Good Trouble’s Tommy Martinez: ‘There’s not a f**ing problem’ with bisexuality
Actor Tommy Martinez plays bisexual character Gael Martinez in Freeform’s Good Trouble. (LISA O’CONNOR/ AFP/Getty Images)
Actor Tommy Martinez has no problem with bisexuality, and wishes other people didn’t, either.
Martinez, who is not bisexual, plays bisexual character Gael Martinez in Freeform’s Good Trouble and recently told MTV that his role provided a “teachable moment” for his family, who moved from Venezuela to Florida when he was four years old.
He said his family asked about playing a bisexual character when he went home for the holiday.
“I was like: ‘It’s fine. It’s fun. There’s nothing bad about it.’ It’s just two humans who are attracted, or are intimate with one another. What’s the problem with that? There’s not a f**king problem with that. Sorry for my language,” he recalled in an interview with MTV published on Tuesday (March 26).
“I feel really good about this character because it’s helping my family to understand that people live different lives.”
— Tommy Martinez
He added: “Some of my other family members questioned if I was really into the guy that I make out with on screen. I used it a teachable moment, where I wanted it to be known that if I did [enjoy it] that it shouldn’t be a problem. I feel really good about this character because it’s helping my family to understand that people live different lives.”
Tommy Martinez explains why he openly discussed his same-sex experience
The 26-year-old actor, who previously starred in CW’s Riverdale, made headlines earlier this month, when it emerged he opened up about a same-sex experience he had as a teenager. Speaking to journalist during a promotional event in January, he said: “I had an experience with a man maybe 10 years ago, and this is the first time that I’m saying that publicly.”
Martinez told MTV he wanted to share that experience publicly because of the treatment he witnessed one of his family members receive for having a same-sex experience.
He said: “He was kind of being made fun of for it, and he had a melt down while we were on this vacation. I had never seen him like that before, and it fucking broke my heart.
“You think if you just had an experience with a man, then you’re either gay or you’re bisexual. Same thing with some of the articles that came out after that panel. It was like, ‘A bisexual [actor] representing a bisexual,’ and that wasn’t the case at all,” he continued, explaining: “I just felt compelled to say it because that family member was still in my mind, and I felt like I needed to, and I wanted to.”
Martinez is currently dating The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina actor Adeline Rudolph (Rodin Eckenroth/Getty)
Martinez said that playing Gael has also taught him more about the stigma bisexual people face within the LGBT+ community.
“That’s upsetting to me because it’s like you are working against the very same things that you are fighting for. There’s still so much work to be done and to tell these kinds of stories,” he said.
Martinez is currently dating fellow actor Adeline Rudolph, who is best known for playing witch Agatha in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Good Trouble is a spin-off of drama series The Fosters, which ran from 2013 to 2018.
Good Trouble follows sisters Mariana Adams Foster (Cierra Ramirez) and Callie Adams Foster (Maia Mitchell), who have just moved from their mothers’ house in San Diego to start anew in Los Angeles. While there, the latter embarks on a romantic relationship with Martinez’s character Gael, an artist who is proudly bisexual.
