STORM2K

John Travolta’s decision to play a woman in “Hairspray” has raised eyebrows among some Scientology watchers.

The actor will reportedly dress in drag to take on the role of middle-aged mom Edna Turnblad in the high-camp John Waters film — a part made famous by the notorious cross-dresser Divine. Edna was later played on Broadway by outspoken gay activist Harvey Fierstein.

A recent Rolling Stone article about Scientology reports that its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, felt that gays “should be taken from … society as rapidly as possible” because “no social order will survive which does not remove these people from its midst.”


“If Hubbard had historically had his way there would be no John Waters films in America and no gay actors to play the part of Edna Turnblad,” notes Rick Ross on Cultnews.com, “which would of course leave Mr. Travolta with no new character role. And it’s doubtful that Scientology’s savior would find anything appealing about Travolta dressed in drag as Edna Turnblad.”



He is one nice-looking man!!!

Where's the problem (as far as Scientologists go)?

Travolta isn't gay and, as far as I can tell, he's not playing a gay character. A cross-dresser, maybe, but the article doesn't say the character is gay. (I haven't seen Hairspray, so I don't know.)

Furthermore, he's an actor. He's going to play personalities and characters who aren't like him -- otherwise, he'd be a really boring actor playing himself. He's played a killer before, but they don't have a problem with that?

Patrick Swayze is a Scientologist, but there was no big to-do about him playing a drag queen in "To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar." Sharon Stone was a Scientologist (not anymore) and look at her character in Basic Instinct." They didn't make a deal about that.

There's a rule in theater (applies to movies, television, and the writing of those scripts, as well) -- "If it's not on the page, it's not on the stage." And even if the character is written as gay, it's doesn't change who the actor is. Non-Scientologists Patty Duke, Tom Hanks, and numerous others have played gay characters...and they are all straight.

I know. I support Scientologists because I think there's a bit of validity there, but I found this odd and wanted to inspire some comments from others.... (like you!)