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AE: Are more gay and lesbian actors auditioning for gay roles?
MK: I’ve heard from casting directors across the board that actors who are gay or lesbian in real life are less inclined to play gay characters. I remember something Paul [Colichman, here!'s CEO] said once: he was recounting his meeting with an actor whose career had suffered because he’d come out, and Paul said, “We want this to be the kind of place where you get something because you’ve been out, instead of losing something.” I love that, I think that’s really important. That should absolutely be part of what we’re doing.

AE: In general, do actors seem to feel more comfortable playing gay characters?
MK: Women seem to be more comfortable playing gay characters than men, but there have definitely been some interesting moments, where people get here and suddenly realize it’s a gay character and get hesitant, and I want to say “Watch Monster!” There are two successful straight women who played lesbian characters and won an Oscar!

Once I told a writer we wanted to have two characters become romantically involved, and she said, “I thought we weren’t putting any salacious material in this film.” After a long pause, I said, “How is it when it’s a straight couple, it’s romantic, and when it’s a gay couple, it’s salacious?” And she was like, “Oh, right.” And this is from someone who is not really homophobic.

I was talking to a director who was having that problem of his actors not wanting to get intimate in a scene, and I said, “Just tell them you’re not asking them to do anything you wouldn’t have a straight couple do.” There’s a lot of learning that goes on, dealing with uncomfortable situations that go on on-set. Sometimes sets can become microcosms of society where people have different outlooks on gay issues. But we want this to be a place that characters who are in love with each other can have sex, hold hands, kiss—all the things straight characters do.

AE: Do you think you’re able to do that because you don’t have to appease advertisers?
MK: I think it’s because that’s the obvious opportunity standing in front of us. We want to give our audiences the images they’re hungry for.

AE: How diverse is here!'s programming?
MK: We want this to be a place that’s also inclusive of transgendered and bisexual people. I hate that there is a prejudice against bisexual people within the gay community, because I feel like, if we can’t be tolerant and accepting of bisexual men and women, who will? We should be the last people to discriminate, considering what we go through ourselves.

There is a real absence of bisexual characters in the material I’m getting, though, and a lack of integration of gay men and lesbians in the same script. Usually it’s all guys, or only lesbians, sometimes with straight people, but rarely with two gay and lesbian leads together.

AE: What's success for you? Where would you like to see here! in three years?
MK: Success would be not only that we’re still here, but that we’ve done some good work that’s gotten some critical notice. That there has been a show, movie or breakout character that spoke to a level of quality that means we’re not only providing good entertainment, but going a step beyond. It’s like the way people found The Shield. They found it, and I’d like people to find the same thing here, regardless of sexual orientation.

To have the kind of reputation that HBO enjoys is of course everyone’s pinnacle of success; I know it’s taken them decades to achieve, and I don’t mean to imply we could do that in three years, but it’s certainly something to aspire to.

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