Nathan Lane Reflects on His Mom's Heartbreaking Response When He Came Out as Gay

Nathan Lane is opening up about his mother's devastating reaction when he came out to her as gay.

Lane shared his coming out story on The Howard Stern Show on Tuesday, April 21.

"I didn't want to tell her, but before I left, we had been through so much together and, you know, I had never lied to her, and so I sat her down and said, 'Look, I know you think I've been seeing a girl, but actually, I've been seeing a guy," he said.

Lane recalled, "She said, 'You mean you're a homosexual?' And I had never heard it put that way. And I said, 'Yeah, I guess so.' And she didn't say it in a vindictive or angry way. She said it with a sort of sadness, 'I would rather you were dead.'"

Lane reflected on this experience, telling Stern, "You have to understand this is another generation. And that was, you know, this was not a sophisticated person in that way."

He then shared how he had begged his mother not to tell his brothers because he wanted to find the right time to tell them himself.

"And then she immediately called them and told them. So I had to deal with that," Lane said. "And so my brother Dan, you know, was a teacher, and we had a long walk and talk and he was very understanding, and yet I think he felt probably in some way that he had failed me. You know, he did ask the typical question of 'Do you think it's maybe just a phase?' And I said, 'No I don't think it's a phase.'"

Lane came out publicly in 1999 three years after he starred in The Birdcage alongside Robin Williams.

Copyright 2026 The Arena Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved

This story was originally published April 21, 2026 at 6:46 PM.