--- title: Yep, Kate McKinnon's 'Ghostbusters' Character Is Gay description: Ghostbusters director Paul Feig affirmatively answered the question he's been asked repeatedly canonical: https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/ author: Megan Lasher article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-07-18T18:11:05.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:02:57.576Z og:title: Yep, Kate McKinnon's 'Ghostbusters' Character Is Gay og:description: Why be so coy about it, though? og:url: https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt35bc4a1c91936dec/69889c4efb4eac635088e520/ghostbusters-paul-feig-mckinnon-gay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Celebrities On The Set Of Univision's "Despierta America" og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Yep, Kate McKinnon's 'Ghostbusters' Character Is Gay twitter:description: Why be so coy about it, though? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt35bc4a1c91936dec/69889c4efb4eac635088e520/ghostbusters-paul-feig-mckinnon-gay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Yep, Kate McKinnon's _Ghostbusters_ Character Is Gay > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays to 40,000 subscribers as of August 2026. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. by [Megan Lasher](https://time.com/author/megan-lasher/) ## Megan Lasher Jul 18, 2016 6:11 PM UTC  Leslie Jones,Kate McKinnon,Kristen Wiig,Melissa McCarthy and Paul Feig on the set of Univisions "Despierta America" to support the film "Ghostbusters" at Univision Studios on July 11, 2016 in Miami, Florida. Leslie Jones,Kate McKinnon,Kristen Wiig,Melissa McCarthy and Paul Feig on the set of Univisions "Despierta America" to support the film "Ghostbusters" at Univision Studios on July 11, 2016 in Miami, Florida. Gustavo Caballero—Getty Images by [Megan Lasher](https://time.com/author/megan-lasher/) ## Megan Lasher Jul 18, 2016 6:11 PM UTC In an interview with _The Daily Beast,_ Ghostbusters director Paul Feig took a moment to clear up some questions about the film. One question that was on viewer’s minds after seeing the film: Was Kate McKinnon’s Jillian Holtzmann a lesbian? People hoped the trailer that McKinnon’s character was gay [going back to the trailer](http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2016/03/ghostbusters-gay-kate-mckinnon-kristen-wiig): her flirtatious performance with Wiig’s character (lots of winks and not-so-subtle pickup lines) left many fans wondering if Jillian Holtzmann was a lesbian. “What do you think?” Feig [said to ](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/07/12/ghostbusters-director-paul-feig-on-the-film-s-misogynistic-trolls-it-s-not-for-all-these-guys.html)[_The Daily Beast_](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/07/12/ghostbusters-director-paul-feig-on-the-film-s-misogynistic-trolls-it-s-not-for-all-these-guys.html)_. “_I’d like to think yes,” reporter Jen Yamato responded. Feig grinned and nodded before replying, “I hate to be coy about it, but when you’re dealing with the studios and that kind of thing…” Feig isn’t the only director afraid of putting an bringing sexuality talk to the big screen. [Earlier this year, Variety ](http://variety.com/2016/film/news/star-wars-avengers-gay-characters-1201764436/)examined Hollywood’s aversion to putting explicitly LGBT characters in films that are not LGBT-focused. “It’s one thing for a studio executive to support gay marriage. It’s another to risk $200 million on a movie with a gay protagonist that needs to play in China and Russia, countries where LGBT citizens face discrimination, legal challenges, and violence,” Brent Lang wrote. Feig said that it was natural for McKinnon’s character to be gay: “You know, Kate is who she is and I love the relationship between Kate and Melissa’s characters. I think it’s a very interesting, close relationship. If you know Kate at all she’s this kind of pansexual beast where it’s just like everybody who’s around her falls in love with her and she’s so loving to everybody she’s around. I wanted to let that come out in this character.” McKinnon—who is _Saturday Night Live_‘s [first openly lesbian cast member](http://www.queerty.com/snl-welcomes-kate-mckinnon-the-shows-first-out-lesbian-cast-member-20120329)— has talked a lot about the power of individuality, which is why she’s so unafraid to be unique. “I tried for a short time to be something I wasn’t, and had no success with it,” McKinnon said in a [recent interview with the _LA Times_](http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-ghostbusters-jones-mckinnon-20160713-snap-story.html). “It’s a practical solution to just be yourself.” That’s why McKinnon’s character, Holtzmann, was so authentic and funny, Feig says. In a lot of the film, McKinnon added in her own mannerisms and improv lines: “I wasn’t like, ‘And now you should wink at them,’” Feig told _The Daily Beast._ “This is stuff that is coming out of Kate! That’s why you connect with those characters. They’re playing versions of themselves. That’s what makes a comedic actor fantastic, when that personality comes out,” he said. “Why would you hire these people who have these enormous personalities and then just cut them off?” Read the full interview at [_The Daily Beast_](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/07/12/ghostbusters-director-paul-feig-on-the-film-s-misogynistic-trolls-it-s-not-for-all-these-guys.html) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/"},"headline":"Yep, Kate McKinnon's Ghostbusters Character Is Gay","datePublished":"2016-07-18T18:11:05.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:02:57.576Z","description":"Why be so coy about it, though?","url":"https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/","keywords":["motto","movies","celebrities","News","Ghostbusters"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt35bc4a1c91936dec/69889c4efb4eac635088e520/ghostbusters-paul-feig-mckinnon-gay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan Lasher","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-lasher/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt35bc4a1c91936dec/69889c4efb4eac635088e520/ghostbusters-paul-feig-mckinnon-gay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Celebrities On The Set Of Univision's \"Despierta America\"","caption":"Leslie Jones,Kate McKinnon,Kristen Wiig,Melissa McCarthy and Paul Feig on the set of Univisions \"Despierta America\" to support the film \"Ghostbusters\" at Univision Studios on July 11, 2016 in Miami, Florida.","creditText":"Gustavo Caballero—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/motto/","name":"motto"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4410357/ghostbusters-kate-mckinnon-paul-feig/","name":"Yep, Kate McKinnon's Ghostbusters Character Is Gay"}}]}] ```