It’s a pity Dirk Bogarde remained firmly in the closet all his life though he should be given credit for starring as a gay character in the ground-breaking film Victim.
@George Broadhead. Dirk Bogarde was one of my all time favourite actors, who also starred in one of my all time favourite films ever Death In Venice (1971), which he also played a gay character.
I can feel him turning in his grave at the thought of this.
His persistent public denial of his sexuality through his writing made his autobiographical books seem emptily unauthentic. All the more sad because a) his sexuality was an open secret – everyone knew, and b) because a bit of truthfulness would have done his literary career no end of good.
A lot of the great stage & film actors of the 30′s,40′s & 50′s were bisexuals.Trevor Howerd who was voraciously heterosexual once commented in the wake of the 1966 law change – that being homosexual was going to be compulsory.
Not strictly relevant was Michael Gambon’s gentle comment that “as to being gay , he had tried it but it made his eyes water so he stopped.” Lovely.
Stephen Bourne assures me he would happily have presented this talk in the evening during the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival…but the programmers of the Festival have forgotten he exists in London and has successfully uncovered some wonderful treasures from our film and TV past (for the record, Stephen published his book Brief Encounters in 1996 and from 1992 to 2001 he was the programmer of Out of the Archives, a celebration of LGBT in British TV which he presented at the National Fim Theatre). Stephen is a national treasure who should be treasured!
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It’s a pity Dirk Bogarde remained firmly in the closet all his life though he should be given credit for starring as a gay character in the ground-breaking film Victim.
@George Broadhead. Dirk Bogarde was one of my all time favourite actors, who also starred in one of my all time favourite films ever Death In Venice (1971), which he also played a gay character.
… a self-hating closeted gay character, Aschenbach. He was, naturally, very good in the role.
Absolutely, George.
I can feel him turning in his grave at the thought of this.
His persistent public denial of his sexuality through his writing made his autobiographical books seem emptily unauthentic. All the more sad because a) his sexuality was an open secret – everyone knew, and b) because a bit of truthfulness would have done his literary career no end of good.
A lot of the great stage & film actors of the 30′s,40′s & 50′s were bisexuals.Trevor Howerd who was voraciously heterosexual once commented in the wake of the 1966 law change – that being homosexual was going to be compulsory.
Not strictly relevant was Michael Gambon’s gentle comment that “as to being gay , he had tried it but it made his eyes water so he stopped.” Lovely.
Shame the talk is at 1.15pm, that rules out those of us who have to work regular hours then.
@Rehan
Stephen Bourne assures me he would happily have presented this talk in the evening during the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival…but the programmers of the Festival have forgotten he exists in London and has successfully uncovered some wonderful treasures from our film and TV past (for the record, Stephen published his book Brief Encounters in 1996 and from 1992 to 2001 he was the programmer of Out of the Archives, a celebration of LGBT in British TV which he presented at the National Fim Theatre). Stephen is a national treasure who should be treasured!