This interview appeared in the July 2007 issue of GAY TIMES.
Words by Richard Smith & Steve Pafford
Although it’s probably not what George Michael would like to be remembered for, something happened a year ago that summed him up beautifully. George was taking a late-night stroll on Hampstead Heath when he was ambushed by a photographer from the News of the World. Did he turn and flee? Did he beg forgiveness? George just barked back at the paparazzo: “Are you gay? No? Then fuck off! This is my culture!”
This is the new George Michael. After his arrest for cottaging in 1998 he came tumbling out of the closet, and straight onto CNN — although it’s debatable how closeted he’d been before. Now George is — officially — The World’s Gayest Man. Passionate and unapologetic, he is also candid. Which makes sense — what’s he got to hide these days? He says we can talk about anything. Except that recent bit of car trouble he’d had — the interview took place just before he was due in court on charges of being asleep at the wheel, and his solicitors had begged him to keep his mouth shut. We meet at his home in Highgate. Someone warned me that it can be hard to shut George Michael up. Thankfully, that turned out to be true.
Okay. Let’s start at the day you were born. That’s what the song on your last album, My Mother Had A Brother, is about. But what’s the actual story? Your uncle killed himself and he was definitely gay?
Not that he was definitely gay, but I think he must have been for my mum to have this fear of me being gay. She had a definite fear that I was going to be like her brother — she thought that would mean I couldn’t cope with life. She almost felt like she’d brought out the gene… So there were very pointed areas where she let my dad be — supposedly protectively — homophobic.
What does that mean?
Well, there was a gay waiter who lived above the restaurant, and I wasn’t allowed to go to the top flat when he was down in the restaurant. You know, in case I saw something.
