Update 11/23/2020 3:38pm:

Recently, LaKeith Stanfield was interviewed by The Hollywood Reporter and spoke on his career, along with the type of roles he’s played that shaped his skill and talent up to this point. Stanfield mentioned wanting to play a gay role “Because I wanted to experience and feel and understand what that meant.” Since then, Stanfield has responded to VladTV’s coverage of the quote, and voiced his thoughts on the platform.

Stanfield posted a screenshot of DJ Vlad’s post of the article and said “Yes i was saying I wanted to experience love through a lens i hadn’t experienced before through a character. After all, love is love.”

He continued on saying, “Of COURSE Vladtv strikes again trying to make that fact a dramatic and negative thing. I’m not surprised. I’m a Black man and he’s Vlad. Out of all the things i said in the interview with THR you chose to zoom in on this and try to frame me in a way where your fans can hate on me, you ain’t slick. Too bad most ppl aren’t deeply bigoted and so don’t care to grab your bait.” Take a look above.

Original 11/23/2020 9:55am:

LaKeith Stanfield recently sat down for an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, where he detailed getting into acting as a kid after his high school drama teacher recognized his talent. He then spoke about playing " two guys who were in love," and he added that "it would just be fine." LaKeith then stated, "I’ve always wanted to play a gay role. Because I wanted to experience and feel and understand what that meant."

From there, LaKeith enrolled in the John Casablancas Modeling Career Center in Los Angeles, and at 17 he was cast in Short Term 12, a 21-minute San Diego State University film school thesis project. The film was a hit at Sundance and won the 2008 Grand Jury Prize for a short film. Stanfield also starred in the feature version of the film, alongside Mr. Robot star Rami Malek. He went on to play Jessie Lee Jackson in Ava DuVernay's Selma, Snoop Dogg in Straight Outta Compton, along with a starring role in Sorry to Bother You and in the hit FX show Atlanta. 

While speaking about the often talked about "Teddy Perkins" episode of Atlanta, LaKeith revealed that he was the only person on set who didn't know Perkins was Atlanta creator Donald Glover in prosthetic makeup. He explained, "I wanted to know more about [the actor], so I started asking him questions. And Donald had a whole history prepared. He was saying he’s been acting for a long time. And I was like, 'That’s funny, because this is a very small business … I would not miss your face.' So I started asking around on the set, 'Who the f**k is this guy?' And then someone finally just spilled the beans, which now I’m kind of mad about, because I wish the illusion would’ve gone on a little โ€ฏlonger."

Source: Hollywood Reporter