‘House’ Star Takes Heat For Backing Sophie Cunningham

There is a slightly obnoxious bit of indie-snob pride that comes with saying it, but Hugh Laurie had a following long before “House” turned him into a household name in the United States.

For some American viewers, Laurie first showed up in the early 1990s through “Jeeves and Wooster,” the excellent British television adaptation of P.G. Wodehouse’s comic stories. The series, starring Laurie as the wealthy, cheerful, hopelessly oblivious Bertie Wooster and Stephen Fry as his brilliant valet Jeeves, aired on PBS in the United States at a time when Friday-night network television was often a wasteland.

For anyone living too far from civilization to have cable, it was one of the best things on television.

That made Laurie’s later transformation into Dr. Gregory House especially strange at first. Where had the polished English accent gone? More importantly, how could the same actor who played the harmlessly foolish Bertie Wooster so convincingly also play a bitter, sarcastic, misanthropic American doctor?

That range is part of what makes Laurie such a remarkable comic and dramatic performer. He can play absurdity, cruelty, charm, arrogance and vulnerability without seeming as though he is trying very hard.

Now Laurie has wandered into another role: participant in one of the nastiest cultural arguments around, the debate over transgender participation in women’s sports.

The exchange began after Laurie commented on the growing controversy surrounding men seeking entry into women’s professional basketball. He described the dispute with a dose of sarcasm, calling it a “broigus,” essentially a bitter and pointless feud.

Laurie also pointed to the unusual physical characteristics of elite male basketball players, noting how extraordinarily rare seven-foot-tall men are and how disproportionately likely such men are to end up in professional basketball.

That brought a sharp response from comedy writer Graham Linehan, best known for creating shows such as “Father Ted” and “The IT Crowd.” Linehan has become one of the entertainment industry’s most outspoken critics of gender ideology, and he challenged Laurie directly.

His question was simple: Did Laurie believe men should be allowed to compete in women’s sports?

Linehan accused Laurie of trying to avoid the real issue by treating the controversy as a silly feud. Laurie answered with characteristic bluntness, telling Linehan to go away in far less polite language before adding that no, he did not believe men should compete against women.

Linehan then pressed him again, asking why Laurie had reacted so angrily if they actually agreed. He urged Laurie to state clearly that he supported WNBA player Sophie Cunningham in her effort to defend women’s sports.

He said he supported Cunningham, while also telling Linehan that calling him a coward had earned the hostile response.

That probably should have ended the argument. Instead, it started another one.

Once Laurie made his position clear, critics immediately began attacking him online. The familiar accusations appeared: transphobia, bigotry, right-wing opportunism and even suggestions that Laurie had somehow drifted into MAGA politics.

That last accusation is especially strange given Laurie’s background. He is Cambridge-educated, has long been associated with the British political left, and spent a significant part of his early career working alongside Stephen Fry. Nothing about his public history fits the caricature of a conservative culture-war provocateur.

Yet that is part of what makes the reaction revealing.

Laurie did not suddenly become a right-wing activist. He did not issue some sweeping political manifesto. He simply said that men should not compete against women in women’s sports and that he supported Cunningham on that issue.

For some critics, that alone was enough.

The broader basketball controversy has become harder to dismiss as purely hypothetical. Several male players with professional basketball backgrounds have publicly declared an interest in entering the WNBA draft, forcing the league to confront questions that many people assumed had already been settled by the existence of separate men’s and women’s leagues in the first place.

The WNBA has reportedly considered how to address the issue, which only adds another layer of absurdity. A league created specifically for women now finds itself publicly debating what qualifies someone to compete in it.

Laurie’s disagreement with Linehan was therefore less substantial than their exchange initially suggested. Both men ultimately agreed on the central question. Their fight was mostly about tone, assumptions and whether Laurie had treated the controversy too casually.

Laurie arguably came away looking better simply because he refused to be bullied into saying something he was apparently already willing to say.

The more interesting part came afterward, when people who might normally admire Laurie suddenly turned on him because he crossed a political line they apparently considered unforgivable.

That reaction shows how rigid the debate over women’s sports remains in some political and cultural circles. Even a longtime figure of the British left can be treated as a reactionary the moment he says biological differences matter in athletic competition.

Perhaps that is the strangest part of the entire episode. Hugh Laurie has spent decades playing characters who say uncomfortable things with perfect timing. Now, by offering a straightforward opinion about women’s sports, he managed to provoke almost as much outrage as Gregory House ever did.

The Western Journal