Gay actors take risk in coming out, says Firth

The actor, who stars as gay college professor George Falconer in A Single Man, said at the film's UK premiere in central London that there were still "invisible boundaries" that gay actors struggled to cross.

He said: "There might be risks for a gay actor coming out. The politics of that are quite complex, it seems to me.

"If you're known as a straight guy, playing a gay role, you get rewarded for that. If you're a gay man and you want to play a straight role, you don't get cast – and if a gay man wants to play a gay role now, you don't get cast.

"I think it needs to be addressed and I feel complicit in the problem. I don't mean to be. I think we should all be allowed to play whoever – but there are still some invisible boundaries which are still uncrossable."

British actor Nicholas Hoult, 20, who has been nominated for the Bafta Rising Star Award, said he did not feel he was taking a risk by playing the role of student Kenny, who takes an interest in Firth's character in the directorial debut of fashion designer Tom Ford.

"There was no fear (in taking the role)," he said. "It was a very interesting character and when you get the chance to work with Colin and Tom, you'd be stupid to turn it down."

A Single Man is released in UK cinemas on February 12.