Stanley Tucci has defended straight actors taking up homosexual roles, saying an actor's job is "to play different people".

The 62-year-old, who has starred in blockbusters together with The Hunger Games and The Devil Wears Prada, just lately performed Colin Firth's on-screen accomplice in Supernova.

"Obviously I believe that's fine," Tucci mentioned about straight actors taking part in homosexual characters.

"I'm always very flattered when gay men come up to me and talk about The Devil Wears Prada or when they talk about Supernova, and they say 'It was just so beautiful, you did it the right way' - because often it's not done the right way."

He added: "I actually do imagine that an actor is an actor is an actor.

"You're supposed to play different people. You just are. That's the whole point of it."

Tucci weighed in on the controversy on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, the place he was interviewed by Lauren Laverne about his life and profession.

He additionally spoke of appearing as an "escape", notably following the loss of life of his first spouse, Kathryn (Kate) Spath, in 2009 from breast most cancers.

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He mentioned: "It's a way of controlling time and emotion and space, because we have no control over any of that in our lives and that's what theatre does, that's what film-making does.

"I really feel a lot safer on stage than I do in my actual life. Sometimes strolling right into a cocktail celebration or a cocktail party I get very nervous."

Tucci said he did not work for a almost a year after Kate's death, adding: "You by no means actually recover from it."

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The actor, who now lives in London together with his second spouse, Felicity Blunt, spoke concerning the doubts he had courting the sister of his The Devil Wears Prada co-star Emily Blunt, who was greater than twenty years youthful than him.

"I was kind of afraid of getting into a relationship and I kept trying to break it off because I am 21 years older than she is and I didn't want to feel old but I knew this was an incredibly special person," he mentioned.

"If anybody made things better for all of us, it is her. She's the one."