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By Brody Levesque (Washington DC) SEPT 1 | Actor James Dean's sexual life has long been a matter of fierce debate. Considered a gay film icon by the Gay community at large, there are numerous published accounts of Dean having had alleged bisexual relationships.
Hollywood biographer Boze Hadleigh, whose focus on film figures he asserted were gay or bisexual, had published in a 1972 interview with the late actor Sal Mineo who stated: "Nick (Adams) told me [ Mineo ] they had a big affair."
Other published sources support the view that Dean could have had homosexual relationships. Gavin Lambert, himself homosexual and part of the Hollywood gay circles of the 50s and 60s, describes Dean as being bisexual. "Live Fast, Die Young – The Wild Ride of Making Rebel Without a Cause," a recent book by Lawrence Frascella and Al Weisel, states that Rebel director Nicholas Ray knew Dean to be bisexual.
Now making the rounds on the independent film circuit is a trailer from Iconoclastic Features, that explores some of the long held views regarding Dean's sexual orientation. Joshua Tree, 1951: A Portrait Of James Dean, due to be released in 2011, is from award winning filmmaker and director Matthew Mishory.
Mishory studied film theory and screenwriting at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he was a Regent Scholar and Golden Reel Award recipient. His writings on film criticism and international cinema history have been published in the Focus Media Journal housed at MOMA in New York City, and in Glitterati Magazine.
His short film Nick and Kate screened in international competition at Filminute 2008 (London/Toronto/Bucharest), was one of twenty-five official selections culled from a field of nearly two thousand by a jury that included two-time Oscar winner Paul Haggis and German critic Andrea Dittgen.
He recently collaborated with television star Erin Daniels on the film Sunday Afternoons and directed the commissioned activist piece The Marionettes , shot entirely with miniatures, an official selection at the 2010 Newport Beach International Film Festival.
In 2009, he wrote and directed the acclaimed experimental biopic; Delphinium: A Childhood Portrait of Derek Jarman the result of his long-time fascination with the work and life of legendary artist Derek Jarman. The film has had an international festival run with premieres at the Raindance Film Festival in London, the Reykjavik International Film Festival in Iceland, and the 22nd MIX Film Festival in New York City.
Mishory also holds a Juris Doctor degree from Loyola Law School at Loyola Marymount University and is very active in progressive political causes. Matthew contributed several Public Service Announcements to the No On Prop 8 effort and has written articles about such diverse subjects as the right to physician-aided suicide and the effect of obscenity laws on transgressive art and expression.
The film stars James Preston, as Dean:
JOSHUA TREE, 1951: A PORTRAIT OF JAMES DEAN Teaser Trailer: [ http://vimeo.com/12295985 ]
James Preston Photo By Bruce Weber
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I was only six years old when James Dean died, too young to appreciate his quiet beauty. It wasn't until my teens when I saw the teen rebel in films and found myself attracted to him. By then I had figured out my desires and knew he was on the list, or would heve been if I had been born a generation sooner.
The film seems compelling from what the trailer presents, an artistic piece, add that to my list of things to see. But my thanks to you, Brody...I can't help but put James Preston on my desktop...sigh.
Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read. (Sir Francis Bacon 1561-1626)
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Before you ask, which film (there have been at least a dozen over the years), for the life of me, I simply can't recall the title; but, I do remember having hosted on my file-server some time ago (and personally viewed) a somewhat controversial filmed biography of James Dean produced many years ago wherein Dean's homosexuality was discussed at some length including much archival footage taken from both his early years at home in Marion, Indiana, through his troubling period in New York City and later triumphs in Hollywood.
What is the reference to "Joshua Tree, 1951"?
I went to the movie's web-site, but it simply redirects you to the Vimeo trailer; nothing more, nothing less.
I did have at one time (again, I can't seem to find it now ... kind of too bad too) a digital capture (from the original negative) of the full-frontal nude of Dean taken at age-22 which mirrors (minus the boxer-shorts) the image you've chosen of James Preston in portraying him. He, absolutely hands-down, no mistaking about it, was drop-dead luscious ... bad-boy image an all.
Warren C. E. Austin
The Gay Deceiver
Toronto, Canada
"... comme recherché qu'un délice callipygian"
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Warren, I recall a film/program on television that researched the life of Sal Mineo, a contemporary of James Dean's. As I recall there was a discussion of Mineo's sexuality and included Dean's as well. I fail to remember the source of that either. You have a good memory!
Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read. (Sir Francis Bacon 1561-1626)
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... Television Documentaries about Sal Mineo out of a slew of lesser oevres; one Canadian produced by the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation), the other by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation); both to the best of my knowledge have never been transferred digitally, and as a consequence are not available either as a VHS-tape or CD/DvD.
The CBC programme (actually created by the National Film Board of Canada for the CBC) documented Mineo's later years, and in particular the run-up to his appearance in the Off-Broadway smash hit "Fortune And Men's Eyes", based upon the gay-angst ridden seminal prison drama and stage-play by John Herbert (13 October 1926 - 22 June 2001), a Canadian playwright, which was then in pre-production in advance of filming at the newly opened, and then still under construction, Archambault Prison in Sainte-Anne-Des-Plaines, Quebec.
Sal Mineo is credited as Executive Producer of the 1971 film, but does not appear in it, and was instrumental in gaining the support of legendary Canadian "Silent-screen", and overtly reclusive, Actress Mary Pickford (dubbed America's Sweetheart) in order that the film might actually get made in Canada after a long, and protracted, legal battle over performance rights. Pickford used her influence to inveigle Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (to whom she had sold her United Artists company in the early 1950's) to create a new division of their firm (to be styled Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Of Canada Ltd., which would later morph into being the now ubiquitos MGM Global Distribution Inc.) to operate in Canada, and to eventually release the finished film in thèâtres World-wide. The Government of Canada and the Canada Council for the Performing Arts picked up the production cost over-runs through the then newly created (especially for the purposes) Canadian Film Development Corporation. MGM in doing so became the first American studio to create a fully-fledged Canadian production-arm and subsidiary, a market which up until that point had been serviced by a myriad number of false-front shell companies.
The BBC Documentary, filmed some years earlier focused largely on his film and early stage career, ending with filming of the newly commissioned, and recently installed Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City (although never publicly exhibited until it was reacquired by the Guggenheim again in 1990), very controversial 1962, multi-panelled room-sized oil-on-canvas work by Harold Stevenson entitled "The New Adam" for which Sal Mineo had consented to sit (or lie in this instance) in all his full-frontal nude glory when visiting Paris where he was introduced to the painter.
Warren C. E. Austin
The Gay Deceiver
Toronto, Canada
[Updated on: Fri, 03 September 2010 19:30]
"... comme recherché qu'un délice callipygian"
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Re: A New Film About Outsider Icon James Dean: Joshua Tree, 1951 
Re: Is this a remake of an earlier film on this subject? 
