‘Ted Lasso’ Actor Billy Harris on What It Took to Understand Gay Soccer Player Colin: ‘He Wasn’t Living His True Self’
“Ted Lasso” character Colin Hughes has had more time in the spotlight in Season 3 since he was revealed to be gay — and the development made sense to the actor playing him, Billy Harris. He said he began seeing the writing on the wall in Season 2.
Early on in Season 3, Colin is revealed to audiences to be gay, but his teammates don’t yet know. Journalist Trent Crimm (James Lance), who himself is gay, catches Colin kissing another man outside of Sam’s (Toheeb Jimoh) restaurant, and he confronts Colin about it. Isaac (Kola Bokinni) is also getting a sense that his teammate may be hiding his sexuality.
“From Series 1 to Series 3, now you’re, seeing the real side of him,” Harris told TheWrap at a “Ted Lasso” FYC event in Hollywood on Monday. “I think there’s something that he’s using and I think it could be comedy — sometimes he’s been the butt of the jokes and stuff like that. I think that because he wasn’t living his true self — and still in the locker room, he isn’t — when I saw how this storyline was going, it kind of all made sense to me, and I’m like, ‘Oh, this poor boy.’ As he said, he’s living two lives.”
It turns out that Grindr line from Season 2 was not as throwaway as it first seemed. He referred to the gay dating app Grindr, comparing it to Keeley’s app Bantr. Harris credits Colin’s time in therapy with allowing him to delve deeper into his sexuality.
“I found out in Season 2,” Harris said. “I read the script and I saw that he was going to therapy. The actor in me wanted to know exactly why because I care about him. I love him,” Hughes said.”There was a Grindr line and he mentioned the Grindr app. There was a huge response from fans on Twitter about that, and what was great is the fans were seeing themselves represented.”
Trent and Colin’s conversation in Amsterdam in Season 3, Episode 6, further opened up a new layers for both characters. Harris credited his scene partner Lance for bringing his A-game.
“What was so beautiful about that scene is you had an older gay guy just talking to a younger gay guy who is confused and doesn’t you know. [He] feels like he can merge the two lives together,” Harris said. “And what Trent does with that is he understands. I just think from his reactions and the looks on Trent’s face — beautiful acting by Jimmy. It’s just someone to listen, and in the real world, I think we can do a lot of that, as well.”
Watch Harris’ interview with TheWrap in the video above.
