The writer and director of 'Boy Erased' Joel Edgerton sits down with Tara Brady of the Irish Times to talk about gay conversion treatment and how parents can "send a child off to this horrible place". The second feature from actor-turned-director Joel Edgerton is an effective, starry adaptation of Garrard Conley’s gay conversion memoir, Boy Erased. There are larger tragedies as the college boy he has a crush on (Joe Alwyn) sexually assaults him. The presence of various prominent gay celebrities among the “patients” – including actor-auteur Xavier Dolan and singer Troye Sivan – adds to the sense of tragedy. Where Desiree Akhavan’s recent gay conversion drama The Miseducation of Cameron Post emphasised the absurdity of the process and the adults involved, Boy Erased is careful to humanise Jared’s parents as loving, but wrongheaded.

Source: The Irish Times February 08, 2019 04:52 UTC