[On November 17th, 1925, Roy Harold Scherer Jr.—better known as Rock Hudson—was born. His iconic career and complex life open up a lot of American histories, so this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of them, leading up to a weekend post on other 20C gay celebrities who lived their lives in the closet.]
[NOTE. I
originally shared this post as part of a September 2015 series on
September-tastic cultural works. But I think it sets up this week’s topics well,
so I wanted to start with it!]
On how biography
adds compelling layers and questions to a forgettable romantic comedy.
I honestly tried
to watch the 1961
romantic comedy Come September
in preparation for writing this post, but after a certain early point I
gave up. Even the Wikipedia
summary of the film’s plot, and more exactly of who is wooing or leaving
whom at any given moment, is almost impossible to follow; and on watching the
opening the film feels more like an advertisement for Italy’s
spectacular Ligurian coast than a coherent story. And the part that I did
most fully understand, and that explains the film’s title, is more creepy than
romantic: September is the month when American businessman Robert (Rock Hudson)
annually escapes to his Ligurian villa with his Italian mistress Lisa (Gina
Lollobrigida); but this year his visit is moved up to July instead, and when he
informs Lisa of the change she cancels her imminent wedding to join Robert per
usual. The course of true love and all, but not exactly the sweetest way to
meet these two star-crossed lovers.
So not exactly a
must-watch classic—but if we delve into the biographies of the film’s stars, it
takes on additional and more interesting layers of meaning. For one thing, the
film’s two young lovers are played by popular crooner Bobby Darin
and up-and-coming ingénue Sandra
Dee, and the story of their connection behind the scenes is by far the
film’s most romantic: Darin and Dee met for the first time on set, fell in
love, and were married that same year. Portrayed in the recent biopic Beyond the Sea (2004), with Kevin Spacey starring as
Darin and Kate Bosworth as Dee, the marriage lasted seven tumultuous years and
produced their son Dodd Mitchell Darin before the couple divorced in 1967. And
no matter what the future held for these two, there’s something fascinating
about watching two young performers pretending to fall in love while (we know)
they were actually falling in love as well, and the romance between these two
popular artists makes for a much more compelling story than anything presented
on screen in Come September.
And then there’s
Rock Hudson. It would be homophobic, narrow-minded, and just plain dumb for me
to suggest that a gay actor couldn’t play a straight character, and of course Hudson’s
entire career (much of it as the lead in romantic
comedies) would belie that notion. Yet at the same time (and of course I’m
far from the first to argue this), there’s something inarguably compelling
about the reality that one of the most popular, traditional (that is, starring
in the kinds of traditional love stories that were permissible and widespread
in the buttoned-up entertainment culture of the 1950s) romantic leads in
Hollywood history was throughout his life and career performing
that sexuality, acting the part of a heterosexual sex symbol. Sir
Ian McKellen argued earlier this year that when he finally came out as a
gay man (at the age of 49), it made him a better actor; “my acting was
disguise,” he put it, “Now, my acting is about revelation and truth.” Seen
through that lens, and given that he never came out publicly during his lifetime
(although his
1985 diagnosis with AIDS led to awareness of his sexuality shortly before
and then after his death), Hudson’s acting was always a multi-layered, complex
facet of his life, and one that lends another compelling layer to a film like Come September.
Next Rock
Hudson post tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What
do you think? Rock Hudson memories or connections you’d share?
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