All of which means that T. R. Knight owes his prestigious appearance here as a Gratuitous Brunette - and a fair measure of his current fame besides - to the scandal frenzy whipped up by Isaiah Washington in 2006-7 over Washington's use of some unfortunate vocabulary during a heated onset argument with their co-star, Patrick Dempsey.Still, even though it seemed for awhile like it was going to be the scandal that wouldn't die, and while I don't approve of Washington's use of 'the other f-word' (since I have no doubt he would have shouted loudest and longest if Knight had used the n-word against him, after all) Washington - a straight man - had played a gay man in Spike Lee's 1996 film Get on the Bus long before Knight had even bothered to come out. Oddly enough, none of this emerged during the extended furore - which was less about homophobia than African-American homophobia**.
Anyway, the entire event is about to pass into the annals of pop culture lore... Knight's portrayal of George O'Malley came to an end following the 2008-9 season of the show, and only time will tell whether either of their careers will survive - with or without another beneficial injection of scandal.
*I don't seem to have the attention span to watch an hour-long drama, even though I can watch an entire box set of a sitcom in one ten-hour sitting. Maybe it's the soap opera histrionics I don't like, although that doesn't seem likely either. I guess it comes down to the sluices of fake blood inherent in a medical drama, which in me at least induce genuine nausea.
**Yes, there is a difference.
*
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