Ripley spoilers follow.
Tom Ripley, aka The Talented Mr Ripley, is a chameleon of sorts – a scam artist who shifts and changes according to the grift at hand, not to mention his own dark impulses.
No one knows the real Ripley, including Tom himself, and the same can be said for each version of him on different media. Whether it be Anthony Minghella's 1999 movie, René Clément's Plein Soleil from 1960, or Steven Zaillian's new Ripley series for Netflix, Patricia Highsmith's original book is ripe for onscreen reimagination, shifting and changing like Ripley himself depending on who's involved.
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One thing we do know though is that regardless of who's writing him or who's playing him, Ripley is queer. He always has been and always will be, regardless of how that queerness is labelled or whether that intention was even there or not. And yes, Barry Pepper's Ripley still counts in Ripley Under Ground, although the less said about that film in general, the better.
Tom's latest incarnation, Zaillian's Ripley, understands this better than perhaps any version has since Matt Damon asked Jude Law if he could get in the bathtub with him twenty-five years ago. And not just because the new series stars Andrew Scott, the first out gay man to play Ripley with some much-needed authenticity.
The homoeroticism of 1999's The Talented Mr Ripley was palpable, especially for queer audiences at the time, but harmful tropes that demonised gay characters were particularly prevalent back then, so there was still some reluctance to make the subtextual gay horniness actual text.
Ripley himself is usually closeted anyhow and actively resents this side of himself, so it's easier to bury these notions with a character who perceives himself in that way.
But Zaillian's Ripley has been made in a different era at a time when queer representation is far more varied and inclusive than it's ever been before. With so many more positive LGBTQ+ characters visible these days, there's now more scope for morally dubious queers to be gay and do crime without fear of moralising or hand-wringing over what it means to be evil and queer on screen.
That's even true when said crimes are inextricably wrapped up in homosexual desire.
The obsession Scott's Ripley develops for Dickie Greenleaf, the man he was hired to bring back to America, is given more space to breathe across these eight episodes compared to a regular movie runtime, delving deeper into the spoken and unspoken elements of queerness that pervaded the original text.
Literally reading between the lines, the sexuality of Tom's new incarnation is actively referred to by characters within the story this time around, even if Ripley himself doesn't want to hear it.
To be fair, anyone with eyes can see it, but it's unusual for these discussions to revolve so openly around Ripley. But by the end of episode two, it becomes very clear why the conversations are taking place.
Tom is already obsessed with being – and being with – Dickie at this point, an experience many queer men might relate to, although not to this psychopathic extreme, of course. The episode ends with Dickie walking in on Tom parading around his room, wearing Dickie's clothes while having imaginary conversations as Dickie himself.
Afterwards, Greenleaf confronts Tom, but he's not angry per se. Instead, he chooses this opportunity to flat out deny his own queerness, which is an interesting response, to say the least.
"I'm not queer," Dickie says with the speed of someone who absolutely is — or is at least someone who's worried about what Ripley's own queerness might mean for him. Marge had already clocked Ripley as queer, says Dickie, yet that begs the question: why has Dickie not kicked Tom out already if that's a problem? And why does he still let Ripley stay now after his feelings for Dickie have become so obvious, and worrying, even?
Tom argues that Marge is jealous of them and the time they spend together. He's willing to leave though, he says, refusing to get in the way of their relationship.
Still, Dickie tells Ripley to stay at first, proving that this infatuation is clearly not one-sided. This is the 1960s, after all. Any purely straight man (if such a thing exists) would have been unsettled by what's unfolding, but not Dickie. Or if he was, there was also something else pulling him in regardless.
Andrew Scott is unbearably hot, yes, that's true, but there's also a charm to the Ripley character that beguiles Greenleaf and ultimately proves to be his undoing. Because when he starts to change his mind and distance himself from Ripley as the lies all unravel, this rejection proves to be too much.
As he does in the book and film adaptations that followed, Tom ends up killing Dickie out on the ocean in a boat far away from the prying eyes of others. If Ripley can't have Dickie, then the sea can.
This happens earlier on than fans of the material might expect, but queerness is as integral to the show as it is to Ripley himself, so that's not just done away with by the end of episode three.
Non-binary actor Eliot Sumner enters the fray soon after in the role of Freddie Miles, a friend of Dickie's who's growing more and more suspicious of Tom. When they get too close to the truth behind Greenleaf's disappearance, Ripley does what Ripley does best and smashes them over the head with a glass ornament.
What's erotic about this is not the murder itself, of course, but the perverse way Ripley deals with the body after. As an alibi, Tom pries open Freddie's dead mouth with his fingers and pours alcohol in so drink can be blamed. And later, Ripley is forced to make out with the corpse when someone almost spots him carrying Freddie through the streets at night, hoping that eyewitnesses will think they're just a young drunk couple in love.
Tom isn't attracted to Freddie, especially not in the way he was — and still is — to Dickie, but this is just the beginning of how death and queerness become intertwined for Ripley and Ripley too.
As the police start to close in on the truth, Tom grows more unhinged and detached from reality, to the point where Dickie's ghost appears to him more than once, as do visions of the moment his beloved was killed by his own hands at sea.
To be gay is to know death more intimately than others, be it through the fear of AIDS and violence or, in this case, the so-called death of Ripley himself as he transforms into Dickie and becomes — in his eyes — the man he's always supposed to be.
Usually, a queer character finding comfort in their identity and accepting who they are would be cause for celebration, but in Ripley's case, he's actively choosing to become someone else entirely, all while remaining deeply trapped in the closet.
The sheer willpower it takes to deny reality so fiercely is almost impressive, if not terrifying, and in the final episode of the series, this all comes full circle as Ripley explains to the detective that it was Dickie who loved him, not the other way round.
There was almost certainly some kind of attraction or at least infatuation there, although the confession of love that Ripley describes did not happen that way, and if the detective knew Tom at all, he'd know that Ripley would have never rejected Dickie's advances, not for a second.
But tormented by the pain of that rejection on the boat, not to mention the "accident" that followed, Ripley now lives in a fantasy world where he was the one who rejected Dickie, who told him that his queer advances were "pathetic".
Ripley's ability to shift between multiple personas has long been interpreted as a metaphor for closeted people who are forced to hide their true selves (remember the fractured mirror at the end of Minghella's film?), but here, Scott's version of Tom takes this one step further by externalising his own self-hatred in a sad, almost pitiable way.
With the queerness no longer just coded or subtext, our newest Ripley is the one that's most true to the essence of this character, a man whose every impulse is driven — at least in part — by his own tortured navigation of life as a struggling queer person in the 1960s.
That's not us defending his abhorrent actions or suggesting in any way that suppressed queerness leads to psychosis, but the desires Ripley experiences are integral to his character nonetheless.
Now, we know what you're thinking. Patricia Highsmith herself once told Sight and Sound that she doesn't think Ripley is gay (contrary to *gestures wildly at everything about Ripley*):
"He appreciates good looks in other men, that's true," she said. "But he’s married in later books. I’m not saying he’s very strong in the sex department. But he makes it in bed with his wife."
But the words "I don't think Ripley is gay" are not the same as an outright denial, and him bedding his wife also doesn't rule out queerness when bisexuality exists, hello? Plus, Highsmith's friend Phyllis Nagy (who scripted the Highsmith adaptation Carol), has suggested in multiple interviews that Patricia did allow for the possibility of him being queer in some fashion (here and here, for example).
Regardless, the subtext has always been there, even in the original book. Just because a creator doesn't intend for their writing to be queer doesn't mean it can't resonate with LGBTQ+ readers and audiences, which is especially curious given that Highsmith herself was actually a lesbian.
But that's the beauty of Ripley, Andrew Scott's gorgeous face aside. Because he's the kind of character who shifts and adapts, not just himself within the story, but also as a wider concept beyond any one particular retelling.
And whether Highsmith thinks Tom is queer or not, she's always been open to Ripley being reinterpreted by others on screen, as she once told Sight and Sound:
"Really, I don’t mind too much if they take liberties with my plots, because they’re trying to do something quite different from a book, and I think they have a right to change the story as much as they wish."
Although it's perhaps fairer to say that Netflix's new Ripley show hasn't really taken any liberties with the character at all. Rather, this is Tom Ripley at his most dangerous and seductive, and most crucially of all, his most authentic self.
Ripley is now available to stream on Netflix.
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After teaching in England and South Korea, David turned to writing in Germany, where he covered everything from superhero movies to the Berlin Film Festival.
In 2019, David moved to London to join Digital Spy, where he could indulge his love of comics, horror and LGBTQ+ storytelling as Deputy TV Editor, and later, as Acting TV Editor.
David has spoken on numerous LGBTQ+ panels to discuss queer representation and in 2020, he created the Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates LGBTQ+ talent on both sides of the camera via video content and longform reads.
Beyond that, David has interviewed all your faves, including Henry Cavill, Pedro Pascal, Olivia Colman, Patrick Stewart, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Dornan, Regina King, and more — not to mention countless Drag Race legends.
As a freelance entertainment journalist, David has bylines across a range of publications including Empire Online, Radio Times, INTO, Highsnobiety, Den of Geek, The Digital Fix and Sight & Sound.
