#panthro

Concept art for Thundercats

Now if you are a ThunderCats fan, you'll know his voice if not his name or face, he was the voice of Panthro in the original ThunderCats.

For those of you who may not know, Earle Hyman was a closeted gay black and indigenous man.

Born in Jim Crow era North Carolina, his family moved to NYC to seek better education and pursue his love of theater in a part of the country less hobbled by prejudice. Aside from his most famous TV roles, Panthro and Russel Huxtable on the Cosby Show (latter for which he was Emmy-nominated!) He had a long and prestigious career as a Shakespearean actor. Particularly playing Othello, self-reportedly hundreds of times, among many other Shakespearean roles.

Eventually his career took him to Norway, the country became his second home, his second (and third, having learned both dialects) language, and the home country of origin for his partner, Rolf Sirnes, meeting him for the first time not in Norway but the U.S. in 1954.

The two fell in love and moved in together shortly after meeting, Earle Hyman would come to Norway nearly a decade later in 1963, where he met international acclaim and stardom. He and Sirnes had a cabin in Skånevik, Sunnhordland, Norway. A town where Sirnes had spent many a summer holiday as a child.

However, for the majority of their lives together, Earle Hyman and Rolf Sirnes would settle into an apartment in Manhattan, where Sirnes spent his retirement working in Greenwich Village.

The pair would not make the news of their relationship public until 2000, in order to protect Hyman's acting career, which was already hard fought. As he spent no small portion of it smashing various racial barriers and making history by playing roles such as Caliban, Horatio, Macbeth, and King Lear.

"We met in a Manhattan company. We were young and poor and found out we were going to share an apartment, and we still do! Life with Earle has been amazing, but also a roller coaster. Actors are a separate breed and it's not far from top to bottom. Norway is my country, but my heart belongs to New York." - Rolf Sirnes in an interview with Margaret Haavik (translated from Norwegian)

They would also come out to the world on the Norwegian TV Show "God kveld Norge!" (Good Evening Norway).

"I could never live without Rolf. He's the best I could get." (quote from Good Evening Norway translated from Norwegian)

Their nearly 50 year relationship would sadly come to a close when Rolf Sirnes passed away in 2004. He was buried in Haugesund, Norway.

Hyman would outlive his partner for another 13 years, passing away in 2017, his ashes are still in the keeping of his family. The obituary written for him by The New York Times makes no mention of Hyman's queerness or of his life partner Rolf Sirnes at all.

So the complete picture of Hyman's legacy and identity nearly fell into obscurity in the English speaking world were it not for more recent articles and attempts at properly archiving Hyman's life via the Folger Shakespeare Library's "Earle Hyman Collection" and the Henry Giardina article on Queerty about the history of Sirnes & Hyman's love.

Hyman left a mark on ThunderCats through his excellent portrayal of Panthro. Who, I would say is known to be by most fans, especially by fans of color, black-coded. Though that is it's own whole other post (and/or possible video essay in the future). Neither the showrunners of ThunderCats nor Hyman himself allowed the character to be pigeon-holed.

Some sketches of our favorite ginger king 👑🦁

And by the way the second part of “YOU CAN’T CURSE WHAT IS ALREADY CURSED” is almost done, but first I need to finish the last two pages.

Thundercats Redesign