West Hollywood Stories of Gay Celebrity Dates and Hookups

In the gay neighborhoods of West Hollywood and San Francisco, not so much in New York or Florida, everyone had a celebrity dating or hookup story.  Here are the most famous or most believable I've heard.

I'm making no claims about the sexual orientation of any of these celebrities except #1 and #10. Some of the stories are probably exaggerations, a non-romantic lunch becoming a romantic date, a casual meeting becoming a vigorous all-night orgy.  Some are probably pure inventions.

Cesar Romero (1907-1994) 1940s heartthrob and the Joker on the old Batman tv series.  My boyfriend Lane hooked up with him in the early 1990s.  When he told the story, Adam West (Batman) and Burt Ward (Robin) were in the mix.

President Ronald Reagan (1911-2004) He was just a local radio announcer when Oscar, the retired set designer from Des Moines, claims that they dated. The biographical details check out.

Desi Arnaz (1917-1986).  Ricky Ricardo on I Love Lucy.  Cesar Romero claimed that they had a long-term "friend with benefits relationship.

Tony Randall (1920-2004) star of the Odd Couple (1968-1975).  Marcus, the first person I met in West Hollywood, said that they met on the set of Hollywood Squares, and hooked up in a hotel in Beverly Hills.  Marcus was in the industry, and introduced me to several celebrities, including Michael J. Fox and Robin Williams, but there's no evidence that Tony Randall was gay.

Tony Curtis (1925-2010), the movie star who went in drag for Some Like It Hot (1959).   Drake, the leather teddy bear artist of South of Market, claimed to have tricked with him when he was starring in Trapeze (1956), about a circus love triangle.  Tony Curtis was married to women five times, but his androgynous prettyboy looks made him the subject of many gay rumors in the 1950s.

Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997), the gay Beat poet.  Fangorn, aka Dennis, said that his first gay experience was a three way with Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky.

Dick Sargeant (1930-1994), Cary Grant (1904-1986), and Groucho Marx (1890-1988), all on the same night, in the same bed!  In 1958, when he was a teenage navy recruit, Randall (the bear with the pierced penis) told us that he hooked up with Dick Sargent (future star of Bewitched), who took him to a gay party.  There Groucho and Cary both invited him home.  They compromised.

Pat Boone (1934-).    This doesn't really count as a friend's hookup story, but Randall, the Muscle Bear with the Pierced Penis, told us that he heard about a three way that Pat Boone had with Dick Sargent and a teenage fan.




Richard Chamberlain (1934-)  The now-out star of Shogun (1980) and I competed over Thanh, the Vietnamese grad student, one night at Mugi. Thanh and I dated once, and then became friends.  He immediately sought out Chamberlain for a dinner-and-bedroom date.

Peter Fonda (1940-), actor and political activist.  This is actually a buffed model representing his iconic role in Easy Rider (1969).  Will, the Bondage Boy with the Sweeney Todd fetish, told us that they hooked up at a bath house in Mexico in 1978.  Fonda, who has been married three times, has been the subject of gay rumors.

Sylvester Stallone (1946-).  In Upstate New York, the Satyr claimed that he had a job as a "fluffer" for Stallone during his 1970 porn movie.









David Cassidy (1950-) teen idol and star of The Partridge Family (1970-1974).  My housemate Derek, a former fitness model, told us about a romantic weekend of motorcycling through Wales with him in 1974.  At that time David Cassidy was the most famous pop star in the world.  If it really happened, why is there no news coverage?

Mark Hamill (1951-), the iconic Luke Skywalker of Star Wars (1977).  He's done a lot of theater, too.  He was starring in The Nerd on Broadway in 1987, when Blake the Opera Buff said that they met and went out on several dates.  Hamill is not out, but there has been a lot of speculation about his sexual identity.

Dean Paul Martin (1951-) and Desi Arnaz Jr. (1953-), the sons of Dean Martin and Desi Arnaz, respectively, and two thirds of the boy band Dino, Desi, and Billy.  Cesar Romero claimed that he had a three-way with them in 1971.

Dan Butler (1954-), who played the ultra-macho sports announcer Bulldog on Frazier (1993-2004). Marshall the Virgin dated him several times shortly after we took him to his first Bear Party in 1994.

Kip Noll (1958-2001) the porn star.  My friend Alan, the Pentecostal porn star, worked with him on a film in the early 1980s.  Does it count as a hookup if your sexual activity is part of your job?










Ronald Reagan, Jr. (1958-),  the President's son, estranged from his father, a ballet dancer, who got married very quickly and suspiciously when his father took office -- what were we to think? Half of West Hollywood claimed to have dated him.  My ex Fred claimed that they met at a bathhouse in Chicago during the summer of 1979.

Scott Baio (1960-). Nearly everybody in West Hollywood claimed to have dated "Charles in Charge."

Rob Lowe (1964-), teen idol and brat packer.  Mario, who picked me up at the Different Light Bookstore, worked with him on a tv pilot when they were both teenagers.  According to Mario, they had dinner, went up to Rob's room, and one thing led to another while they were watching Magnum, P.I.

Keanu Reeves (1964-).  The brooding star of the Matrix movies has played gay characters several times, but he had barely begun his career in 1988, when my friends Scott and Will ran into him at the Rage.  They described a wild night that included making out on the beach and skinny-dipping in a pool of a house in Beverly Hills that didn't belong to them.

Luke Perry (1966-2019), star of the teen drama Beverly Hills 90210 (1990-2000).  Remember the Family Guy episode, in which Meg accidentally "outs" him in the school newspaper, and he sues for slander?  My friend Barry, the Colonial Williamsburg boy of Long Island, claimed to have met him while cruising in West Hollywood one night in 1997.  Perry was married with a son at the time, but ok.

Leonardo DiCaprio (1974-), the indy movie star who has played gay characters several times, and receives nearly as many gay rumors as the big boys, Tom Cruise and John Travolta.  Lots of guys claimed to have dated or hooked up with him, but the most believable story came from Farshad, the French Moroccan on my sausage list, who said that they met in Paris in 1995.

Mark-Paul Gosselaar (1974-), star of Saved by the Bell.  He doesn't really count, since it wasn't actually a date: my friend Infinite Chazz claims a hookup that went wrong when MP dumped him for another guy.

Prince Carl Philip of Sweden (1979-).   Zack, the photography student at the Rhode Island School of Design, said that he spent the night with him when they were teenagers, both boarding school students in Connecticut.

Dylan O'Brien (1991-),  star of the Maze Runner movies and the tv series Teen Wolf (2011-).  Jimmy, the Boy Toy of my platonic friends,  told me that they went to high school in Hermosa Beach, California together.  They used to do it in his parents' garage.  This was before I had heard of Dylan O'Brien, so he's an odd person to try to impress me with, and there are some gay rumors.

By the way, the top photo is of model Craig Moody.  He's gay and from Florida, but none of my friends has claimed to have dated him.

Harry Styles (1994-).  Ryan H,, the college track star that I met while driving through small-town Illinois, said that he met Harry Styles of the boy band One Direction in the summer of 2015, and had a rather unsatisfactory three way with him and a silver fox.

See also: Celebrities I've Dated

Dancing with a Swedish Leatherboy

Fiesch, Switzerland, June 1977

During the summer after my junior year at Rocky High, when I still belonged to the ultra-fundamentalist Nazarene Church and thought gay people were monsters, I was one of the delegates to the Nazarene Youth Society International Institute, 500 cream-of-the-crop teenage Johnny and Suzie Nazarenes from around the world meeting in an old army training camp (now the Sport und Ferienzentrum) in Fiesch, Switzerland.














What did we do for a week?

Boys-only swimming

1. Evangelization services, with altar calls every night.
2. Bible studies, prayer meetings, and workshops on personal evangelization.
3. The International Jump Quiz Tournament.
4. Swimming in the camp pool (boys only before noon, girls only after noon).
 5. Field trips to Rhone Glacier, Brig (for skiing), and Mount Eggishorn (for mountain climbing).

I tried to call Giovanni, the foreign-exchange student who I had a crush on, but the number didn't work.


We had some free time for sightseeing, as long as we followed the rules:

1. Don't make friends with the locals.
2. Don't go near any Catholic churches.
3. No dancing, movies, live theater, card games, or festivals. No restaurants that serve alcohol (in Switzerland they all do).
4. Be back at the base by 7:00 pm, and in your bunk 1/2 hour after altar call ends. 

Sport und Ferienzentrum, Fiesch

I started hanging out with Alex, whose dad was a missionary in France, and who had no qualms about breaking the rules.  We visited Sion Cathedral, chatted up some high school boys on the train, abandoned our lunch boxes for a restaurant.

And one night we snuck out after curfew, walked into town, and ended up in a disco (breaking three rules at once).

My eyes were drawn to an older guy, maybe 25, sitting with his friends: blond, glasses, wearing a leather jacket with no shirt underneath.  I glimpsed a stunning, sculpted physique like a marble statue, and a gigantic bulge.  So I dragged Alex over to talk to him.

Our barracks

In English, he said that his name was Christoffer, and he was an engineering student from Goteborg University in Sweden.

"I had lunch with King Karl Gustaf last year," I yelled, trying to make myself heard over the music.. "He told me to apply to Goteborg University."

"He doesn't know what he's talking about," Christoffer yelled.  I didn't realize it at the time, but in retrospect, he was very drunk. "You should be a model.  You have the right. . .um. . face for it. . .and you, too," he added, turning to Alex. "You should be models together."

Suddenly we heard the throbbing beat of Donna Summers' "I Feel Love."  "Come on, we dance," Christoffer said, throwing off his leather jacket and dragging us onto the dance floor.

I had never danced before, so I'm sure I was bad at it, but Christoffer wasn't paying attention.  He jumped and gyrated and lip-synched until his body started to glow with sweat.

I wasn't going back to camp without a touch, so I reached out and ran my palm lightly over that white-marble chest.  Christoffer grinned at me.  He reached over and undid a button of my shirt, and then another, and ran his hand underneath.

The Swedish leather boy

Then Alex pulled me away.  "We have to get back!" he yelled.

"No, stay!" Christoffer yelled.  "Come to my hotel.  We have Schnapps!"

An offer of alcohol quashed any erotic interest I might have had.  I said goodbye and quickly followed Alex out of the club and through the dark, cool night to our camp.

"I think I saved you from a fate worse than death back there," Alex said. "That Christoffer guy was gay."

"No way!" I exclaimed.  "Didn't you see his body?"  In Rock Island, we thought that muscles were a sure sign of heterosexual identity.

I never saw Christoffer again, of course, but I have often wondered what would have happened if we accepted his offer of "Schnapps."

See also: My date with the King of Sweden

The Catholic Priest in My Bed

Akron, Ohio, April 2007

In the spring of 2007, I was teaching at the University of Dayton, and dating Paul, an aspiring writer who had just graduated from Ohio Dominican University. He had four of the characteristics I find attractive: short, husky, gifted beneath the belt (Bratwurst+), and religious (devout Catholic).

Devout Catholic.

1. He got his name by being born on June 29th, the Feast Day of Saint Paul.  Lucky he wasn't born on June 30th, the Feast Day of Saints Clotsindus and Ostianus.

2. He went to Catholic schools and a Catholic college.

3. His older brother was a priest.

4. He wore a scapular around his neck, except at the gym.

5. He had a little basin of holy water in his apartment, which he used to cross himself.

6. When he spent Saturday night with me, he insisted on going to Mass the next day.

7. And fasting before, so no Sunday brunch.

Being closeted, Paul didn't want anyone to know that we were gay.  He wouldn't take me to his regular church in Huber Heights, or go to a church near me in Fairborn, where someone might recognize.

We often drove all the way into Columbus to find a relatively gay-friendly Catholic church.  If not, we went to Holy Family, the most conservative church in town, where statues outnumbered people, and elderly nuns sat in the front row with rosary beads, and priests still heard confessions.

The nice thing about conservative churches is that it's easy to be closeted.  It never occurs to anyone, ever, that a member of the congregation -- or a visitor -- might be gay.  Paul and I could sit together, hug, answer questions as a couple, and everyone just assumed that we were heterosexual friends, or father and son (I was 45, and he was 25).

Besides, one of the priests was very cute.  Father Christopher, 26 years old, a new graduate of the Pontifical College Josephinum.  Tall, dark-haired, with glasses and a hint of a respectable physique, who threw references to Harry Potter and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy into his homilies.


I have a thing for clergy: Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim.  There's something about the juxtaposition of the physical and the spiritual, the erotic thoughts that leak into sacred spaces, the penis hidden beneath those gaudy robes and black cassocks.

No chance that we would ever hook up!  He was a graduate of the most conservative seminary in the U.S., and a priest at the most conservative church in Ohio!

Just looking was enough.

One Sunday Father Christopher announced an upcoming spiritual retreat, centered on the contemplative works of Thomas Merton.  Participants would car-pool to the Loyola Retreat House, near Akron, Ohio, about three hours away.

I liked Thomas Merton, and I really liked Father Christopher, so I signed up.  Paul couldn't make it.

A group of 10 of us drove up in three cars, leaving at dawn and arriving just in time for lunch.  Then an afternoon of meditation workshops, book discussions, lectures, free time for contemplation, dinner, and Mass.  It was like a Nazarene camp meeting.

The next morning, we had another Mass, followed by breakfast, more workshops, discussions, and lectures, lunch, and more free time for contemplation.  Then we headed home.

I got to spend a lot of time with Father Christopher.  My life story had to be strictly closeted, of course, but I still managed to complain about the Nazarene church of my childhood, and share lots of stories about how much they hated Catholics.

 He was shocked -- he had believed that everyone loved and respected the Catholic Church, even Protestants.

But the best part was bedtime.  Since Father Christopher and I were the only non-couples at the retreat, we were assigned to share a room.

I didn't intend to try anything, of course -- the last thing I needed was to be ejected from a retreat center a three hour drive from home.  But I was hoping for a Sausage Sighting.

Father Christopher changed into his pajamas in the bathroom, then climbed into bed with rosary beads.  "Hail Mary, full of grace," he began.  "Oh -- Boomer, I hope this won't disturb you?"

"Not at all."  I waited..

No chance of seeing any autoerotic activity later.  I looked it up: Catholics consider masturbation "intrinsically evil," like being gay.

But sometimes the penis has a mind of its own.  Especially when you lack a regular sexual outlet.

I watched.

Father Christopher finished his rosary, kissed it, put it aside, and crossed his arms over his chest like a vampire.  Soon he began to snore. 

I watched.

After about half an hour, it began to rise.

It stood at full attention.

I didn't dare touch it, but...could I move off the covers, and get a peek?

I reached over and carefully tugged at the covers.

Father Christopher murmured something, and I retreated.

It was still standing at full attention.

I tried again.

It stood, peeking out of his underwear, ready for action, a Bratwurst with a mushroom head.

Eventually he turned over.  He hadn't awakened, or even touched anything.

Later I discovered that the average person has about 5 dreams per night.  10% of those dreams have sexual content, and 5% of the sex dreams result in a spontaneous orgasm.

So if you watch most men all night, you have a 1 in 40 chance of seeing a spontaenous orgasm.  But since Father Paul didn't have an access to an ordinary sexual outlet, my chances were probably like 1 in 10.

Still, my luck was amazing.

In the morning Father Paul showered and changed, and we continued the retreat.

I don't think he even knew that his erotic life came alive every night in dreams.

See also: Barry and the Creepy Old Guy; and Paul Gives Up Men for Lent