“That was pretty easy for me because I’m Lebanese and I think that’s a genetic fixture, you’re going to use food to communicate with people. “He likes to take care of people and communicates love through food,” he says.
His first step was to look for things he shared with his character. But Salem didn’t approach the role as if he were playing the perfect mate. Things get complicated when Andrew falls for Rafi after attending one of his cooking classes.Ĭompared to Nico, Rafi comes off as an ideal and hunky would-be boyfriend who is both charming and considerate. He does such a good job that the fake becomes a runaway viral sensation. His life-long best friend, Jake, decides to create a “fake boyfriend” online to push Andrew away from his toxic on-again, off-again boyfriend. The rather broad premise of My Fake Boyfriend is based around the lengths he and his friends go to so he can escape a relationship with Nico, a narcissistic soap star played by Marcus Rosner. Which is not to say Andrew, the film’s protagonist, isn’t dealing with other forms of strife. “You could have taken all those characters and made them straight and it wouldn’t have made a difference,” he adds.
But at some point, you’re like ‘sh-t, I’d like to see a movie with gay characters where there is no commentary about being gay. If you think about the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s and early 1990s, you can make movies about that forever because it was brutal. “Not to say those films aren’t beautiful, because they are. “If you think about (older) gay films, even the fact that you had to call them gay films just because the central characters are gay, they always revolved around HIV or coming out, some sort of trauma porn,” Salem says. It causes no strife in the characters’ lives. It’s not about coming out, nor is their sexuality even really addressed. But unlike in past depictions of gay characters, none are struggling with their sexuality. But it does showcase the continuing evolution of queer cinema. It hardly seems necessary to label it as a gay or queer rom-com. My Fake Boyfriend is fairly typical as an entertaining and featherweight rom-com.
I got to the point in my life now where I was to be part of a bigger purpose.” All the gay, well-adjusted people who were happy were white.
Because when I was younger, I had a really hard time with coming out because I didn’t see anybody on TV who looked like me who were gay. But there was that worry: Will it work against me if I’m out? Things have changed, but even if they haven’t I feel a personal responsibility now. “This film has really helped me embrace that because I’ve been out for awhile in my life and to agents and people in the industry,” he says. The character also has added significance for the actor, who came out as gay to family and friends in his mid-20s just before embarking on his acting career. It’s his first comedy and the first time he has played a romantic love-interest. My Fake Boyfriend, which is currently streaming on Prime Video, marks a number of significant firsts for the actor. It took him five years of working graveyard shifts as a nurse in Vancouver while going out for auditions before booking his first significant role. At that point, he had no experience on stage or in front of a camera. Salem surprised everyone, perhaps even himself, when he decided to abandon a career in medicine to become an actor after receiving a Bachelor of Science degree in nursing from the University of Calgary. Salem says he had a similar experience watching and working with Emmy-winning actress Elisabeth Moss when shooting the recurring role of a resistance fighter in Season 4 of The Handmaid’s Tale.īut given the unusual way he entered the profession, this unofficial on-set mentorship has likely proven extra useful for the actor. It’s probably not unusual for a relatively new actor to take cues from more experienced performers. They’ve been doing it for a minute and they are really good at their job and they a lovely to work with. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Manage Print Subscription / Tax Receipt.