English actor Charlie Hunnam has been selected for the coveted role of Christian Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey, to the chagrin of the internet.
We haven’t seen a casting backlash of these proportions since, well, last week when Ben Affleck was announced as the new Batman. There’s even a Change.org petition signed by nearly 20,000 people calling for openly gay actor Matt Bomer to be recast instead.
It’s nice to know people have their priorities in check.
Meanwhile, many may know Hunnam from the FX series Sons of Anarchy or his lead role in this past summer’s Pacific Rim, but what you may not know is that Newcastle bloke got his start by playing gay.
How about we take this to the next level?
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At 18 years old, he took the role of high schooler Nathan on the original UK version of the hit gay TV series Queer As Folk, with graphic portrayal of gay teen sex. Hunnam has since been involved in several films and TV shows, while evolving from twink to twunk to a full on hunk.
If you haven’t heard of or seen him before, we’ve gathered ten reasons why he’s the perfect man to slip into Christian Grey’s kinky shoes:
1. Those eyes
3. He can wear a suit…
…any kind of suit
4. That boyish smile
5. That BAWDY
7. He can rock any number of hairstyles, facial and otherwise:
8. He’s got a sexy voice
9. He’s funny
10. And most importantly, he really knows how to sex up a lady…
…or a fella
DickGreenleaf
Interesting. The facial mole that a skin doctor told him to have removed, appears to be coming back. You can see it starting to return in the first picture. BTW, I remember Charlie in the Judd Apatow series, Undeclared. Too bad it only ran one season.
Caine
Happy to see someone FINALLY mentioned his groundbreaking role in QUEER AS FOLK
– almost unrecognizable to the young man he turned into – especially as seen on Sons of Anarchy.
balehead
He’ll be brilliant..He’s a chameleon as an actor…
Dev.C
All that sexy, and yet all those fans prefer the hotter,more mature gay actor. I bet Bret Easton Ellis is putting his fist in his mouth right about now.
KEVINVENTION
I’m buyin’ him as a believable (and unrecognizable) twink in “QAF”. I’m buying him as a badass MoFo biker in “SOA”. I can certainly buy him as Christian in “Fifty Shades”. Sh*t, I’d buy him ANYTHING and IN ANYTHING. He’s the Real Deal, acting and otherwise… 😉
Katbox
Wow is that really the same guy in oaf? amazing.
Dxley
Perhaps he needs to shave more often and quit making highways on his forehead. That’s a total turn-off
KEVINVENTION
@Dxley: Is that really all you can come up with? REALLY? Must be a bitch to be that catty and bitter… 🙁
Niall
Confirmation that the age of IQ of Queerty writer’s has definitely dropped.
Anyways, he doesn’t even look like the same guy from QaF, had to believe it’s him.
@balehead: No matter how brilliant he is, you can’t make a purse out of a pig’s ear. I doubt he’s brilliant enough to save an adaptation of such a horribly written book.
Jay
I might look at it someday after it comes out on video if he shaves and wears his hair shorter. He does nothing for me as a greaseball.
Whom do we contact to get Matt Bomer hired instead?
LeNair Xavier
Since I have fantasized about being boinked by Charlie Hunnam years ago when I first saw that sex scene of him from the original “Queer As Folk”, you get no argument from me.
And I have not read the book, but I’ve heard there’s a good deal of BDSM, which I’m not into. But I’ll take it if it’s coming from him. He can punish me for taking so long to give it up to him.
Alan down in Florida
Is it just me or does that black and white photo make him look very Steve McQueen?
KEVINVENTION
@Alan down in Florida: It’s not just you. I thought the same thing. I also think he looks amazingly like Travis Fimmel (during his Calvin Klein modeling days) in the photo immediately below the pic you’re talking about… 😛
MarionPaige
Hunnam probably deliberately worked on a look and roles (a la Sons of Anarchy) that would separate him from Gay and Queer as Folk. For example, Hunnam looks less beefy in the movie Pacific Rim than when I saw him last in SOA. Now that Charlie has established himself to the US market as something other than his character Nathan in QAF, he can quit that stupid Sons of Anarchy and get back to looking like a matinee idol. Charlie was apparently 20 when he shot QAF and some of the situations he was put in in that idiot show were just awful. He has an interview somewhere where he describes the shooting of that infamous first sex scene between “Nathan and Stewart”. He also married some girl he had only known for four weeks when they both auditioned for Dawson’s Creek – which seems to indicate he was trying very hard to get rid of QAF.
50 Shade sounds like shit that can’t possibly work but then so did Twilight. 50 Shades reportedly started out as Twilight fan fiction.
Whup-Ass Master
50 Shades is a crap novel and it’s going to make a crap movie. He’ll be hiding this one from his resume. But whatever, he’s cute 🙂
Caleb in SC
@Whup-Ass Master: Agreed.
patricklee5150
I can’t believe that there is no mention of his starring role in “Nicholas Nickleby” 2002. That is when I fell in love with this gorgeous man.
tomcat79
Charlie is DAMN HOT and I look forward to seeing how he develops the character of Christian onto the big screen….note to the director- let’s do it in 3D =)