Joel Grey, stage actor, comes out as gay at 82

NEW YORK, Jan. 29 (UPI) -- Screen and stage actor Joel Grey publicly came out as gay on Wednesday.

The 82-year-old star, who earned an Oscar for playing the Master of Ceremonies in the 1972 film Cabaret, says in the new issue of People magazine that he "doesn't like labels, but if you have to put a label on it, I'm a gay man."

While Grey hasn't been keeping his homosexuality a secret from friends and family, he's never addressed it publicly.

"All the people close to me have known for years who I am," said the actor. "[Yet] it took time to embrace that other part of who I always was."

Grey says he realized he was attracted to both girls and boys while growing up in Ohio as the son of actor Mickey Katz and called his 24-year marriage to actress Jo Wilder "the happiest [period] of his life."

Grey had two children with Wilder: Jennifer and James Grey.

"I feel very happy for my dad that he has come to a point in his life where he feels safe and comfortable enough to declare himself in a public way as a gay man," Jennifer told the magazine.

Grey last starred in a 2014 episode of television's CSI and has published a few photography books throughout his life.