Critics are saying Jay Leno crossed the line when he interviewed Stop-Loss star Ryan Phillippe Thursday night.
Leno was chatting with Phillippe, 33, about his first role as a gay teen on the soap One Life to Live when he asked, "Can you give me, like – say that camera is your gay lover... Can you give me your 'gayest look?'
"Say that camera is Billy Bob – Billy Bob has just ridden in shirtless from Wyoming," Leno persisted as Phillippe grew more uncomfortable.
"Wow," Phillippe replied. "That is so something I don't want to do." At one point, he jokingly stood up to leave the interview.
Openly gay Jeff Whitty, who penned the Tony-winning Broadway play Avenue Q, happened to be in the audience.
Whitty later blogged, "Would you ask a guest to make their 'blackest face?' Their 'Jewiest face?' Why not?"
Whitty's criticism of Leno comes two years after he wrote an open letter to the late-night host regarding his inappropriate use of gay stereotypes as punch lines.
After the letter was published, the two spoke about it. Now, Whitty says his "first instinct was right."
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