Did Certain Celebs Make us Gay?

A few weeks ago, I wrote an article about Brad Pitt, and one the comments posted by a reader resonated with me: 

"I had to face the fact that I was gay after watching Legends of the Fall."

After reading that, it occurred to me that this otherwise innocuous comment scratched the surface of a larger, more profound question: how many gay people realized they were gay after discovering a certain celeb or public figure?

We all have that "a-ha" moment, most of us privately. But for those whose moment comes to them in public, sitting in a crowded movie theater surrounded by people having an altogether different experience, it can feel as though your secret has just been revealed to the world - LOUDLY.

My co-worker James had the same experience. For him, it came in the form of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas -- when, as a 7th grader, he went to see the movie with his family and cousins.

It came without warning.

"It was intense," he said. "Everyone else was there to see Dolly Parton's boobs - and so was I, I thought. But all of a sudden, there was a scene where a bunch of farm-hands were dancing in jeans...shirtless. And something happened. I was excited, but terrifed.  It was also horrible - I got all hot and flushed and nervous - but I felt glued to my seat. It wasn't until after the movie that I realized what had just happened, and I wanted to just put it behind me."

He thought he had, but then later that week, he picked up an issue of People magazine that featured the movie on the cover.  "I opened it up and I'll never forget it," he said.  "In the article about the movie, they also had a photo of the farm hands!  Only this time, they were in their underwear!  It was then that I pretty much knew I was gay -- and it was sort of scary."

As gay people, we all have that "Who was your first celebrity crush?" stories, but this is deeper than that.   

Once I started asking around, it seemed like every gay person I knew had a moment of clarity  where they realized they were gay -- thanks to something they'd seen in movies, on TV or via some sort of media.

"The second I saw Luke from Flipper, I knew I'd be gay for the rest of my life," my friend Richard said. "In fact, I still get butterflies when I think of him."

Clearly, this is a phenomenon unique to gays and lesbians. Straight people don't see George Clooney or Catherine Zeta-Jones up on the big screen and think, "Oh my god, I am soooo straight!"  Lucky them - they just get to watch and enjoy.

But for gays, media has the power to reveal ourselves to ourselves, and to forge a connection to something larger. For many of us, one of the first things we do when we are coming out is to buy "gay" music or rent a "gay" movie (not necessarily porn) in order to learn the common language and start to feel part of a community.   

As for my cinematic coming out, it was Richard Gere and his tight-tight jeans in American Gigolo. I was young, had barely given any thought to girls OR boys, and then POW! It hit me, just like it happened to my friend James...I was gay, and obviously life was never the same again.  I guess you could say Richard Gere made me gay.

What about you? Did you realize you were gay thanks to a movie or TV show? Share your experience here.

(Images courtesy of Getty, Yahoo)

Comments

[Tim]

I was watching What's Eating Gilbert Grape & Johnny Depp just enthralled me. I think I was ten or eleven. After him it was a couple pro wrestlers & ultimately it was James Franco in Never Been Kissed/Freaks & Geeks.

[Joe]

While I denied my sexuality until the age of 42, I knew I was attracted to men after my first wet dream. The dream consisted of an slender and masculine silhouette of Henry Winkler diving into water in front of a blazing sunset. Since I was too young to have had any intimate contact with another person, the mere vision of "the Fonz" made me convulse in pleasure and horror. I awoke in a panic not only about wetting my underwear with a strange emission but also because I felt pleasure while dreaming of a man diving into water. My guilt made me pray every night that I would not soil myself with such dreams and the emission of strange bodily fluids. Fortunately, this prayer wasn't answered.

From that moment on, I tried for more than three decades to suppress this life-changing image of the Fonz and my attraction to men. Now, I can admit that watching "Happy Days" and seeing the leather-jacketed stud every week on television was a one of many defining moments in my sexuality. Thanks Fonzie!

[billsmith]

I knew I was gay the second I saw Lee Majors on "Six Million Dollar Man." I was 12 and i knew!

[Marc]

Ron Ely as Tarzan on TV! How did that loincloth get passed the censors?

Also, I always focused on Rex Banyan, Dr. Quest's pilot/bodyguard on that oddly all-male TV adventure cartoon Johnny Quest.

[homo]

Sad. For me it was a real person.
He was the boyfriend of one of my best friends.
But a real live non-celebrated person.

[peter]

Richard Hatch (from the original "Battlestar Gallactica" not "Survivor"). I had a dream where he kissed me deeply. I can still feel that imaginary kiss when I remember that dream. I was in my early 20s, and SO in love with him.

[Bootsnshoes]

I didn't know I was gay watching all those great movies growing up but I did always find myself tenting watching the likes of Robert Redford, Paul Neumen, Richard Gere, and the likes. It wasn't until I went to see "Making Love" with my girl friend in the early 80s when I was in my early 20s and saw Michael Ontkean and Harry Hamlin kissing that I really knew what was going on. I had always know from about 6th grade on that there was something different about me in that while I wanted a girl friend, it was the other boys that always got my attention. In college I kind of suspected it but that movie was the turning point for me. Very scary back then to come to that realization.

[Ross]

Ron Ely was definitely the object of much personal time. Yes, but I think for me, it was Burt Reynolds in Gator. I wanted to be Lauren Hutton so bad. I was just fantasizing of what she was doing with that Bear God!

[Ross]

I don't think it's a gay thing though. It's a guy thing. Straight guys had Farrah and Pamela, etc. And there were many that stirred my juices: Erik Estrada, Robert Urich, Tom Selleck, Gil Gerard, Dennis Cole. Half of the TV I watched in the 70's and 80's was just in the hope that some guy would take off his shirt. And then I discovered my mom's Playgirl's. WOOF!

[Brent]

it was my first thanksgiving home after having returned from serving a mission for the mormon church. i was on a "date" with one of the former sister missionaries. we were watching the re-make of "miracle on 34th street", and i remember watching dylan mcdermott, and those amazing, crystal blue eyes of his...i remember glancing at my date and saying to myself, "this just isn't going to work."

[Todd]

Leonard Whiting's rear in Zeffirelli's "Romeo & Juliet." I sat next to my older brother in the theater and afterwards he couldn't shut up about the fleeting glimpse of Olivia Hussey's endowments. But it was the shot of Leonard Whiting's beautiful bum that was burned into my memory and kept creeping into my fantasies after bedtime for years to come.

[Anonymous]

It's not a guy thing! Patricia Quinn in The Rocky Horror Picture Show did it for me. Before that, I'd had crushes on girls I'd seen in movies (I'd watch the actresses' love scenes over and over again!), but I somehow managed to convince myself I was in it for their male costars (even though I followed the actresses themselves rabidly and didn't care who they were making out with). Then I saw The Rocky Horror Picture Show and started imagining myself in Magenta and Columbia's bedroom and there WERE no male costars in there...Eeep. Time to face facts.

[Lost in Middle America]

My realization that I was committed to the other team came (figuratively and literally) when I was in college. I was home on break, up late, watching MTV. Went to sleep and dreamed of Billy Idol. The dream was entirely in shades of blue. Billy managed to give me the wettest dream I have ever had and the only one I remember, to the tune “Eyes without a face” no less.

[Joe SCruz]

John Phillip Law in "The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming," while watching it in a movie theater with my college girlfriend. As I say when speaking on panels in schools about being GLBT, it wasn't my first clue but it was the last straw. If I was more interested in the guy on the screen than in the live girl next time, it was time to stop wasting my time and the girls'!

It was on TV a while back and I texted half a dozen friends, "the movie that brought me out is on TV right now!" LOL

[Josh]

OMG, I had that aha moment that you speak of when I saw "The Karate Kid" with my parents as a six-year-old. I remember watching the film and rooting for the evil, blond, surfer-looking antagonist (William Zabka)that Ralph Macchio has to fight at the end of the film. When my parents asked me what I thought of the movie afterwards I remember saying that I was sad that the bad guy didn't win at the end, and they were surprised that I was on his side as opposed to the protagonist (Macchio), who everyone else cheered for. I think they thought that I was just a "devil's advocate," to borrow a phrase with a different definition, or someone who identified with the antagonist cause he was more fun and interesting. Well, he definitely was more interesting to me, because he was drop dead gorgeous. He epitomized the hot 80's surfer. I don't think that I realized what my feelings meant at the time, but once I knew that I was gay, I remembered that moment with new perspective.

[reo]

subconsciously, mister rogers.
consciously, cary grant.

[Daniel]

Anybody old enough to remember Robert Conrad in the TV series Wild Wild West? The reruns used to come on weekdays in the area where I lived as a kid. I'm sure I already was fully aware that I was gay but boy did looking at that body in those tight pants confirm it for me.

[Daniel]

Also, competing close with Robert Conrad in those days was Lee Majors, not for Six Million Dollar Man but for the reruns of The Big Valley, when he was younger and much cuter. He may not have been as fine as Conrad but boy did I have it for his character "Heath Barkely".

[Adam]

OMG, I haven't thought about it in years but I had such a crush on Larry Wilcox from C.H.I.P.S. You know, the cute blond cop opposite Eric Estrada. I never missed a show he was in.

[Tayler]

I may be dating myself here but... David Cassidy! Still today the man does it for me.

[Dave]

I agree with Ross' list: Erik Estrada, Robert Urich, Tom Selleck, Gil Gerard, Dennis Cole. And Ron Ely, Lee Majors and Robert Conrad back in the day were smokin' hot!

[Marsha]

omg my ah-ha moment was Angelina Jolie i've always found myself attracted to women even though i had boyfriends, iam married now with two kids iam bisexual, ive been with two women in my life, i know if i wasn't married i'd be a full blown lesbian

[Tom]

Carleton Carpenter in ''Two Weeks with Love''. I saw the movie and fell in love, even though he was/is not my type. Many years later, I was in a play in New York and Carpenter was in the audience. He came backstage after to say hello to the cast. I didn't tell him of my earlier experience as a member of his audience. A fine gentleman and a good actor.

[Greg aka splerk]

Yes - I agree about Robert Conrad. Matt Dillon from
Tex" only because my best friend in high school looked a lot like him but better with his blue/green eyes & I got myself in trouble later with that ALL that.But still today I like Dillon, there is just something about him.
I like Johnny Depp better now & Clooney then.
The boys of BAYWATCH excluding David Hasseldork.
There are some nude picks of Matt Le Blanc before "Friends" circulating and I must say they are very very impressive.

[Jim]

Christopher Reeve in Superman did it for me. It was 1980 when I was 11 years old. I had seen the movie plenty of times before. One night while I was watching it at a friend's house on HBO, however, something clicked. I had my first erotic thought! I remember it clearly.

[Michael Schilling]

I new I was gay as a small kid as when Michael Landon from Bonanza came on the screen. I would jump right in front of the screen when ever he was on. So I knew I gay as this sexy guy would stand their in those pants showing all.

[RobYYZ]

I was out by 15 but always had this crush on Keanu Reeves...I don't know why but I always fantasized about being his boyfriend...it so weird...I know...I know...to this day I melt when I see a picture of him...I am a monogamous oriented person but I always say to the person I am dating...there is one thing you need to know about me...I will leave you for Keanu Reeves...lol...they think it's a joke...but I am serious...lol...I also had a boyfriend jealous about the fact that I had a mad crush on the lead singer of THE SPOONS...Gordon Depp...ah to be a boy crazy teen again...lol

[John]

Wow....there were so many! The two that stand out are Christopher Atkins in The Blue Lagoon. To see him in a loincloth for the entire movie would've been good enough, but to see him out of it REALLY hit home for me. That's where the beginning of my celebrity sexual fantasies started. Up until then, I had never seen full frontal nudity from a man. I was not allowed to see Rated R movies, so the first time I saw it, I had set my alarm clock for about 1:30am, because it was starting at 2am, and I watched it with the volume down so as to not wake my parents. Soon after that, my mother actually told me that she wanted me to see the movie because she thought it was a good coming of age story. Little did she know that it would be a good coming-out of age story for ME!!!!

The other one that stands out for me is Steve Antin in The Last American Virgin. Loved seeing his butt in that film. I just recently found out that he has also come out of the closet. Oh, to be with him!!!!

[Jimxyz]

I new I was gay as a small kid as when I saw Rock Hudson barechested on McMillian & Wife

[Wyatt1969again]

Hmmm…

For me it was in Ninteen-Seventy-Somthin and we lived in SanDiego. My big brother was in little league - he was a kickass pitcher, shortstop, and first baseman. His team, I think, was called: Fathers and Sons Pizza. What’s really funny is the fact that after enduring at least two prior little league baseball seasons being my brothers tag-along (trust me - a humility unto itself) - I didn’t want to see another Shakeys Pizza for the rest of my Fu***ng life. As it turns out - I didn’t get to go anywhere for pizza anyway.

I happened to be busted for stealing $37.00 in cash off my Moms dresser. A major infraction accompanied by an ass whipping and 3 months restriction. It sucked…a lot. The fact that I bought a Wrist Rocket (a Sling Shot) and blew out our back neighbors kitchen door window - well that didn’t help either.

Yet were it not for the result of my actions that early summer I would not have known for sure that I was and would always be - Gay.

As it happened my parents were often gone quite a bit. So babysitters were no strangers. And, yes, we went through them like disposable Dixie cups. One day we got…Petro - the oldest son of the baseball team’s Coach whom himself was as well the owner of the team and the Pizza joint (F&S).

And so it was that after sitting in front of our living room window all day and watching Petro (a genuinely good guy who anyone could rightly trust) and my brother play catch - I knew I was destined to marry Petro and live happily ever after.

Of course things didn’t really work out this way.

Still it was like there was Han Solo in the movies - but in real life - there was Petro. And that’s just how hot he was - Smokin.

[Bud]

It was Bobby Sherman from Here Comes the Brides! But I liked Luke from Flipper be4 that, too!

[Joey]

For me it was several guys. Richard Gere, Tom Selick, Michael Landon, Mark Spitz and many more. Of course not that i have given away my age, it went on over the years Clay Aikman, Andy Rodick, Pete Samprass etc. The only thing that i was confused about was my love for extremely smooth and extreme hairy guys.....Nothing in the middle for me. My fav celeb today is Rafael Nadal....MMMMMMMMMM

[stm]

Paul Michael Glazer in Starsky and Hutch did me in...... at 11.

[Shawn]

Mine was Shaun Cassidy. I so fell in love with him from the Hardy Boys.... Then can Luke Skywalker...and it just grew from there. Today however it is the guy from Dark Angel and NCIS he is so cut and hot and that smile and attitude are such a turn on..

[jack]

This thread is cool because all of the men named were idols of mine. Nobody named my all-time, first and best crush though. I remember being in grade school and watchin Ozzie and Harriet on an old fashioned 12 inch TV. Ricky Nelson was a teenager and had a magnificent hair chest, worn tight jeans with a huge bulge, and had the most handsome face in the world. I say him when the camera for some reason focused on his package and I about went nuts. I have loved the teenager Nelson ever since. I have sought guys who look like him. I loved Matt Damon, Brad Pitt, Richard Gere,Chris Aiken, Burt Reynold, Harry Hamlin, Johnny Depp, Henry Winkler, Robert Redford, the young Marlon Brando, Leonard Whiting in R&J, Michael Landon on gunsmoke, Robert Urich, and more recently Steve Sandvoss and Wes Ramsey in "Later Days." Nobody ever quite compared with Ricky Nelson though. I was in love with him.

[greg]

Ricky Nelson and his brother David, who had the much superior body, in a trapeze episode of Ozzie and Harriet. I sent for his fan club for a picture and jerked off all over it. I was in the 7th grade.

[Tom]

As a preteen, I used to lie on the floor with against my boner while watching Chad Everett in Medical Center.

[Shawn William]

David Duchovny in X-files did it for me. I was probably a pre-teen. Episodes where he was shirtless or running around in his boxers holding a gun gave me enjoyable moments after the show.

[rkcb]

1967
I am five years old...

I am at the movies with my parents watching "Thoroughly Modern Millie", when John Gavin ("Mr. Trevor Graydon") first saw Mary Tyler Moore ("Miss Dorothy") and "fell in love" with her. The way he looked at her... All I knew that at the end of the film, when they get married and (finally) kiss onscreen... I wanted to be "Miss Dorothy" kissing "Mr. Trevor Graydon".... YUMMY!

[joey]

there are so many people out there that think being gay is a choice. i wonder with all of these people in the world that find any excuse to sue could use this article to sue a celebrity for making them gay.

[kristen]

For me, at six years old, I first heard Stevie Nicks, at 11 I saw her on a video with Tom Petty "Stop Dragging my Heart Around." I was glued to my seat, and I watched as much Solid Gold as I could just HOPING that Stevie Nicks would be on. The hair, the eyes, the voice, the lyrics, the ultra-feminine wardrobe (and those boots!). Yes, the voice and face of Stevie Nicks was a turning point in my life. Something inside of me moved, although I didn't know what it was, I just know I wanted it to happen more..

God Bless Stevie Nicks.

Kristen

[Harraldo]

Richard Thomas. John Boy. I can't be the only one who fell like a ton of bricks for him, right?

[JC Gonzalez]

Being eleven years old, fat, awkward, shy, lonely, and utterly confused, sitting alone in a dark room watching a movie with a girl seemed ridiculous at the time. Laughable, even though I could firmly feel the carpet below me, taste the popcorn and Mexican candy, and certainly see The Virgin Suicides DVD playing on the television screen in front of me. Yes, it definitely was real, and yes, I was alone in a room with a girl nearing the midnight hour.

Was this what it was supposed to be like? Is this the defining moment everyone keeps on talking about? I suddenly considered that maybe I wasn’t a freak and right at that moment, the future looked clear. Yes, I could continue this. This was possible. A girlfriend, later a wife, kids, and so on. My mind was straying; I continued to focus on the movie not moving an inch, wondering what to do next or what to do at all. I didn’t know what to say and my mouth couldn’t move. I could feel her hand against mine and maybe I should touch her more?

My stomach ached. This wasn’t real. I loved her, I really loved her. But I couldn’t imagine kissing or fucking her like I was supposed to. The thought frightened me. She intimidated me. Yet I was obsessed. I couldn’t let this moment go. She was a chance at leaving behind all those years of doubt and fear and confusion.

When I was five or six, in the first grade, I watched the film The Neverending Story. In fact I could not stop watching The Neverending Story. I tried so desperately hard to convince my father that I really wanted to be like Atreyu, the young hero in the film. He was my hero.

Not exactly, for I mostly watched a scene where he was crawling in mud dripping wet and half-naked over and over again. I couldn’t stop staring. And later, boys in school, who seemed so distant on the playground playing their sports activities that I was never invited to be a part of—yet I couldn’t stop staring and dreaming. I fell in love with an Atreyu look-alike, Alejandro. His long dark hair with perfectly tanned skin was something I couldn’t ignore on the soccer field. But I also fell in love with the idea of maybe one day becoming that—or a girl. Becoming a girl seemed so beautiful and elegant. It certainly would have answered and solved many of the problems I was facing at the time. I knew I couldn’t mention a word of my schoolday crushes to my father, or my mother, or my sister, or to anyone else. Not that there was anyone else, the boys hated me and the girls rejected me.

As I grew a little bit older I kept on hearing other kids’ talk of sex, of tits and ass and wanting to rub your dick all over them. It didn’t quite make sense. Looking at college girl porn magazines that my cousin and I found under my uncles bed in dusty shoeboxes didn’t inflict any of those feelings in me. Nothing mysterious or weakening arose in me. I didn’t lose my concentration and I didn’t start to sweat or anything that I thought was supposed to happen at the sight of tits and ass.

As my cousin gazed, ohh’ed and ahh’ed, I simply did not want to look at these women. In time those pictures turned into terrifying things. They represented what was missing, I guess. I knew I was missing something, I wasn’t sure what at the time but I knew whatever it was it must be the cause of me not having any friends. It was probably the cause of me not liking what the other kids liked, in music, movies, and sports too. Desire was certainly it, the desire for girls. Love and marriage and sex filled my mind for years until I could finally take no more and just had to block it out, praying that someday I would wake up and want it all—with a girl.

I waited, sitting there next to a girl my father seemed to really push me to hang out with that night, a girl who I came to really love on some level, and I still waited for that urge.

A kiss? I thought about it for a while. Maybe if I could bring myself to a kiss that night and that would change things. Maybe that was what would cure and automatically light the fire that is desire. I looked over at her large breasts; they developed sooner and fuller than the other girls in my class. They were huge and glowing from the light of the flickering television screen. They were beautiful, I must admit, so I imagined licking them bare. The thought made me laugh out loud, which is a strange reaction when you’re supposed to be watching The Virgin Suicides.

“What? What’s so funny?” she asked me.

I shook my head. “Nothing I just remembered something. The movie reminded me…”

She didn’t seem to take much notice and continued watching. So did I.

I had to do something, and for some reason getting up to sit on the edge of the bed right behind us instead of on the floor seemed to be the right thing to do. I kept on imagining scenarios of the night’s future progression. If I actually could muster up a move, maybe she’d vomit, or slap me. Maybe I’d vomit. Maybe it might be this intense connection where nothing else matters and I’m lost in her. We’d tug each other’s hair and wake up the next morning naked and warm in each other’s arms. What if her parents walked in? All those cliché stories of fathers being weary of boys their daughter bring home and being extra watchful come to mind. Would I be one to experience that normalcy? What an honor.

So as I sat there on the edge of the bed, not really sinking my mind into the movie or into her, but into myself, I suddenly came into reality when I felt weight press against my legs. I looked down, and she’s leaning back against them like the back of a chair. She had scooted over and positioned herself so that my legs cupped her back and my feet were placed against her thighs on the ground. I was frozen. I couldn’t breath and my jaw locked up. My legs grew suddenly tense as every muscle tightened and I wondered if she could feel it. If she could tell, would this make things awkward or would she interpret it as a good thing? I couldn’t be sure of anything at that moment. But her only reaction was a sigh. She nuzzled in more, getting comfortable between my shins.

Now my future lined up properly for the first time in my mind. The normal thing could and certainly would happen to me. At least something would happen that night, some sort of heterosexual progress that would lead me in the right direction to sex, love, and marriage. My dad would be so proud.

But I still didn’t know what to do next. In this position, I certainly couldn’t take her hand in mine and I certainly couldn’t lean over to kiss her either. So what was I to do? A massage, I could lean forward and rub her shoulders. However, I could not really bring myself to do it just then and simply decided it would be best for me to wait. I didn’t want things to move too fast, now.

I started to focus on the movie this time, and wondered to myself why I didn’t want to spy on those beautiful blonde girls just as those boys did in the film? The sisters in the film were certainly beautiful enough with their clear skin, flowing light hair, and bright big eyes. Suddenly, the scene comes on where teen heart-throb Josh Hartnett comes into full swing in the film. He struts down the hallway, his long hair sways and the dreamy score plays. Moments that are ultimately life-changing and defining in your real life seem to appear to you as though they were happening in slow-motion. In this case the scene was literally in slow-motion—an aspect that only helped. Josh’s body stays imprinted in my mind even as the shot cuts away.

And fuck, I’m gay.

There’s no going back now. The future I had laid out in my mind was suddenly erased and thrown out the window. I didn’t give a shit if my father and mother, or the world, hated me or thought I was some sort of disgusting pervert. I didn’t care if I could become that slutty gay guy you always see on television getting disowned, getting AIDS and dying, or getting beaten to death. I didn’t care if was a freak of nature; I just wanted to be in Josh Hartnett’s pants at that very moment.

Sex, love, and marriage, in my eleven year old brain, lost their overpowering sense of dread. I knew that certainly there was a place to go, to somehow move forward. That desire, lust, and sexual animalistic attraction that I was apparently missing had suddenly been found, realized, and accepted by me. Only me, and that was a first step.

So I sighed and didn’t do anything with the girl. I was content sitting there with her, a friend, resting between my knees as we ate popcorn and watched the rest of the film about suicidal sisters. Gorgeous sisters they were; godly.
They were my heroes; they were the ones I wanted to become. These beauties, these vixen queens with the power to sway people with their ethereal qualities and mystifying intelligence, this is what I admired. Atreyu from The Neverending Story was not my hero as I had once told my father years earlier, and certainly Atreyu was not a character I admired deeper than on a purely physical level. Neither was Josh’s. But these girls, they were otherworldly, and in control.

[david]

Yup! Another vote for Robert Conrad's tight pants in Wild, Wild West!

[Phil]

Guy Madison made me gay. The thing is, he probably was too.

[Phil]

Oh, he was Wild Bill and I was 10 or 11.

[Phil]

Then there was Gardner McKay. I was old enough then (14?) to have to watch Adventures in Paradise alone (if you know what I mean).

[ren]

after you hidden your true color of transformation.. you will realize that u are purple like butterfly that u like to fly and to find true flower that u can make satisfy and make your self happy as a god father heaven and mother earth creature.

[ren]

i dont know what can i say but i know i love my boyfriend and iam proud of being a gay..thats all.

[Bill]

When I finally accepted my sexuality in my late 20s I soon realized why I was so intrigued by the child stars of my teenage days. I can't remember all of the actors' names, but here are some of the characters that did it for me: Robbie Douglas ("My Three Sons"), Paul Peterson (the actor who played Donna Reed's son), Wally Cleaver ("Leave it to Beaver"), Dobie Gillis, the red-haired brother on "The Waltons." And there were some hot older men, too: Ben Casey, M.D. (now I'm really dating myself) and, from the world of sports, Rocky Colavito, an outfielder (?) for the Cleveland Indians. I guess I like swarthy older men!