Cowboy Chuck Browning is the epitome of all- American macho - a rugged rodeo star with a long history in ranching.But a few days ago, watching Brokeback Mountain - a controversial Oscar-tipped film about a gay romance between a ranch-hand and a rodeo cowboy - he wept.
For Chuck went through the same struggle as the movie's characters when he realised it was the cowboys, not the cowgirls, he was attracted to.
The critically-acclaimed film, which opens nationwide next weekend and has been a surprise hit in the States, brought back memories of gay-bashing.
So strong was the homophobia that it cast a shadow over Chuck's upbringing on a Wyoming ranch.
"I thought it was an incredibly beautiful movie and very realistic," says Chuck. "And because it was set in the time and place where I grew up, there was a lot of things I could relate to. I knew I was different as a child, I just didn't know why.
"There were no gay role models in Wyoming back then."
Chuck runs his own ranch - the Five B - in Arizona with his long-term 32-year-old partner, Jay Barker.
Each year they compete in events held by the International Gay Rodeo Association, which Chuck has won 13 times. But the 43-year-old - who had childhood picnics on Casper Mountain where the Brokeback characters, played by Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger, work - remembers when it was not so easy to be gay in the heartlands of America.
He says: "I spent my summers helping my uncle on his beef ranch. Men were men and women were women and that's just the way life was. I never thought it could be any different.
"It was only when I moved to Montana to start university that I began experimenting. I worked with a lifeguard there who was openly gay but I still couldn't empathise much. He was very camp and I am definitely not.
"Looking back at the cowboy lifestyle of men spending day after day doing hard physical work together, I can see how it is kind of a gay lifestyle. But people would never have dared admit to it.
"When I was growing up gay bashing went on which is some of the reason I never came out while I lived there."
In his early 20s Chuck went to live in Phoenix, Arizona, where he hoped to find acceptance of his sexuality.
"When I moved to the city it was a great revelation to me that there were other people out there who felt the same way I did," he recalls.
"Being gay wasn't a shock to my city friends. They were very supportive and accepting. It gave me the courage to come out to my family." Chuck told his mother Kay he was homosexual over a hotel breakfast when she came to visit. It was a dark time for him. He was grieving the loss of his first serious partner, Ken, who had died of an Aidsrelated condition.
"Mum was relieved that I confided in her," he says. "I told her Ken had been more than a friend and she was completely accepting.
"At the same time, she knew times might be hard for me. Few parents actually want their children to be gay because of the discrimination they have to endure. And mum was aware there were difficulties I'd have to face in life."
His dad had a tough time accepting the news. Chuck says: "My father didn't really understand. I think he still feels uncomfortable I'm gay."
For Chuck the most moving aspect of Brokeback Mountain is that the story on which the movie is based may have led to a real murder.
In 1997 a magazine carried a tale by Annie Proulx about two gay cowboys from Wyoming.
An instant success, Brokeback Mountain won awards and was famous across America. But not everyone was happy. "A lot of people were angry about the story," says Chuck. "They felt it stereotyped cowboys from Wyoming as gay."
Homophobic violence escalated. A character in the piece is tortured to death. Tragically the same happened in real life.
On October 7, 1998, student Matthew Shepard was lured from a bar by two men who said they were gay.
They drove the 21-year-old to a remote spot outside Laramie, Wyoming, tied him to a fence and pistol-whipped him before leaving him to die.
"It was a brutal killing," shudders Chuck. "It forced a change in attitudes.
"It was no longer OK to hate someone just because they were gay - even the most macho cowboys felt that."
However, fear and hatred of homosexuals remain. Many Christian groups have urged members not to see the film.
Chuck admits: "It is still a difficult subject for a lot of people.
"Of course there will always be the odd incident, which is sad. But for the most part the worldwide MTV generation has finally made it to Wyoming.
"Now Casper has an openly gay mayor, which just goes to show how times have changed."
from Mirror
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