." "I say hello, and it's a done deal." "If people hear my voice and identify me as gay today," "I'll say..." ""Thank you."" "I'm proud of it." "Thank you." "There is nothing wrong with sounding gay." "There's nothing wrong with being effeminate." "There's nothing wrong with being butch." "There's nothing wrong with sounding straight." "Just do it with confidence." "I would like to sound more gay." "[SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE]" "Yeah, well, over time you just come to accept..." "You know, or hopefully you do... come to accept it." "So I..." "[SIGHS]" "And I wouldn't think about it at all except when I call the dentist and they ask if David is a man's name or a woman's name." "[LAUGHING]" "Do you have just two minutes for a quick interview?" " Uh, sure." " Okay, awesome." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "They say if you can't handle the answer, don't ask the question." "Do you have two quick minutes to talk?" " Yeah." " Okay, cool." "Awesome." "♪ ♪" "DAVID VOICE-OVER:" "Well, I say if you can't handle the answer, that's a question you've got to ask." "[UPLIFTING MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "[PENSIVE MUSIC]" "♪ ♪" "Charles Nelson Reilly, I adore you." "[LAUGHING]" " We love him." " Is he gay?" "Well, he's dead, but, um... ♪ ♪" "Women are sort of privileged to dress up in high heels and tight skirts all the time, but straight men don't really have that." "But gay men have found leather, and they do it that way." "You look amazing." "[MUMBLED] Oh, thank you." "♪ ♪" "I don't think being an annoying, you know, screaming, obnoxious bitch, uh, is hot." "But, you know, you take a..." "You take a man-cake, and you put, sort of, a little female-frosting glaze on it." "I think it's pretty sexy." "♪ ♪" "DAVID:" "Are there times when straight men sound more gay?" "Usually when they're sucking my [BLEEP]." "[LAUGHING]" "♪ ♪ 22 years, we've been together." "22 years!" "♪ ♪" "It's that "ugh-ugh" sound." "[DAVID LAUGHING]" "A uvular." "[LAUGHS]" "♪ ♪" "Do I sound gay?" "ALL:" "Hell, yeah!" "Do I sound gay?" "ALL:" "Hell, yeah!" "Do I sound gay?" "ALL:" "Hell, yeah!" "Up here!" "Yes." "[ALL CHEERING]" "[SOFT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]" "♪ ♪"