In 1980, Chevy Chase, in a TV interview, joked about Cary Grant being gay ('Oh, what a gal!')
Cary Grant, whose original name was Archibald Leach, was born in 1904, near Bristol in England.
Cary Grant's mother, Elsie, was Jewish. (The religion of Cary Grant, actor)
In the early 1920s, Cary Grant was in the Bob Pender stage troupe and they took him to the USA.
In the USA, Cary Grant acted at one time as a male escort, for socialites. (Gay For Today: Cary Grant)
In 1931 Cary Grant arrived in Hollywood.
In 1932 Cary Grant met Randolph Scott, and the two shared a rented beach house in Santa Monica for twelve years. Rumours had it that Grant and Scott were gay lovers.Cary Grant also lived for a time with gay Australian artist Jack Kelly, a set designer professionally known as Orry-Kelly.
Authors Marc Elliot, Charles Higham and Roy Moseley believe that Grant was bisexual.
Higham and Moseley claim that Grant and Scott were seen kissing in a public car park in the 1960s. (Gay For Today: Cary Grant )
In the book Hollywood Gays, Boze Hadleigh quotes homosexual director George Cukor, as saying about the alleged gay relationship between Randolph Scott and cary Grant: 'Randolph will admit it – to a friend.'
Screenwriter Arthur Laurents said Grant was 'at best bisexual'. (Gay For Today: Cary Grant)
William J. Mann wrote Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood, 1910-1969. Mann relates how photographer Jerome Zerbe spent 'three gay months' in the movie colony taking many photographs of Grant and Scott, 'attesting to their involvement in the gay scene'. ( Gay For Today: Cary Grant )
In Darwin Porter's book, Brando Unzipped (2006) it is reported that Grant had a gay affair with the bisexual Marlon Brando. (Gay For Today: Cary Grant)
Cary Grant's gay friends included Cukor, William Haines, and Australian artist and costume designer Orry-Kelly.
Grant's first wife was actress Virginia Cherrill. They married in 1934, and divorced in 1935.
Cary Grant was the first person in a film to use the word 'gay' as meaning homosexual.
This was when Grant starred in In Bringing Up Baby (1938).
In one scene, Grant appears in a frilly pink dressing gown and says "I just went gay all of a sudden."
Grant wore women's clothes in the film I Was a Male War Bride (1949). (Cary Grant)
2 comments:
It has been my experience that often times where there is smoke there is fire. There are too many clues. Straight men USUALLY, especially of that era, would not live with another man for 11 years nor would they keep company with so many others who were admittedly gay. (Like J. Edgar Hoover did with Clyde Toleson -- he was even buried next to him). Today, perhaps, it is a different story although not necessarily.
I believe homosexuals of that era especially, married for cover. Rock Hudson certainly did as did Cole Porter and many many others. I think Carey Grant may have also. I did not know the man so it is just gaydar. I think bisexuality while sometimes true is often NOT true for men. Either they are gay or not and if they say they are bi it's either to make society breath a sigh of relief or to make themselves breath the same sigh.
The same can sometimes be said for women but for women biological and emotional issues make bisexuality more possible.
Since male homosexuality is truly objectionable to many in our culture because men are not supposed to be gentle or sweet to other men, I think Carey Grant and others of his day hid his homosexuality since they faced ruin if they admitted it.
This is all speculation. I say Carey Grant was gay because there are too many arrows pointing that way. Like others of his generation he hid it .... not necessarily all that well.
Natalie, what you say would be a whole lot more plausible if you got the man's name right. It's Cary Grant, not Carey! To get it wrong once is okay but you did it every time. So I'm not confident you've really studied Grant's life/career.
Anyway, I think there's too much evidence of genuine heterosexual relationships in Grant's life to suggest he wasn't at least bi-sexual. Besides, why marry 5 times if just as cover. Surely once or twice would have done the trick. He even married after his career was well over when he no longer had anything to prove.
Generally though I don't get why men can't genuinely be bi-sexual. Seems odd to me.
Check out Richard Schickel's book on Cary Grant, I think it offers a very plausible argument of his evolving sexuality.
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