‘Neighbours’ to get its first gay male character

MELBOURNE - After 25 years, Australian TV show ‘Neighbours’ will get its first gay male character.

Ramsay St newcomer James Mason, 20, will reveal he is gay in an upcoming episode.

Neighbours executive producer Susan Bower said the coming-out storyline was a direct result of requests from young viewers in Neighbours’ online forums.

Bower said though lesbian romances had featured on Home and Away and Neighbours, love scenes between men are still fairly taboo on Australian dramas.

She said the show copped flak for its teen pregnancy and surrogacy storylines, so teen homosexuality was sure to come under fire, too.

“I do believe homophobia is still alive and well, and I have no doubt that we will get complaints about it,” the Herald Sun quoted Bower as saying.

“Neighbours is an icon, like Vegemite. People get very possessive about it,” Bower added. (ANI)