Peter Berlin: "That Boy" uses his physique and d*ck to show us the wonder of the Gay World

Link to the n*de photos 

His actual name was Peter Berlin, but all you needed to say was That Boy, and the old guys of West Hollywood (that is, men over 30) would remember: the Boy sunning himself on the beach, the "Dancing Queen" at the disco, the leatherman glaring from the back bar, all blond hair, bronze muscles, and c*ck

He was not handsome -- actually, he had an unremarkable long horse-face.  Nor was he blond. And the world he traveled was more often graffiti- and gang-strewn Tenderloin than the Fire Island of the A-gays.  But that didn't matter.  You saw him half on screen, half in your dreams

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There was no such thing as a closet in Peter Berlin's world, no such thing as homophobia.  Only endless nights of cruising -- but not the meaningless, destructive tricks that the straights condemned us for.  A glorious freedom that was, in itself, fulfilling enough to be the sole purpose of life.

That Boy (1974) was a defining moment of my coming out, the first gay film I ever saw, in 1984, during my second year in grad school at Indiana University.  My friend Viju and I drove into Indianapolis to go to the bars, and someone invited us to see it with him.  There was a midnight showing in a sleazy theater near Monument Circle.

Peter is not actually the boy of That Boy.  He plays an unnamed Everyman who wanders through the Castro and the Tenderloin of  a straight-free San Francisco, cruising on the street and in back rooms, looking at men, and being looked at.  He finds the gaze, being the object of desire, more glorious than the acts themselves.  But then he looks at That Boy, but the boy does not look back

Could this be the one person in the Gay World who does not desire him?  No, the boy is blind!  Peter is intrigued, and invites him for coffee and conversation. They walk hand in hand through the park and sit by the pond to look at (or hear) the ducks, making a romantic connection before heading to the back room.

Peter was born Armin Hagen Freiherr von Hoyningen-Huene. the son of a baron, in December 1942, and raised in Berlin, in a family of diplomats and fashion photographers.   After secondary school, he worked as a photographer for a German interview program, met famous people like Alfred Hitchcock and Brigitte Bardot, and cruised.  

A double life, respectable by day, sleazoid by night, was a standard part of the gay experience in the 1960s, when straights and gays alike believed that we were destined to be permanent outsiders, constantly hiding, denizens of a seedy underworld.  But Armin took pride in being gay.  He cruised in outfits of his own design, photographed himself and his tricks, turned the gay activity into a work of masculine beauty,

More after the break.  

Shortly after Stonewall, Armin moved to San Francisco, re-invented himself as Peter Burian and then Peter Berlin, and quickly became a gay icon, appearing in magazines and films, acting as his own cinematographer.  He was renowned for his gleaming, muscular physique and big d*ck, but more importantly for his utter lack of guilt, hesitation, and fear.

During his heyday, Peter Berlin was filmed, drawn, photographed, and painted by such greats as Mapplethorpe, Warhol, and Tom of Finland (left).  He became friends with Salvador Dali and Rudolph Nureyev. 

 His two gay films, Nights in Black Leather (1973) and That Boy (1974), became classics.  They have been released on DVD, and you can stream them on ThisVid and Mubi.

In the 1980s, AIDS, neoconservative retrenchment, and changing social norms made cruising seem quaintly naive, even dangerous.  He retreated from the public eye, but continued to photograph himself and others. There have been several exhibitions of his work, especially after the documentary That Man (2006) introduced a new generation to the art of cruising.

Today Peter is over 80 years old, still living quietly in San Francisco, still happily recalling how he gave a  generation of gay men a glimpse of what it was like to experience desire without apology or regret.

See also:20 musclemen who guided me through the Age of Innocence, from Bomba the Jungle Boy to the American Psycho

Indiana University: My first visit to an adult bookstore

Ich bin ein Berliner: Eight divine dudes from Deutschland with sizeable Schwanzen