Dominick dunne gay
Published in:May-June issue.
Money, Murder, and Dominick Dunne:
A Life in Several Acts
by Robert Hofler
Wisconsin. pages, $
IT WOULD BE Strenuous to imagine a gayer experience than the one led by Dominick Dunne. Growing up in Hartford (across the street from Katherine Hepburn), he was not only called a “sissy” by his father but beaten with a riding crop, Dunne said, to get the “incipient fairyism” out of him. It was seeing Now, Voyager at sixteen that convinced him that, love Bette Davis, he could come across a better life.
His idea of the latter was not confined to just the movie stars he idolized, however. He was a social climber as skillfully, an admitted snob, and a tremendous gossip who, like Truman Capote, used stories about the rich and famous to be accepted. Although he won a Bronze Star during World War II for going back to retrieve a wounded soldier and, after the War, married and had children, he also hired hustlers, picked guys up off the street, did drugs, and used the services of Scotty Bowers (whose memoir Full Service () detailing his years of supplying men to
Can we discuss Dominick Dunne/Joan Didion/John Dunne, and gossip about him?
I just watched DD's fascinating documentary, After the Party, last night. I have some questions.
1. How was he let into so many parties, when he acted so blatantly social climb-ish? Was he recognized, or seen as an outsider?
2. What is Joan Didion's reputation in literary circles?
3. How did her daughter with John Gregory Dunne, Quintana, die? You never read much about the daughter -- only the shocking death of John. Wasn't she only in her 30s when she died? Who was her husband? You never hear much on him, either. I seem to recall reading (here, in fact) that they had a shady life but I forget details.
4. What's up with Dominick's other son, the teacher in San Francisco, Alexander? I know Griffin is some thoughtful of director-producer, once married to Cary Lowell, but you don't hear much about the other kid.
5. Was DD really gay?
| by Anonymous | reply | June 28, AM |
I liked the docu as well, OP.%0D %0D Re: adequately, Joan is a goddess to her fans, and among the most overrated names ever to the rest of u
Two recent items focused on gay men in the closet, though in two quite different ways: Dominic Dunne (), the subject of a recent biography (Money, Murder, and Dominick Dunne: A Life in Several Acts by Robert Hofler); and James Beard (), the subject of a recent documentary film (America&#;s First Foodie: The Astonishing Life of James Beard). Dunne, who died 40 years after Stonewall, nevertheless spent a lifetime cringing in the closet. Beard, who died only 15 years after Stonewall, was an exuberantly gay male to everyone who knew him, but his acquaintances and employers and the media built a protective closet around him, one that he decided to break out of publicly only at the finish of his life &#; so that the nature was robbed of an example of a male lover man of great talent, living a rich, packed life. (Dunne was, to my mind, no gentle of model of how to live a life.)
For what it&#;s worth, neither man was flagrantly dramatic, but I pegged them both the first day I saw them talking about their lives and work.
The visuals:
(#1)
(#2)
You can watch Dunne in an interview here. Bea
Money, Murder, and Dominick Dunne
A Life in Several Acts
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Though Dominick Dunne seemed to stay his entire adult animation in the public eye, Robert Hofler reveals a conflicted, enigmatic man who reinvented himself again and again. Dunne was, in turn, a television and film producer, Vanity Unbiased journalist, and author of best-selling novels. Money, Murder, and Dominick Dunne brings to light a number of his difficult and tragic relationships: his intense rivalry with his brother, gay lovers he hid throughout his life, and fights with his editors. Hofler discusses the painful rift in the family after the murder of Dunne's daughter, Dominique—and Dunne's coverage of her killer's trial, which launched his career as a reporter.
"You've met the two Mrs. Grenvilles. Now meet the two Dominick Dunnes, or three, or four. Robert Hofler stunningly captures all of them."—Stephen M. Silverman, author of David Lean
"In a compelling new biography that is as breezy as it is revelatory, Robert Hofler carefully traces