Lance Bass claims his CW pilot was axed after coming out

Lance Bass has shared his experience with industry resistance after coming out as gay.

In 2006, the popular entertainer, who gained fame as a member of NSYNC, publicly discussed his sexuality for the first time during an interview with People magazine.

“I knew that I was in this popular band, and I had four other guys’ careers in my hand, and I knew that if I ever acted on it or even said (that I was gay), it would overpower everything,” he disclosed to the publication back then.

Since coming out, Bass has built a successful career, featuring in various TV series, releasing a New York Times bestselling memoir, and establishing his own production companies.

However, his journey after revealing his sexuality hasn’t always been smooth.

As ‘Gay Times’ writes, in a recent interview on the Politickin’ podcast with Gavin Newsom, Marshawn Lynch, and Dough Hendrickson, Bass shared that he lost a CW pilot soon after his interview with People was published.

“I had a sitcom with The CW at the time, and we were about to shoot the pilot, and this came out, and they were like, ‘We can’t do the show anymore. Like, they have to believe that you’re straight to play a straight character,’” he explained. “Every casting director I knew, they’re like, ‘Lance, we can’t cast you because they can’t look past… you’re too famous for being gay now that they can’t look at you as anything other than that.’ So I lost everything.”

Bass mentioned that he encountered the same reactions from agents, noting that “everyone just kind of fell off.”

“At that moment, I had to completely restart and rebrand. They were right about that, it was definitely a career killer. But, not too long after that, I just saw a lot of success stories in entertainment and I love that… it’s actually a good thing to be yourself these days,” he added.

Towards the end of his remarks, Bass mentioned that some of the same casting directors have since contacted him to express remorse for their previous decisions.

“They were like, ‘Yeah, that was really dumb.’ And they’ve actually cast me in a lot of things since, which is really funny and ironic,” said the Trolls Band Together star.

“But I never hold grudges at all. I’m very understanding – I get it, business is business. It sucks, but I never can hold grudges.”

Check out Bass’ full interview here.