Robbie Williams Addresses Rumours About His Sexuality, Saying He ‘Wants to Be Gay,’ But Isn’t

Robbie Williams thinks he’s exhibited a lot of “Patience” around rumors of his sexuality — but in a new interview with The Guardian, the Take That singer is setting the record straight.

Speaking to the outlet about his forthcoming biopic Better Man — in which he is portrayed by a CGI chimpanzee — the singer looked back on his 2005 lawsuit against a tabloid claiming that he was gay, saying that he mostly felt “sad” about the allegations simply because they weren’t true, not due to any internal fear of being perceived as gay.

“I’ve done everything but suck a c–k. Honestly, you’ve never met somebody that wants to be gay as much as me,” he said. “You want to be an ally while at the same time protecting your own authenticity and your own life.”

Using a football metaphor, Williams continued breaking down exactly why the rumors “annoyed” him. “I’m a Port Vale fan, and it’s like somebody going, ‘Well you’re a Liverpool fan,'” he said. “When somebody says you’re a Liverpool fan a hundred times it’s like, ‘I’m not a f–king Liverpool fan. Why do people think I’m a Liverpool fan?!'”

Elsewhere in the interview, Williams broke down the new biopic, addressing the very simple reason why he decided to have himself portrayed as a chimp (“Let’s face it, a Robbie Williams biopic without the monkey is way less appealing, or intriguing,” he said) and added that his former Take That bandmate Gary Harlow took umbrage with his portrayal in an early script of the film. “He phoned me up and he’s like, ‘Rob, read the script, I come off worse than Darth Vader in the first Star Wars,'” Williams recalled. “It was problematic for him.”

This article was first published by Billboard U.S.