Eleven Gay Historical Figures Worthy of the "Milk" Treatment

I thought all of these historical figures would make fascinating choices for a biopic, and your casting choices were eerily perfect.

Just a note though, Robert Pattinson plays Salvador Dali in Little Ashes, not Federico Garcia Lorca (he's played by Javier Beltran)

I may be straight, but I'm not narrow.

These are all terrific choices, and I agree with Chuckles, the right director (Julian Schnabel, perhaps?) could do wonders with Walt Whitman's life. Some others I'd like to see, and the gay directors I'd like to see tackle the subjects:

Pyotr Tchaikovsky: Ken Russell's The Music Lovers (1970) doesn't cut it; filming it today would allow for a more balanced examination of his life, particularly how he wasn't always tortured by his homosexuality--which is how he's traditionally and incorrectly portrayed--but often fully embraced his love for men, and how these love affairs provided inspiration for his music; how about Rob Marshall (Chicago) to direct?

Richard the Lion Hearted: Anthony Hopkins' portrayal of the über-butch but still gay Richard in The Lion in Winter is an under-heralded classic; it's time this heroic but flawed gay monarch get his proper, wide-screen epic treatment; this could be the opportunity for Roland Emmerich (The Day After Tomorrow) to do something serious yet still have his patented DeMille-esque style.

Denis Rake: One of those interviewed in the mammoth documentary The Sorrow and the Pity (1969), Rake was the son of a British opera singer who became a circus performer and ended up in the military during World War II, where he went to France to aid the Resistance and had an affair with a German officer; after the war, he became Douglas Fairbanks Jr's butler. I mean, this is just begging for a big screen film, preferably with François Ozon (Time to Leave) directing.

Marshal Hubert Lyautey: Another chance to shatter stereotypes, here we have a French military officer so revered that his crypt is next to Napoleon's in Les Invalides; a bit tricky, however, as he was an imperialist who conquered Morocco for France; but he loved the men of North Africa, his homosexuality was widely known, and there's the paradox that despite his deeply conservative politics, his closest friends were liberal artists and writers; gay Italian director Ferzan Ozpetek (Facing Windows) might have the right temperment and intelligence for this.

afhickman

There are lots of gay artists and celebrities whose lives might make interesting movies.  Here's a list of those who spirng immediately to mind: William Haines, Ramon Novarro, Carl Van Vechten, Hart Crane, George Cukor, Clifton Webb, Frank O'Hara, Charles Laughton, John Gielgud, William Thomas Strayhorn, Bruce Chatwin--the list goes on.  Personally, I'd like to see a screen biography of Peter McGehee.  Maybe we could start with a series of documentaries on Logo, or some such place. 

"The mountain has wings."

Patricia Bosworth’s biography of Montgomery Clift has been in and out of  development  since the 1970’s

Diaghilev has been featured in a number of films including most notably by Alan Bates  in NIJINSKY.  In 2005 there was a great documentary on the Ballet Russe.as well.

The rights to Gad Beck’s autobiography has already been optioned. by Steven Spielberg.

There was a documentary about Mapplethorpe and his lover Sam Wagstaff two years called Black, White +Gray, directed by James Crump.  And recently actress Eliza Dushku announced at Sundance her intention to produce a Mapplethorpe Bio-film with her brother, Nate, playing Mapplethorpe..

Andy Garcia has already appeared as the poet in the 1996 Bio-film, THE DISAPPEARANCE OF GARCIA LORCA.

And I am all for  Mark Christopher making more films; be it Sylvester’s bio or one of his insightful stores about gay sexuality in the rural Midwest. He’s terrifically talented.

Some openly gay Bios that might have wide appeal would be takes on Da Vinci, Michelangelo (forget Heston’s take on him), Bill Tilden the tennis champ, Congressman Barney Frank, Noel Coward, Broadway star Harry Richmond,  actor Clifton Webb, Decorator Nate Berkus, British envoy to the Congress of Vienna Lord Castlereagh, Fredrick the Great of Prussia, Drag Star Julian Eltinge, and the Woolworth heir that danced with the Duchess of Windsor Jimmy Donahue  all with fascinating lives and gay stories.

That's all I am saying... 

INSIDEGUY

I've always thought that someone should make a movie about the life of Bayard Rustin. He was involved in the life of every famous civil rights activist who ever lived. He even had a famous debate with Malcolm X.

Denzel would never play him though. Bayard liked having sex and Denzel would never go there.

Robert Pattison plays Dali in Little Ashes, Lorca is played by Javier Beltran (Who, for some reason, doesn't have an imdb page)

There's a decent BBC tv film called 'Riot at the Rite', about the first staging of Rite of Spring, which features quite a lot about Diaghilev and Nijinsky's relationship. Diaghilev's played by Alex Jennings and Nijinsky by Adam Garcia.

Freddie Mercury 

Has there been one about him?Seems like it would be an incredible part for someone to play and the music would be amazing and he's Indian, he's very, very well known and has cross-cultural and cross-generational appeal.  I don't know what  fellow Brit Sacha Baron Cohen's range is in terms of acting but I could see him dissapearing into the part and I can't imagine he'd be afraid accurately portray the sexual aspects of the story.  I think he sings as well.  Would be a great challenge for him as an actor

Bayard Rustin

Given his feelings about homosexuality (or rather, playing gay parts) I'm not sure Denzel Washington would be a good choice for Bayard Rustin. 

I  know he's kind of the "go to" guy (other than Will Smith) but surely there's some other fabulous black actor out there who could do this part and give an oscar-worhy performance.

Maybe Giancarlo Esposito?

"Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common." (Dorothy Parker)

afhickman

Ivor Novello is an excellent idea.  Noel Coward has been done, but I'm sure he'd like to be done again.  Can Pharrell Willams act?  I'd like to see more of him.  But Freddie Mercury is already taken, or so I understand.  Hasn't the project with Johnny Depp (!) been green-lighted?

Bayard Rustin, I presume?

"The mountain has wings."

With the history that the Japanese and Chinese have, I think you're just asking for a huge controversy if you have a Japanese actor play a beloved Chinese icon.  Wasn't there this type of controversy when Memiors of  Geisha came out as Chinese actors were playing "Japanese roles"?  Yeah, sometimes you just can't meld "Asia" together.  Asia is huge and contains many MANY different races and cultures. 

That is all...

Besides the Freddy Mercury bio mentioned above ( My choice to play him MIKA. He has both the chops and looks to do it). A couple that I would love to see done are

Randy Shilts (And the Band Played On, Conduct Unbecoming)

Leonard Matlovich ( military hero awarded purple heart and bronze star )

Although I`m not really a fan of his music,I do think he is a very talented actor and one of the best in chinese/hong kong movie history.But casting a japanese as him would be...troublesome.In fact the actor who plays him should be very fluent in Cantonese.which means he probably should be also from Hongkong.

And Leslie got really unique style which will be very hard to copy.

Believe it or not, Eliza Dushku is in the process of producing a film on Mapplethorpe (starring her brother who does resemble him).

See:   http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/marc_malkin/b79642_sundance_dushku_developing_mapplethorpe.html 

and  http://mynewplaidpants.blogspot.com/2009/01/mapplethorpe-meets-dushku.html 

That was a fantastic piece of writing, A., and you did a fabulous job of choosing actors (and the comparison pictures).  Amazing!

I would love to see many if not all of these choices made into movies (dream big!) but I think I would be most thrilled to see something about Harry Hay and Walt Whitman.

• AfterAndrew

Eytan Fox (Walk On Water, The Bubble) is already attached to direct Gad Beck's biopic (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1186026/). 
And a film about Whitman sounds absolutely fantastic. If they don't de-gay him...

By the way, any news about the Memoirs of Hadrian film by John Boorman?

François
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His life would make a FABULOUS biopic.

And another vote for Giancarlo Esposito as Bayard Rustin. 

They are trying to make the play ROMAN NIGHTS into a film (see imdb) it is about Tennesse Williams, his time in Rome and his close friendship with Anna Magnani set in Italy in the 1950s and 1960s.  Sort of the "ultimate fag / fag hag story"---he wrote several plays for her. 

Peter Sarsgaard would be a perfect Tennessee Williams. 

www.romannights.com

Is it just me, or is it a little sad that on a gay website, in an article about gay historical figures, that only one of the "dream actors" is actually gay themselves?

I find it offputting that this article only metioned Oscar Wilde in passing, through his relationship (or rather, kiss) with Walt Whitman, while Wilde hiself is one of the most famous gay men in history.

Not only that, but his life would make a great movie. It has everything: wealth and nobility, a cover-up marriage, long-term relationships with Lord Alfred Douglas (who later on goes back to the closet) and Robert Baldwin Ross (one of the earliest out gays known), scandal and prison for "gross indecency" with other men, and his self-imposed exile from society in his last days.

I think you'll find that film's been made, with Stephen Fry and Jude Law.

Very good too, but then I am in love with Stephen Fry. 

As the gay computer nerd I am I couldn't be more shocked that the person who is regarded as the father of computer science and artificial inteligence was not only homosexual but actually open about it at the times of WWII. I had been studying Turing for over two years without having a clue of this fact.

Think of "a beautiful mind" but with someone who actually worked with a real government (the british one), was crucial to decode the enigma code of nazis helping the allies win the war, saving millions of lives in the process, and someone with so much influence in the field that has shaped our modern lifes. It's not a stretch for me to say that without Turing I wouldn't be writting this and you wouldn't been reading this in a computer screen. Every single program anyone uses is an incarnation of a turing machine, from this blog to your music player. Add to that a tragic and almost poetic ending of his life (Turing killed himself with a poisoned apple after being forced to go through hormone therapy when the police found out he was gay) and you have one awesome movie.