MY HUSBAND, ROCK HUDSON: The Real Story of Rock Hudson's Marriage to Phyllis Gates

by Phyllis & Bob Thomas Gates ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 15, 1987

A self-serving, scarcely credible account of Gates' experiences as the wife of the popular Hollywood star who died of AIDS last year. Writing in a style that would make a Photoplay editor wince, Gates shunts aside the deeper questions that might have turned her story into a penetrating analysis of a socio-sexual tragedy. As it stands, this superficial, shockingly unfeeling account does a disservice to both its subject and its author. In her eagerness to portray herself as a victim, Gates has been forced to depict herself as invincibly naive. Used as a ""cover"" to defuse an impending scandal involving Hudson's homosexuality back in 1955, she insists that she was totally unaware of her future husband's sexual orientation at the time of his proposal. Well, perhaps--but disbelief is difficult to suspend. Even more incredibly, Gates claims she remained a loving dupe throughout nearly three years of marriage. This, despite unexplained absences, midnight phone calls from anonymous males, mysterious visits from Hudson's former ""roommates."" Surely, not even Minnesota farm girls were quite that wide-eyed, even in the ""innocent"" 50's, especially if they've worked for several years, as Gates did, in theatrical agencies on both coasts. Totally absent is any discussion of the widespread ""homo-phobia"" of the day that made Hudson agree to his bizarre masquerade in the first place. Also missing: any understanding of the torment Hudson may have felt because of his enforced position as ""sexual outsider."" From evidence published elsewhere, it would appear that he was not a particularly sympathetic individual. Fairness, however, would seem to demand at least some mention of the cultural and psychological pressures that contributed to his actions. Alternately mean-spirited and pretentious, Gates' ""confessions"" are finally both suspect and exploitive. Eighteen black-and-white photographs (not seen).

Pub Date: May 15, 1987

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1987

Categories: NONFICTION