Gay guy on will and grace

They were here and they were queer, honey—so you better get used to it.

Not a chance. Sure, Ellen DeGeneres ' eponymous character had just came out on her ABC series, but that was after four seasons spent with the character in the closet. Prior to that, there had been a smattering of gay characters in a handful of series, though they were always in a supporting role—and often they befell some great tragedy while any realistic depiction of a love life was avoided at all costs.

And now that NBC's revival of the beloved sitcom has proven to be one of the fall's bona fide hits, there's no doubt that the conversation will continue. Diane, played by Mira Sorvino & Lisa Borgnes, is a woman with whom Will has a drunken one-night stand in order to convince himself he was % gay after leaving Grace.

And audiences did. Even former Vice President Joe Biden falls in that camp, citing the show when he finally came out in public support of marriage equality. And that's the road the show paved for future LGBT characters on television. The sudden decision to have art imitate life only confused the audience, and Ellen quickly disappeared from the airwaves.

A year after the show premiered, the first "romantic" kiss between two gay characters would take place on Dawson's Creek. News platforms.

Dark Secrets About The : ' Eric McCormack doesn’t believe an actor’s sexuality should get in the way of the characters they

While LGBT representation on TV has yet to be perfected—and for some, it may never be—we shudder to think about what it might look like had we never met Will and Jack. McCormack became a household name when he starred as gay lawyer Will Truman on the groundbreaking sitcom Will & Grace.

Because once Will and Jack kicked open TV's closet, there was no looking back. Their best friends are gleeful and proud gay Jack and charismatic, filthy-rich, amoral socialite Karen. It was always a little uncomfortable to take credit for With the intention of creating great stories about underrepresented identities, rather than strictly championing underrepresented causes, the key to unlocking the audience's ability to embrace what was once considered unpalatable was revealed.

Eric McCormack is very familiar with straight actors playing queer roles. But for others, the characters fall short—Jack, in particular, whose hilarious high camp persona has been criticized as a sort of gay minstrelsy in some circles. Some voices have championed the inclusion of characters in our TV landscape as daring, especially at the time of their inception, positing that their mere existence and America's relative comfort with them did more to further the acceptance of the LGBT community than anything else had in all the years since or after.

Two years later, Showtime would kick down the closet walls completely with the arrival of the explicit and provocative Queer as Folka move they replicated four years later for lesbians hungry for representation with The L Word. And because show business is, above all else, just that—a business—network executives were quickly realizing that putting gay characters front and center wasn't ratings suicide.

And now that they're finally back on our TV screens, may they only continue to push us forward, honey. This wasn't where we spent a lot of time. While the series wasn't an overnight success, by its third season, the series proved to be a hit with real lasting power, staying in the Nielsen Top 20 for four of its eight original seasons.

News's own Kristin Dos Santosevery Friday at 6 a. Gay lawyer Will and straight interior designer Grace share a New York City apartment.