ANDREW RANNELLS оп the Art of Unclehood

WHEN 10 NIECES AND NEPHEWS INTERSECT WITH ONE TV AND BROADWAY STAR, LESSONS ARE LEARNED, BONDS ARE FORMED, EXPLETIVES ARE SHOUTED AND A FUNNY @#$*% & ! BOOK IS WRITTEN

- JASON SHEELER

Don’t call him a “guncle.” For actor Andrew Rannells, the popular portmanteau for “gay” and “uncle” is unwelcome—and infantilizing. “I’m not a tangential character in my nieces’ and nephews’ lives, I’m their uncle,” he ways with a laugh. “And it’s a little cutesy. I’m a 44-year-old man.”

Rannells—known for his roles on TV (Girls, Black Monday) and Broadway (The Book of Mormon)—writes about his significant breadth of experience with the 10 children of his four siblings in his new book of humorous essays Uncle of the Year: And Other Debatable Triumphs. “I had this romanticized idea that when my brothers and sisters had kids that I would be the greatest uncle in the world,” he says. “And it didn’t really work out that way.” (He notes he now knows one cannot “call a child an a--hole.”)

Rannells also opens up about how the advancement of LGBTQ+ equality left him uncertain. “It’s very tricky now that we have the option to have kids,” he says. “It was the same thing with marriage. When that became possible, everyone was like, ‘You gonna get married?’ And I was like, ‘Well, I don’t know.’” He admits the interrogations left him reeling: “As my sister Natalie said to me very bluntly, ‘Yeah. Welcome to my world.’”

But when Rannells was in his late 30s, his friends began having children. “I had the luxury to think about it, to ask myself if I wanted kids,” he says. “And the answer was no. And it was scary. I felt like maybe I should have done something differently.” So he consulted his mom. “I asked her, ‘Were you always happy having children?’ And the answer was no,” he recalls, laughing.