Alan Cumming Says to Call Him Queer, Not Gay

The night before Alan Cumming turned 40, his husband found him weeping. "My husband said, 'Is it because you're turning 40?' And I said, 'No, it's because I don't want to be famous anymore.' I was at Sundance, which is really intense, you're constantly being poked in the head. And I just thought, 'I don't want this to be my life anymore. It's just too much,'" he tells BuzzFeed in an interview to promote Virgin Atlantic's new LAX Clubhouse.

Twenty years later, Cumming is more famous than ever, largely because of his Emmy-winning turn as host to Peacock's runaway reality show hit "The Traitors." Was Cumming able to reconcile his feelings about being famous?

"I then thought, even if I stop making films and stop everything, it's still going to happen for years. So that was when I realized I've just got to deal with it," he explains "With my success, I've got nice homes that I can go to, and they're sanctuaries – people don't know where I am, it's away from everybody. That's definitely something I've created to get away from being recognized. But it's part of life, you know? Luckily, if people didn't recognize me, I probably wouldn't get to have those nice homes. So that's the bargain that you have to live with."

And being recognized in one thing that Cummings hates."I don't ever want to be recognized, ever. It's not something that I seek. It's just a part of my life," he tells me. "I try to be kind and have my own boundaries. Like, maybe I don't want to have a photo right now on this plane or whilst I'm picking up my dog's poop."

"The Traitors" recently completed its third season in which the Faithfuls exposed the Traitors and split the cash prize. Asked if there were any behind-the-scenes dish about this season, Cumming told a story about how he and the contestants went on a boat trip as a storm was brewing. Because of safety regulations, they weren't allowed to get off the boat; instead went on "this two-hour journey in a fucking mental storm. We're tilting so far over that the sea was actually on the window. Such projectile vomiting from Sandra. The only person, of course, who was totally fine with it was Kate from Below Deck. She was like, 'Is there any drink? Is there any liquor here?' Things careening off the shelves, people upstairs vomiting, and the cameras falling into the sea. And then Kate and I just shooting the breeze and having whiskey."

One meme that emerged on the latest season was how dysfunctional the Traitors were. Cumming picked them on the first episode from the 21 reality show stars who were brought to the Scottish castle where the show is filmed. Danielle Reyes ("Big Brother"), Carolyn Wiger ("Survivor"), and Bob the Drag Queen ("RuPaul's Drag Race") Bob the Drag Queen ("RuPaul's Drag Race"). And just to make things more interesting, Cumming invited "Boston Rob" Mariano ("Survivor") to join them. It wasn't long before they turned on each other. Suspecting that Bob the Drag Queen was exposing him, "Boston Rob" went after the "RuPaul's Drag Race" winner and coordinated his elimination. After that, the Traitors went
Into free-fall and the show's dynamic was upended.

"It's so interesting to me that this series had these so many traitors being completely bonkers, chaotic, and dystopian in betraying each other – and then, for it to end in such a lovely way, with four people all trusting each other. In a funny sort of way, it mirrored what's going on in America right now," he adds. "It was the ending we all needed."

One thing that continues to wrangle Cumming is how his sexuality is mislabeled. "I let that one go," he responds. "I mean I try to, when I have a chance to, define myself as bisexual. But if people say gay – I like queer, actually, because it's more all-encompassing, and it doesn't necessarily have to do with what you do with the contents of your underpants. It's more of a sort of sensibility as well. I quite like that."

He feels he brings that queer sensibility to "The Traitors," in part to his outre fashions and his snarky attitude. "'The Traitors' is such a queer show. There's me at the center of it, being super queer with all my crazy outfits. Two of the winners this year are queer people, and that's so lovely. I really did push to have a better representation in the show, and that's certainly worked."

And sees expressing one's queerness is an important political statement these days.
"With all these draconian, horrific things, laws, and attitudes against the queer and trans community in America right now, I think it's a really positive thing to see so many queer people and, hopefully, trans people in a show that also celebrates dressing up, androgyny, femme-ness, and queerness," he continues. "Hopefully we challenge people: If you like all that and you love this show, maybe you shouldn't vote for a party that is trying to demean and destroy those people's lives."