With the new dramedy "Say Uncle" and two TV series – a comedy-reality hybrid and a drama – in the works, Peter Paige won't have much time to attend Pride events this month. That's not to say he won't celebrate it.
"I'm very proud, but I don't have a lot of partying in me," Paige tells BTL via phone from his home in Los Angeles.
Although Emmett, Paige's flamboyantly gay character on "Queer As Folk," now only exists on DVD, Paige's pursuit of film and TV work is keeping him on his toes. "I'm incredibly busy with other projects so there's a lot of stuff coming down the pike," he says. "It's not like I'm lacking for something to do on a daily basis."
Surprisingly, Paige still sleeps. "I have to sleep because I don't function if I don't," Paige says.
Paige wrote, directed and starred in his debut film "Say Uncle" and, even then, managed to get some rest since he made specific preparations well before the brisk 18-day shoot. "I went into this having storyboarded every single shot of the film and rehearsed every scene as an actor," he says. "I was as prepared as I could be so I could get as much sleep as possible."
In the film, which will be aired on Showtime after its theater run, Paige plays Paul, a childish gay man who fills the absence of his godson with other kids in the neighborhood and later gets profiled as a pedophile. But don't confuse Paige with Paul.
"I'm much more suave than Paul," he says. "I'm much more worldly than Paul … I'm able to pick up social cues in a way that he's not, [but] I love kids and they bring out some of the best qualities in me."
Laughing, he continues, "I don't have cognitive dissonance."
Only the beginning of the film parallels Paige's life, and he wants to make that clear "so people don't think I'm some kind of pervert." There's still, however, a fine line that separates his character Emmett and Paul, since both have a carefree, exuberant edge. "It's certainly a recurring theme in my work up to now that all of the characters that I play have a boyishness," he says.
But, if anything is different between Emmett and Paul, it's that Paul, although he relishes his tighty-whiteys, doesn't get completely nude. "Nude scenes, sex scenes, it's all weird," he says. Paige stripped down on several occasions in "Queer As Folk," sometimes showing off what gay men otherwise would have only been able to imagine. Although 10 crewmembers would usually be present during the nude scenes, 40 fewer than a normal shoot, "you start to get pretty comfortable."
In "Say Uncle," Emmett trades places with fellow cast mate Kathy Najimy, who engages in a sex scene, albeit suggestive, with her distant and lazy husband.
Najimy plays a mother who is convinced that Paul is loony. "She's [Najimy] really smart and really engaged," Paige says. "She won't do anything she doesn't believe in, so she can be a pain in the ass, but it's all for the good for the film."
Don't think that Paige is trying to start any fights with Najimy. He's called her that to her face. "It's not like I'm talking bad about her behind her back. She knows it," he says. "She's willing to be a pain in the ass if it's because she believes it's going to help make the movie better."
Unlike most directors' original vision, Paige's wasn't skewed much at the end of the shoot and the film was 97 percent of what he visualized. "You are always making compromises in a film," he says. "It's a big movie. So for us to be so close to what I saw in my head when I wrote this movie really makes me happy."
Although raking in money for the film was the most challenging aspect of his debut, he also had trouble focusing on the script, which took him nine years to complete. "I actually write quite quickly when I'm actually writing," he says, blaming it on being a Gemini. "My focus tends to turn to the newest, shiniest thing in the room."
Although Paige is busy promoting "Say Uncle" and working on other endeavors, he still misses his "Queer As Folk" days. "I miss that home," he says. "[With a series] you go back year after year and work with all the same people and it's really satisfying in that way."
Paige plays tennis with Scott ["Ted"] weekly and the cast plays poker regularly. "I still have a pretty great relationship with most of them," he says.
Paige's Picks
Favorite meal you've cooked?
"Oh, wow, that's rough 'cause boy do I not cook. The one thing I can make is I can cook a salmon."
TV show? "Grey's Anatomy"
LGBT film? "My Beautiful Laundrette"
Coffee or tea? "Tea, more often than not."
Madonna or Mariah? "Madonna."
Favorite "QAF" memory? "The day a 15-year-old stopped me on the street and told me he came out to his family because of me."
Boxers or briefs? "Briefs."
