Posted on 05/28/2013 9:56:37 AM PDT by Red Badger
Who played George?
Argghhh! Me too.
I remember as a youngster seeing Liberace on TV and he was quite a showman. Flamboyant? Absolutely, but I never really thought about him as a homosexual. He kept that part of his life quiet, which was/is fine with me.
I just read an article about Liberace that stated he was conservative and an avowed capitalist. Interesting.
Oh, and no, I haven’t seen the movie.
I was a little nauseated watching them kiss but that scene sealed the deal for me. Now I am embarrassed that I gave it that length of time but I was curious what Soderbergh would do with the subject.
Oh I saw that one! He played twin brothers.
George was only mentioned in the script.....
What an interesting post - a comedienne that I like - Jackie Kashian - tweeted this last night:
I had 2 Grandmothers who INSISTED w the same ferocity 1. Liberace “just never found the right girl” and 2.Wrestling is REAL.
Interesting confluence of Grandmas, Liberace and Wrestling!
I did hear that Liberace was incensed over any "rumors" that he was a homosexual. This is the kind I respect. Just like Van Cliburn, they don't make it any part of their public life.
Why do you think they call it “Palm” Springs?.........
It was mentioned in the movie that he had sued some mag or paper that dared call him a homosexual.......and he won........
Gayme of pianos
Now THAT would have been the part that I would have enjoyed.
If afflict is finished with his wife, let me know.
My mom always had music in the house. We watched the Durante,cole, como, and liberace shows. Also member of RCA victor record club.
I was a kid then and didn’t know gay, straight or whatever.
Nowadays. A 10 year old is exposed to all that crap.
What a coincidence! I remember seeing a show with D.Reynolds and Liberace dancing together on a stage! I don’t remember what show it was; it could’ve been his. Anyway, she was in a long dress and he in an elegant suit, and they were dancing doing a tap-dance or soft-shoe type dance, like Fred and Ginger used to do. They could’ve been singing together or bantering with each other; like I said, I can’t remember what the show was called!
Did you doctor that TV Guide picture. I’m LMAO at the TABOO warning with a picture of Liberace.
“Liberace, who hid his homosexuality”
“I disagree. Rock Hudson was hiding. Robert Reed was hiding. But Liberace shattered gaydar detectors across the entire country single-handedly (and you don’t want to know what the other hand was doing).”
I know it seems impossible to believe, you had to be there, I’m guessing you are younger, but, yes, he tried to hide it.
Here is some of the info to show you, how he really did try to convince the world he was not homosexual, from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberace
“Lawsuits and rumors about homosexuality
Liberace’s fame in the United States was matched for a time in the United Kingdom. In 1956, an article in the Daily Mirror by columnist Cassandra (William Connor) described Liberace as “…the summit of sex—the pinnacle of masculine, feminine, and neuter. Everything that he, she, and it can ever want… a deadly, winking, sniggering, snuggling, chromium-plated, scent-impregnated, luminous, quivering, giggling, fruit-flavoured, mincing, ice-covered heap of mother love”, a description which strongly implied he was homosexual without actually saying so explicitly.
Liberace sent a telegram that read: “What you said hurt me very much. I cried all the way to the bank.” (This phrase was already in use by the 1940s.) He sued the newspaper for libel, testifying in a London court that he was not a homosexual and had never taken part in homosexual acts. He won the suit, partly on the basis of Connor’s use of the derogatory expression “fruit-flavoured.” The case partly hinged on whether Connor knew ‘fruit’ was American slang implying that an individual is a homosexual. The £8,000 damages he received from the Daily Mirror (then approximately $22,000) led Liberace to repeat the catchphrase to reporters: “I cried all the way to the bank!” Liberace’s popularization of the phrase inspired the title of Crying All the Way to the Bank, a detailed report of the trial based on transcripts, court reports and interviews, by the former Daily Mirror journalist Revel Barker.
Liberace fought and settled a similar case in the United States against Confidential. Rumors and gossip magazines frequently implied that he was gay. A typical issue of Confidential in 1957 shouted, “Why Liberace’s Theme Song Should Be ‘Mad About the Boy!’”
In 1982, Scott Thorson, Liberace’s 22-year-old former chauffeur and live-in lover of five years, sued the pianist for $113 million in palimony after he was let go by Liberace. Liberace continued publicly to deny that he was homosexual and insisted that Thorson was never his lover. The case was settled out of court in 1986, with Thorson receiving a $75,000 settlement. Scott Thorson stated after Liberace’s death that he settled because he knew that Liberace was in profoundly ill health, and that he had intended to sue based on conversion of property rather than palimony.
Because Liberace never publicly acknowledged he was gay, confusion over his true sexuality was further muddled in the public’s mind by his public friendships and romantic links with women. He further obscured his sexuality in articles like “Mature Women Are Best: TV’s Top Pianist Reveals What Kind of Woman He’d Marry.”
In a 2011 interview, actress and close friend Betty White stated that Liberace was, indeed, gay and that she often served as a “beard” to counter rumors of the musician’s homosexuality.”
No, they just centered on the last five or so years of his life........
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