Hugh Jackman has been married to his wife Deborrah for seventeen years now, yet some people still insist that he’s gay. Some people point towards their two adopted children as some form of evidence, yet they fail to recognize that Deborra suffered miscarriages before she and Hugh decided to open their home to kids who needed a family. The rumors of Hugh’s sexuality seem particularly cruel because I don’t think it’s an issue of people basing their judgment upon Hugh’s inherent ability to sing and dance like a boss. Instead, I think people are saying this because Deborra isn’t the typical stick-thin, over-Botoxed trophy wife that we’re used to seeing with movie stars. This is about people saying that she’s “not good enough” to be married to a hetero A-lister, so of course, she must be bearding. And that’s an awful thing for people to think.

For his part, Hugh doesn’t seem to be upset by people questioning his sexuality, but it matters a lot to him that the rumors upset his wife. In a 2008 interview, Deborra claimed that she often told people that Hugh wasn’t gay. In 2011, she seemed to indicate that the rumors affect her body image by adding, “heaven forbid I have a human experience and carry a little weight.” Last year, Hugh covered the matter while conducing his Les Miserables Oscar campaign by telling the Hollywood Reporter that the rumors bother Deb. Still, the buzzings persist, and now Hugh and Deb are talking to the press together:

Hugh Jackman and wife Deborra-Lee Furness have hit out at the “stupid” and “offensive” rumours that the Wolverine star is gay.

In an interview with the Nine Network’s 60 Minutes, Jackman said he finds the persistent gossip “frustrating,” especially for his wife of 17 years.

“If I was [gay], I would be,” Jackman told the program in a candid 16-minute interview last night. “It’s to me not the most interesting thing about a person anyway, but I do get frustrated for Deb, because I see Deb go ‘Ah, this is crazy’.”

Jackman’s hit stage performance as Peter Allen in A Boy from Oz a decade ago appears to have shaped the Australian actor’s image and raised speculation that the marriage between Jackman, 44, and Furness, 57, was a “sham.”

“It is just wrong, it’s like, it’s a lie,” said Furness, sitting alongside her husband. “It’s just offensive. If he was gay, fine, he would say he’s gay. It has gotten so out of whack … it’s stupid, yeah, it’s annoying, because it’s not true.” Furness added that playing a psychopath does not make an actor a psychopath any more than playing a gay man makes an actor gay.

[From MSN News]

I can totally understand why the persistence of these rumors would upset Deborra because, like I said above, she’s taking it personally because people tend to point towards her physical appearance as indicative of Hugh’s sexual preference. She’s not saying that being gay is “stupid” or “offensive,” but she’s saying that people’s attitudes towards her marriage are both of those things. I’ll never understand why people have to be so nasty, and sadly, I think people will only gain more ammunition by the fact that she’s so plagued by these rumors.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet