Matt Bomer Says 'Fellow Travelers' is Key to Knowing 'What Our History Is'

"We have to educate ourselves if we want to know what our history is."

There's been a lot of hype lately about the Showtime limited series Fellow Travelers. Part historical thriller about the Lavender Scare (the systematic outing and dismissal of LGBTQ+ federal government workers in the mid-20th century) and part steamy queer love story, Fellow Travelers tells the story of the romance between Hawkins "Hawk" Fuller (Matt Bomer) and Tim "Skippy" Laughlin (Jonathan Bailey). For Bomer, he said he was "cynical" it would ever get made because, "are people going to invest in a four-decade queer love story?" But he felt the story was important to tell because "we're not taught these things in school...[it's] informative and educational, but also, oddly, very timely." Bomer is interested in playing more than queer characters, but if a queer story "comes my way and I have the opportunity to help put it out there, absolutely." To that end, he can also be seen in Bradley Cooper's highly anticipated film Maestro about Leonard Bernstein, where Bomer plays Bernstein's lover. He used letters between the two men to build a "beautiful backstory."

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Editor's Note: This conversation has been edited and condensed for publication.

How does it feel to be able to talk about your work again after the strike?

I mean, it's wonderful. I'm so grateful to the [Screen Actors Guild] union for getting the terms they got and getting this unprecedented deal that benefits everyone in the union. But I have to say, it's been kind of nice to just let the work be out there. If you're doing a junket or something and having to roll from interview to interview, you might get asked some questions that might seem a little inane or reductive about the material. It was kind of nice to be able to dodge that. You always fear, God, are people going to know about it or be able to see it? And I think that's a legitimate concern. But it was such an extraordinary privilege to get to work on this piece, I still can't believe that it was able to be made.

So what made you want to do Fellow Travelers?

It felt so unprecedented to me in so many ways, both in terms of the content and how this relationship was being told. I thought it captured certain queer dynamics in a way that I hadn't seen and it was massively educational to me. I think I'd heard Pete Buttigieg speak about the Lavender Scare once on a talk show years ago, but I knew nothing about it, and how it was influencing people working in government at the time. And so it was really informative. And obviously the character and the roles and the pace. It was just an incredible gift. I have to say, I was very cynical. Having been on television for 23 years, I just thought, are people going to invest in a four-decade queer love story? Multiple queer love stories?! And I was so blown away by the engagement and the investment from the Showtime executives; the Fremantle folks I had worked with before, Dante Di Loreto, on The Normal Heart. But all these people at Showtime just really got behind the show and Ron [Nyswaner, creator/writer/executive producer]'s work. And I thought, "oh, my gosh, is this really gonna happen?" And I kept thinking, "no, no." But it was one of those jobs that—and I don't mean to sound metaphysical or esoteric—but it just felt like something was pushing it forward. And when that happens, you should always know this as an actor, when that happens, you just know that the piece is much bigger than you and you're just there to be a part of it. And by the way, that could have just been Ron Nyswaner's willpower, because this was his baby and he was determined to get it made no matter what.

The story is something we've never really seen on TV before, showing a time in history many of us know, but from a perspective we've never really seen before. Why do you think the period of the Lavender Scare is so key to understanding the modern queer rights movement?

I think it's really important; we're not taught these things in school. No one's going to teach us. We have to educate ourselves if we want to know what our history is. And I think it's important to look back at our country's history, and we know what's happening—and I'm not saying we look back and shame or anything like that—but to acknowledge that there were times we let our fears get the better of us, that we thought that certain people were better or more deserving than others. It's important to look back and see that, because you don't have to look very far. I'm not going to make an overly political statement, but you really don't have to look far this day and age to see that we're right on the precipice of being back there. So, I thought that the story was informative and educational, but also, oddly, very timely.

What has been the response to it?

I've been in my own little bubble because of the strike, other than loved ones and close friends who had watched and reached out. I had an event last week, right after the strike ended, and it was the first time I had face-to-face contact with people, queer people who I don't interact with on a daily basis who are responding to the show. It was just so nice to hear. I was really taken aback. I have to be honest with you, I almost didn't know what to say at first, because I had been in my little privatized world of well, the work's just out there, and it is what it is.

The other thing the show does is show queer sex in a way we rarely see on TV. I wanted to get your thoughts on the importance of the sexuality of the story?

Well, to me, there's such an external physical manifestation of everything that's going on internally with the characters, psychologically, given experiences they've had in their lives. And they just happen to be really complementary of each other. They are an exploration of the power dynamics between the two of them. But it's more than that. Hawk is who he is in a sexual relationship because of traumatic experiences that have happened to him. Between war, between his dad walking in on him with Kenny, his first lover, and vowing to himself that he'd never be seen on his knees again for anybody, that he would win, he would survive, and he'd be in control. And then you have Skippy, I don't want to speak on behalf of Jonathan, who just gives himself over completely. To me, they were really these beautiful, outward manifestations of their internal experience. And the relationship is always different after one of their scenes than it was before. Even though it's a dynamic that I had never really seen on screen before, it brings them closer each time.

How did you find Hawk? Or rather, how you were going to portray him?

I did grow up in a very conservative Christian home. And for me, the stakes of maintaining a certain identity were life and death when I was in high school, for me, in my mind, at the time. And so I had to bifurcate and create a persona that allowed me to survive and attempt to thrive in high school in a "Friday Night Lights," Texas town. So I related to that aspect of the character. We did have very different nervous systems. What was so fun for me is that I always kind of got by trying to be the good boy. And Hawk gets to be the bad boy. I mean, don't get me wrong, I had my bad boy moments, too. They were well hidden. Whereas Hawk, it was so interesting, when you're playing a character, you're always looking for the shadow of the character, the part they hide. He sort of leads with the part that most characters hide. And the hidden parts of him are really the more loving parts.

Also very straight, very stereotypical man, hide your feelings, etc.

Yes, yes. I love getting to play that experience and I felt there was part of it that I understood. But there was a process that I put myself through every morning, 96 days of this shoot, I had a process to kind of drop in. Even though I was friendly and interacted with people on set and things like that, I tried not to stray too far from that over the course of the filming day.

Also, can we talk about Jonathan Bailey? Actually, can we spend a moment just praising Jonathan Bailey?

Johnny first and foremost is just a tremendous actor, and so fun to get to work and collaborate with. He has so much energy and passion. We sat down when we started this job, before we started filming. I was still thinking in my head, "Are we really gonna do this?" And he's like, "We got this, we can do this," and we just made a pact that we're gonna have each other's backs, no matter what, and we were able to communicate really openly. He's just a dream scene partner, really. I felt like what he brought to the table with his Tim was so complementary of what I was trying to do with my Hawk.

The story is set over 40 years, which is a long time. Was that intimidating?

I had a process and these sort of mantras that I had for myself, and physical processes and choices that I made for each decade in terms of where he was in his life. And obviously, you have to build the whole backstory before you even start in the '50s. So, you know that when you're doing '50s and '80s on the same day, or '50s and '70s on the same day, you know where you are. It's obviously a really daunting thing. I think I was really the beneficiary of working on Maestro two weeks before I started work on this. I had seen Bradley [Cooper] jump through decades and age and Carey [Mulligan] jump through decades and age. I'm not comparing myself to them at all as artists, but I thought, "Oh, this is possible." And then once I saw the incredible work that our hair and makeup artists did on the show, they were so informative. It just gave you the confidence to go out there and do your best. I never wanted to see Johnny in his new look until we were filming a scene in that decade. One of the real treats filming this was getting to see what he brought to Skippy in each decade of his life and the life history brought and physical choices he was making.

This is a reductive question, but I must ask, what was your favorite decade for clothes?

Oh my gosh, I think I really love the '70s. I really love Skippy in the '70s. Our costume designer was so fantastic and a huge part of what gave us the confidence to jump from decade to decade. He made custom underwear for me. I kept those. He made custom swimsuits for me. I kept those. There was something just so freeing about the bacchanalian aspect of it all. Obviously, it's the rock bottom of Hawk's life. But going from the super-controlled conservative '50s to the bacchanalian freedom of the '70s just felt so good.

What about Maestro are you most excited about?

I had always been fascinated by Leonard Bernstein because, to me, he was one of the few people I knew was gay early on. So, I've been interested in him and his music, obviously, in his composing. So I auditioned for the role, and it was a beautiful part. I met with Bradley and then I was there on set with Steven Spielberg; it was just all really overwhelming. But I was really fortunate that all the correspondence between my character David Oppenheim, and Leonard Bernstein, a lot of their written correspondence over their whole life is in the Library of Congress. So I wrote out every letter that David wrote to Lenny over the years that pertained to the time period we're working in. And I would give a letter that was close to that time period to Bradley on the day it made sense to do so. I don't know, it just provided this really rich and beautiful backstory that I couldn't have come up with on my own, I don't think.

You have many amazing projects in the works, but many have to do with important moments or topics to queerness and queer identity. Is that important to you, to find those stories to tell?

Yeah. And I would even venture to say educated me as well. I'm not saying that's exclusively the type of project I'm interested in working on, but if it comes my way and I have the opportunity to help put it out there, absolutely. There's a film about Lawrence v. Texas that I'm producing with Steven Soderbergh. That was a Supreme Court case I knew nothing about. It's fascinating. I had no idea that this sodomy law in Texas, where I grew up, in my home county, [was where the incident that led to the Supreme Court overturning sodomy laws] in 2003. So when that script came my way, I wanted to give it any opportunity that I could, I wanted to help it out in any way that I could. And so thankfully, Steven Soderbergh came on board. So when things like that come my way, I [will] always try my best to help out and put them out there. But at the end of the day, I'm just an actor. I went to conservatory. I thought I was going to do theater my whole life. I've had some really incredible people give me shots, and I'm very grateful for that. I just like to act. But in a show like Fellow Travelers, I feel like it's just kind of the best of all worlds and doesn't happen very often in a career—once if you're lucky. So I'm very thankful.

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