Stranger Things star Noah Schnapp and friends poke fun at his own coming out – and it’s hilarious
Noah Schnapp made a TikTok video with his friends making fun of the fact his coming out made global news. (Getty)
Stranger Things star Noah Schnapp took to TikTok with his friends to make light of the fact that his coming out made global news, and it’s really funny.
Schnapp gained recognition for playing Will Byers in the Netflix sci-fi, horror series. The actor shared in a TikTok video that he is gay, joking he’s more similar to his on-screen character than he previously thought.
The 18-year-old’s coming out video quickly made headlines around the world as Stranger Things fans took joy in Schnapp living as his authentic self.
Schnapp and his friends hopped on the trending ‘fake celebrity deaths’ prank that’s been gaining popularity on TikTok and decided it would be the perfect opportunity to laugh at the news.
The prank does literally what it says on the tin with people pretending to read headlines that a celebrity suddenly passed away before capturing others’ shocked reactions.
In the video, shared by user @meltyiceycubey, a group of teens, including Schnapp, parodied the prank.
One teen looked at a phone before yelling: “Oh my God, guys, guys, guys! Noah Schnapp gay at 18!”
The camera panned across the room to catch the group’s exaggerated reactions before finally landing on Schnapp himself as he yelled “Oh my God!” in faux shock.
TikToker users loved the video, which has well over 7 million views and almost 2 million likes as of Sunday (8 January) afternoon.
“The Noah Schnapp multiverse,” one social media universe quipped.
Another jokingly asked: “Who’s 2023 bingo card was this on?”
A third TikToker user commented this was “exactly how I and the whole fandom reacted” when Schnapp came out.
Schnapp came out to fans on Thursday (5 January) in a TikTok video recounting the moment he finally told his loved ones he was gay.
In text placed over the video, Schnapp wrote: “When I finally told my friends and family I was gay after being scared in the closet for 18 years and all they said was ‘we know’.”
The actor smiled in the video as he lip-synced to a voiceover that says, “You know what it never was? That serious. It was never that serious. Quite frankly, it will never be that serious.”
Underneath the video, Schnapp captioned the post: “I guess I’m more similar to Will than I thought.”
The news came after Schnapp confirmed speculation that his character is gay and in love with his friend, Mike Wheeler (Finn Wolfhard). Schnapp told Variety it’s “100 per cent clear that [Will] is gay” and his character had been struggling with his feelings throughout the show – a feeling that many Stranger Things fans picked up on.
While the reaction to Schnapp’s coming out has been overwhelmingly positive, some Stranger Things fans have slammed the resurgence of meme’s falsely claiming that his co-star Millie Bobby Brown is homophobic.
The cruel meme, which first emerged in 2017, eventually led to Brown, 18, quitting Twitter in 2018.
