Tab Hunter 80 and Now He Says Gay

 By Greg Hernandez  http://greginhollywood.com/ | Permalink   

Tab Hunter, who celebrates his 80th birthday today, made a big splash in movies with the starring role in Damn Yankees. A few years later, he turned to television withThe Tab Hunter Show which lasted one year on NBC then moved to Europe to star in a series of spaghetti Westerns.

After fading from view in the 70s, Tab made a comeback in the early 80s in a series of movies includingGrease 2 and most significantly, the films Polyester and Lust in the Dust.

When I met and chatted with Tab at last year’s TCM Classic Film Festival, I wondered if life had changed for him much since the publication of his autobiography Tab Hunter Confidential: The Making of a Movie Star a few years back.

In the book, he not only shared details of his Hollywood hey-day, he also publicly confirmed that he is gay.

“I wrote is because I didn’t want some schmuck writing about me after I was dead and gone,” he said. “I figured get it from the horse’s mouth and not from horse’s ass after I’m no longer here so that’s exactly why I wrote it.”

Tab was closeted during his career as were other stars of his generation (Rock Hudson, Richard Chamberlain etc) and I wondered what he thought of some of these younger actors who are coming out such as Neil Patrick Harris, John Barrowman, Luke Macfarlane etc).

He said: “That’s up to the individual. I never talk about those things. The only thing that’s important is the work and growing as a human being from A to Z. Your growth mentally, physically and spiritually. Those are the three most important things on this journey of life.”

His advice to younger actors, gay or straight: “Put your nose to the grindstone. Ego’s a killer, remember that.”

Tab told me his life is good these days: “I live in Santa Barbara and I write and I work in my garden. I’ve got my dogs and my horse and I’ve got some nice friends. I’m doing all right for an old man.”