Bill Schenley
2005-09-08 05:46:20 UTC
Brad Davis, 41, Star Of 'Midnight Express,' Dies
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FROM: The Los Angeles Times (September 10th 1991) ~
By Victor F. Zonana, Staff Writer
Actor Brad Davis, the all-American boy who starred as Billy Hayes in
the film "Midnight Express" and originated the role of Ned Weeks in
the play "The Normal Heart," died Sunday at his home in Studio City.
Davis was 41 and died of AIDS-related complications, said his wife,
free-lance casting director Susan Bluestein.
Bluestein said the couple learned that Davis was infected with the
human immunodeficiency virus in 1985 but, fearing discrimination, kept
his condition a secret so he could continue to work as an actor.
"The Hollywood community may deny it. They will say he could have
worked. All I know is that my husband was frightened, and that he
wanted to be able to keep putting food on our table for his family,"
Bluestein said.
She said Davis had decided to go public about his illness about a
month ago but was prevented from doing so by his deteriorating
physical condition. Bluestein and the couple's 8-year-old daughter,
Alexandra, have both been tested and been found to be free of HIV.
"I promised my husband I would come forward to help other families who
are living with the secrecy and the fear," she said in an interview.
"He did not want to be one more faceless person."
She added that Davis, who drank heavily and used intravenous drugs
until he joined Alcoholics Anonymous in 1981, apparently contracted
the virus from drug use. "He had a couple of experiences of sharing
needles with people who later died of AIDS," she said.
Ironically, Davis' two most celebrated roles were as a drug smuggler
suffering the hell of a Turkish prison in "Midnight Express" and as
the lover of a man dying of AIDS in "The Normal Heart."
"He brought fury and overwhelming love to the role of Ned," said
playwright Larry Kramer, author of "The Normal Heart." "He was also
one of the first straight actors with the guts to play gay roles,"
Kramer added.
Davis also played a young, gay sailor in German director Rainer Werner
Fassbinder's 1982 "Querelle."
John Erman, who directed Davis in "When the Time Comes," a film about
assisted suicide, said: "He was a consummate professional but also had
this little-boy quality that came through in his work."
Davis was born in Tallahassee, Fla., grew up in Titusville and moved
to New York City at 18, spending two years at the American Academy of
Dramatic Arts before studying with noted acting teacher Wynn Handman.
"He belonged in the front ranks of actors," said Handman, who has
taught Richard Gere, Christopher Walken, James Caan and Raul Julia.
"He was not only dedicated but naturally gifted."
Those who knew him said Davis' career suffered after his triumph in
"Midnight Express" because of his drug addiction. "He was young and
wild and success came fast. He couldn't handle it," his wife said.
Their 20-year relationship -- they were married 15 years ago --
survived the strain and grew stronger after Davis became sober and
more spiritual, she said.
Davis was also featured in such films as "A Small Circle of Friends,"
"Chariots of Fire," "Heart," "Cold Steel" and "Rosalie Goes Shopping."
On television he was seen in "Walt Whitman," "Sybil," "Roots," "Robert
Kennedy and His Times," "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial," "Unspeakable
Acts" and "The Plot to Kill Hitler."
On stage he appeared in "The Elusive Angel" and "Entertaining Mr.
Sloane."
In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by his parents
and a brother. Funeral services will be private.
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Hollywood Called Hypocritical By Actor Who Died Of AIDS
FROM: The New York Times (September 12th 1991) ~
By Bernard Weinraub, Special to The Times
The publication of an anguished indictment of the film industry as
indifferent and hypocritical toward people with AIDS, written by the
actor Brad Davis, who died of the disease on Sunday, has touched a raw
nerve in a community that prides itself on openness and tolerance.
Mr. Davis, who starred in "Midnight Express" and other films and
plays, wrote his thoughts about Hollywood and AIDS as he drafted a
proposal for a book to discuss the six years in which he carried the
HIV virus. Mr. Davis kept his illness a secret from everyone but his
wife, Susan Bluestein, a casting director, and a handful of friends,
largely out of fear that it would shatter his career if Hollywood knew
about it.
Portions of Mr. Davis's reflections were published in The Los Angeles
Times today, after his wife got in touch with the paper. Ms.
Bluestein, who could not be reached for comment today, was quoted in
the paper as saying that Mr. Davis wanted to have his story told. What
emerges is a bleak portrait of an actor desperate to hide his
condition and "remain anonymous at all costs."
'One More Pariah in Hollywood'
"I make my money in an industry that professes to care very much about
the fight against AIDS -- that gives umpteen benefits and charity
affairs with proceeds going to research and care," wrote Mr. Davis,
who began work on his proposal in the last months of his illness. "But
in actual fact, if an actor is even rumored to have HIV he gets no
support on an individual basis. He does not work."
Mr. Davis expressed the fear that "somehow the gossip mill would get
hold of me and that would be that: I'd be one more pariah in Hollywood
who would never get a job."
Ironically, Mr. Davis's reflections have been made public at a moment
when the movie industry is, essentially, celebrating its own
contribution and commitment to AIDS. On Sunday, virtually the entire
movie establishment is planning to show up at the Universal
Amphitheater in Universal City to honor, among others, Bette Midler,
the actress, and Sidney Sheinberg, president of MCA, for their
involvement with the AIDS issue. Recently, the leading players in the
industry appeared at a highly publicized fund-raising event given by a
show business lawyer, Alan Hergott, for the National Gay and Lesbian
Task Force. At the time, Mr. Hergott called it a "breakthrough."
But Mr. Davis's comments are, some Hollywood film makers say, a
reflection of the industry's ambivalence and confusion, even fear,
about dealing with AIDS and, for that matter, with homosexuality.
'It's Too Close'
"AIDS is a pariah disease, it's too close to many people in this town,
it's too frightening," said Bruce Davison, the award-winning actor who
appeared in "Longtime Companion," one of the few films about AIDS.
"It's easier, for example, to make films about Vietnam when it's not
the 60's or 70's. Someday, when they find a cure for the disease
they'll make a movie about AIDS. It'll have a certain nobility then."
Mr. Davison said Mr. Davis's concerns about working were valid. "It's
the same as Rock Hudson," he said. "I remember going to the doctor's
office to get a physical and there was Rock Hudson. He was trembling.
He was frightened. Now I know that he was terrified that he'd be found
out and he wouldn't have a job."
Mr. Davis, in his notes, indicated uncertainty about how he contracted
AIDS. "I was a total drug addict -- an alcoholic and I.V. drug user --
a user of just about any kind of drug I could get," he wrote. "And I
was sexually very promiscuous. I've never known any addicts who
weren't."
Certainly, the bleak subject of AIDS is considered financially risky,
especially in the aftermath of the summer flop "Dying Young," with
Julia Roberts, which dealt with a young man dying of cancer. (On the
other hand, "Love Story" and "Terms of Endearment," in which major
characters died young, proved to be financially successful.)
Economic Distress Cited
"Look, the economy is depressed, people are struggling financially,
it's a hard time in the industry," said Craig Zadan, producer of
"Footloose" and other films, who is planning to co-produce with Oliver
Stone a film about Harvey Milk, the gay San Francisco politician who
was assassinated. "People want to escape. It's not a good time to come
in with a film about death."
Mike Medavoy, chairman of Tri-Star Pictures, said: "There's always a
pause when you make a film about someone dying. You're afraid to be
maudlin or false. It's just a very difficult subject to do well. Even
films like 'Love Story' and 'Terms of Endearment' had a very hard time
getting made."
But others say dealing with AIDS is especially delicate and complex in
an industry where there are numerous gay actors and directors who are
not only silent about their sexuality but who also try to hide it.
"Hollywood is scared to put money on AIDS films because it's a
stigmatized disease and a lot of people here are in the closet who
just don't want to be associated with the subject," said Zelda
Rubinstein, the actress from "Poltergeist" who was an an early
supporter of AIDS education and support. "It frightens a lot of people
here."
Several people in the industry agreed that Mr. Davis was right to
worry about working. "There's so much competition, there're fewer and
fewer projects, if you have any excuse to hire one person over
another, you do it," said Mr. Zadan. "I don't think it's an issue of
prejudice. All of these decisions are subjective. The slightest thing
can influence you."
TV More Flexible
Mr. Medavoy observed: "An actor's health is not a a question that I
would consider, unless he had a serious heart condition and we had
insurance problems. If a director wants to hire an actor, and he's a
good actor, I'm not going to ask what his health is."
Even film executives acknowledge that television has been somewhat
more flexible and open about AIDS and gay people than the film
industry. Several prime-time series, including "L.A. Law," "Doctor,
Doctor" and "Thirtysomething," have included gay characters, and there
have been some moving television dramas about AIDS, including "An
Early Frost" and "Our Sons." "Longtime Companion" will be shown on PBS
on Sept. 29.
A leader in Hollywood efforts to combat AIDS, Helen Gorman Kushnick,
who is Jay Leno's manager and who lost a 3-year-old son to AIDS
because of a tainted blood transfusion, said: "If everybody takes the
position that Brad Davis did -- and believe me, I'm not judging him --
then people with AIDS will remain a minority. If people choose to
speak out, they become the majority. People have got to speak out.
I've had breast cancer. And I've had nothing but support. I didn't
keep it a secret. And NBC just hired me to be executive producer of
the 'Tonight' show next year."
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(Midnight Express)
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Profile In Courage, Anger;
Brad Davis Battled AIDS, Hollywood Indifference
FROM: The Los Angeles Times (September 11th 1991) ~
By Victor F. Zonana, Staff Writer
Eight weeks ago, upon returning home from a Fourth of July weekend at
the beach with his wife and daughter, actor Brad Davis pulled out a
yellow legal pad and drafted a proposal for a book he never got the
chance to write.
"The purpose of this book is to reveal what it's like to be infected
with HIV, to be receiving treatment, and having to remain anonymous at
all costs -- chronicling how I have done this for over six years,"
wrote Davis in spare and simple prose.
"This may not be such a novel premise," the actor conceded. "Nobody
wants to walk down the street with a sign saying 'AIDS' pinned to his
or her shirt."
"The difference," wrote Davis, the boyishly handsome actor who won a
Golden Globe award for his role as hashish smuggler Billy Hayes in
"Midnight Express," "is I am a recognizable celebrity."
Then came Davis' indictment of the industry he had dreamed of entering
since he was a 5-year-old boy in Florida.
"I make my money in an industry that professes to care very much about
the fight against AIDS -- that gives umpteen benefits and charity
affairs with proceeds going to research and care," Davis wrote. "But
in actual fact, if an actor is even rumored to have HIV he gets no
support on an individual basis. He does not work."
Davis, who was 41, succumbed to AIDS complications at his Studio City
home on Sunday. He got his wish and worked until June, when he starred
in the cable TV drama "A Habitation of Dragons." With him at the time
of his death were his wife of 15 years, casting director Susan
Bluestein, 45, and their 8-year-old daughter, Alexandra.
Though Davis was surrounded by loved ones when he died, Brad and Susan
were very much alone and isolated with their awful secret for most of
the six years they knew the actor was infected. Even after they
widened the circle in 1989, Susan said, only seven people knew that
Brad Davis had AIDS until just days before his death. (Susan and
Alexandra have been tested repeatedly and been found free of the
virus.)
So closely did the family guard their secret that it was only on
Saturday, the day before he died, that a weakened Davis called his
longtime friend director John Erman and told him.
Monday, the day after Brad died, Susan contacted The Times through
family friend Larry Kramer, the playwright and AIDS activist, in order
to fulfill a vow she had made to her husband. "He wanted our story
told, and he wanted it told with integrity," she said. "He wanted it
told before the scandal sheets got hold of it."
Susan went so far as to authorize Davis' physician, Dr. Joel Weisman,
to speak about his case and to provide The Times with Brad's book
proposal. "These were Brad's words, the most recent words he had on
the subject," Susan said.
What emerged is a portrait of personal courage, and terror, that
speaks volumes about how far Hollywood, and the nation, still need to
go to confront an epidemic that has stolen so many of their best and
brightest. It is a tale of clandestine late-night visits to medical
clinics and hospitalizations as "Robert Davis" paid out-of-pocket
because the patient was afraid he'd be discovered if he filed
insurance claims as Brad.
Constantly, Davis wrote, there was the anxiety that "somehow the
gossip mill would get hold of me and that would be that: I'd be one
more pariah in Hollywood who could never get a job." Fearing for his
livelihood, Davis denied himself the solace that support groups can
bring to people with AIDS and HIV infection, and may have shortened
his life by seeking treatment so late in the course of his disease.
"Brad lived a life of sheer, utter hell for six years," said Kramer,
whose 1985 AIDS play, "The Normal Heart" featured Davis as an
hysterical and passionate Kramer-like character named Ned Weeks. "He
managed to work by keeping this all a secret for six years, but at the
cost of a dreadful, dreadful strain that probably shortened his life."
"This proves everything that everyone has said about how awful
Hollywood is in its reaction to AIDS," added Kramer, who has been
close friends with Davis and his wife since 1972. "We've got Broadway
Cares in New York, but what are they doing to help their own in
Hollywood? Nothing."
As his health ebbed, Davis' determination to speak out grew. "Brad did
not want to be one more faceless person to die of AIDS," said Susan,
choking back tears. "He did not want George Bush to be able to keep on
saying, as he said last week, that he cares more about the unemployed
than he does about people with AIDS."
Davis himself had scornful words for Ronald Reagan, who, when asked to
address the health crisis, said he wouldn't do anything to condone
homosexuality. "What an unbelievably ignorant, arrogant, bigoted
position," wrote Davis. "How could he possibly think that his opinion
on homosexuality had anything to do with a devastating disease that
was ravaging people, reducing them to skeletons and killing them?" he
wrote.
It is the unwavering conviction of those who knew Davis -- respected
individuals with decades of collective experience in the entertainment
industry -- that the talented actor would have been unemployable had
he gone public with his secret.
"He was absolutely justified in his fear that he wouldn't find work if
it had been known he had HIV," said producer Rick Rosenberg, who made
"Robert Kennedy and His Times," in which Davis starred.
"This town would be terrified to have an HIV-positive actor in a
leading role," Rosenberg said. "An educated producer or director might
do it, but would the insurance company say OK? Would the money people?
No. And on television, the advertisers might panic."
Hollywood's ambivalent reaction about AIDS has been evident ever since
Rock Hudson's publicists disclosed his AIDS diagnosis shortly before
he died in 1985. His death led Elizabeth Taylor to co-found the
American Foundation for AIDS Research. But there were also sensational
stories about Hudson kissing co-star Linda Evans on "Dynasty." And,
critics note, no major star has ever publicly acknowledged being
HIV-positive.
"It would be an extraordinarily difficult thing for an actor to
overcome," said personal manager Barry Krost, who represents singer
Sarah Brightman. "If it were a star -- and Davis qualifies -- the
tabloids would get hold of it," imperiling a film's financing and
distribution.
Given Davis' reputation as a risk-taker and his convictions about the
AIDS issue, the role of openly HIV-positive Hollywood conscience on
AIDS is one that the young star might have been expected to relish.
But Davis, who sought out chancy roles, simply felt he could not take
a risk with his livelihood.
"Yes, the silence must be broken," said Rodger McFarlane, executive
director of Broadway Cares, a New York organization that provides
financial, practical and emotional support to theater people stricken
with AIDS. "But Brad had a wife and a child and a mortgage, and --
like any actor -- he never knew when he would work again."
It is telling that while he worked in Hollywood, when Davis finally
reached out for help in 1989 he turned to New York. There, McFarlane
worked tirelessly to hook Davis up with a doctor, Weisman, who would
go to great lengths to protect his famous patient's identity.
"The arrangement I had with Brad was this: 'When you're too sick to
work, or when you've lost your looks and can't work, you'll pay me
back by going public,' " McFarlane said.
"I'll be a hero later," McFarlane recalled Davis saying. "I've got
Alexandra to feed now."
Nor was Brad Davis alone in his terror. "There are lots of others out
there like him -- big names, names you'd recognize," said McFarlane.
"It's not just people up on the screen," added Weisman, whose Sherman
Oaks practice cares for many people infected with HIV in the
entertainment industry. "It is also people in the crafts. The crux of
the issue is: If you are perceived to have AIDS or cancer, you're
unhirable. You don't get a picture."
Weisman knows a thing or two about AIDS. In 1981, he co-authored the
first article about a mysterious pneumonia in five Los Angeles gay men
for a Centers for Disease Control publication, and he currently serves
as chairman of the board of the American Foundation for AIDS Research.
Weisman speaks from personal knowledge when he says that the secrecy
around AIDS is costing lives. "We do a great injustice for future
research and care when well-known faces die of AIDS and they are
recorded as having died of something else," he said.
And, he added, "in Brad's case, the delay in seeking treatment . . .
probably cost him years of vitality and life." Weisman began caring
for Davis in early 1989; before that, the actor felt healthy and did
not seek care for his HIV infection even though he had known about it
since 1985.
"Until January, 1989, I felt great, took no medication, told no one,"
Davis wrote in his book proposal.
The actor had learned that he was infected with the often fatal virus
in the fall of 1985 in a transatlantic phone call from Susan while he
was in Rome filming the miniseries "Blood Ties."
"I had given blood at Cedars Sinai before I left in September and they
had sent a letter to my house announcing that I was HIV positive,"
Davis wrote. "A really sensitive and caring thing to do, don't you
think. . . ?
"After going through the terror of waiting to find out if my wife and
my daughter were infected -- which miraculously they were not -- I
settled into accepting my condition without a lot of trauma. . . . Had
my family been infected I would have totally fallen apart, but there
is a saying 'We are never given more than we can handle.' "
The saying comes from Alcoholics Anonymous, an organization from which
Davis drew peace, strength and serenity after he joined and became
sober in 1981. Before that, Davis wrote, "I was a total drug addict --
an alcoholic and I.V. drug user -- a user of just about any kind of
drug I could get. And I was sexually very promiscuous. I've never
known any addicts who weren't."
Though Susan has said that Davis apparently contracted the virus by
sharing needles with people who later died of AIDS, Davis in his book
proposal wrote the media's and public's fascination with how specific
individuals contracted the virus is "very disturbing."
"There are many different ways to contract the virus, and each carries
its own degree of judgment or compassion," he wrote. "Gays (are) the
most heavily judged, receiving the least compassion. One step up are
the I.V. drug users, then heterosexual promiscuity, women who get it
from infected husbands, transfusions and the ultimate in no judgment
and total compassion, babies born with the virus.
"The problem with this is if there are 'innocent' victims then there
must be guilty victims," Davis wrote.
The fight against AIDS will be hampered, Davis wrote, until "that kind
of judgment is suspended" and it is widely recognized that no people
with AIDS "deserve to have this disease and (that) all (of them)
deserve only compassion and support."
But Davis' support team consisted only of Susan, Kramer, McFarlane,
Weisman, a physician's assistant who came to the house to draw blood
and perform other routine procedures, a therapist and Mark Senak, the
director of client services at AIDS Project Los Angeles.
Senak, who had met Davis briefly backstage in 1985 during the New York
run of "The Normal Heart," recalled getting a phone call from a
desperate and frightened Davis shortly after Senak moved to Los
Angeles in 1989.
Recalled Senak, who had been director of legal services for Gay Men's
Health Crisis in New York: "I thought to myself, is this what it is
going to be like out in Los Angeles, brokering medical services for
people needing anonymity?"
Senak said Davis' reluctance to file insurance claims "is not
exclusive to Brad. I find it with clients time and time again. People
are so afraid of losing their insurance."
Of course, Susan was Brad's most devoted source of support. "He was
the great love of my life, that is the truth," she said, tears welling
up. "He was not going to be one more person with this disease to be
abandoned."
The couple met in 1971 when Davis was signed by agent Stark
Hesseltine, for whom she worked as a secretary and who had previously
discovered such talents as Robert Redford, Elizabeth Ashley and Blythe
Danner.
"He came into the office while I was typing, sat on my desk and said:
'You want to have some eggs on Thursday?' " Susan laughed.
The then-struggling actor "never had any money," she recalled. "He
just ate what was cheap."
"He was skinny and funny and Southern," she said. "I said yes because
he was so sweet." They moved in together shortly thereafter and were
wed five years later.
Davis' big break came in the film "Midnight Express" but, his wife
said, he was too young to handle success and drank heavily and abused
drugs.
"He was not a closet drunk," she recalled. "He made scenes in public
many places, many times. He was wild."
By 1981, Davis' career was "completely shattered," she said. "He hit
bottom. He couldn't get a job in this town. And then he (joined AA
and) got sober."
Davis first heard about AIDS in 1982 when his friend, Larry Kramer,
told him about what was then known as "gay cancer."
Wrote Davis: "In the back of my head a little voice said: 'Whew! At
least this is one horror I don't have to worry about coming to rest in
my lap.' That may sound cold, but having nearly died so many times
during the drug years, my instinct for my own survival was now very
keen."
By 1983, "confident that the 10-year nightmare of addiction was over,"
wrote Davis, Susan gave birth to Alexandra, "the joy of our lives."
"I was working again," he wrote. "Everything seemed to be turning
around."
But there would be no happy ending. Saturday night at 8:30, Davis
called his longtime friend Erman, who directed the actor in "When the
Time Comes," a film about assisted suicide.
"This very weak voice said, 'It's Brad,' " Erman recalled. "I was
having people to dinner so I said, 'I'll call you tomorrow.' He said:
'No you can't.'
"I said, 'Brad, you've got to talk up, I can't hear you' . . . and
then he said, 'I just want to tell you I'm very sick, I have AIDS and
I just want to say goodby to you.'
"I said, 'I can't say goodby, I'm not ready to say goodby. Can I call
you?' He said, 'No, I'll call you.' I was afraid to call Susan because
he had told me not to call."
Monday morning, a message on Erman's answering machine announced to
him that Davis died Sunday.
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(Querelle)
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FROM: The Los Angeles Times (September 10th 1991) ~
By Victor F. Zonana, Staff Writer
Actor Brad Davis, the all-American boy who starred as Billy Hayes in
the film "Midnight Express" and originated the role of Ned Weeks in
the play "The Normal Heart," died Sunday at his home in Studio City.
Davis was 41 and died of AIDS-related complications, said his wife,
free-lance casting director Susan Bluestein.
Bluestein said the couple learned that Davis was infected with the
human immunodeficiency virus in 1985 but, fearing discrimination, kept
his condition a secret so he could continue to work as an actor.
"The Hollywood community may deny it. They will say he could have
worked. All I know is that my husband was frightened, and that he
wanted to be able to keep putting food on our table for his family,"
Bluestein said.
She said Davis had decided to go public about his illness about a
month ago but was prevented from doing so by his deteriorating
physical condition. Bluestein and the couple's 8-year-old daughter,
Alexandra, have both been tested and been found to be free of HIV.
"I promised my husband I would come forward to help other families who
are living with the secrecy and the fear," she said in an interview.
"He did not want to be one more faceless person."
She added that Davis, who drank heavily and used intravenous drugs
until he joined Alcoholics Anonymous in 1981, apparently contracted
the virus from drug use. "He had a couple of experiences of sharing
needles with people who later died of AIDS," she said.
Ironically, Davis' two most celebrated roles were as a drug smuggler
suffering the hell of a Turkish prison in "Midnight Express" and as
the lover of a man dying of AIDS in "The Normal Heart."
"He brought fury and overwhelming love to the role of Ned," said
playwright Larry Kramer, author of "The Normal Heart." "He was also
one of the first straight actors with the guts to play gay roles,"
Kramer added.
Davis also played a young, gay sailor in German director Rainer Werner
Fassbinder's 1982 "Querelle."
John Erman, who directed Davis in "When the Time Comes," a film about
assisted suicide, said: "He was a consummate professional but also had
this little-boy quality that came through in his work."
Davis was born in Tallahassee, Fla., grew up in Titusville and moved
to New York City at 18, spending two years at the American Academy of
Dramatic Arts before studying with noted acting teacher Wynn Handman.
"He belonged in the front ranks of actors," said Handman, who has
taught Richard Gere, Christopher Walken, James Caan and Raul Julia.
"He was not only dedicated but naturally gifted."
Those who knew him said Davis' career suffered after his triumph in
"Midnight Express" because of his drug addiction. "He was young and
wild and success came fast. He couldn't handle it," his wife said.
Their 20-year relationship -- they were married 15 years ago --
survived the strain and grew stronger after Davis became sober and
more spiritual, she said.
Davis was also featured in such films as "A Small Circle of Friends,"
"Chariots of Fire," "Heart," "Cold Steel" and "Rosalie Goes Shopping."
On television he was seen in "Walt Whitman," "Sybil," "Roots," "Robert
Kennedy and His Times," "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial," "Unspeakable
Acts" and "The Plot to Kill Hitler."
On stage he appeared in "The Elusive Angel" and "Entertaining Mr.
Sloane."
In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by his parents
and a brother. Funeral services will be private.
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Hollywood Called Hypocritical By Actor Who Died Of AIDS
FROM: The New York Times (September 12th 1991) ~
By Bernard Weinraub, Special to The Times
The publication of an anguished indictment of the film industry as
indifferent and hypocritical toward people with AIDS, written by the
actor Brad Davis, who died of the disease on Sunday, has touched a raw
nerve in a community that prides itself on openness and tolerance.
Mr. Davis, who starred in "Midnight Express" and other films and
plays, wrote his thoughts about Hollywood and AIDS as he drafted a
proposal for a book to discuss the six years in which he carried the
HIV virus. Mr. Davis kept his illness a secret from everyone but his
wife, Susan Bluestein, a casting director, and a handful of friends,
largely out of fear that it would shatter his career if Hollywood knew
about it.
Portions of Mr. Davis's reflections were published in The Los Angeles
Times today, after his wife got in touch with the paper. Ms.
Bluestein, who could not be reached for comment today, was quoted in
the paper as saying that Mr. Davis wanted to have his story told. What
emerges is a bleak portrait of an actor desperate to hide his
condition and "remain anonymous at all costs."
'One More Pariah in Hollywood'
"I make my money in an industry that professes to care very much about
the fight against AIDS -- that gives umpteen benefits and charity
affairs with proceeds going to research and care," wrote Mr. Davis,
who began work on his proposal in the last months of his illness. "But
in actual fact, if an actor is even rumored to have HIV he gets no
support on an individual basis. He does not work."
Mr. Davis expressed the fear that "somehow the gossip mill would get
hold of me and that would be that: I'd be one more pariah in Hollywood
who would never get a job."
Ironically, Mr. Davis's reflections have been made public at a moment
when the movie industry is, essentially, celebrating its own
contribution and commitment to AIDS. On Sunday, virtually the entire
movie establishment is planning to show up at the Universal
Amphitheater in Universal City to honor, among others, Bette Midler,
the actress, and Sidney Sheinberg, president of MCA, for their
involvement with the AIDS issue. Recently, the leading players in the
industry appeared at a highly publicized fund-raising event given by a
show business lawyer, Alan Hergott, for the National Gay and Lesbian
Task Force. At the time, Mr. Hergott called it a "breakthrough."
But Mr. Davis's comments are, some Hollywood film makers say, a
reflection of the industry's ambivalence and confusion, even fear,
about dealing with AIDS and, for that matter, with homosexuality.
'It's Too Close'
"AIDS is a pariah disease, it's too close to many people in this town,
it's too frightening," said Bruce Davison, the award-winning actor who
appeared in "Longtime Companion," one of the few films about AIDS.
"It's easier, for example, to make films about Vietnam when it's not
the 60's or 70's. Someday, when they find a cure for the disease
they'll make a movie about AIDS. It'll have a certain nobility then."
Mr. Davison said Mr. Davis's concerns about working were valid. "It's
the same as Rock Hudson," he said. "I remember going to the doctor's
office to get a physical and there was Rock Hudson. He was trembling.
He was frightened. Now I know that he was terrified that he'd be found
out and he wouldn't have a job."
Mr. Davis, in his notes, indicated uncertainty about how he contracted
AIDS. "I was a total drug addict -- an alcoholic and I.V. drug user --
a user of just about any kind of drug I could get," he wrote. "And I
was sexually very promiscuous. I've never known any addicts who
weren't."
Certainly, the bleak subject of AIDS is considered financially risky,
especially in the aftermath of the summer flop "Dying Young," with
Julia Roberts, which dealt with a young man dying of cancer. (On the
other hand, "Love Story" and "Terms of Endearment," in which major
characters died young, proved to be financially successful.)
Economic Distress Cited
"Look, the economy is depressed, people are struggling financially,
it's a hard time in the industry," said Craig Zadan, producer of
"Footloose" and other films, who is planning to co-produce with Oliver
Stone a film about Harvey Milk, the gay San Francisco politician who
was assassinated. "People want to escape. It's not a good time to come
in with a film about death."
Mike Medavoy, chairman of Tri-Star Pictures, said: "There's always a
pause when you make a film about someone dying. You're afraid to be
maudlin or false. It's just a very difficult subject to do well. Even
films like 'Love Story' and 'Terms of Endearment' had a very hard time
getting made."
But others say dealing with AIDS is especially delicate and complex in
an industry where there are numerous gay actors and directors who are
not only silent about their sexuality but who also try to hide it.
"Hollywood is scared to put money on AIDS films because it's a
stigmatized disease and a lot of people here are in the closet who
just don't want to be associated with the subject," said Zelda
Rubinstein, the actress from "Poltergeist" who was an an early
supporter of AIDS education and support. "It frightens a lot of people
here."
Several people in the industry agreed that Mr. Davis was right to
worry about working. "There's so much competition, there're fewer and
fewer projects, if you have any excuse to hire one person over
another, you do it," said Mr. Zadan. "I don't think it's an issue of
prejudice. All of these decisions are subjective. The slightest thing
can influence you."
TV More Flexible
Mr. Medavoy observed: "An actor's health is not a a question that I
would consider, unless he had a serious heart condition and we had
insurance problems. If a director wants to hire an actor, and he's a
good actor, I'm not going to ask what his health is."
Even film executives acknowledge that television has been somewhat
more flexible and open about AIDS and gay people than the film
industry. Several prime-time series, including "L.A. Law," "Doctor,
Doctor" and "Thirtysomething," have included gay characters, and there
have been some moving television dramas about AIDS, including "An
Early Frost" and "Our Sons." "Longtime Companion" will be shown on PBS
on Sept. 29.
A leader in Hollywood efforts to combat AIDS, Helen Gorman Kushnick,
who is Jay Leno's manager and who lost a 3-year-old son to AIDS
because of a tainted blood transfusion, said: "If everybody takes the
position that Brad Davis did -- and believe me, I'm not judging him --
then people with AIDS will remain a minority. If people choose to
speak out, they become the majority. People have got to speak out.
I've had breast cancer. And I've had nothing but support. I didn't
keep it a secret. And NBC just hired me to be executive producer of
the 'Tonight' show next year."
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(Midnight Express)---
Profile In Courage, Anger;
Brad Davis Battled AIDS, Hollywood Indifference
FROM: The Los Angeles Times (September 11th 1991) ~
By Victor F. Zonana, Staff Writer
Eight weeks ago, upon returning home from a Fourth of July weekend at
the beach with his wife and daughter, actor Brad Davis pulled out a
yellow legal pad and drafted a proposal for a book he never got the
chance to write.
"The purpose of this book is to reveal what it's like to be infected
with HIV, to be receiving treatment, and having to remain anonymous at
all costs -- chronicling how I have done this for over six years,"
wrote Davis in spare and simple prose.
"This may not be such a novel premise," the actor conceded. "Nobody
wants to walk down the street with a sign saying 'AIDS' pinned to his
or her shirt."
"The difference," wrote Davis, the boyishly handsome actor who won a
Golden Globe award for his role as hashish smuggler Billy Hayes in
"Midnight Express," "is I am a recognizable celebrity."
Then came Davis' indictment of the industry he had dreamed of entering
since he was a 5-year-old boy in Florida.
"I make my money in an industry that professes to care very much about
the fight against AIDS -- that gives umpteen benefits and charity
affairs with proceeds going to research and care," Davis wrote. "But
in actual fact, if an actor is even rumored to have HIV he gets no
support on an individual basis. He does not work."
Davis, who was 41, succumbed to AIDS complications at his Studio City
home on Sunday. He got his wish and worked until June, when he starred
in the cable TV drama "A Habitation of Dragons." With him at the time
of his death were his wife of 15 years, casting director Susan
Bluestein, 45, and their 8-year-old daughter, Alexandra.
Though Davis was surrounded by loved ones when he died, Brad and Susan
were very much alone and isolated with their awful secret for most of
the six years they knew the actor was infected. Even after they
widened the circle in 1989, Susan said, only seven people knew that
Brad Davis had AIDS until just days before his death. (Susan and
Alexandra have been tested repeatedly and been found free of the
virus.)
So closely did the family guard their secret that it was only on
Saturday, the day before he died, that a weakened Davis called his
longtime friend director John Erman and told him.
Monday, the day after Brad died, Susan contacted The Times through
family friend Larry Kramer, the playwright and AIDS activist, in order
to fulfill a vow she had made to her husband. "He wanted our story
told, and he wanted it told with integrity," she said. "He wanted it
told before the scandal sheets got hold of it."
Susan went so far as to authorize Davis' physician, Dr. Joel Weisman,
to speak about his case and to provide The Times with Brad's book
proposal. "These were Brad's words, the most recent words he had on
the subject," Susan said.
What emerged is a portrait of personal courage, and terror, that
speaks volumes about how far Hollywood, and the nation, still need to
go to confront an epidemic that has stolen so many of their best and
brightest. It is a tale of clandestine late-night visits to medical
clinics and hospitalizations as "Robert Davis" paid out-of-pocket
because the patient was afraid he'd be discovered if he filed
insurance claims as Brad.
Constantly, Davis wrote, there was the anxiety that "somehow the
gossip mill would get hold of me and that would be that: I'd be one
more pariah in Hollywood who could never get a job." Fearing for his
livelihood, Davis denied himself the solace that support groups can
bring to people with AIDS and HIV infection, and may have shortened
his life by seeking treatment so late in the course of his disease.
"Brad lived a life of sheer, utter hell for six years," said Kramer,
whose 1985 AIDS play, "The Normal Heart" featured Davis as an
hysterical and passionate Kramer-like character named Ned Weeks. "He
managed to work by keeping this all a secret for six years, but at the
cost of a dreadful, dreadful strain that probably shortened his life."
"This proves everything that everyone has said about how awful
Hollywood is in its reaction to AIDS," added Kramer, who has been
close friends with Davis and his wife since 1972. "We've got Broadway
Cares in New York, but what are they doing to help their own in
Hollywood? Nothing."
As his health ebbed, Davis' determination to speak out grew. "Brad did
not want to be one more faceless person to die of AIDS," said Susan,
choking back tears. "He did not want George Bush to be able to keep on
saying, as he said last week, that he cares more about the unemployed
than he does about people with AIDS."
Davis himself had scornful words for Ronald Reagan, who, when asked to
address the health crisis, said he wouldn't do anything to condone
homosexuality. "What an unbelievably ignorant, arrogant, bigoted
position," wrote Davis. "How could he possibly think that his opinion
on homosexuality had anything to do with a devastating disease that
was ravaging people, reducing them to skeletons and killing them?" he
wrote.
It is the unwavering conviction of those who knew Davis -- respected
individuals with decades of collective experience in the entertainment
industry -- that the talented actor would have been unemployable had
he gone public with his secret.
"He was absolutely justified in his fear that he wouldn't find work if
it had been known he had HIV," said producer Rick Rosenberg, who made
"Robert Kennedy and His Times," in which Davis starred.
"This town would be terrified to have an HIV-positive actor in a
leading role," Rosenberg said. "An educated producer or director might
do it, but would the insurance company say OK? Would the money people?
No. And on television, the advertisers might panic."
Hollywood's ambivalent reaction about AIDS has been evident ever since
Rock Hudson's publicists disclosed his AIDS diagnosis shortly before
he died in 1985. His death led Elizabeth Taylor to co-found the
American Foundation for AIDS Research. But there were also sensational
stories about Hudson kissing co-star Linda Evans on "Dynasty." And,
critics note, no major star has ever publicly acknowledged being
HIV-positive.
"It would be an extraordinarily difficult thing for an actor to
overcome," said personal manager Barry Krost, who represents singer
Sarah Brightman. "If it were a star -- and Davis qualifies -- the
tabloids would get hold of it," imperiling a film's financing and
distribution.
Given Davis' reputation as a risk-taker and his convictions about the
AIDS issue, the role of openly HIV-positive Hollywood conscience on
AIDS is one that the young star might have been expected to relish.
But Davis, who sought out chancy roles, simply felt he could not take
a risk with his livelihood.
"Yes, the silence must be broken," said Rodger McFarlane, executive
director of Broadway Cares, a New York organization that provides
financial, practical and emotional support to theater people stricken
with AIDS. "But Brad had a wife and a child and a mortgage, and --
like any actor -- he never knew when he would work again."
It is telling that while he worked in Hollywood, when Davis finally
reached out for help in 1989 he turned to New York. There, McFarlane
worked tirelessly to hook Davis up with a doctor, Weisman, who would
go to great lengths to protect his famous patient's identity.
"The arrangement I had with Brad was this: 'When you're too sick to
work, or when you've lost your looks and can't work, you'll pay me
back by going public,' " McFarlane said.
"I'll be a hero later," McFarlane recalled Davis saying. "I've got
Alexandra to feed now."
Nor was Brad Davis alone in his terror. "There are lots of others out
there like him -- big names, names you'd recognize," said McFarlane.
"It's not just people up on the screen," added Weisman, whose Sherman
Oaks practice cares for many people infected with HIV in the
entertainment industry. "It is also people in the crafts. The crux of
the issue is: If you are perceived to have AIDS or cancer, you're
unhirable. You don't get a picture."
Weisman knows a thing or two about AIDS. In 1981, he co-authored the
first article about a mysterious pneumonia in five Los Angeles gay men
for a Centers for Disease Control publication, and he currently serves
as chairman of the board of the American Foundation for AIDS Research.
Weisman speaks from personal knowledge when he says that the secrecy
around AIDS is costing lives. "We do a great injustice for future
research and care when well-known faces die of AIDS and they are
recorded as having died of something else," he said.
And, he added, "in Brad's case, the delay in seeking treatment . . .
probably cost him years of vitality and life." Weisman began caring
for Davis in early 1989; before that, the actor felt healthy and did
not seek care for his HIV infection even though he had known about it
since 1985.
"Until January, 1989, I felt great, took no medication, told no one,"
Davis wrote in his book proposal.
The actor had learned that he was infected with the often fatal virus
in the fall of 1985 in a transatlantic phone call from Susan while he
was in Rome filming the miniseries "Blood Ties."
"I had given blood at Cedars Sinai before I left in September and they
had sent a letter to my house announcing that I was HIV positive,"
Davis wrote. "A really sensitive and caring thing to do, don't you
think. . . ?
"After going through the terror of waiting to find out if my wife and
my daughter were infected -- which miraculously they were not -- I
settled into accepting my condition without a lot of trauma. . . . Had
my family been infected I would have totally fallen apart, but there
is a saying 'We are never given more than we can handle.' "
The saying comes from Alcoholics Anonymous, an organization from which
Davis drew peace, strength and serenity after he joined and became
sober in 1981. Before that, Davis wrote, "I was a total drug addict --
an alcoholic and I.V. drug user -- a user of just about any kind of
drug I could get. And I was sexually very promiscuous. I've never
known any addicts who weren't."
Though Susan has said that Davis apparently contracted the virus by
sharing needles with people who later died of AIDS, Davis in his book
proposal wrote the media's and public's fascination with how specific
individuals contracted the virus is "very disturbing."
"There are many different ways to contract the virus, and each carries
its own degree of judgment or compassion," he wrote. "Gays (are) the
most heavily judged, receiving the least compassion. One step up are
the I.V. drug users, then heterosexual promiscuity, women who get it
from infected husbands, transfusions and the ultimate in no judgment
and total compassion, babies born with the virus.
"The problem with this is if there are 'innocent' victims then there
must be guilty victims," Davis wrote.
The fight against AIDS will be hampered, Davis wrote, until "that kind
of judgment is suspended" and it is widely recognized that no people
with AIDS "deserve to have this disease and (that) all (of them)
deserve only compassion and support."
But Davis' support team consisted only of Susan, Kramer, McFarlane,
Weisman, a physician's assistant who came to the house to draw blood
and perform other routine procedures, a therapist and Mark Senak, the
director of client services at AIDS Project Los Angeles.
Senak, who had met Davis briefly backstage in 1985 during the New York
run of "The Normal Heart," recalled getting a phone call from a
desperate and frightened Davis shortly after Senak moved to Los
Angeles in 1989.
Recalled Senak, who had been director of legal services for Gay Men's
Health Crisis in New York: "I thought to myself, is this what it is
going to be like out in Los Angeles, brokering medical services for
people needing anonymity?"
Senak said Davis' reluctance to file insurance claims "is not
exclusive to Brad. I find it with clients time and time again. People
are so afraid of losing their insurance."
Of course, Susan was Brad's most devoted source of support. "He was
the great love of my life, that is the truth," she said, tears welling
up. "He was not going to be one more person with this disease to be
abandoned."
The couple met in 1971 when Davis was signed by agent Stark
Hesseltine, for whom she worked as a secretary and who had previously
discovered such talents as Robert Redford, Elizabeth Ashley and Blythe
Danner.
"He came into the office while I was typing, sat on my desk and said:
'You want to have some eggs on Thursday?' " Susan laughed.
The then-struggling actor "never had any money," she recalled. "He
just ate what was cheap."
"He was skinny and funny and Southern," she said. "I said yes because
he was so sweet." They moved in together shortly thereafter and were
wed five years later.
Davis' big break came in the film "Midnight Express" but, his wife
said, he was too young to handle success and drank heavily and abused
drugs.
"He was not a closet drunk," she recalled. "He made scenes in public
many places, many times. He was wild."
By 1981, Davis' career was "completely shattered," she said. "He hit
bottom. He couldn't get a job in this town. And then he (joined AA
and) got sober."
Davis first heard about AIDS in 1982 when his friend, Larry Kramer,
told him about what was then known as "gay cancer."
Wrote Davis: "In the back of my head a little voice said: 'Whew! At
least this is one horror I don't have to worry about coming to rest in
my lap.' That may sound cold, but having nearly died so many times
during the drug years, my instinct for my own survival was now very
keen."
By 1983, "confident that the 10-year nightmare of addiction was over,"
wrote Davis, Susan gave birth to Alexandra, "the joy of our lives."
"I was working again," he wrote. "Everything seemed to be turning
around."
But there would be no happy ending. Saturday night at 8:30, Davis
called his longtime friend Erman, who directed the actor in "When the
Time Comes," a film about assisted suicide.
"This very weak voice said, 'It's Brad,' " Erman recalled. "I was
having people to dinner so I said, 'I'll call you tomorrow.' He said:
'No you can't.'
"I said, 'Brad, you've got to talk up, I can't hear you' . . . and
then he said, 'I just want to tell you I'm very sick, I have AIDS and
I just want to say goodby to you.'
"I said, 'I can't say goodby, I'm not ready to say goodby. Can I call
you?' He said, 'No, I'll call you.' I was afraid to call Susan because
he had told me not to call."
Monday morning, a message on Erman's answering machine announced to
him that Davis died Sunday.
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(Querelle)