Who is Scotty Bowers?
February 12, 2012 4:22 PM Subscribe
I finished Scotty Bowers tell-all, "Full Service." It is an over the top tell-all about sex in Hollywood, mainly during the 40s and 50s heyday. Gore Vidal claims, "Scotty doesn't lie-the stars sometimes do—and he knows everybody." Maybe I'm really jaded, but he comes across as the Forrest Gump of sexual escapades that neatly manages to leave no paper trail. Throughout the book and the blurbs it is hinted that he's really well known in Hollywood (Tennessee Williams wrote a book about him, then tore it up!), is this true and are there any sources about Scotty Bowers outside his book?
I would never have picked up a Hollywood tell-all were it not for the Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal references, the former only another improbable incident in the auto-biography. Given the amount of name dropping, there has to be some independent verification that this guy isn't making up everything. Right? Here's a short-list of some of his run-ins:
- Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson were both homosexual and he arranged tricks for them.
- He arranged tricks for Brian Epstein in the early 60s (or tricked him out?), and subsequently helped him get a secret mansion for the Beatles when the arrived in LA during the height of Beatles-mania in the late 60s.
- He helped arrange lesbians to make a film for Kinsey, along with procuring lesbians to be interviewed by Kinsey, which helped with his research into the eventually published, "Sexual Behavior in the Human Female"
- Asked Farouk of Egypt to send some of his pornography to Kinsey, which was temporarily blocked by customs.
The list goes on and hits every single star of the period. That's not even to mention the gas station he turned into a brothel in the 40s that nearly every gay movie star, production assistant and stylist of the time frequented.
Are there any mention of Scotty Bowers in any capacity, hustler or otherwise, outside of the book itself? The Beatles, Edward and Wallis Simpson, Kinsey, etc. are all very well researched individuals, not to mention every big star in the golden age of Hollywood that he's procured tricks or other services for. Googling this myself has become hard as all reference to him are the book.
I would never have picked up a Hollywood tell-all were it not for the Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal references, the former only another improbable incident in the auto-biography. Given the amount of name dropping, there has to be some independent verification that this guy isn't making up everything. Right? Here's a short-list of some of his run-ins:
- Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson were both homosexual and he arranged tricks for them.
- He arranged tricks for Brian Epstein in the early 60s (or tricked him out?), and subsequently helped him get a secret mansion for the Beatles when the arrived in LA during the height of Beatles-mania in the late 60s.
- He helped arrange lesbians to make a film for Kinsey, along with procuring lesbians to be interviewed by Kinsey, which helped with his research into the eventually published, "Sexual Behavior in the Human Female"
- Asked Farouk of Egypt to send some of his pornography to Kinsey, which was temporarily blocked by customs.
The list goes on and hits every single star of the period. That's not even to mention the gas station he turned into a brothel in the 40s that nearly every gay movie star, production assistant and stylist of the time frequented.
Are there any mention of Scotty Bowers in any capacity, hustler or otherwise, outside of the book itself? The Beatles, Edward and Wallis Simpson, Kinsey, etc. are all very well researched individuals, not to mention every big star in the golden age of Hollywood that he's procured tricks or other services for. Googling this myself has become hard as all reference to him are the book.
There was some discussion of him in either Shocking True Story: The Rise and Fall of Confidential or The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson, or maybe Tab Hunter's autobiography, because I have encountered the name before (I remember noticing the name, because I know someone else named Scott Bowers). So I think he really was someone who was active in the 1950s Hollywood gay scene.
But, yeah, I'm sure his memoir is embellished like whoa. People's tell-all sexcapades memoirs generally are. It's a grand tradition--if you took Frank Harris at face value, he slept with pretty much everyone who ever published a book in English.
Pretty sure Brian Epstein was on the receiving end of any tricking that was going on. He was not a man most people would find attractive.
The Kinsey stuff I would probably believe out of all that; Kinsey had a number of connections on the Hollywood gay scene. The Edward and Wallis stuff I would be unlikely to believe, particularly because they had so many layers of staff between them and the public for the most mundane transactions that I doubt they would deal with anyone in the gay demimonde (especially in the 1950s) without so many intermediaries that their identities wouldn't be obscured.
posted by Sidhedevil at 5:53 PM on February 12, 2012
But, yeah, I'm sure his memoir is embellished like whoa. People's tell-all sexcapades memoirs generally are. It's a grand tradition--if you took Frank Harris at face value, he slept with pretty much everyone who ever published a book in English.
Pretty sure Brian Epstein was on the receiving end of any tricking that was going on. He was not a man most people would find attractive.
The Kinsey stuff I would probably believe out of all that; Kinsey had a number of connections on the Hollywood gay scene. The Edward and Wallis stuff I would be unlikely to believe, particularly because they had so many layers of staff between them and the public for the most mundane transactions that I doubt they would deal with anyone in the gay demimonde (especially in the 1950s) without so many intermediaries that their identities wouldn't be obscured.
posted by Sidhedevil at 5:53 PM on February 12, 2012
Ithink it's pretty close to true--I've done enough interviews at the Motion Picture Home to learn that Hollywood pretty much ran on sex.
posted by Ideefixe at 6:42 PM on February 12, 2012
posted by Ideefixe at 6:42 PM on February 12, 2012
Gore Vidal--a writer and personality by whom I am enchanted--is not someone who feels the need to fact-check his own statements, to put it politely.
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:43 PM on February 12, 2012
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:43 PM on February 12, 2012
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Kattullus at 5:26 PM on February 12, 2012