COMING OUT

Lance Bass Reveals Awkward Way NSYNC Member Learned He Is Gay

“I knew he wouldn’t care, but it was just so nice to hear those words,” Bass said.

Lance Bass has revealed how fellow NSYNC member Joey Fatone found out he was gay. “I was at my computer, and my boyfriend at the time − my very, very first boyfriend − was sitting on my lap,” Bass, now 46, recalled in a clip from Fatone’s new docuseries, Boy Band Confidential. After a night out, the NSYNC boys returned to Bass’s home. At 3 a.m., Fatone woke up and, while looking for Bass, stumbled upon him in an awkward position. “He’s sitting there, and there’s a guy straddling (him) on top of him,” Fatone, now 49, described the scene. “I was like, ‘Surprise,’” Bass said. “He’s like, ‘Oh, please. I don’t care.’” It was a huge relief for Bass, who hadn’t yet told anyone in the band about his sexuality. “I knew he wouldn’t care, but it was just so nice to hear those words,” Bass said. Fatone kept the information to himself after the reveal, and Bass later came out publicly in 2006 in People Magazine. Bass married Michael Turchin in 2014, and the couple has two children.