{"id":258,"date":"2006-05-13T00:40:56","date_gmt":"2006-05-13T04:40:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=258"},"modified":"2018-08-22T22:51:07","modified_gmt":"2018-08-23T02:51:07","slug":"14667-%c2%a0%c2%a0-tab-hunter-eddie-muller-tab-hunter-confidential","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=258","title":{"rendered":"14667. (Tab Hunter &<\/span> Eddie Muller) Tab Hunter Confidential"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"06-05-13<\/a>I was sur\u00adprised at how much I learned about how Hol\u00adly\u00adwood works from this biog\u00adra\u00adphy of a star of the 1950\u2019s. Tab Hunter was a \u201cheart-throb\u201d, an actor who was mar\u00adketed for his hand\u00adsome\u00adness. I frankly don\u2019t find his kind of looks very attrac\u00adtive, but many peo\u00adple do. <\/span>His auto\u00adbi\u00adog\u00adra\u00adphy is \u201cco-authored\u201d, prob\u00ada\u00adbly mean\u00ading that Hunter was exten\u00adsively inter\u00adviewed, pro\u00advided tape record\u00aded rem\u00adi\u00adnis\u00adcences, and the \u201cco-author\u201d put it togeth\u00ader in first-per\u00adson voice. It\u2019s a per\u00adfectly valid way for an actor, who doesn\u2019t hap\u00adpen to be an expe\u00adri\u00adenced writer, to tell his sto\u00adry. In this case, the result seems to be unusu\u00adally hon\u00adest. Hunter stum\u00adbled into movie act\u00ading, and was ini\u00adtially suc\u00adcess\u00adful because of his looks. He was gay, and went through the com\u00adplex\u00adi\u00adties, strate\u00adgies, and per\u00adils that gay actors had to face in the 1950s. What it par\u00adtic\u00adu\u00adlarly charm\u00ading about the nar\u00adra\u00adtive is the fact that Hunter (real name Arthur Andrew Kelm), who had an impov\u00ader\u00adished child\u00adhood in a rather dis\u00adfunc\u00adtional sin\u00adgle-par\u00adent fam\u00adily, was in per\u00adson a rather bash\u00adful, ret\u00adi\u00adcent, and psy\u00adcho\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcally con\u00adser\u00adv\u00ada\u00adtive per\u00adson, more com\u00adfort\u00adable with hors\u00ades than peo\u00adple. His whole\u00adsome, boy-next-door image was not an act. How\u00adever, he was able to attract peo\u00adple like Antho\u00adny Perkins and Rudolf Nureyev as lovers. He moved eas\u00adily in sophis\u00adti\u00adcated cir\u00adcles in the the\u00adatre, and in Europe\u2019s high soci\u00adety, with\u00adout alter\u00ading his per\u00adsona. His act\u00ading career has nev\u00ader been tak\u00aden seri\u00adously, though he did some fine work on the stage and in tele\u00advi\u00adsion, and clear\u00adly cared deeply about his craft. He strug\u00adgled to get roles that didn\u2019t con\u00adsist most\u00adly of pos\u00ading shirt\u00adless. But in the end, he was done in by cul\u00adtural shifts that put his image out of fash\u00adion. His most intel\u00adli\u00adgent career move was to appear in John Waters\u2019 1980 low bud\u00adget cult film, Poly\u00adester<\/em>. That, and pub\u00adlicly com\u00ading out of the clos\u00adet, won him the respect he had nev\u00ader got\u00adten as a teen idol. The book is not vin\u00addic\u00adtive, but it gives a very believ\u00adable account of some of the nas\u00adtier things that went on in the film indus\u00adtry in the 1950\u2019s and 1960\u2019s.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was sur\u00adprised at how much I learned about how Hol\u00adly\u00adwood works from this biog\u00adra\u00adphy of a star of the 1950\u2019s. Tab Hunter was a \u201cheart-throb\u201d, an actor who was mar\u00adketed for his hand\u00adsome\u00adness. I frankly don\u2019t find his kind \u2026<\/p>\n

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