‘Fellow Travelers’ star Jonathan Bailey on the life-changing impact of playing Tim Laughlin

Jonathan Bailey admits he’s still grieving the loss of Tim Laughlin, the wide-eyed congressional staffer turned fervent gay rights activist he played in Showtime’s groundbreaking limited series “Fellow Travelers.”

“Playing a character who is always searching for truth and has something to fight for that is meaningful and important made me really think, ‘How do you want to leave the world behind?’” Bailey told NBC News. “It’s a tiring thing for everyone to be like, ‘I want to make the world a better place.’ But Tim is an example of someone who’s a normal guy. He didn’t come from wealth, and he lived life to its fullest, including loving in a way that was just spellbinding.”

That love is the animating force of “Fellow Travelers,” which chronicles the decades-spanning romance between Bailey’s Tim and Matt Bomer’s Hawkins “Hawk” Fuller against the backdrop of key moments in queer history. After falling in love at the height of the Lavender Scare in 1950s Washington, D.C., Hawk and Tim weave in and out of each other’s lives for years at a time, unable to sever their bond. But after learning of Tim’s terminal AIDS diagnosis in the ’80s, Hawk drops everything to take care of Tim in San Francisco, where the former lovers are forced to address the true nature of their volatile relationship.

“Fellow Travelers” was nominated for three Emmys in limited series categories last month: Bailey (who also won a Critics Choice Award) for supporting actor, Bomer for lead actor and creator Ron Nyswaner for writing.

Jonathan Bailey and Matt Bomer play gay men whose love story spans decades in Showtime's limited series "Fellow Travelers."Ben Mark Holzberg / Showtime

Following the success of Netflix’s romantic drama “Bridgerton,” in which he played a rakish viscount looking for his viscountess, Bailey expressed a desire to tell a sweeping gay love story. He booked the coveted role in “Fellow Travelers” six weeks before the start of filming in Toronto, following an electric Zoom chemistry read with Bomer — one of the most prominent openly gay actors working today — that even brought one of the executives to tears.

While he said he inherited the “inherent shame” of the AIDS crisis as a gay man who came of age in the early aughts, Bailey, who is English, knew very little about the Lavender Scare. He credited the writing of Nyswaner for helping him capture the spirit of Tim, a devout Catholic struggling to reconcile his faith with his growing infatuation with the emotionally unavailable Hawk, who is adept at playing the system to avoid getting outed.

“There’s something so childlike and full of wonder and unadulterated kindness about Tim that never leaves him,” Bailey noted. “When you see the huge effects of the societal pressure and control on gay people and how it affects Tim, I thought, ‘How do you tell a story of someone who’s bruised, battered and frayed by relentless, unforgiving control?’ I think the older he gets, the more painful it is for him.”

Bailey, like many queer people, has had a complicated relationship with religion. He attended a Church of England school and, at 11, was a scholarship student at his local Catholic school, where he “was completely aware of the lack of education around sexuality and gender identity.” Like Tim, he began to question his own “inherited beliefs” in his 20s, when he came to terms with his own identity.

While Tim’s religion makes him believe that something is innately wrong with him, it also gives him the capacity to believe in a love that he has felt but cannot always see with Hawk, who complements him in a way that is both “beautiful” and “painful,” Bailey said. “I think to say that they broke up a few times somehow assimilates it to a heteronormative relationship — they were completely not afforded that.”

“What Tim realizes is that the act of loving is the thing that you want to survive with and live alongside and to die with, and to be the more loving one is sometimes easier,” added Bailey, who thinks “there was no other” man whom Tim loved as deeply as Hawk. “I think the power of their dynamic — the brilliance — is that they met at that time, and it’s just a genius way of discovering and exploring how political and social attitudes really can’t kill love.”

Bailey and Bomer, who have both acknowledged that a show like this might not have even been made a few years ago, see “Fellow Travelers” as a kind of love letter to the queer actors who came before them.

“The way we look at each other is also about the opportunity that we’ve got that wasn’t there before,” Bailey said of his and Bomer’s palpable on-screen connection, which has evolved into a close off-screen friendship. “There’s a weight that comes to telling your own story or other people’s story that are similar or shares elements of your identity.”

Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey both earned Emmy nominations for their roles in "Fellow Travelers."Ben Mark Holzberg / Showtime

On the day of the Emmy nominations, Bailey was in Malta — where he has been shooting the new “Jurassic World” film — with one of his best friends. They had already planned to find somewhere to grab a celebratory drink together in the late afternoon. But by the time they had settled in and tuned in to the livestream announcing the nominees, Bailey’s phone began to ring off the hook.

“The thing that was special, if a little ridiculous, is that we took a little selfie, and I realized there was just a pride flag that was in the distance,” Bailey recalled. “Having now spent a lot of time in Malta, you realize there’s only a few.”

Now on the precipice of superstardom with his roles in “Wicked” and “Jurassic World,” Bailey is redefining what is possible for an out gay actor in Hollywood, becoming a heartthrob to male and female audiences alike — even if he doesn’t often think about that label. “I’m excited to play more roles the older I get, and we will see what the heartthrob status is when I’m in my 50s,” he said cheekily.

As his profile has risen, Bailey has wrestled with which parts of himself he is willing to share publicly. His Olivier Award-winning turn in a gender-swapped West End revival of “Company” gave him an opportunity to speak openly about his sexuality — something he didn’t feel the need to reveal unless it was tied to his work. Now, he feels much more confident in interviews to volunteer certain stories about himself, including a harrowing experience in which a Pennsylvania man called him an anti-gay slur and threatened his life in a Washington, D.C., coffee shop.

For Bailey, who is still adjusting to the privilege of being able to choose his next projects, the company he keeps going forward is just as important as the material he is given to work with. He will return to the stage next year in Nicholas Hytner’s London production of “Richard II” and will reprise his role as eldest sibling Anthony in the next season of “Bridgerton.” He will next be seen as Jack Maddox, a charming academic and celebrity crush of protagonist Charlie Spring (Joe Locke), in the sixth episode of the third season of “Heartstopper,” which premieres in October.

“I recognized in the show something that I obviously didn’t have growing up, which is aspirational, generous storytelling about queer identity and gender identity that wasn’t necessarily a gay [show],” Bailey said of his initial reaction to watching “Heartstopper,” which, like many older queer viewers, made him feel slightly melancholic. “There’s so many people of that generation who just love it, because it’s brilliant and so well-performed by such an incredibly talented young cast.”

But truth be told, Bailey doesn’t think he will ever be able to let go of Tim Laughlin, who he likes to believe had “a very happy end of his life” fighting for AIDS awareness with the ACT UP movement without Hawk by his side. After having spent a year unpacking the life-changing experience of playing the character in post-screening Q&As and media interviews, Bailey has grown to feel the power of his work “more than [he’d] ever known.”

When playing a character who is confronting his own mortality, “you just think about how life is futile and quick,” Bailey said, “and if I can live a life as front-footed and as curious as Tim, then I’ll be a lucky man.”

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