Hollywood: Henry Willson, Scotty Bowers, Rock Hudson: The Gang's All Here

During the glory days of studio-driven Hollywood, Jack (David Corenswet), a World War II vet with a wife and a baby on the way, wants to become an actor (no, a movie star). He hasn't been discovered yet (go figure), so he takes a job at  Ernie West's garage where the rich-and-famous fork over $200 ($2000 in today's money) to have sex with the attendants (have you read Scotty Bowers' book?).

Jack's main client turns out to be Avis Amberg (Patti LuPone), whose husband owns Ace Studios, and can get Jack work ("You take care of Mama, and Mama takes care of you.").

He won't do male clients, so he enlists Archie (Jeremy Pope), who aspires to be the first black gay screenwriter working in mainstream cinema. Archie's first client is the young, nervous Roy Fitzgerald (Jake Picking), who is destined to become movie great Rock Hudson. They start dating.

Meanwhile, Raymond (Darrin Kriss), a half-Filipino aspiring director, has had no luck getting his movie with an Asian star greenlighted, so studio exec Dick Samuels (Joe Mantello), who is gay, suggests that he work on Archie's movie.  Raymond hires his girlfriend Camille, who is black, for the female lead.

Jack tries out for the male lead. But Roy (now named Rock Hudson) has an edge: sleazy agent Henry Willson, who has the dirt on everyone and can blackmail them into casting his stable of gay-for-pay beefcake actors.

Plus Rock (left) slept with Dick Samuels.  But Jack is sleeping with Avis....

This all sounds very sleazy, an examination of the sexual exploitation of attractive men through the lens of the me-too era. But it's not.  The sex-for-screen tests exchanges are portrayed as perfectly legitimate and beneficial -- millions of people have acting talent, but how many are both hot and willing to put out?

The main problem of this system is prejudice. Jack, Archie, Raymond and their allies, all amazingly non-racist and gay-friendly for 1948 (and for 2020), are up against a system embedded with racism and homophobia.  But they're going to change all of that!  They're getting on the bus, throwing the first rock at Stonewall, and making movies about interracial and gay romance.

Ok, that didn't happen.

The sets are gorgeous, the background music spot-on, and you see fictionalized versions of Rock Hudson, Scotty Bowers, Henry Willson, Anna May Wong, Vivian Leight, Tallulah Bankhead, George Cukor, Noel Coward, Cole Porter, and Eleanor Roosevelt.   But...

Ok, that didn't happen.

Beefcake: Lots.

Gay Characters: Lots

My grade: B.