‘Sheer outrageousness’: writers on their favourite LGBTQ+ movie characters

Writers pick a wide array of memorable LGBTQ+ movie characters, from swaggering criminals to tender misfits. Each figure is valued for a particular blend of presence, humour, transgression and emotional truth that keeps them lodged in viewers’ minds. Corky, the ex-con turned plumber in 1996’s Bound, is celebrated for her unapologetic visibility: trussed in a closet at first yet soon flexing a labrys tattoo, swigging beer in dive bars and driving off in a beaten-up Chevy with her new partner in crime.

Eric in Edge of Seventeen captures the messy, earnest rebirth of coming out and coming of age, while Harvey Fierstein’s Frank Dillard in Mrs Doubtfire is remembered as a confident makeup artist who helps his brother transform and appears in a happy relationship that resists tragic stereotypes.

John Waters’s Divine is singled out for an extremity of performance—brash, beehive-haired and crowned the “filthiest person alive”—that still feels unmatched in sheer outrageousness.

lgbtq+, movie characters, corky, bound, edge of, eric, mrs doubtfire, harvey fierstein, john waters, divine