Debbie Reynolds: We all knew Liberace was gay

Contents:

• WHAT LIBERACE REVEALS ABOUT THE MARCH OF GAY RIGHTS
• LIBERACE'S EX-LOVER CLAIMS GAY AFFAIR WH JACKSON
• RISHI SUNAK APOLOGIS TO LGBT VETERANS FOR PAST ARMED FORC GAY BAN
• DEBBIE REYNOLDS: WE ALL KNEW LIBERACE WAS GAY
• LIBERACE GAY

WHAT LIBERACE REVEALS ABOUT THE MARCH OF GAY RIGHTS

How did he mata this fictn, and what do say about Ameri's rapidly changg attu to gay rights? "His grand entrance at New York's Rad Cy Mic Hall April 1984 was as cheerfully, flamboyantly mp as his fans had e to expect om his 50-year mil until his ath 1987, Liberace sisted he was not gay.

Behd The Canlabra, a forthg film starrg Michael Douglas, tells the story of Liberace's long-standg relatnship wh his former chffr, played by Matt morn dienc are faiar wh a diverse range of gay and lbian personali, Liberace rose to promence at a time when mp and homosexualy were monly and erroneoly seen as synonymo. He grew up a nservative, workg-class, Polish-Italian mid-wtern hoehold, at a time when homosexualy was punishable by up to 10 years prison some US a rult, he had good e to fear that exposure of his private self would almost certaly have meant the end of his reer. "But the gay stuff is only one ntext for unrstandg Liberace.

"He prented himself as a girly boy, not a gay man. The Cassandra article might be nsired too homophobic to be published a natnal newspaper today, and the 1959 trial that followed reveals much about the very different social attus of the time - not least the repeated e of the term "homosexualist" durg the se. Unr oath, Liberace ttified that he was not gay and had never taken part homosexual activy.

LIBERACE'S EX-LOVER CLAIMS GAY AFFAIR WH JACKSON

"I don't thk the trial eher helped the e of gay rights or hred , " says Revel Barker, thor of Cryg All The Way To The Bank, which tells the story of the se.

"People like my parents, who were big fans of Liberace, didn't really thk of him as a homosexual before or after - they jt thought he was a great performer. "But the Cassandra trial, upled wh his repeated nials of his homosexualy, was one reason why sectns of the fledglg gay rights movement creasgly viewed Liberace wh 50 by the time the Stonewall rts kicked off the morn fight for gay and lbian rights the US, he displayed snt sire to mand regnn or equaly for the muny even though as time passed "he was livg a glass closet", acrdg to Kopelson.

"Nothg about him speaks to a morn gay man, " Pyron adds. Likewise, says Kopelson, some morn gay men fd difficult to relate to him - ntrast, he says, wh the actor Rock Hudson, another famo closeted celebry of the era. Still, Liberace's supporters say he n and should be remembered as a gay in, nohels - not one that reprents liberatn, but a none-too-distant era when sexual mori had to munite via d language and he ntu to functn as a marker of the lims of the entertament dtry's the Canlabra's director Steven Sorbergh provoked a fierce bate when he said he had to take the film to the ble statn HBO bee Hollywood's studs believed was "too gay" Showmanship, appears, is still pable of kickg up a storm at the box n follow the Magaze on Twter and on Facebook.

RISHI SUNAK APOLOGIS TO LGBT VETERANS FOR PAST ARMED FORC GAY BAN

He sued two newspapers, the UK's Daily Mirror and the Amerin magaze Confintial the 1950s for suatg that he was gay. It was a hard battle, maly bee Liberace still nied he was gay.

His diagnosis me at the height of the AIDS epimic when many gay men were diagnosed wh the disease. To date, bisexual and homosexual men are still the group wh the hight fectn rat of HIV/AIDS.

DEBBIE REYNOLDS: WE ALL KNEW LIBERACE WAS GAY

Liberace was a closeted homosexual and is believed that he ntracted the disease om one of his partners, but which one is not known for certa. Throughout his life, Liberace vehemently nied that he was homosexual and vered up his sexualy by datg many different women. He also sued anyone who acced him of beg gay for libel; he won every time.

All three, far om ndid self-portras, are extensns of Liberace’s stage act, prentg a theatril versn of his reer path and opulent liftyle scbbed ee of any signs of nflict or homosexualy (“‘wonrful’ is, ‘private’ at, ” wrote John Waters when he reviewed the third book for Vogue 1986). Liberace’s gay private life — once the subject of so much speculatn — was, turns out, rather unremarkable. Sorbergh’s adaptatn is, that sense, le wh nventnal reprentatns of gays and lbians the movi and on televisn today (The Kids Are Alright, Morn Fay), albe wh sex scen that are slightly more Game of Thron than Glee (Sorbergh has said that his film land at HBO bee movie studs nsired “too gay”).

But the film’s foc on Liberace’s gay domtic life mak a strangely normalizg portrayal of an entertaer whose onstage self-prentatn was plited, divisive, and arguably que subversive precisely bee wasn’t openly gay. The former ma him a surge of the post-Stonewall gay rights movement; Thorson wr his book, echog the sentiments of other gay wrers and activists of the time, that he felt Liberace’s nial of his homosexualy and his disease “had set the entire gay movement back a . ” The homophobia here is thly veiled (Liberace won the su), but, if you watch old footage of the showman today, the hostily toward his brand of entertament is unrstandable: more than anythg, Liberace’s act seemed preposteroly, repellently phony.

LIBERACE GAY

And yet Liberace que obvly didn’t seem like a straight man onstage: The cric David Ehrenste, his 1998 book Open Secret: Gay Hollywood 1928-1998, wrote that Liberace’s “every word and gture was crafted to raise the qutn of his sexual inty the mds of his adorg fans, only to stave off their actually brgg up earnt at the last mute.

” Liberace’s lawyers seized upon that le, particular, as evince of the thor’s tentn to imply that their client was gay. The wrer and filmmaker Bce LaBce nicely highlighted the puzzle of Liberace’s imprsn upon viewers an say prented last year at a nference on mp: when he broke down mp performers to subtegori, LaBce clud Liberace on the lists of both “Classic Gay Camp” and “Bad Gay Camp” figur.

The pot is that Liberace was not simply a gay man on stage — he was a straight man, a transvte, a grandmother, a queer ltle boy.