Well, you never saw this coming. The Expendables 3, the latest installment of Sylvester Stallone’s geriatric mercenary franchise, has a gay couple among its pack of iconic macho action stars, according to its director. Patrick Hughes has confirmed that the characters played by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jet Li are gay. In an interview with Grantland, the director mentions a scene of the movie with the two actors getting cozy in a bar. Stallone glances over and says “get a room.” Schwarzenegger and Li giggle like schoolgirls and the Austrian Oak responds “we don’t need a room!” Is the scene meant to imply that the two are a couple? “I believe so,” says Hughes.
It’s an odd moment in a film that’s been savaged by critics and performed poorly at the box office (something the studio is blaming on an online leak of the film). Is this testosterone-filled action junk–featuring some of Hollywood’s leading Republicans such as Kelsey Grammer, Stallone and Schwarzenegger–opposed to Proposition 8? Schwarzenegger, the former California Governor, performed two gay marriage ceremonies while in office even though he isn’t a proponent of gay marriage. Then again, the movie, otherwise a tired, lazy cash grab, is filled with bizarre, knowing glances at the real world. Wesley Snipes plays a character sprung from jail, where he is serving time for tax evasion, just as Snipes did himself. Mel Gibson is cast as the villain, which he pretty much is in real life. Despite its poor box-office, there will be an Expendables 4, and there will also be an all-female version.
Correction: an earlier version of this article mistakenly listed Harrison Ford among the Hollywood Republicans.
