Tommy
Kirk was a star at Disney Studios in the early 1960s but there were issues
"I knew I was gay, but I had no outlet for my feelings," he said
" I consider my teenage years as being desperately unhappy. I knew I was
gay, but I had no outlet for my feelings. It was very hard to meet people, and,
at that time, there was no place to go to socialize. It wasn't until the early
'60s that I began to hear of places where gays congregated. The lifestyle was
not recognized, and I was very, very lonely. Oh, I had some brief, very
passionate encounters and as a teenager I had some affairs, but they were
always stolen, back alley kind of things. They were desperate and miserable.
When I was about 17 or 18 years old, I finally admitted to myself that I wasn't
going to change. I didn't know what the consequences would be, but I had the
definite feeling that it was going to wreck my Disney career and maybe my whole
acting career. It was all going to come to an end.”
He
added that “It was very hard to meet people, and, at that time, there was no
place to go to socialize. It wasn't until the early '60s that I began to hear
of places where gays congregated."
While
filming The Misadventures of Merlin Jones, in 1964, Kirk started seeing a
15-year-old boy he had met at a local swimming pool in Burbank. Tommy was 22
years old. The boy’s mother found out and reported the affair to Disney Studios
“the boy's mother went to Walt," he said "I was quickly fired."
Disney
didn’t renew Tommy’s contract "Even
more than MGM, Disney was the most conservative studio in town.... The studio
executives were beginning to suspect my homosexuality. Certain people were
growing less and less friendly. In 1963, Disney let me go. But Walt asked me to
return for the final Merlin Jones movie, The Monkey's Uncle, because the Jones
films had been moneymakers for the studio." (The film earned earning $4
million in rentals in North America alone, an astounding sum at the time)
Tommy
made a few more film outside of Disney. But on Christmas Eve 1964, he was arrested
for suspicion of possession of marijuana, a hefty crime at the time, especially
for a movie star. The DA dropped the grass charges but since officer also found
barbiturates (in what was probably an illegal search and seizure) he was
charged with possession of illegal drugs, which wasn’t true. The actor produced
proof that the drugs had been prescribed by a physician. But it really didn’t
matter. The 1960s were far more conservative than they are portrayed, and he
was fired from several film in the making. He bounced back but fell victim to
drug addiction and gave up acting in the mid-1970s. “I was drinking, taking
pills and smoking grass. In fact, I was pretty wild. I came into a whole lot of
money, but I threw a lot of parties and spent it all. I wound up completely
broke. I had no self-discipline and I almost died of a drug overdose a couple
of times. It's a miracle that I'm still around. All of that didn't help the
situation. Nobody would touch me; I was considered box office poison”
The
days when he earned more than $1,000 a week were over. (That would be roughly
$6,000 a week today) To get by he worked as a waiter, a chauffeur and a carpet
cleaner in the San Fernando “I made a lot of money and I spent it all.” He said
“No bitterness. No regrets. I did what I did... I wasn't the boy next door
anymore. I could pretend to be for a few hours a day in front of the camera.
But I couldn't live it. I'm human. I'm not Francis of Assisi. I don’t blame
anybody but myself and my drug abuse for my career going haywire. I’m not
ashamed of being gay, never have been, and never will be. For that I make no
apologies. I have no animosity toward anybody because the truth is, I wrecked
my own career.”