The Telegraph

Veteran actor Leslie Jordan on Hollywood homophobia, alcoholism and late-blossoming fame

What do Dolly Parton, Lady Gaga and 5.7m followers on Instagram all have in common? Each loves the pint-sized phenomenon that is Leslie Jordan. The 65 year old, 4ft 11in actor, hailing from Chattanooga, Tennessee, was already an industry darling before Covid-19 hit, but his Instagram videos, filmed in lockdown, have turned him into a proper star. “I’ve always had a little bit of fame,” he says, calling from his home in West Hollywood, which he moved to as an aspiring actor in 1982. “I could walk around places and they’d go: Oh! We love [‘lurve’] you from Will and Grace! Oh! We love you in American Horror Story! But now, I swear it’s like Lady Gaga. I can’t get down the street!” It is hard to do justice to Jordan’s joyous Southern tones in print – just remember that every “ing” is an “in’”, and every “I” is an “Ah”. The sentences don’t so much lilt as capsize. The accent, the size, the spry face, have been his signature whether as a gruff editor in The Help, a victim of Gaga’s in American Horror Story (we’ll come to that later), or of course Beverley Leslie, Karen Walker’s nemesis in Will & Grace, with whom he was forever trading barbs (“Oh,” she calls him one time, “the world’s oldest girl!”). But when, last spring, he started posting videos on his Instagram account, things really kicked off. Killing time in Chattanooga, where he had gone to be near his elderly mother and younger twin sisters, his tangential one-minute monologues made him a lockdown delight. “Well hello, fellow hunker-downers,” is a standard opener, followed by reminiscences about favourite roles, life questions or dancing to Britney Spears. The result is that he now has a book coming out, a new TV show and an album, even if he himself knows he’s not the world’s greatest singer (“The Rolling Stone said I had a ‘capable voice’”, he cackles). Called Company’s Comin’, it is a collection of the Southern Baptist hymns Jordan used to sing as a child, accompanied by country royalty like Chris Stapleton, Brandi Carlile and yes, Dolly. “I don’t think it gets any better right now to be Leslie Jordan,” he beams. “Everything I’ve ever worked for, for the last 30, 40 years is coming to fruition.”