Jim Parsons is having a big year — maybe his biggest year. Back in September, the Big Bang Theory actor beat out Don Cheadle, Louis C.K., Alec Baldwin, Jason Bateman, and Matt LeBlanc for the Best Actor in a Comedy Series Emmy (his third) which was followed one month later by the GLESN Inspiration Award. Now, he’s one of four cover stars for Out magazine’s annual Out100 issue, in which he’s named Entertainer of the Year.
“I was very conscious in 2013 to try to enjoy every month, every week at a time, as much as I could,” the 40-year-old TV star tells the mag of his busy year. (In addition to The Big Bang Theory, he filmed the Ryan Murphy-directed The Normal Heart for HBO.)
Parsons, whose sexuality was casually revealed in a New York Times profile last year, has been very protective of his private life, which includes a decade-long relationship with partner Todd Spiewak. There was some minor chatter when the Times profile first came out, but for the most part, he and Spiewak have been able to fly under the radar.
“I didn’t think it was still that much hoopla, and that was really kind of rewarding,” he tells Out of coming out. “That’s progress — progress that I’m really happy to be a part of, making what was extraordinary ordinary without being boring, for God’s sake.”
Indeed, the CBS star told Us Weekly in October that he and his partner — whom he called his “favorite person on the planet” at the Emmys — live relatively normal lives. “We feel very average, we feel very normal. We really do,” he told Us. “The strange stuff is the Hollywood stuff we have to walk through, not the gay stuff we have to walk through.”
“I’ve never considered myself an activist,” he continued. “I’ve never considered my relationship with Todd to be an act of activism. Rather simply, it’s an act of love, coffee in the morning, going to work, washing the clothes, taking the dogs [out] — a regular life, boring love.”
