So last week, one of the biggest entertainment news stories that many media outlets (including us!) reported on was that of legendary Star Wars actor Billy Dee Williams casually coming out as gender fluid in a recent interview with Esquire magazine. The thing is though, according to Williams himself, that's actually not what happened. In fact, he didn't even know what the term gender fluid means.
Speaking to The Undefeated to clarify the situation, Williams (who Star Wars fans know best for playing the role of Han Solo's frenemy Lando Calrissian in the Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi) called the media gaffe a misunderstanding.
"Well, first of all, I asked last night. I said, 'What the hell is gender fluid?' That’s a whole new term," Williams told The Undefeated. "But what I was talking about was about men getting in touch with their softer side of themselves.
He continued:
"There’s a phrase that was coined by Carl G. Jung, who was a psychiatrist, who was a contemporary of Sigmund Freud, and they had a splitting of the ways because they had different ideas about the...what do you call it? Consciousness. Unconscious. It’s collective unconsciousness. But he coined a phrase that’s, 'Anima animus.' And anima means that is the female counterpart of the male self, and the animus is the male counterpart of the female. So, that’s what I was referring to. I was talking about men getting in touch with the female side of themselves. I wasn’t talking about sex, I wasn’t talking about being gay or straight. People should read [Jung]. I mean, it would be an interesting education for a lot of people."
The Undefeated also pointed out that Williams identifies as a man and that, while mistakenly conflating gender identity and sexual orientation, he also identifies as straight.
"No, no, no, I’m not gay—by any stretch of the imagination. Not that I have anything against gay people. But personally? Not gay," he said.
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