Billy Eichner Recalls the Moment He Was Told He Was ‘Too Gay’ to Be on TV: ‘We Don’t Know What to Do With You’

Comedian Billy Eichner is opening up about the challenges he faced early on in his acting career.

Eichner was a guest on the Sunday episode of Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend where he talked about his career, his popular show Billy on the Street, and new movie, Bros.

Bros is slated to be the first gay romcom created by a major studio, set to release at the end of September.

At one point during the conversation, Eichner discussed how being “too gay” was previously used as an excuse by executives to not hire him for television shows.

“I had a live stage show that I did in New York, which is where the Billy on the Street videos started. I would show those videos on a screen. This is before YouTube even existed. This is like 2004, 2005,” he began.

“But then an interesting thing happened where a lot of folks in the industry would come and they would acknowledge that I was talented or that they thought I was funny — that the audience was laughing a lot, that I was unique and this, that, and the other thing, but it was always, you know, ‘We don’t know what to do with you. You’re very New York,'” Eichner recalled.

He said despite their explanations, it was really meant to send the actor a message that he was “too gay.”

“And a lot of times in both overt ways and subtle ways, I was sent the message that I was just too gay. I was being openly gay on stage. I was talking about gay sex,” Eichner added, “Now everyone’s talking about gay sex. But this is 2003. Right?”

“This is back when you were losing roles to dinosaurs,’ O’Brien joked.

“Dinosaurs were fucking on screen, but I wasn’t allowed too,” Eichner laughed.

As the conversation continued, Eichner recalled the moment everything changed by going viral online.

“So that message was sent to me many times, but then what happened was the internet came along and I put my videos online. And after a little while they went viral and very viral,” he added.

“I was able to point to all of those people in the industry and say, ‘Hey, I’m not too this or too that. This video has millions of views. These views aren’t coming exclusively from gay people, watching in New York City. Look at the comments they’re coming from all over the country and all over the world,'” Eichner said.

“That’s when they finally put me on TV. I needed those numbers to point to and say, ‘Hey, I have proof that I am not this little niche thing that you assume I am because I’m gay,'” he concluded.

Listen above via Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend.