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Bruno's big opening
By: Nigel Robinson
Bruno: gay stereotype?
Bruno: gay stereotype?
Bruno, Sacha Baron Cohens new film has premiered in London
Cohen, who scored with the film Borat, about a fictitious Kazhakh journalist in the USA, and is also the man behind Ali G, plays the eponymous flamboyantly gay Austrian fashion reporter.
However some gay activists are already worrying about the effect Cohen’s camp creation will have on the public’s perception of gay men.
In America the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) are concerned that Bruno might reinforce negative homosexual stereotypes.
At the Paris premiere, for example, Cohen turned up as the character dressed in gold Lederhosen, and at the recent MTV awards he bared his behind at Eminen.
Bruno also speaks with a lisp, wears effeminate and outrageous clothes, and drops his trousers at the slightest opportunity.
Universal studios dismiss the concerns, however, and insist that the film’s intent is to satirise, not confirm, homophobia.
"Bruno uses provocative comedy to powerfully shed light on the absurdity of many kinds of intolerance and ignorance, including homophobia," they said.
Bruno – also erroneously known as Bruno: Delicious Journeys Through America for the Purpose of Making Heterosexual Males Visibly Uncomfortable in the Presence of a Gay Foreigner in a Mesh T-Shirt – opens nationwide on 10 July.
