|
 Reality TV Teenager Grows Up And Learns How The Real World Works In ABC's Life As We Know It
INSTINCT: Hey, we saw you on a float at L.A. Gay Pride this past June. Have you finally embraced your inner gay man?
KELLY OSBOURNE:[Laughs] I’ve always wanted to be in a gay pride parade—they’re so much fun. My best friend is gay, and he hates the parade. He’s, like, “The one day a year the gays get to show how cool they really are, and they end up gyrating on floats in jockstraps.” He’s jaded. So it was my mission to get him on a float with me.
Did it change his opinion?
No. [Laughs] He’s too serious.
So, we also heard you flipped off the religious protestors.
I did! It’s so disgusting. There’s this separation of church and state, and the religious people can be such hypocrites.
Your mom has definitely been visible in supporting the gays. Was Pride this year your first big gay event?
I went to the GLAAD Awards with my mother in San Francisco. We went to this bar afterwards…AsiaSF. It was so much fun. But I pretty much only hang out with gay people. My roommate is a lesbian, and I hang out with her friends all the time.
Do you give a shit if people think you’re a lesbian by association?
I wouldn’t give a flying fuck. The only reason people think straight is “okay” is that that’s what they’ve been programmed by society to think. I hang out with my gay friends because, really, they are more creative and just way more fun. They also have a sense of humor because they don’t care what people think of them.
So, you’ve been up in Vancouver, Canada, filming Life As We Know It, and you’ve been living on your own for the first time.
Yeah, I’ve been up here three months now. I love it. I’m the type of girl who doesn’t shut her bedroom door, so it’s great not to have my family coming into my space.
And your character in the show, Deborah, what’s her story?
My agent told me to read the script; told me it’s really, really good. “What part do they want me to play?” I asked him. He told me, Deborah. Deborah’s the fat girl! Why do they want me to play the fat girl? At first I was kind of insulted that they offered me that part. [Laughs] In the beginning she wasn’t portrayed in such a great light and it was really harsh what some of the kids said to her.
Welcome to high school.
I felt that it wasn’t going to do anything but make people [who are in positions similar to Deborah’s] feel like shit. But the rewrite was amazing. Deborah gets to prove that she’s tough. She’s best friends with one of the three main boys. She starts dating him, because the only reason he started making fun of her was to fit in and not be made fun of himself. But then he’s, like, “Fuck it, I like her, and I don’t care what people think.” My mother is also a single mother who moved to Seattle from England and who doesn’t make a lot of money, so I have to have a job after school.
The creators are the same people who brought us the wonderful yet short-lived Freaks And Geeks. Is anything carried over from that show?
The sense of humor, definitely.
Your show is on ABC in the time slot immediately following The O.C. over on Fox. Was that intentional?
I don’t know. They both center around teenagers, but our show doesn’t have a beach in it. We have lots of coffeeshops.
Why do you think gay guys like teen dramedies like My So-Called Life and Life As We Know It?
I have this friend who is into soap operas, and he doesn’t want to be in a relationship right now, so his relationship is with his TV and he gets all the drama from his soap operas. [Laughs]
What are the chances of Kelly Osbourne becoming a gay icon?
I would love that!
Just don’t follow in Liza’s footsteps, okay? We have enough tragic female figures in the gay culture.
Oh my god, I went to this thing for M.A.C. makeup where Liza Minnelli was singing, and, of course, it was full of gay guys. They all started crying, and I was with my makeup artist and she’s, like, “Just drink something,” so I wouldn’t laugh—and I choked. She was singing “My Funny Valentine,” and I was sitting next to all these crying gay guys. It was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. [Laughs] But I get the whole Barbra Streisand thing. I know a bunch of her songs…
We’ll have to get you into therapy for that.
[Laughs] My mom is obsessed with show tunes, so I know a lot of them.
Do you see yourself becoming more like your mom?
I have no fear of becoming like my parents. It would be a privilege to be half the person my mom is. [Pauses] I’m coming to terms with the fact that I’m becoming more and more like my mother every day. I will be the world’s biggest yenta before you know it.
|
Instinct Online 
