Tag Matt Tyrnauer | TLA Gay Blog

December 12, 2018December 11, 2018 by tlagay

This new doc invites you inside Studio 54

For a brief 33 months, from 1978 to 1980, the nightclub Studio 54 was THE PLACE to be seen in Manhattan.

A haven of hedonism, tolerance, glitz and glamour, Studio 54 was very hard to get into and impossible to ignore, with news of who was there filling the gossip columns daily. Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager, two college friends from Brooklyn, succeeded in creating the ultimate escapist fantasy in the heart of the theater district. Rubell was the outgoing party-boy who wanted to be everybody’s friend and knew every celebrity, and Schrager was the quiet, behind-the-scenes workhorse. The club was an instant success and a cash cow, but the drug-and-sex-fueled dream soon imploded in financial scandal and place’s demise.

We’re a little obsessed with Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood

Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood tells the deliciously scandalous story of Scotty Bowers, a handsome ex-Marine who landed in Hollywood after World War II and became confidante, aide-de-camp and lover to many of Hollywood’s greatest male – and female – stars.

In the 1940s and ’50s, Scotty ran a gas station in the shadow of the studio lots where he would connect his friends with actors and actresses who had to hide their true sexual identities for fear of police raids at gay bars, societal shunning and career suicide. An unsung Hollywood legend, Bowers would cater to the sexual appetites of celebrities – straight and gay alike – for decades.