Filmmaker Terry Gilliam: “I Tell the World I’m Now a Black Lesbian” Because White Men Get “Blamed for Everything”

Now you’ve seen it all, folks: a white man wants to live the easy life — that of a black lesbian.

While speaking at the 2018 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, Terry Gilliam, a film director and comedian best known for his role in the Monty Python comedy troupe and acclaimed films like Brazil and The Fisher King, was asked about the BBC’s recent push for diverse voices in its comedy slate. Gilliam was asked whether he thought Monty Python would even be made today because of its lack of diversity.

Previously, Shane Allen, controller of BBC’s comedy lineup, said: “If you’re going to assemble a team now, it’s not going to be six Oxbridge white blokes … It’s going to be a diverse range of people who reflect the modern world.”

“I’m no longer a white man, I’m a black lesbian,” Gilliam said, according to ET Canada. “But seriously, it’s really crazy. In the BBC, it is true that every little group of people on this planet must be represented in everything they broadcast.”

He said Allen’s comments made him cry.

“It made me cry: the idea that … no longer six white Oxbridge men can make a comedy show. Now we need one of this, one of that; everybody represented… this is bulls***,” Gilliam said.

“I no longer want to be a white male,” he said. “I don’t want to be blamed for everything wrong in the world: I tell the world now I’m a black lesbian… My name is Loretta and I’m a BLT, a black lesbian in transition.”

Cut to live footage of me trying to figure out how many black lesbians actually have it easier than white men in the comedy world:

Cut to live footage of me wondering how Gilliam went from a call for diversity to “white men are blamed for everything” to identifying as a black queer woman.

Gilliam also said the statement made him “so angry.”

“Comedy is not assembled, it’s not like putting together a boy band where you put together one of this, one of that [and] everyone is represented.”