Автор: Katherine Monk

TORONTO—Ask Cillian Murphy if this is the year that bears witness to the emancipation of the gay male kiss on-screen, and the Irish actor's ice-blue eyes glaze over into a blank saucer stare.

"There's no sex in this movie," says Murphy of his role in Breakfast on Pluto, director Neil Jordan's latest about a young, male transvestite coming out in the midst of the Troubles. Murphy plays Patrick "Kitten" Brady (sic), a kid abandoned at birth who spends the rest of his life fantasizing about his biological mother and father as well as finding one true love to call his own.

For a brief moment, Kitten does find love and support in the lead singer of a rock band, but things fall apart when the peace-loving Kitten throws away a secret stash of IRA weapons.

Though Kitten and the rocker are never pictured in any state of carnal union, there is touching, nuzzling, and even kissing, and in a festival season marked by watershed films such as Brokeback Mountain a.k.a. "The Gay Gone With the Wind", Breakfast on Pluto could be seen as part of a larger shift taking place in popular culture.

"I don't think you can ever comment on whether anything is part of a collective shift," says Murphy, whose first name is pronounced with a hard "C" as in "Kill-ian."

"Whether there's a comparison to be made between Brokeback Mountain and Breakfast on Pluto isn't for me to say. I haven't seen Brokeback Mountain, and I'm not a spokesman for anybody. I'm just an artist trying to tell a story."

Murphy has been telling plenty of stories of late. Since catching the eye of the North American public in the high-brow zombie movie 28 Days Later..., Murphy has been cast in such A-list dramas as Cold Mountain and Girl With a Pearl Earring, as well as setting a new standard for villainous evil in Batman Begins and Red Eye.

"I've discovered that acting is the biggest thrill I get," says the 29-year-old. "It's the best form of self-expression I've been able to find, and one that gives me the chance to work with people I admire."

Murphy includes his recent work with Jordan as a high point. He also puts Batman director Chris Nolan and Red Eye director Wes Craven on his list, as he does director Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland the two responsible for 28 Days Later..., as well as the forthcoming, as yet untitled, Sunshine project.

"The actor-director relationship has to be give and take. Without an exchange, it gets awfully boring and you lose faith in the project. The beauty of working with Neil is he creates a whole environment for your character to romp around in. It's a very free atmosphere and that works well, because finally, every actor has to trust the director implicitly."

Murphy says he does a lot of work on building character in his own mind, then brings his very best work to the set every day regardless of whether he's playing the peach-faced suitor to an artist's model, a happy-go-lucky cross-dressing gay man, or a cold-blooded villain such as the Scarecrow or Jackson Rippner.

"What playing Scarecrow taught me was that anyone can evoke fear. Even in a soft performance, you can make it scary movies can do that."

Murphy says Neil Jordan movies are just a little bit different than most because they twist and turn in unpredictable ways. "Yet, they speak for themselves. They are all complete in their own way, and as an actor working in a Neil Jordan movie, trust becomes even more important because so much of it is Neil's vision."

That said, Breakfast on Pluto is a near encyclopedic landscape of the western world during the 1970s as free love, feminism, gay rights, the sexual revolution, the advent of urban terrorism, and the decline of religion all play a role in Kitten's evolution.

"Kitten is a beautiful misfit. I'd like to avoid the word 'camp' in this because I think it takes something away from who Kitten is. The character is an enigma yet there are certain threads that run all the way through the course of the film, and those are Kitten's qualities: She loves easily, she trusts easily, but ultimately, people take advantage of her and that's her tragedy."

Murphy says he tries not to think too much about the types of parts he plays. "My only rule is diversity. I try to mix it up as much as possible. I think that's a good thing to do because it stops you from being too judgmental about characters," he says.

"The more characters you allow to inhabit you, the more you learn about your own psyche and that's actually quite liberating. I have more in common with Kitten than I do with Rippner, but with a little digging, you can make a little room in your soul for anyone."