Tab Hunter Confidential Page #8

all the trappings,

I didn't think, that

a star would have.

He was very real person.

It was the frst long-term

relationship that I ever had.

We were together for

about seven years.

Hollywood turned

their back on him.

And I realized what it must

be like to be very popular

and to be very unpopular.

I cerainly

commiserated with him.

But he didn't ever want

to talk about it much.

ANNOUNCER:
Tab has been

out of town for a while.

Now he's back, just horsing

around, waiting for the day

he's discovered again.

I was very concerned.

So I bought space in "Variety"

to just tell people hello.

Is there any possibility

of you getting

job somewhere around here?

I just wanted people

to know that I wasn't

dead, that I'm still alive.

And a couple responses- really

sweet people-- said, yeah,

get lost, or yeah, drop dead.

Tab Hunter, who was every

high school girl's idea

of a dream boat--

he was a boy who

never seemed to get any older.

Well, he has.

Well, I might as well have

been a relic from the silent era

because people

wanted real people

in real situations, no more

Hollywood made-up personas.

We want to be free to ride

our machines without being

hassled by the man.

TAB HUNTER:
The new actors

were anti-establishment,

and I was apple pie

and All-American.

It would have

taken some director

to give him the kind of a

par that would make everybody

look at him in a new way.

In order to make the

change, he would have had

to do something really radical.

This was a low-budget

horror flm--

--made on a show string.

It needed a very

handsome debonair man

who would love women to death.

Tab Hunter would

be the last person

you would expect to do that.

TAB HUNTER:
"Sweet Kill"

was cerainly way out there.

I did it because the movie roles

were just not coming along.

Tab was so much a par

of that Eisenhower era.

The '50s, as an era, was

repudiated in the '60s.

Young people are

the only people

in this whole country that

have saved the soul of America.

It was a completely

changed world.

America was at war with itself

as well as at war with Vetnam.

My brother was in military

medical evacuations.

He had joined the Navy.

He wound up in Vetnam,

as so many young men did.

I was at a horse show at the

Cow Palace in San Francisco.

And I was sitting on my horse

at the back gate waiting

for the announcer to

announce my horse Nob Hill

and myself for the nex

entry into the arena.

And I saw a man in

military uniform coming,

and he walked over to me, and

he said, are you Ar Gelien?

I just want to tell you your

brother was killed in Vetnam.

I thought, why him?

Why not me'?

Walt was married, and

he had seven children.

I remember taking the moment,

closing my eyes, and saying,

Walt, I'm gonna win

this class for you.

And my horse won the

class that night.

And then afterwards I

went back to the barn.

And when I was in the stall with

my horse, I totally lost it.

I was scared of my own shadow.

My brother was the one who

opened the doors of life

for me.

I really looked

up to him so much.

My mother was very stoic

about my brother's death.

She was getting better,

but it took a while.

I was very concerned

about her well-being,

and I would see her a great

deal more than I had when I was

running around with the movies.

I found her a little

aparment in Long Beach.

Whatever she need, I

would be there for her.

Well, I made a promise to my

mother to take care of her.

And I defnitely was

going to keep it.

I had to create

work in some way.

I discovered dinner theater.

Dinner theater was a place where

people could come and stuff

their faces, then sit back,

and while they were getting

to belch, watch the show they

you were doing. (LAUGHING)

They were becoming

very, very popular.

There was a stigma attached

to working dinner theaters.

They said that it was the place

that old actors went to die.

I was making more

money at dinner theater

than I was waiting for a picture

now and then in Hollywood,

that's for sure--

six weeks here,

eight weeks there, four weeks

here, all over the country.

I felt I had to keep going once

you put yourself in that gear.

I was on the road constantly.

INTERVlEWER:
Your

story in "Here Lies

Jeremy Troy," which

is at the Grand

Dinner Theater in Anaheim--

That's right.

We'll be there for eight weeks.

It's right opposite the

entrance to Disneyland.

It's a very lonely,

lonely existence.

You perform in front

of 1,500 people,

and you go home to a hotel

room in the middle of nowhere

by yourself.

Working at dinner theater

was very exhausting.

And doing that every single

night took a toll on me.

I wore myself right

into the ground

to the point of where

I had a hear attack.

I was sure that it

could be the end.

I was wondering if I was

going to be able to make it,

and I was praying a lot.

I did give up dinner

theater after that.

I learned to try to relax a bit.

I learned to be grateful

for every moment

and thankful- thankful.

I love the church.

I love my religion.

But I still just felt

like I was such an outcast

because of my sexuality.

It took a long time for

me to fnd my way back.

It was so peaceful,

and it was so imporant

that I try to be a par of it.

And I struck up a conversation

with a priest who I felt

I can really communicate with.

I told him I was a

Catholic, and I told him I

had some terrible reservations.

He was so receptive.

And he really made me

feel better about myself.

He was discovering something

about his own truth.

For a man to have to live

in someone else's presuming

about who you should love,

how do you ever know yourself?

He was going to go where

his hear told him to go.

By going back to my church

and my beliefs, that really,

really helped me through

a very diffcult period.

And little by little, I just

felt the weight of the world

was lifted from me.

I knew Tab is an

image, you know'?

And that was the thing that

was so very imporant to me

and why I so much wanted

him to be in Polyester."

It's Todd, honey.

Todd?

Todd Tomorrow?

John Waters called me up

on the telephone and said,

I've got a script I'd like you

to read for a flm with Divine.

What do you think, sweethear?

Oh, it's very high brow, Todd.

And then he said,

how would you feel

about kissing a

(LAUGHING) And I

just said, I'm sure

I've kissed a hell

of a lot worse.

John's flms were outrageous.

I prayed that he would never

go watch "Pink Flamingos."

Happy birhday, fatso.

Oh!

And he did.

How could anyone be

flthier than Divine'?

Even then, he didn't

say, oh, well, never mind.

He was unafraid.

I remember an agent

saying to me at the time,

you can't do that flm.

And my response was,

what have I got to lose'?

Where's my career now'?

I thought this will

be a lot of fun.

Why don't you show me

your bedroom, honey'?

Mother may I'?

Yes, you may.

Ooh!

I could only afford

him for one week.

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