[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BlogPosting","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/lance-bass-gay-wedding-show\/#BlogPosting","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/lance-bass-gay-wedding-show\/","headline":"All About That Bass: Lance Bass On His Big Fat Gay Televised Wedding","name":"All About That Bass: Lance Bass On His Big Fat Gay Televised Wedding","description":"\u201cIf we were straight, no, we would not be doing a wedding special at all,\u201d Lance Bass says. It\u2019s a week before the air date...","datePublished":"2015-02-03","dateModified":"2015-02-27","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/author\/yahoostyle\/#Person","name":"Yahoo Style","url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/author\/yahoostyle\/","identifier":2750,"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31612f000bc7ea00611ec9fcb4683e449f209266b86c40928f17ce2644044f61?s=96&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31612f000bc7ea00611ec9fcb4683e449f209266b86c40928f17ce2644044f61?s=96&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Equally Wed","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"http:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/equally-wed-lgbtq-weddings-logo.jpg","url":"http:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/equally-wed-lgbtq-weddings-logo.jpg","width":218,"height":60}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/lance-bass-michael-turchin.jpg","url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/lance-bass-michael-turchin.jpg","height":439,"width":568},"url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/lance-bass-gay-wedding-show\/","about":["Celebrities","Celebrity News","News","Planning"],"wordCount":1319,"keywords":["celebrities","David Yurman","gay","Lance Bass","media","Michael Turchin"],"articleBody":"\u201cIf we were straight, no, we would not be doing a wedding special at all,\u201d Lance Bass says. It\u2019s a week before the air date of \u201cLance Loves Michael: The Lance Bass Wedding\u201d on E! and the former \u2018NSYNC-er and his new husband, 27-year old artist Michael Turchin, are taking selfies and chatting on the twin swings by the pool of their house in Sherman Oaks, Calif. \u201cWhat I\u2019ve learned from being out is that it\u2019s all about visibility. I come from Mississippi and I know you don\u2019t change people’s minds until they get to know you and they get to witness what a gay person is like.\u201d Like so many milestones for LGBTQ visibility, the airing of a gay celebrity\u2019s wedding on a major network feels like it should have already happened, but hasn\u2019t.Bass and Turchin met at a party in Palm Springs in 2011, and sitting in the car on his way home, Turchin decided to send Bass a message on Facebook. The two hung out platonically for a month, both assuming the other had put them in the friend zone. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to be rejected by Lance Bass!\u201d Turchin says. The question of who made the first move is a long-standing dispute (\u201cYou leaned in,\u201d \u201cNo you leaned in\u201d) but Turchin says there\u2019s one consistent factor in the story: \u201cLiquid courage.\u201dThere were two proposals, both by Bass: one in New Orleans, and another a year later when the couple was on safari in South Africa, this time with a better ring\u2014rose gold with two stacked rows of black diamonds designed by David Yurman, who reached out to the couple after they went on a Twitter rant about a poor ring-shopping experience at Saks Fifth Avenue. The two originally planned to marry this summer, but when they learned they could capture it all in an E! special (and have the network foot the bill), they pushed the event up to December 20, at the Park Plaza Hotel in LA. \u201cI think people watching this on TV will see how normal and how like any other straight couple we are,\u201d Turchin says.What else makes these newlyweds just like any other couple? A shiny new Vera Wang Weddings picture fame on the shelf at home, still fitted with a stock photo of a white bouquet; a pile of un-mailed thank-yous fanned out on a countertop, filled with stock thanks: thank you so much for our beautiful china. We wish you could have been there to celebrate but we know you were there in spirit.Otherwise, of course, this is a new normal. Bass knows this and has learned to watch his words, especially when it comes to issues of identity. “I get in trouble for everything I say,” he says. “It\u2019s dissected not just by the straight community but by the gay community.” Rather than claim to be representing the queer community, Bass sees getting married on television as a way to reach and possibly ease the pain of young gay people in communities like Ellisville, Misissippi, where he grew up. “I want those little Lance Basses out there watching this TV special to feel like, \u2018Oh my gosh, there\u2019s nothing wrong with me,\u2019\u201d he says. \u201cI think this is what we were put on earth to do.”Raised in a conservative, Southern Baptist town, Bass couldn\u2019t imagine marrying a man, let alone a guy like Turchin. “When I was growing up I didn’t know any Jewish people, either.” (Turchin’s family is Jewish; he grew up in Miami.) “I didn’t think there were Jewish people living in the United States,” Bass says, matter-of-factly. The pair got married under a traditional Chuppah, and danced the Hora at the reception. There’s also video footage of Bass and former bandmate JC Chasez, who performed live for the couple’s first dance, doing another internationally recognizable set of moves at the wedding: the little jumps and chomp-chomp-chomp hand motions that go along to the \u2018NSYNC song “Bye Bye Bye.” (Justin Timberlake did not partake in the festivities\u2014he was on tour.)Turchin, who classifies his art as \u201cpop\u201d (Turchin\u2019s portraits of Pee Wee Herman, Popeye, and Bugs Bunny line the entryway of their house) and Bass agree on a word to describe their wedding: \u201cpop-tastic.\u201d The wedding planning was swift and easygoing, apart from a disagreement about the cake (spoiler alert: Turchin wins; their cake featured the two grooms\u2019 faces). But during the E! special, celebrity wedding planner Sharon Sacks and Bass exchange a concern-filled gaze when they talk about who will walk down the aisle first. Without the default of gender, the decision falls to the couple, but speaking to them now, it seems the questions were mostly raised for the benefit of the cameras. \u201cNeither of us will be wearing a wedding dress,\u201d Bass says. \u201cThat\u2019s the number one question [we get]: Who is wearing the dress? It\u2019s not even a joke, half of people are not even joking. That shows you how far we have to go with people\u2019s ignorance about the gay community.\u201dThe couple did, however, opt to give viewers a white dress\u2014three, in fact, worn by model friends Anne Marie Kortright, Allie Rizzo and Julie Henderson, who walked down the aisle before Turchin and Bass. “That was bringing in the gay element,\u201d Turchin says. \u201cWe gave them women in white dresses!\u201dThere are some other things that Bass, who came out on the cover of People magazine in 2006 and subsequently released a memoir called Out of Sync about his struggles in the closet, would like to clarify. When asked which misconceptions about \u201cbeing gay\u201d he\u2019d like to never address again (if people would stop asking), he says: \u201cThere\u2019s so much gray area in between everything. You know, a straight person is not completely straight, a gay person is not completely gay; there\u2019s all this gray area. And I just wish people would understand that. Nothing is black and white. Nothing is black and white.\u201dAlso, for the record, sex is just sex. \u201cEveryone is so interested in gay sex!\u201d Bass says. \u201cIt\u2019s like, \u2018Well guys, it\u2019s not too far off from your regular hetero sex.\u2019\u201d Turchin quickly agrees. \u201cI\u2019m not gonna ask you about your sex life and what you like to do. Why is it such a casual question?\u201d\u201cAnd we like sports! Imagine that!\u201d Turchin adds. In fact, he and Bass plan to host a public viewing party of the E! special at Boxers in New York\u2019s Chelsea neighborhood. \u201cIt\u2019s a gay sports bar,\u201d the couple says together. \u201cWhich is perfect for us.\u201d After the premiere, they will fly down to Fort Lauderdale, and Bass will officiate a mass wedding for 100 couples of various orientations as part of a \u201cLove is Love\u201d event sponsored by the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau to celebrate the recent legalization of gay marriage in Florida.Following that, the only question that remains is where they will honeymoon\u2014as it turns out, Fort Launderdale is only three hours from Cape Canaveral. Asked whether he\u2019d consider outer space as a destination (in 2002, Bass was certified by NASA and the Russian Space Program for a journey that infamously never came to pass), the former boy bander\u2019s eyes light up. \u201cYou have eight months, start now!\u201d Bass says to Turchin, referring to the training regimen. His husband gets excited: \u201cYes! Let\u2019s go to the moon!\u201d \u201cNo one\u2019s really been to the moon in a long time,\u201d Bass says. \u201cYeah, but it\u2019s a honeymoon, on the moon.\u201d Pop-tastic.This article was first published on Yahoo.com and is published on Equally Wed with Yahoo’s explicit written permission.Photos by Jessica Sample for Yahoo Style"},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"All About That Bass: Lance Bass On His Big Fat Gay Televised Wedding","item":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/lance-bass-gay-wedding-show\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]