My father thought I was gay: Michael Caine

London: Academy Award-winning actor Michael Caine says his father thought he was gay when he told him that he wants to be an actor.

He said: "My dad was a Billingsgate fish market porter. When I told him that I was going to be an actor, he never said a word but I saw his face and thought, he thinks I`m gay. The theatre in those days was very gay. But I wasn`t." Caine won supporting actor Oscar in 1986 for ‘Hannah and Her Sisters’ and later in 1999 for ‘The Cider House Rules’. The 80-year-old actor also admitted that he was very shy as a kid and avoided talking to anyone. "I was the shyest child. If strangers came into the house, I`d hide behind the curtains and wouldn`t come out until they`d gone," contactmusic.com quoted the actor as saying. The ‘Inception’ star has since gained a tremendous amount of self-belief and credits his upbringing for helping him turn into the successful actor he is today. He said: "My three great achievements with which I had absolutely nothing to do are that I was born an Englishman, a Londoner and a Cockney." IANS