AIL Meets writer, performer and gay icon David Leddick

To say 85-year-old David Leddick has led a fascinating life is an understatement. As an officer in the US Navy he witnessed the first testing of the hydrogen bomb in Bikini Atoll, before going on to become the worldwide creative director of Revlon and L’Oreal. He’s written almost 30 books including homoerotic art books and novels, and has been a columnist for Huffington Post. In his blog David’s Gay Dish he’s doled out relationship advice, and nowadays he writes and performs in musicals. His latest play, Rent Boy: The Musical comes to London at the end of this month.

Where did the idea for Rent Boy: The Musical come from?
It’s based on a book I did called Escort. It was 40 interviews with male escorts with photographs. It inspired our theatre team to do a musical which was produced as “Escorts” but then when we met the President of the Rent Boy organisation it inspired us to change the name. Our run in New York for producers to see our show was great. Every show sold out except two matinees. The high-priced front seats always sold out. Time Out listed us among the six sexiest things to do in New York.

What is it about the escorting world that fascinates you?
It’s not so much the escort world that fascinates me but all the activities people engage in that are taboo to talk about, write about, and see.Male escorts are one of the largest businesses in the US. There are two thousand of these guys here, and four thousand internationally just in the rent boy system. All this transgender stuff that’s going on? That’s just gay guys who just can’t come out. So they switch over to being women, losing their sexual organs in the process. Ugh! Stuff like this interests me a lot. You only have one life. You’d better live it instead of hiding from it.

How do you think the show will be received in London compared to New York?
I think the show is going to be hot in London. My impression of the UK is they act like they’re not all that interested in sex but actually they are extremely. It must be that chilly climate. Let’s get hot!

What would you like the play to achieve?
I would love the play to fill a certain place in London theatre so it could have an extended run, playing to the floods of tourists coming and going from London. That’s what a fun, sexy show like this can do. It’s not Ibsen for God’s sake. It’s opening up new worlds for people to see.

Rent Boy will be showing at Above the Stag, a full time LGBT theatre. A number of London’s gay venues have closed down recently, sparking many protests. What do you make of this? Is anything comparable happening in the US?
I think specifically gay venues close down because gayness is becoming more universal as a subject of interest. At all my gay book events the crowd has always been 70% gay, 20% women, 10% couples. We find this has been pretty consistent at theatre events also. Certainly the women at Rent Boy in New York always laughed first and laughed loudest. The gay experience has set the path for many women as to how to have a world that doesn’t depend on older, fat, white straight men running everything.

You’ve said you’ve never suffered from homophobia. Do you think you’ve been exceptionally lucky?
I have said I am not aware of having encountered homophobia. One of my nephews says I just didn’t notice it. My great friend Jean Ann once said of me “some people think being gay is a sin. Some people think it’s a crime. You seem to think it’s a luxury.” I had my first boyfriend when I was four. He was always going to marry me when we grew up, the rat. I always had plenty of male attention. It wouldn’t lead you to think there was anything wrong with it. I’m not concerned what other people think of me. Only of what I think of them.

You’ve talked about Coco Chanel being one of your role models. Have you had any male, gay role models?
Unfortunately there are no good gay role models for men as they become more mature. Gay men tend to get stuck only being attracted to the kind of men they first started liking. And for myself I don’t find the heterosexual marriage mode a good role to copy. I certainly wouldn’t want a marriage like my parents. I have always wanted great romance and have had it. And if you don’t like me and find me irritating you’re not stuck with me. I’m out of there. We are here to be fulfilled physically and emotionally. I am not at all sure marriage is the answer to that. You have to be brave to lead the life that will really satisfy you. And first, you have to know who you are.

You’ve dished out relationship advice on your blog. What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?
The best piece of advice I ever got was from my friend Peggy Prag when I was 28, had given up dancing and was really depressed. She said, “I know you are really unhappy now but I promise you there will be things you will be interested in later, in your future, that you cannot even imagine now.” She was so right. I thought it was all over. It was in fact just the beginning.

You’ve had several careers so far, do you have any others up your sleeve?
I do sort of feel that at 85 I am shifting into yet another chapter of my life. I have a new graphic novel called Two Bracelets that I’m doing just to really own the story as it is designed to be a television series. It’s a really fantastic plot and very, very apropos of what’s going on sexually and gender-bending wise right now. I think if there is anything I can do in this late chapter of my life it is to leave behind stuff I have experienced and thought of, and thought important for other people to encourage them to rage forward with their lives. Later in life you really see how important it is not to just kill time but to really use your life. Failure and success are not that dissimilar. It’s not trying that is really letting yourself down. And truly, who gives a damn what other people think of you? The truth is, they are not. They are only thinking of themselves.

Rent Boy: The Musical runs from June 26th to July 26th at Above The Stag.