Patrick Stewart Was the Straight Best Friend We All Needed

It was impossible not to feel your heart warm when watching a video of actors Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen together. Their friendship was warm, with a level of camaraderie, candor and care, that any of us deserve, and that many coveted. But they weren’t just friends, they were also a model for something that is not always seen, appreciated or explored in queer lore: the gay-straight male friendship. Gay men are known to roam in gaggles. And, in usual depictions of gay groups, such as on Queer as Folk or Looking, a group of queer male friends might include other letters of the LGBTQ+ acronym, but is very rarely depicted as including our straight counterparts. That is, in part, understandable: being exclusively surrounded by gays can feel like letting your hair down. You can speak in gay lingo, spew cultural references ad nauseum. There’s no need to code switch. And, of course, for many gay men, their experiences of straight men are not always pleasant, nor is that discomfort exactly abating. Many LGBTQ+ people, gay men included, have felt the chill of the uptick in homophobia in recent years.But for those of us who count straight men among their closest friends, this specific friendship can be a balm. It can cure our own fears of interaction with straight men and directly counter notions we have that there are no good straight men out there. Among my own straight male cohort, I count several college and work friends who are great friends, devoted fathers, and who counter almost every stereotype out there about the emotional capacity of The Dude. Which brings me back to McKellen and Stewart, who died on Wednesday at age 86. Their friendship always had the looseness and conviviality of a queer friendship, but across lines of sexuality. In appearances together, such as on the Graham Norton Show, their ease with one another was touching and poignant. When they sat next to each other, they held hands, denoting an intimacy that everyone around them could practicall