Le fou beauty and the beast gay
Home / gay topics / Le fou beauty and the beast gay
At the time of the release, Gad remarked in interviews that “too much has probably been made of this entire thing,” and later in 2022 reflected in an interviewthat, “We didn’t go far enough to warrant accolades… We didn’t go far enough to say, ‘Look how brave we are.’ My regret in what happened is that it became ‘Disney’s first explicitly gay moment’ and it was never intended to be that.”
As for Gad’s relationship with Disney today?
“LeFou is somebody who on one day wants to be Gaston and on another day wants to kiss Gaston.
Noting that Condon “felt awful” about his remarks, Gad believes LeFou’s flirtation with a male suitor might have been better received if viewers had been permitted to discover it for themselves.
“Had the audience defined it as a sweet exclusively gay moment, I would have been delighted!
He also talked about the controversy that arose after he mentioned there was a "gay moment" in the film. Gad emphasizes that it was supposed to be a "sweet and innocuous moment" but it ended up being"both too little and not enough".
Advertisement
HuffPost Shopping's
Best Finds
Newsletter Sign Up
Entertainment
Don't miss a beat.
In the course of our discussions, we tried to distinguish whether or not LeFou loved Gaston or was in love with Gaston.”
They “ultimately landed on the side of LeFou was truly in awe of Gaston, and that was not driven by any sexual desire whatsoever but rather a deep-seated love, appreciation, and belief in this person he had served alongside in battle for many years.” To be as clear as possible, Gad reiterates that the Beauty and the Beast creative team “never once discussed” putting the focus on “LeFou’s sexuality, which frankly was not a thing to really explore in a random comedic character in the film… or so I thought.”
However, prior to the release of the film the marketing focus did shift onto LeFou’s sexuality.
The discourse surrounding LeFou’s sexuality can be traced an interview that Condon had with Attitude in March 2017 in which he said the following: “LeFou is somebody who on one day wants to be Gaston and on another day wants to kiss Gaston.
I mean, if I were gay, I’m sure I’d be pissed.”
Gad also notes that he “never once discussed” LeFou’s sexuality with the movie’s creative team, and described the much-buzzed-about dancing scene as “harmless” and “a fun blink-and-you’ll-miss-it little beat.”
Gad says that prior to production commencing that he, director Bill Condon, and screenwriters Stephen Chbosky and Evan Spiliotopoulos had a “casual (but ultimately seismic) conversation… about the specific nature of LeFou’s devotion to Gaston (Luke Evans).
So that part was good."
Condon's intent for LeFou was much purer. "In Dreamgirls, it was a balance. I mean, if I were gay, I'm sure I'd be pissed.
What This Means For Beauty And The Beast
Several Mistakes Were Made
Even though 2017's Beauty and the Beast is one of Disney's better live-action remakes, it is undoubtedly tainted by how the LeFou controversy was handled both in the movie and via publicity.
Despite expectations of LeFou being Disney's first openly gay character, this only amounted to a fleeting glimpse of LeFou dancing with another man during Beauty and the Beast's ending.
Eight years after the release of Disney’s live-action adaptation of “Beauty and the Beast,” actor Josh Gad is reflecting on the controversy surrounding the film’s so-called “exclusively gay moment.”
In his memoir “In Gad We Trust,” Gad brushes off the implication that the 2017 film was intended to feature Disney’s “first-ever gay character” despite a brief scene in which his character, LeFou, was seen dancing with another man.
It was two hours and 40 minutes. “I can’t quite imagine a Pride celebration in honor of the ‘cinematic watershed moment’ involving a quasi-villainous Disney sidekick dancing with a man for half a second. The show was later made available on both of the Disney-owned streaming platforms. And Disney, to their credit, didn’t cut it anywhere.
I love the fact that there were countries — I think Russia was one of them — that wouldn’t show the movie because of that. Still, he holds the belief that some of these creative adjustments are necessary: "[I]f you’re true to the medium you’re working in, and you want to tell this story in that way, you have to throw everything up in the air and, in a way, start over," he said.
Beauty and the Beast is now streaming on Disney+.
- Release Date
- March 17, 2017
- Runtime
- 129 minutes
- Director
- Bill Condon
- Writers
- Evan Spiliotopoulos, Stephen Chbosky, Linda Woolverton, Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont
- Producers
- David Hoberman
Josh Gad Shares Regrets About Gay LeFou In Disney’s Live-Action ‘Beauty and the Beast’ Remake
The actor is opening up about the public response and the global controversy surrounding his Beauty and the Beast character in his new memoir…
Eight years after the release of Disney’s live-action adaptation of Beauty and the Beast, actor Josh Gad is reflecting on the controversy surrounding the film’s so-called “exclusively gay moment.” In his just-released memoir In Gad We Trust, Gad claims that he “never once” played his character LeFou as gay, and brushes off the implication that the 2017 film was intended to feature Disney’s “first-ever gay character” despite a brief scene towards the end of the film in which his character, LeFou, was seen dancing with another man.
“I for one certainly didn’t exactly feel like LeFou was who the queer community had been wistfully waiting for,” Gad writes.
I can't quite imagine a Pride celebration in honor of the 'cinematic watershed moment' involving a quasi-villainous Disney sidekick dancing with a man for half a second. But the second we pointed it out and seemingly congratulated ourselves, we had invited hell and fury,” he wrote.
It’s clear no one else is into him, but he loves him.'"
Condon went on to further discuss the original animated Beauty and the Beast film, noting how its soundtrack made it feel appropriate to draw romantic interest between Gaston and LeFou. "It was always meant to be a grace note, but suddenly it sounded as if I was pretending to be breaking barriers, and it wasn't."
Leonardo DiCaprio's New Dark Comedy Thriller Reaches Huge Milestone (But It's Still So Far Away From Profit)
Leonardo DiCaprio's new action movie gets an encouraging box office update, but it has a long way to go to become profitable.
Despite his insistence that LeFou's LGBT+ identity wasn't meant to break any barriers, Condon did admit that he 'loved' some of the backlash that it generated, as well as Disney's response.
In his memoir, Gad breaks down how there were behind-the-scenes discussions about LeFou's loyalty and feelings for Gaston (Luke Evans). He’s confused about what he wants,” Condon told Attitude magazine at the time, before noting that the film concludes with “a nice, exclusively gay moment.”
Stephane Cardinale - Corbis via Getty Images
After news of the subplot made headlines, “Beauty and the Beast” was banned in several countries and drew boycotts in the U.S.
Still, the film was a box office smash, raking in a reported $1.2 billion worldwide.