NYSocBoy's Beefcake and Bonding

When I was living in West Hollywood, my mother called every Saturday morning and asked "How many movie stars have you met this week?" Like most people who have never been to Los Angeles, she thought that about 30% of the population consisted of celebrities, so you would run into them everywhere, at the French Quarter, at the laundromat, at the gym.

There were a lot of professional actors around. But most were famous only to their fans: "Look, there's Greg Rikaart, who plays Kevin Fisher on The Young and the Restless!"

Or not actually famous at all: "Look, there's David Greenan, who starred in the low-budget horror movie Silent Madness!"

And if you did see a really famous person, you probably wouldn't recognize them. They look different in real life.

But I have managed to meet about 20 celebrities. Usually just a fleeting conversation. Once in a while, a friendship. Twice, a relationship (or at least a few dates.)

Everybody in West Hollywood has dated (or claims to have dated) at least one celebrity. I'm claiming two, although one of them was just a hookup. Can you figure out which two:

1. Michael J. Fox, star of Family Ties.

2. Scott Valentine, who played Mallory's boyfriend on Family Ties.

3. Robin Williams.

4. Richard Chamberlain. He tried to steal my date one night at Mugi.

5-6. Lou Ferrigno and Bill Bixby. Well, at least I saw them once, in the office of Muscle and Fitness. Unfortunately, they were fully clothed.

7. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Ditto.

8. Bodybuilder turned opera buff Ed Stroll.

9. Ernest Thomas, star of What's Happening.

10. Adam West, TV's Batman.

11. David Cameron, whose mother wrote the children's classic The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet.

12. Teen idol Peter Barton. The less said about him, the better.

13. Nate Richert, star of Sabrina the Teenage Witch. We met at the Gold Coast, but I didn't know who he was. Until later.

14. Jeff MacKay, who starred in Tales of the Gold Monkey, the cutest of the lot. But not with that silly Castro Clone moustache.

15. Douglas Barr, who starred in Designing Women. He was one of Peter Barton's friends.

16. John Amos, who starred in Good Times and played the older Kunta Kinte in Roots. I often saw him at the gym, once in the shower. His physique was amazing.

17. Jimmie Walker, star of Good Times. Obnoxious.

18. Richard Dreyfuss, a fellow fan of the paranormal, met browsing at the Bodhi Tree. One day we got coffee, and I tried to subtly determine if he was gay or not.

19. Heartthrob and Batman star Cesar Romero. He sold me a love seat.

20. Tom Wopat, star of Dukes of Hazzard. I cruised him at a party, but ended up having tacos with Andrew Lloyd Webber instead.

We usually went to church on Sunday nights, but for some reason I was home one night in November 1968 to see the last half of the best movie ever made, The Secret of Boyne Castle, on the anthology series Wonderful World of Color.

This was former child star Kurt Russell's only movie as a Disney Adventure Boys (others included Peter McEnery, Tommy Kirk, Tim Considine, and Jeff East) before he moved on to playing oddball outsider Dexter Riley in a series of Disney comedies.

Here Kurt plays Rich, an American exchange student in Dublin who learns that his older brother Tom (bisexual muscleman Glenn Corbett, previously a model for Physique Pictorial and star of Route 66) is not a steel company executive after all, but a spy charged with delivering essential information to Boyne Castle, in the west of Ireland. When Tom is captured by Russian agents, Rich must take over the mission, racing through the quaint villages and lush green hills of Ireland, hoping to elude capture and reach Boyne Castle before the Russians. Fellow student Sean (long-faced, steely-eyed Patrick Dawson) tags along, throwing himself into deadly danger for no logical reason except that he rather likes Rich.

The two are presented as more intimate than mere buddies, framed in tight shots, their faces together in close ups. While they are sleeping on the heather, Rich hears a suspicious noise, and wakes Sean by moving his own body slightly. Although all we see are their faces and necks, to wake someone with such a small gesture means that they must be cuddling together. They rescue each other a dozen times, and are eventually rescued by big brother Tom.

But the most important scene, the scene I have remembered fondly for 40 years:

At an inn, Rich flirts with a waitress.
“You didn’t tell me you had an eye for the ladies!” Sean exclaims, as if he hadn’t anticipated any competition.
Rich responds by asking the waitress if she has any rooms to rent for “for a few hours.” Suspicious, she wants to know why the two boys would need a room for such a short period.
Rich and Sean exchange a knowing grin.

In 1968 I was entranced by that grin. I knew that it was a clue to the secret. If only I could decipher it, I could find my way to that other world, Oz or Living Island or Middle Earth, the world where boys could fall in love and got married.

How might we account for the not-so-subtle homoerotic badinage between the Rich and Sean? Certainly Glenn Corbett might be a gay ally: he began as a model for the Athletic Model Guild, the Advocate Men of its day, and made a career as a buddy-bonding “man’s man. Kurt Russell was never particularly gay-friendly. Patrick Dawson works mostly in Irish radio, but his limited filmography includes the gay-vague Ginger in The Jigsaw Man (1983). We should look at the director, Robert Butler, who in the 1960’s specialized in dramas with strong male leads, such as Ben Casey, Dr. Kildare, and I Spy, and later directed such hunk-fests as Remington Steele, Moonlighting, and Lois and Clark. Whether he was working with Bruce Willis, Dean Cane, Pierce Brosnan, or Kurt Russell, Butler neither minimized nor hid their physicality, allowing and even directing them to be open as objects of desire, both to male viewers and to each other.

When I met Peter Barton, he was guest starring in some tv shows, doing live theater, and calling his agent every day, trying to transition to a macho 1980s leading man. But just a few years before, he had been a soft, androgynous teen idol.

Born in 1956, the former medical student started his acting career in 1979, as the teenage son on the short-lived sitcom Shirley! Only 13 episodes were filmed, but that was enough for the teen magazines to adulate Peter as the Next Big Thing. He was handsome, muscular but not a bodybuilder, and just androgynous enough to meet the gender-bending expectations of the era of Culture Club and ABBA.

Dozens of shirtless, speedo, and semi-nude shots followed, plus a starring role in Hell Night (1981) with Vincent Van Patten, in Leadfoot with Philip Mckeon, and in a movie-of-the-week, The First Time (1982). Peter also appeared in a tight swimsuit in an episode of Battle of the Network Stars. Many gay boys found in him a kindred spirit, gazing at his movies or swimsuit spreads and thinking "He's one of us."

Then his big break came: The Powers of Matthew Star, one of the many kid-friendly sci-fi series in the 1982-83 season (others included Voyagers!,The Greatest American Hero, and Knight Rider). Strangely, it aired just before the drag queen-friendly Madame's Place.

The plot was similar to Shazam!, which aired on Saturday mornings a few years before: teenager with superpowers lives with an older man. In this case, Matthew, or E'Hawke (Peter Barton) was a prince from a planet orbiting Tau Ceti, hiding out on Earth from enemies who wanted him dead. He went to Crestridge High School and lived with his guardian, Walter, or D'hai (Louis Gossett Jr.), who was working undercover as a science teacher.

I watched occasionally, but it was a little too "Saturday morning tv" to draw a big audience. Besides, Matthew had a girlfriend, there was no homoerotic buddy-bonding, and there was not enough beefcake. Most gay kids quickly changed the channel to The Dukes of Hazzardon CBS. Powers was cancelled after only 22 episodes.

Peter's teen idol fame ended shortly thereafter, as more muscular actors like Willie Aames and Scott Baio rose to the limelight.

In 1988, he got his big break, a starring role on The Young and the Restless. Other soaps followed, plus the detective series Burke's Law.

Today Peter lives in upstate New York with his 6-year old daughter. He has never married.

We're in the midst of a Malcolm in the Middle marathon, and I must admit that the dysfunctional family sitcom (2000-2006) was not particularly gay-positive. There were some gay references here and there; Francis, the bad boy sent to military school, pretends to be gay to get girls; Reese tells a girl "Sorry, I'm gay" to dissuade her. But overall, this was an aggressively heterosexist world.

But what it lost in gay potential, it made up for in beefcake.

1. Over the course of the series, Reese (Justin Berfield, left) bulked up, becoming a veritable muscleman.

2. Gifted child Malcolm (Frankie Muniz) was a little scrawny, but a few years later, in Extreme Movie, he displayed biceps and a bulge while being tormented by a S&M dominatrix.

3. Francis (Christopher Masterson) had a respectable physique which he displayed a few times.

4. He was in military school, surrounded by muscular cadets, such as Eric (Eric Nenninger, top photo)

5. Drew (Drew Powell, left)

6. And Stanley (Karim Prince), who didn't own a shirt.

7. Dewey, the youngest boy, had a never-ending procession of weirdo boy friends, some of whom grew up to become teen hunks, like Chad (Cameron Monaghan), star of Shameless.

8. But the real revelation was in Frankie's gifted-student classmates, the Krelboynes. According to Hollywood myth, high intelligence goes hand-in-hand with social phobia, lack of fashion sense, glasses, buck teeth, and multiple allergies, so they were drawn as unattractive as possible. As if to make up for the stereotyping, they have blossomed.

Remember Lloyd, aka Evan Matthew Cohen? Unfortunately, he's retired from acting, but not from modeling. (Be careful -- there's another Mathew Cohen wandering around the internet, and Google Image Search may have mixed them up.)

9. Eraserhead, aka Will Jennings, is now a tall, imposing ginger giant.

10. And Stevie, Malcolm's wheezing, wheelchair-bound bff? Craig Lamar Traylor spent his childhood explaining to people that he wasn't really disabled. His acting career hasn't been doing too well, but he certainly presents a striking figure.

See also: Christopher Masterson in the Middle; Frankie and Erik in the Middle: Justin Berfield's Very Special Episode.

It may be a little strange to mention a porn film in a G-rated blog, but That Boy (1974) is special. It was a defining moment in my life, the first gay erotic film I ever saw, in the spring of 1984, during my second year at Indiana University. My friend Viju and I drove into Indianapolis to go to the bars, and someone invited us to see it with him. There was a midnight showing in a sleazy theater near Monument Circle.

The star, 32-year old Peter Berlin, moved from Germany to San Francisco in the early 1970s and quickly became a gay icon, appearing in magazines and films, acting as his own cinematographer. He was renowned for his gleaming, muscular physique and gigantic bulge, but more importantly for his utter lack of guilt, hesitation, and fear.

There was no such thing as a closet in Peter Berlin's world, no such thing as homophobia. Only endless nights of cruising -- but not the meaningless, destructive "hookups" of later generations. A glorious sexual freedom that was, in itself, fulfilling enough to be the sole purpose of life.

That Boy has more of a plot than the usual porn film: An unnamed sexual Everyman (Peter) wanders through a bucolic San Francisco, looking at men, and being looked at. That gaze, being an object of adoration, is even more glorious than the sexual acts themselves. But then he looks at a boy who does not look back.

Could this be the one person on Earth who does not desire him? No, the boy is blind, so Peter must try new, different tactics to draw him into the world of sexual freedom.

During his heyday, Peter Berlin was filmed, drawn, photographed, and painted by such greats as Tom of Finland and Andy Warhol, and had several exhibitions of his own work. Then in the 1980s, AIDS, neoconservative retrenchment, and changing sexual mores made him seem quaintly naive, even dangerous. He disappeared from the public eye.

Today he is over 70 years old, still living quietly in San Francisco, still happily recalling how he gave a generation of gay men a glimpse of what it was like to experience sexual desire without apology or regret.

His films Nights in Black Leather and That Boy have been released on DVD, and a documentary, That Man, appeared in 2005.

See also: Raul and I Bankrupt the Gay Porn Industry.

When I was growing up in Rock Island, Chicago was the nearest big city, a three hour's drive across the prairie, so we went quite often. My Spanish class drove there to see La Casa de Bernarda Alba, the Garcia Lorca play. My parents took me to the Museum of Science and Industry for my birthday trip one year. In college I drove out for my brief modeling career, and later to apply for jobs on Michigan Avenue. After Los Angeles, it's the city where I feel most at home.

And, surprising for the Midwest, there's a lot of beefcake art. Here are the top 10 public penises:

1. The Goethe Memorial in Lincoln Park, showing a muscular, naked poet with an eagle on his knee. Almost makes you want to read Faust. There's also a Goethe-Institut with German classes, art exhibitions, and theater performances.

2.-3. The Bowman and the Spearman, two naked Indians guarding the entrance to Congress Plaza. Croatian sculptor Ivan Meštrović didn't draw upon Native American cultures; he envisioned neoclassical Graeco-Roman muscles.

4. Speaking of Native Americans, the naked "Signal of Peace" stands in Lincoln Park. It's part of a four-statue series called "Epic of the Indian" by gay sculptor Cyrus Edwin Dallin (who, oddly enough, also sculpted the statue of Moroni atop the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City).

5. John Boyle's The Alarm, a memorial to the Ottawa Indians, is also in Lincoln Park. The muscular "brave" stands at attention with a woman at his feet, a precursor to Boris Vallejo's depictions of Conan with his legs being hugged by naked ladies.

More after the break.

6. But Chicago is not all about stylized Native Americans. There's a lot of neoclassical beefcake, too, like the Fountain of the Tritons by Carl Milles, in the courtyard of the Art Institute -- five naked Nordic mermen cavorting with umbrellas. You can also see Swedish artist Carl Milles' naked men in Michigan, Wisconsin, Sweden, and Japan.

7.-8. The Elks National Memorial is a paeon to beefcake. The friezes outside include "Fraternity," three guys hugging at the feet of a topless lady, and inside, monuments to (naked) Fraternity, Justice, Charity, and Brotherly Love, as well as "They That Are Persecuted," by Eugene Savage.

9. Four fountains in Grant Park: Turtle Boy, Fisher Boy (left), Crane Girl, Dove Girl. I prefer Fisher Boy.

10. The Victory Monument, in Bronzeville, commemorates African-American soldiers in World War I. This panel depicting a semi-naked soldier and an eagle.

11. Chicago's oldest gay neighborhood, Halsted between Clarke and Irving Park (and environs), contains some famous gay venues, including The Cellblock, The Gay Center, the Quads Gym, and Man's Country (the best gay sauna in the U.S.).

No wonder Carl Sandburg called it "The City of Big Shoulders"

I'm sure you are wondering about Sage Northcutt, who played the martial arts-expert bud of the androgynous Moises Arias on his 2009-2010 reality series Moises Rules.

He just graduated from high school in Katy, Texas (near Houston), with a roomful of trophies and a series of magazine covers .

But not for acting -- for fitness, martial arts, and kickboxing -- Texas Teen, Philadelphia Health Classic, the Europa Super Show. Actually, he's won every competition he has participated in.

But his true love is MMA (Mixed Martial Arts Fighting). He's been an amateur so far, but now that he's a high school graduate, he can go pro.

His sister Colbey is also a MMA fighter.

So, is he gay or straight?

He took a girl to his Homecoming Dance, and in his spare time he cooks chili and lassos snakes. I'd have to guess straight.

Gay-positive?

Probably.

See also: Moises Arias.

In the fall of 1997, when I moved to New York to work on my doctorate in sociology, you had four main tv choices on Monday nights: America's Funniest Home Videos, the hundredth series starring Bill Cosby, the uber-religious Seventh Heaven, and Suddenly Susan (1996-2000). Guess which won?

It was one of many workplace sitcoms about Young Female Journalists with Big Ideas who butt heads with stick-in-the-mud magazine or newspaper editors, in this case Susan (Brooke Shields, best known for Blue Lagoon nearly twenty years before) and Jack (Judd Hirsch, best known for The Breakfast Club nearly twenty years before).

Suddenly single after a long engagement, Susan is assigned to write a column about what it's like to be...um...single in contemporary San Francisco. But she, naturally, wants to do more. And, of course, she and Jack have a "You're so arrogant!" Sam-and-Diane romance going on.

Her main coworkers included:
1. Photographer Luis (Nestor Carbonell, top photo), a Latino hunk ("Today is the day I work on my biceps.")
2. Sardonic restaurant critic Vickie (gay-positive comedian Kathy Griffin, right)
3. Susan's arch-nemesis, tough-as-nails reporter Maddy (Andrea Bendewald).
4. Pete (Billy Stevenson), the mail boy.

5. Hip music reporter Todd (David Strickland, left).

Two things made Suddenly Susan memorable (excluding Nestor Carbonell's biceps).

1. On March 22, 1999, David Strickland committed suicide. Instead of replacing him without comment, the producers decided to incorporate his death into the series.

When Todd fails to report for work and doesn't respond to his pager, his coworkers spend the day searching for him and worrying. Finally they congregate in his apartment. The episode ends with the telephone ringing. Everyone looks around, afraid to answer, knowing what news is coming. It gave me goosebumps. Very effective.

2. Pete the Mail Boy. Although he appeared in only 15 of the 93 episodes, he was still memorable as just about the only gay character on television who wasn't portrayed as a swishy stereotype. In fact, he was dimwitted and rather a nerd.

When he married his boyfriend, the equally nerdish Hank (Fred Stoller, left), he talked the homophobic Jack into participating -- quite a memorable accomplishment for the 1990s.

"Cruising" is my generation's word for "hooking up": searching for a sex partner as a form of recreation. No ongoing friendship or romance is expected, although one might develop, and the hunt is nearly as much fun as the act itself.

Cruising has a bad rap. People complain that it's an addiction.
But any activity can be addictive if it takes over your life.

It's meaningless, leading nowhere.
Who said that sex always has to lead to something?

It's dangerous, leaving you open to robbery, violence, and HIV.
Not if you follow a few simple rules.

There are different rules for cruising in real spaces like bars, and online. Real spaces first.

1. Select your cruising venue carefully. You can cruise anywhere -- a bar, an organization meeting, a shopping mall, a gym, a museum, the beach -- but it should be a place where there are a lot of gay men who have enough time to stop and chat.

And someplace within an easy drive of your apartment. Nothing is worse than meeting someone you like and having him say "I live only 45 minutes from here."

2. Cruise early. The best hours are between 2 and 4 pm in public places, and between 9 and 11 pm in bars. If you haven't met someone by that time, give up. When it gets late, you start getting desperate, and you are more likely to go home with someone inappropriate.

3. Cruise with a buddy. Cruising alone makes you seem creepy, especially if you are over 40. Besides, everyone looks more attractive in a group, and your buddy can help you judge potential partners.

4. Do not drink while cruising. Or drink only in moderation. The same thing with drugs. You need a clear head to judge potential partners. If you are drunk or high, you will make mistakes.

5. Gather information. When you see someone that you find attractive, strike up an ordinary conversation. Talk about the music at the bar, the exhibits at the museum, the food at the festival. Move on to questions about jobs, leisure interests, family, and so on. If he is hesitant, or if his story has blatant contradictions, move on.

6. Don't discuss sizes or sexual acts. Oddly, talking about sex makes you seem less sexy. If he asks, be brief and noncommittal. If he wants details, chances are he has no intention of following through with a meeting. He just enjoys thinking about sex.

But what if we're completely incompatible?

No such thing. Two people who are attracted to each other can always find something to do in bed.

7. Word the invitation carefully. You are obviously attracted to each other, so where do you go from here? A friendship, a romance, or a hookup?

If you invite him to do something specific -- get coffee, go to a movie -- you are initiating a romance.
If you invite him to get together, and specify in the future -- you are initiating a friendship.
If you invite him to get together now -- you are initiating a hookup.

8. Invite him to your place, if possible. You are more relaxed and in control when it's your own space. Agree to his place only if it's closer, and bring your buddy.

9. Take your own cars. Never get into a car with someone you don't know well.

10. Make sure that someone knows where you are. Have your roommate in the house. Have your buddy follow you. Don't just disappear.

11. Clean your apartment in advance. Nothing spoils the mood more than dirty dishes in the sink, an unmade bed, and an overflowing clothes hamper.

12. Hide your valuables. Leave your wallet in the car.

13. Bring condoms. Safe sex practices only!

14. Don't kick him out afterwards. If it is a daytime hookup, etiquette demands that you offer him coffee or a snack afterwards. If it's a night time hookup, spending the night is customary.

15. Don't pretend that you want a relationship. I've had one-night stands who made a big deal of giving me their number, and it turned out to be fake. Hookups sometimes become friendships or romances, but it's perfectly ok if they do not. Of course, you may want to go farther -- in that case, ask him for a date on the spot. Otherwise, just say "Thank you for coming over," and add him to your list of memories.

When I was living in Florida, newcomers from the small towns (or big cities) of the vast homophobic Straight World often went crazy with joy: "You can be open here! You can be free!" They found a job in a gay venue, read only gay books, went only to gay movies, and never ventured beyond the magic square bounded by Oakland Park Blvd., Powerline Road, NW 13th Street, and the Atlantic Ocean.

"Oh, you live on NW 12th Street? Isn't that a little...iffy?"

Most residents of Wilton Manors weren't quite so insular. But all of our friends were gay. So were our neighbors. And, as far as we know, so was the guy on the next treadmill at Barney's Gym, the guy sorting coupons in the check out line at the Publix Supermarket, and the woman browsing among the humorous cards at To the Moon. We avoided heterosexuals as much as possible. They were the enemy, screaming "God hates you!" from behind security fences at Gay Pride, or asking simpering, insulting questions, like "What do they think causes it now?"

So my house mates were surprised, and not entirely sympathetic when I befriended a heterosexual.

In the fall of 2003, when I was working at Florida Atlantic University, I saw Josh (not his real name) in the locker room of the campus gym, stripping out of a plaid shirt, suspenders, and a ridiculous red bowtie. I concluded that he was heterosexual almost immediately, through the gleaming, new-looking ring on his finger and his casual references to his wife. Surely Josh concluded that I was gay almost immediately, from my answer to the question " What are you working on now?” (media images of gay teenagers), or from the shelves of gay books, rainbow flag mouse pad, and gay pride poster in my office.

But no, when an attractive girl passed, Josh nudged me so I could look. "I only look at guys," I said.

That didn't do it.

"He will never figure it out," my housemate Yuri told me. "Stupid straight guys can never see anything but straights."

"Anyway, why would you want to tell a breeder?" my other housemate, Barney, said with an accusatory glare, as if I was planning some act of treason. "When he finds out, he'll start screaming that you're trying to molest him."

"He's not a friend, really. He just comes to my office to chat. Besides, it's a challenge. Somehow or other I'm going to get him to figure it out!"

"Impossible!" Barney exclaimed. "But why don't we make it interesting? I'll bet you $20 that you can't get him to figure it out during the next week. You can say anything you want except 'I'm gay.'"

"I want in on this thing too," Yuri said. "But you can't cruise him. Or talk about your old boyfriends."

I spent the next week dropping all of the hints I could think of.

"I can't get married in this state. It's illegal."
"Oh...still married to the wife back home, huh?"
No, you nitwit, gay people can't get married!

"I can't donate blood. It's illegal."
"I hear you. Get a venereal disease just once, it haunts you for the rest of your life."
No, you idiot, gay men can't donate blood!

"My childhood church was totally homophobic. It blamed gays for everything from child molestation to 9/11."
"That's ridiculous! Gays are just people, like you and me."
Are you in on the bet? Did my housemates pay you to pretend ignorance?

Finally in desperation I invited Josh over for dinner with Barney and Yuri.

"Oh, a guys' night! Leave the girlfriends at home! Sounds great!"

During dinner, I brought up Wilton Manors' reputation as a gay mecca.
"Yeah, gentrifying neighborhoods often have gay guys fixing things up."

Barney's job managing a gym with a mostly gay clientele.
"It's great that you're so secure in your masculinity that you aren't worried about them seeing you naked in the locker room."

Yuri's quest for the World's Biggest Penisin the Basque country of Spain four years ago.
"Wow, are they really that big? They must really impress the ladies!"

My housemates grinned at me.

After dinner I invited Josh to select a movie to watch from our collection of 200-odd DVDS. Other than a few classics, they all had gay characters, gay subtexts, or covers displaying muscular guys with their shirts off. Without a word or even an odd look, he selected Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, which has none.

Josh sat on the couch, directly behind a coffee table containing a pile of gay magazines. On top was an issue of The Advocate, selected deliberately because the word “Gay” was written on the cover three times, along with photos of the gay icons Harvey Milk and Chad Allen. Surely that would be enough.

It wasn't.

After the movie, we were channel surfing, when an attractive man appeared on the screen. “Wait – go back,” I exclaimed. “That guy was totally hot!”

"What for?" Josh asked. "It was a guy."

Finally in desperation, I pulled out my wallet, handed $20 bills to Yuri and Barney, and said, in a loud, clear voice, "I am gay."

"Yeah, right. Don't be funny." He turned to Yuri. "Does Jeff always joke around like this?"

"Yes, all the time," he said, barely restraining his laughter. "Except when he wants to impress a girl."

I hit him on the head with a pillow.

When they finally assured Josh that I wasn't joking, he was shocked. "I had no idea. You hide it so well!"

Hide it?

Then: "I think it's great that you guys are so secure in your masculinity that you don't mind having a gay roommate."

See also: My Relatives Never Figure It Out; Was It a Screen?

I hate movies about war -- actually, I'm not a fan of movies about people dying in general -- so I'm not going to see Field of Lost Shoes (2014). But if you have the stomach for it, it looks like there will be some gay subtexts.

It's based on a true story of the Civil War: In May 1864, as Union troops led by General Ulysses Grant pushed into the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, the Confederacy scrambled for a final defense.

274 teenage cadets from the Virginia Military Institute were called into service, and marched 80 miles to New Market. They never expected to fight. But General Breckenridge put them on the front line, where 47 were wounded and 10 were killed (mostly freshmen).

Several of the main cast members play cadets on the casualty list, including Zach Roering (Vampire Diaries), Parker Croft (Once Upon a Time), and Max Lloyd Jones (The Sandlot 2). I assume that Nolan Gould (Modern Family), who plays a composite character, is also a goner.

That basically leaves Luke Benward (How to Eat Fried Worms) still alive at the end.

But this is a good lineup of hunky actors, who apparently deliver a number of shirtless scenes.

I'm sure there won't be any gay characters -- Hollywood thinks that there were no gay people in the past -- but several of the actors, including Nolan Gould, Zach Roering, and Parker Croft, have played gay characters or performed in gay-positive venues.

And there's bound to be significant gay subtexts in the buddy-bonding among the doomed cadets.

When I was in high school and college it was customary to closet gay writers. The professor might have known, but it was assumed unseemly (at best) to tell a class full of "impressionable youth" that gay people exist So Oscar Wilde was arrested on "scandalous charges," and Shakespeare's rhapsodies over the "fair youth" of the Sonnets was a "poetic convention of the day."

And Walt Whitman (1819-1892), whose Leaves of Grass includes exceptionally open lines like "we boys together clinging, one the other never leaving"?

"Oh...um...he's talking about his brother."

In my junior year, my American Renaissance professor, Dr. Ames, brought Whitman a little farther out of the closet: "He loved women -- he scattered illegitimate children up and down the Eastern Seaboard -- but he also had a bit of the fruit in him."

Thirty years later, Walt Whitman the "good gay poet," and his magnum opus, Leaves of Grass, are usually closeted by English professors. I often give my students this list of famous writers, and ask them to guess which ones were gay or bisexual:

1. Herman Melville (Moby Dick)
2. Charles Dickens (Tale of Two Cities)
3. Walt Whitman (Leaves of Grass)
4. William Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet)
5. Emily Dickinson (Final Harvest)
6. Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland)
7. Oscar Wilde (The Importance of Being Earnest)
8. F. Scott Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby)
9. Edgar Allen Poe (The Raven)
10. Kenneth Grahame (The Wind in the Willows)

Answers: #1, #3, #4, #5, #7, #10.
They're always the most surprised to find out that Whitman was gay, and Dickens was not.

So let's make things clear: Walt Whitman, the greatest poet in American history, was definitely, undeniably gay.

There is no evidence that he had any erotic interest in women: the illegitimate children story was a screen, made up during the 1920s to "save" the poet's image.

Before there was a vocabulary for same-sex desire, Whitman was all about inventing one:
"the manly love of comrades" and "adhesive friendships."

Near the end of his life, when the word "homosexual" was coined, and same-sex desire defined as a symptom of a dangerous psychosis, he backtracked a bit, claiming that he meant only spiritual comrades, nothing physical.

But he had many "physical" comrades through his life, and his journals describes cruising in detail. He picked up men on streetcars, at the docks, in the park.

Jerry Taylor, slept with me last night, heavenly.

Traverce Hedgeman, young, slight, fair, feminine, conductor.

Howard Atkinson, tall, sandy, country-fied.

Thin, smooth, and slightly feminine were his favorite traits. In West Hollywood, we called them Cute Young Things.

His long-term lover, Peter Doyle, went against type.

He also spent time with early gay rights pioneer Edward Carpenter (1844-1929), and, perhaps, artist Thomas Eakins (1844-1916), who painted a famous portrait of him, and may have photographed him nude.

Labeled only "Old Man, Seven Photographs," they are today housed in the Getty Museum,

But not on exhibit; you have to ask for them.

Even today, Walt Whitman is closeted.

See also: Gay American Renaissance

In the fall of 2000, I was depressed. I was writing my doctoral dissertation, and my committee was making lots of unwelcome "suggestions":

Take out that section about gay people not being able to get married, and concentrate on the important issues.

Put in a section about the guilt and pain that all gay people feel.

But I followed each of the suggestions, worried that they would say "Sorry, your dissertation is on gay people, switch to something else," like my committee at USC did, the first time I tried getting a Ph.D.

Plus Yuri had moved to Florida, and I had to take a second job to pay for my tiny New York apartment, so I was working all the time, plus commuting two hours every day on the Long Island Railroad.

So I wasn't thinking, and I didn't follow most of the rules of gay cruising. Neither did my partner.

1. Select your cruising venue properly. Check. I met Jorge at the Eagle, the leather bar in Chelsea. He was shorter than me, in his mid-20s, dark-skinned, and very muscular. Exactly my type. Or so it would seem.

2. Cruise early. No. It was nearly 2:00 am, and at last call people get desperate and weird.

3. Cruise with a buddy.No. I was by myself.

4. Do not drink while cruising.Check.

5. Gather information. No. we only exchanged first names.

6. Don't discuss sizes or sexual acts. No. We discussed in detail the sexual acts that we were interested in.

7. Word the invitation carefully. No. He just said "Let's go," and we went.

8. Invite him to your place. No. I followed him out into the cold New York autumn.

9. Take your own cars. No. He drove us to New Jersey. We had to drive around for about an hour to find a parking space on the street, and then walk about ten blocks through a desolate, scary neighborhood. I was completely lost. How would I ever find my way home again?

10. Make sure someone knows where you are. No. I didn't even know where I was.

We walked into a row house, through the living room, and up the stairs. "Be quiet, my mama and brother are asleep," Jorge said.

He lived with his parents!

11. Clean your apartment in advance. No. His bedroom was a mess, unmade bed, dishes from a snack on his desk, the floor littered with bodybuilding magazines and gay porn.

12. Hide your valuables. No.

13. Bring condoms. Check. But they weren't necessary. We undressed and squeezed into his narrow single bed. And Jorge promptly fell asleep.

I like cuddling with musclemen as much as the next guy. But I couldn't sleep in such a cramped space, and Jorge did not respond to my attempts to wake him.

14. Don't kick him out afterwards.

We awoke to bright daylight that made his room look even messier, and a yell from downstairs, "Jorge, quieres desayuno?" (Breakfast is ready!).

Jorge pushed me away and leapt to his feet. "Dios mio, it's late!" he exclaimed. "My girlfriend and her padres will be here soon, to go to Mass!"

He had a girlfriend!

"Quick, get dressed!" He pulled on his briefs and started fumbling with his jeans. "I'll sneak you out the back door."

"But...I don't know where I am."

"Go up to Clmumble-mumble and turn right, then turn left by the Dairy Queen, and go down West Side to the church, and you can catch the HBmumble-mumble. It's only a couple of miles."

He led me downstairs, through a little foyer and into a laundry room. I could hear a conversation in Spanish and clattering plates from a room nearby.

15. Don't pretend that you want a relationship.

He ushered me through to the back porch, and made the "call me" gesture before shutting the door.

Call him? I never got his last name, email address, or telephone number.

See also: My date with the teen model.

There are two problems with looking for beefcake and bonding in contemporary ballet:

1. The ballet is not easy, so you won't see a lot of amateur productions, thus limiting the venues for your search.

2. The plotlines are aggressively heterosexist. Occasionally you find a piece with homoerotic subtexts, such as The Midsummer Night's Dream, The Afternoon of a Faun, or Proust, but usually it's boy meets girl, over and over and over again.

Take the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, one of the most famous theaters in the world, with the renowned Kirov Ballet Company (tickets run from $25 to $75, if you're interested).

This year they're doing:

1. Swan Lake: a prince falls in love with a woman who has been transformed into a swan. There's been an all-male version, but not here.

2. La Sylphide: a male farmer falls in love with a sylph (a female forest spirit).

3. Sleeping Beauty: based on the fairy tale about a woman who has been put under a spell, and can only be awakened by "true love's kiss." See Maleficentfor a non-heterosexist interpretation.

4. The Nutcracker: a girl falls in love with a magic nutcracker.

5. Le Parc: four Cupids oversee men and women falling in love. It could easily be revised to have some same-sex couples, but...no.

6. Anna Karenina: The married Anna has an an affair with Count Vronsky.

7. The Fountain of Bakhchisarai: The Khan is in love with two women.

8. Shurale: A forest monster kidnaps a woman, and a prince rescues her, and...um...falls in love...

9. Don Quixote: Don Quixote wins the heart of Dulcinea. No buddy-bonding with Sancho Panza.

10. Cinderella: The fairy tale about a prince who falls in love with a girl wearing glass shoes. Can you imagine anything more uncomfortable?

11. Spartacus: The homoerotic tale of the ancient Roman slave is turned into a hetero-romance.

12. Giselle: A nobleman falls in love with a peasant girl, who dies. He's got a competitor, so there could be some triangulation, but...no.

Wow. I guess we'll have to make do with beefcake. Fortunately, ballet specializes in muscular male bodies in extra-revealing outfits.

See also: The Erik Bruhn Prize.

Lots of UFO contactees tell us that this is the final era of humanity. We have only a short time to prove to the Galactic Overlords that we can do the right thing: end war, stop environmental degradation, switch to solar energy. If we succeed, we will be invited to join the Federation. If not, our planet will be "cleansed."

The Argentine sci-fi series Aliados (Allies) draws on that plot. Six teenagers are chosen by the Feminine Energy Creator to save "the human project." They have only 105 days.

Unfortunately, they have problems of their own, each with its own catch phrase.

1. Noah (Peter Lanzani, left), a hedonistic millionaire's son: "Self Satisfaction at Any Cost."

2. Anorexic pop star Azul (Oriana Sabatini): "Brilliance and Pop Destruction"

3. Maia (Mariel Percossi), a violent bully: "The Pleasure of Hurting."

4. Manuel (Agustin Bernasconi): a shy, insecure bullying victim: "The Voice of Suffering"

5. Homeless juvenile delinquent Franco (Julian Serrano, left): "Alienation in a Pure State"

6. Valentin (Joaquin Ochoa), an orphaned victim of child labor: "Prisoner of His Loneliness"

Seven "Beings of Light" have agreed to help them. They have catch phrases, too:

Ian (Pablo Martinez, left), the leader, from a place beyond time and space: "Secrets of the Soul"

The others are connected to the teenagers:
1. Noah gets his "soul mate" Venecia (Jenny Marinez) from the Astral Plane: "Love in Action."

2. Azul is inhabited by Luz (Oriana Sabatini), from the Causal World: "The New Message'

3. Maia gets Ambar (Lola Moran), from the planet Sirius: "Peace Disguised in War"

4. Manuel gets Inti (Nicolas Francella), from the planet Upsilon Andromeda B: "Fire that Heals"

5. Franco gets Devi (Caroline Domenech), an enlightened human: "Between Heaven and Earth"

6. Valentin gets Gopal (Maximo Espindola), from the Land Beyond the Mirror: "Reflections of Friendship"

Complex stuff, full of New Age jargon, with some Hinduism thrown in, and the plotlines are even more complex, full of alliances, betrayals, hidden agendas, and people who aren't what they seem.

It's a major hit in Latin America. There are both broadcast episodes and online webisodes, plus a music soundtrack, two video games, a theatrical performance, and a Club Aliados that countless thousands of kids and teens have joined.

Notice that some of the human-Light Being pairings are same-sex. The episode I saw seemed to have a gay subtext between Valentin and Gopal (left), and others have found links between Noah and Ian.

However, there aren't any specifically gay characters. Producer Cris Morena has been criticized for erasing gay people from the Cosmos.

You can see the episodes through the official website.

There were many variations of the Tarzan mythos during the middle years of the 20th century, but one of the most fondly remembered by the first generation of Baby Boomers was Wild Boy, Prince of the Jungle.

He had a short run, appearing in 8 issues of a Ziff-Davis series (1950-1952), which oddly starts with 10. Then St. John took over the title, renamed it Wild Boy of the Congo, and published 6 issues (#9-#15), in 1953. That's it.

But what he lacked in longevity, Wild Boy made up for in gay potential.

His origin story: the young American boy David Clyde goes to the Congo with his uncle, who hires evil native to kill him. He escape and grows up in the jungle, but speaks a stilted "me, Tarzan" patois.

He has two animal companions, a panther (Daro) and a monkey (Kimba), and a native boyfriend, Keeto (who speaks the same patois.)

Artists vary in their interpretation of Wild Boy: should he be a little kid or nearly an adult? And just how feminine should his wavy hair, lipstick, and eye liner get?

But he's definitely a gay icon. He displays no interest in women, but he rescues and hugs Keeto every five minutes.

The comics are hilarious today for their stereotypes of the white Western colonial master and the "childlike" natives.

Hint: the good ones wear Western-style clothes, and the bad ones wear loincloths.

Here he uses the old chestnut "I will make the sun disappear!" to avoid execution by an evil tribe. How corny can you get?

But at least he's holding hands with Keeto.

Islam doesn't have quite the beefcake potential of Hinduism or Jainism. No androgynous gods, no naked holy men. The Quranic prohibition of idol-worship is often interpreted to mean "no human figures, period," and even when humans are allowed, propriety forbids bare chests, let alone nudity.

But there are remnants of the penis-obsessed Graeco-Roman culture and muscular transplants from the neoclassical greats of Europe -- and, sometimes, contemporary Muslim artists get away with arguing that the only way to depict strength, honor, liberation, or war is through muscle. Nothing sexual is intended.

One assumes.

In fact, I found at least 20 impressively nude or muscular statues, reliefs, and other public works of art in the Islamic world (countries with 50% or higher Muslim populations).

Here are the first 10, arranged roughly from west to east.

1. Ceuta (a Spanish colony on the coast of Morocco): The Pillars of Hercules, two mountains standing guard at the entrance to the Mediterranean, is memorialized in a statue of Hercules.

2.Algeria was under French domination for over 100 years, from 1830 to 1962, so one might expect some equivalent of the Luxembourg Gardens or the Musee d'Orsay. There isn't a lot, but in Jijel, about 350 km from Algiers, you can see Le Pêcheur (The Fisherman), a boy mending his nets.

3.Tunisia, likewise, was under French domination from 1881 to 1956, but about the only significant beefcake art is, oddly a statue of the first president, Habib Bourguiba, in Ksar Hellal. He's liberating four oppressed peasants, including two muscular, half-naked ones.

4. Libya was the site of the Roman Province of Tripolitana, so there are many statues of muscular men, now in the National Museum. This one came from the Hadriatic Baths.

More after the break.

5. Much of the rich beefcake art of ancient Egypt has been scattered through Europe and the U.S., but some remains, like this one outside the Alexandria Library.

6-7. And in the Museum of Antiquities in Cairo.

8. Only 16% of the population of Israel is Muslim, but it's in the Middle East, so I'm including it anyway.

At the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, you can see The Great Warrior of Montauban, a beefy, muscular guy, naked but lacking a penis, carrying a sword.

It actually has nothing to do with the Middle East;Montauban is in France. It was sculpted by Antoine Bourdelle to commemorates the Franco-Prussian War.

9. Martyr's Square in Beirut, Lebanon is topped by Renato Mazzacurati's memorial. Freedom is leading the half-naked soul of a martyr to Paradise while his body lies prostrate below. He's not supposed to be armless, or ridden with bullet holes -- he's a favorite target for revolutionaries.

10. The extremely conservative countries of the Arabian Peninsula are generally lacking in artistic representations of humans of any sort, so it's surprising to find Coup de Tete by Zinedine Zidane in Doha, Qatar. It's a 16-foot tall depiction of two guys, one punching the other in the stomach.

Apparently it commemorates the World Cup in soccer.

They're not nude, and they're not hugging, but at least they're two guys.

See also: The Gay Arab World; Ancient Egyptian Beefcake.

When I was in high school in the 1970s, the heterosexual girls and gay boys agreed that Steve McQueen was the hunkiest movie star of all time. We couldn't name any movie that we had actually seen him in -- his heyday was in the 1960s, when he starred in blockbusters like The Great Escape (1963), The Cincinnati Kid (1965), The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), and The Reivers (1969).

But he had an aura of coolness about him that kept us reading movie magazines and pinning his posters to our bedroom walls up until his death in 1980, at the age of 50.

Steve had two children: a daughter, Terry (1959-1998), and a son, Chad (born 1960), who became a race car driver, martial artist, and actor.

Here he threatens Ralph Macchio in The Karate Kid (1984).

Chad has three children, Madison, Chase, and Terrence. Chase, who just turned 19, is a professional soccer player in England.

Terrence renamed himself Steven R. McQueen in honor of his grandfather. He's a model and actor, with starring roles in Everwood, Minutemen, and CSI.

Now he's playing Jeremy Gilbert on The Vampire Diaries.

Although he hasn't played any specifically gay characters, he's a gay ally.

In your quest for public penises in the Islamic world, don't forget that most Muslims live far from the Arabic-countries of the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa, in Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, South Asia, and Indonesia.

1. Turkey is the most secular Muslim country in the world, with a large percentage of the population "culturally Muslim" but not observant. I spent a semester there in the spring of 1989, and found it no more homophobic than Texas in the U.S.

The first president of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, tried hard to Westernize the country, which included introducing public art. There's a lot of it, including many statues commemorating Ataturk himself. Like the Monument of Great Triumph in Afyonkarahisar, about 100 miles from Ankara.

It's a nude, muscular Ataturk jumping over the bodies of his enemies.

2. Eskişehir, a two-hour drive north of Afyonkarahisar, is called the "City of Sculptures." There are napping commuters, soccer players, turtles -- and this brawny fisherman.

3. Antalya, on the Southern Coast, features several more statues, including another of Ataturk, and this neoclassical figure of Attalu, mythical founder of the town.

There are lots of real Graeco-Roman relics in Turkey, too, such as "The Runner" in the Archaeological Museum in Izmir.

4. Ahmet Bedevi (1899-1963), called the "Manisa Tarzan" was an environmentalist and eccentric who planted thousands of trees around Manisa, plus walked around nearly naked. There is a nearly-naked statue to commemorate his work.

5. In Mersin, the War of Independence memorial is a naked, muscular torso carved into the stone face of a mountain.

More after the break

6. Moving eastward to Iran, the Islamic Republic disapproves of human images, but ancient Iran was part of the Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman empires, so there is some beefcake to be found.

On the road to Kermanshah, in western Iran near Kurdistan, you can see the Zoroastrian god Vahram, stylized as Hercules. He was carved about 150 BC.

7. The Turkic-speaking Central Asian states are generally lacking in public penises, but at least theres' some beefcake in the Coal Miners' Monument in Karaganda, Kazakhstan: two Tom of Finland hunks, one shirtless, the other falling out of his shirt, cruising each other.

8. The Partition of India in 1947 was one of the biggest imperialist blunders in history. The British thought it would be a good idea to split India into Hindu and Muslim countries. Bangladesh later split off from the Muslim country, Pakistan.

At Dhaka University, you can see the Aporajeyo Bangla, the monument to the Liberation War, some muscular soldiers with guns.

9. Indonesia has the largest Muslim population of any country in the world, and the capital, Jakarta, has been undergoing a renaissance of public art. Russian artists Matvey and Otto Manizer sculpted the Panung Pahlawan, "The Hero," a young man going off to war without his shirt, while his mother hands him his lunch.

10. But the most famous of Jakarta's public monuments is "Youth Builds a Nation," a muscular young man screaming, maybe because he is carrying a flaming pizza over his head and there's a smokestack in his butt.

See also: The Top 10 Public Penises of Islam; A Bodybuilding Contest in Turkey.

When I was in high school, the heterosexual girls and gay boys swooned over a trio of adult actors who epitomized cool: Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Robert Redford.

Redford, who was already in his 40s, didn't have a particularly buffed physique, but he made up for it with a mischievous smile, a gleam in his eye, and the hint of superheroic sexual prowess.

He came to Hollywood in 1960, and did the rounds of tv guest spots before getting his big break as a morally-dubious movie star in Inside Daisy Clover (1965).

Barefoot in the Park (1967) was the standard "uptight guy meets free spirit girl" romance that we've seen a billion times before, but for some reason it resonated with 1960s audiences, proving that Redford could play a hetero-romantic lead.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1968) was the standard "cowboys in love" romance that we've seen a billion times before, but it also resonated with 1960s audiences, proving that Redford could play gay-subtext buddy-bonding.

He spent the next decade doing both.

Hetero-romance: The Way We Were (1973), The Great Gatsby (1974), Three Days of the Condor (1975).

Gay subtext buddy-bonding: with Michael Pollard in Little Fauss and Big Halsey (1970), George Segal in The Hot Rock (1972), Dustin Hoffman in All the President's Men (1976).

No explicit gay characters, and he claims he wasn't even aware of the gay subtexts at the time.

During the 1980s, Redford's roles became fewer, as he moved into production, fostering independent films. He started the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, and the Sundance TV Channel.

Park City, Utah, north of Provo, the heart of Mormon homophobia? Is Redford...um...homophobic?

He hasn't made a lot of pro-gay statements, but in 2013 he spoke in favor of marriage equality at an event sponsored by Equality Utah. "Utah is changing," he said.

Maybe Redford is changing, too.

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The Top 10 Public Penises of Chicago

Sage Northcutt: MMA Fighter from Katy, Texas with Gay Friends

Suddenly Susan: Biceps, Brooke Shields, and Pete the Gay Mail Boy

15 Rules of Gay Cruising

Fall 2003: Straight Guys Never Figure It Out

Field of Lost Shoes: Buddy-Bonding in the Civil War

Walt Whitman, The Good Gay Poet

Fall 2000: Breaking Every Rule of Gay Cruising

Where are the Gay-Themed Ballets?

Aliados: Argentine Teenagers Save the World

Wild Boy: The Gay Jungle Boy of 1950s Comics

The Top 10 Public Penises of Islam

Steve McQueen's Hunky Family Tree

10 More Public Penises of Islam

Robert Redford on Gay Rights