Love, Simon deleted scenes see Colton Haynes flirt with Nick Robinson in a gay bar
To coincide with the home entertainment release of Love, Simon in the US, 20th Century Fox has released a couple of deleted scenes from the movie.
The clips see Nick Robinson’s titular protagonist go to a gay bar for the first time.
In one of the scenes, Simon’s best friend Nick (Jorge Lendeborg Jr) drags him on a night out, but refuses to tell Simon where the pair are going.Â
As they approach their destination, Simon sees that Nick plans to have them enjoy the night at the Atlanta Eagle and feeling out of place given the leather-clad men walking around, immediately tries turns around to go home.
Turns out, even the promise of “kick-ass ribs” and the reassurance that “the place had great reviews on Yelp,” wasn’t enough to encourage teenage Simon to venture into the Eagle.Â
Fortunately, the club’s doorman comes to his aid by suggesting that their “twink” selves check out the slightly tamer bar next door.Â
Another deleted scene continues to depict the characters’ evening as it shows them dancing – and Nick boasting about how many men are checking him out – when Simon is approached by an older guy played by American Horror Story: Cult star Colton Haynes.
Mistaking him for an acquaintance named Alex, Haynes’ character Kevin explains that he got confused as Simon as the same hair as his friend.Â
He then responds to Simon’s question as to whether that’s a good or a bad thing by saying that Alex’s hair is the only good thing about Alex and asking whether Simon wants to dance.
Encouraged by Nick, Simon joins the flirtatious stranger on the dance floor but when Kevin asks a waiter to bring them shots and the 17-year-old is asked to provide some ID, their meet-cute is cut short and he and Nick are chucked out of the bar.
Despite it being a super sweet scene, Haynes, who is also known for starring in supernatural television show Teen Wolf, didn’t make it into the final cut unfortunately. But if he had he would have been the second actor in the film that has previously worked with director Greg Berlanti.
Both Haynes and Keiynan Lonsdale, who plays Bram in the film, have been series regulars throughout Berlanti’s Arrowverse for years now. The former starring in Arrow and the latter, appearing mostly in The Flash and more recently, Legends of Tomorrow.
Speaking about why the scene was cut, Berlanti previously told Gay Star News: “It just played as it wasn’t his character.It just slowed down the narrative. It felt like we were jumping the gun about what his experience was.”
The film’s co-writer Isaac Aptaker also explained to The Hollywood Reporter that while “the guys were great” in the scene, “it messed up the pacing and the momentum of the movie” so it had to be ditched.
Well, at least we can watch it now…