Finn Kaifur: Icelandic college student studies ballet, takes a polar plunge, shows his stuff. With Pete White and bonus n*de model Shaun Ross

  

Link to the n*de photos

This guy drew my attention on Instagram with a photo of swimming in an ice-covered lake.  Not just a polar plunge -- he was floating in there!

"Comfort kills your dreams."  But ice water kills your body.

He's Finn B__, originally from Iceland, 19 years old as of this writing. I don't usually post the full name of non-actors, so I'll change his last name to Kaifur, Icelandic slang for "Big D*ck."

Finn notes that growing up, he was subjected to bullying and had few friends, which led to depression and low self-esteem.  He only came out a short time ago.

Wait -- bullied for being gay?  In Iceland?  Are you sure they weren't bullying you because you hang out with your shirt off in sub-zero temperatures?  Not that I'm complaining.

For someone who wants to make friends, Finn doesn't reveal many personal details.  He's attending college in the U.S., but he doesn't say which college.  Or his major.  He posts that he's in love with his philosophy professor, but also does ballet routines.  And he's on the hockey team.

Back home in Iceland, he lived with his grandmother and cat.

In the U.S., he has a dog.

He thinks American guys are handsome.  Dude, I've been to Iceland.  The guys are totally hot, although I actually prefer cut cocks (n*de Icelander on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends).

His American friend, Thomas, is leaving to join the army, "So I need to spend time together in a way that makes him remember me for a long time."

Be sure to hydrate, guys.

"I've been in two relationships.  Both ended in heartbreak.  Why?"  It's not you, buddy, it's the nature of relationships.

More after the break

Taylor Gregory: The fierce, fabulous Barbie kid grows up to ballet, bodybuilding, and kissing boys. With bonus Czerwonko going downtown

  

Link to the n*de dudes

When I was doing a profile of Iain Armitage, who played Young Sheldon, the preteen and teenage version of the Big Bang Theory's neurotic physicist , I thought Wyatt McClure should come next.  He played next door neighbor Billy, who started with a gay-subtext interest in Iain before the writers decided to give him a crush on his sister Missy instead.

Wyatt McClure turned out to be unsuitable; no beefcake, and straight.  But he did draw my attention to his best friend, Taylor Gregory: 17 years old as of this writing, and extremely muscular.

Taylor has done some acting, but he is primarily a dancer, interested in a career in ballet. Here he plays the Prince in Nutcracker at Christmastime 2023.  

Auditioning for the Houston Ballet Academy's intensive summer session in 2025.  Did they require you to dance shirtless on your audition video, or did you think your physique would give you an edge?

Gay in real life:

Taylor: "We weren't celebrating Valentine's Day, but we were."  His date, a guy named Carson, is getting friendly under the table. We don't see Wyatt's date; maybe they're taking the photo.

Taylor tries to kiss Wyatt, who isn't into it.  

Any questions?

Any gay roles:

In 2015, when he was six years old, Biloxi, Mississippi native starred in a commercial for Mochino's high-end Barbie doll collection.  He was  the first boy ever to be shown playing with Barbies on tv.  With his femme hair and his "fierce and fabulous" snap, he became a media sensation and "a voice of the LGBTQ community."  

In one of the news stories I watched, Taylor's Mom seemed uncomfortable with the idea of her son being a gay icon.  It was just an acting role; in real life, he plays with Matchbook cars (translation: "My son is straight")

Gay boys are allowed to play with cars, Mom, just as straight boys are allowed to play with dolls. You can't tell by the toys they like.

But she did allow him to perform at the  Gulf Coast Equality Fest, an annual LGBTQ+ event "aimed at inspiring, educating, honoring, and celebrating our community and our allies."  

More after the break

More Nutcracker Beefcake

When I was a kid, our church forbade movies, theater, carnivals, circuses -- basically anything that had a plot.  And my working-class parents disapproved of anything "long hair."  So ballet and opera were completely alien.

Except at Christmastime, when we would go to see "The Nutcracker" at Centennial Hall on the Augustana College campus, or at Rock Island High School, or both.  One year the Youth Symphony participated, so I got to be in the orchestra pit for eight full performances.

The plot is heterosexist -- Elsa receives a nutcracker shaped like a toy soldier for Christmas.  He comes to life, fights an army of mice, and reveals that he is actually a prince.  They return to his kingdom, the Land of Sweets, where he makes Elsa his queen.

But who pays attention to the plot?  No matter what people tell you, they go to ballets for one reason, and one reason only: to celebrate male or female beauty.  Dances in form-fitting tights, swaying and twisting, making every curve and muscle visible.

No other art, not even bodybuilding, displays the male physique so openly and extensively.  You don't just get a glimpse or a hint -- everything is out there, through the entire performance.

No wonder every gay kid in town, even those who were otherwise obsessed with sports, couldn't wait for Christmas.

Ballet dancers have mixed feelings toward The Nutcracker -- it is so darn cliched. "Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies" over and over and over. 

And the costumes are rather uncomfortable. 

More after the break

Madden Zook: 5 soul-winning movies and 3,000 girl-hugging photos prove that he's straight, right? Plus some n*de ballet dudes

 

Link to the n*de photos

Madden Zook, who just appeared as the #50 most popular on the Teen Idol website, looks like a model -- a little skinny, but with one of those "ratboy" faces that are all the rage. 

No question that he's straight in real life. 90% of his photos show him hugging, kissing, smooching, and licking girls.  Oh, here's one where she is just sniffing his bicep.

The girl-hugging would usually disqualify a guy from further research, but I was fascinated: the heterosexism was so very, very over the top, absurdly excessive.   Lots of straight guys devote most of their social media to hugging and kissing The Girl of Their Dreams, but every single photo on his Instagram and Facebook?  Dozens of them? What are you trying to prove, buddy? 

Wait --  I thought this was another girl-hugging photo, but upon closer examination, it's a dude hugging him.  

So, how did Zook become a teen idol? Hugging and kissing girls won't make you famous. He must have done some acting or singing at some point.    

He has five acting credits on the IMDB:

Laps (2018): Swimmer Mitchell (Brayden Benson, center) is being bullied, so he tells the swim coach (Ian Lang).  That's progressive.  When I was a kid, the teachers said "You have to settle your own disputes," and my Dad enrolled me in judo lessons.  Didn't help.

Zook (left) and Cameron Judd (right) play the bullies. 

It was written and directed by Ian Lang, whose Internet biography reads: "And we know that God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to his purpose" -Romans 8:28. 

Maybe Zook is fundamentalist, and hugs and kisses a lot of girls to prove that he's not "that way" in spite of his swishiness? 

Ian also wrote, produced, and stars in Red Hood: The Fan Series (2019), Christian-based sequel to Red Hood: The Series (2016),: Jason Todd,  the Second Robin in the Batman mythos, returns to Gotham City as the vigiante Red Hood.  He is subdued by a cadre of born-again Robins led by Bruce Wayne's son Damien (Cameron Judd again).  

I watched one of Zook's episodes: he plays a patient in a sinister hospital rescued by Damien.  I didn't stick around to see if they do any buddy-bonding; gay kids might like the lingering close-ups of 12-year old boys in muscle shirts, or sleeping in their altogether, but they made me uncomfortable.

More after the break.  

Nutcracker Beefcake

Heterosexist plotline aside, every year The Nutcracker gives us the opportunity to see traditional, family-friendly, school-sanctioned, Christmastime ballet written by a gay man.

And loaded to the brim with hot guys in tights.

Not only the Nutcracker-turned-Prince who woos Clara, but the Mouse King, the Cavalier, party guests, soldiers, sentinels, Arabian dancers, Russian dancers -- the list goes on.





















Not a lot of shirtless dancers -- it's set in a Russian winter, after all.  But wander backstage before or after the performance, and you can get a glimpse of Christmas perfection.















More after the break.

Hippolytus, the Gay Charioteer of Greek Myth

In Greek myths, Hippolytus, a chariot devotee (similar to today's auto racers), was the son of Theseus (who killed the Minotaur).  After he rejected the advances of his stepmother Phaedra, she told Theseus that he raped her, whereupon Theseus asked the god Poseidon called up a sea monster to terrorize Hippolytus'  horses and drag him to his death.

In the Euripides play Hippolytus (428 BC), we learn why Phaedra was so interested in the lad.  He rejected Aphrodite, the emblem of heterosexual love, for Artemis, the "chaste" goddess of the hunt.  Angry at the slight -- how dare there be any non-heterosexuals in the world! -- Aphrodite caused Phaedra to fall in love with him, thus leading to his death (this is a scene from a performance at the National Theater of Athens).

Jean Racine's Phèdre (1677) gives Hippolytus a girlfriend, Aricia.  This ballet version stars Slovenian dancer Tadej Brdik (left)

The 1962 film version, directed by Jules Dassin, stars gay actor Anthony Perkins as the son of a shipping magnate (Raf Vallone) who has a consensual -- but doomed -- romance with his stepmother (Melina Mercouri).

Several artists have depicted the death of Hippolytus, so they can show straining muscles and minimal clothing.  Peter-Paul Rubens (1577-1640) shows us a beefy specimen, part of his cloak transformed into a faux phallus.

Pierre Subleyras (1699-1749) depicts several guys thrown from the chariot.  Hippolytus must have been riding with a coterie of boyfriends.

I don't know why his wrists are tied.

(Photo has been removed at the request of a reader.)

Joseph Désiré Court (1797-1865) goes about as far as he can go.  I think it's hidden by a stirrup.

Ballet Beefcake and Bulges

Although actors are increasingly likely to be shirtless on tv and in movies, their bulges are carefully hidden from view, sometimes literally taped back.

Ballet is the only art form where bulges are commonly visible.

Everyone knows it, but no one talks about it.  Spandex tights are necessary to allow the dancer a full range of movement, and your eyes are supposed to be trained onto the dance, not the beneath the belt gifts.

But really, who can look at anything else?

Sometimes there are shirtless shots that add to the aesthetic display.  But you still can't take your eyes off the ballet bulge.

You can see bulges at some of the most famous opera houses in the world.  This is Mathias Heymann of the Opera national de Paris.

But down home works just as well, as Ronnie Underwood of the Oklahoma City Ballet demonstrates.

Ballet dancers start at a very young age.  The Latvian ballet star Timofej Andrijashenko began performing professionally while still in his teens.

I couldn't resist a more recent photo.

The Prix de Lausanne is an annual competition for dancers aged 15 to 18 who are not yet professionals.  Oscar Frame won in 2015.

But they rarely perform for more than a decade.  Roberto Bolle, age 41, has had an extraordinary long career.

Cinderella: Men in Tights

Let's face it -- 90% of the reason we go to the ballet is for the beefcake -- to look at the muscular male dancers in skin-tight leotards.  10% or less is for the bonding -- gay subtexts are scarce, even when the choreographer is gay.

And Cinderella is the most heterosexist of the lot.  It's based on the most iconic of Charles Perrault's fairy tales:

1. Cinderella escapes from her horrible childhood home to a fancy dress ball, with the help of a fairy godmother and a furry-animal makeover.
2. The Handsome Prince falls in love with her.
3. She flees at midnight, before she turns into a pumpkin.
4. The Handsome Prince tries her shoe out on every woman in the kingdom, but it only fits Cinderella.

Cinderella has no female friends, only bullying stepsisters.  The Handsome Prince has no male friends, just fawning courtiers.  It's male-female pas de deux, heterosexual love! love! love! from here to eternity.

There have been about 20 ballet versions, but the most commonly performed is the 1945 version with music composed by Sergei Prokofiev.

It adds some comedic touches, such as having the stepsisters performed by men in drag (as they are in the popular British pantomimes).  In 1948, it was re-choreographed as a full-blown comedic ballet.

Still entirely heterosexist, from stem to stern.

Fortunately, costumers usually compensate by dressing the Prince in the most tightly revealing leotards they can find.

So audiences who are bored by the heterosexual love! love! love! mantra can still find something to look at.

See also: The Midsummer Night's Dream Ballets.

Serge Lifar: Gay Masculine Beauty during the Jazz Age

During the 1920s, the go-to guy for masculine beauty was a Russian ballet dancer named Serge or Sergei Lifar.

Born in Kiev, Russia in 1905, Lifar went to Paris in 1923 and joined the Ballet Russes as Sergei Diaghilev's newest protege-lover.  In 1925, he became lead dancer, to the consternation of previous protege-lovers who were no longer getting the best roles.

Ballet was big during the Jazz Age, maybe because it was the only art form that allowed audiences to see masculine biceps and bulges, and Diaghilev showed off Lifar's every chance he got.  In La Chatte (1927), Lifar entered the stage riding in a "chariot" formed entirely of men.

That didn't sit well with the other members of the ballet company.

In 1929, Diaghilev died, and Lifar moved on to become the director of the Paris Opera Company, where he staged and danced in his own creations, including a renovation of The Afternoon of a Faun in 1935, and Icare (1935), his masterpiece, about the Greek boy who flew too close to the sun.

But Lifar was famous far beyond the world of ballet.  He was photographed in newspapers and magazines. He was painted and sculpted.  He was on a stamp in the Ukraine.

He cavorted with artists, writers, and film stars, many involved in the gay culture of Paris Between the Wars, like Salvador Dali, Paul Valery, Jean Cocteau, Gertrude Stein, and Paul Robeson.

In 1944, during World War II, Lifar's collaboration with the Nazis got him "banned for life" from the Paris Opera.  He claimed that he was working as a secret agent (he returned in 1947).

And don't forget the "duel" he fought in 1958 with equally flamboyant ballet producer George de Cuevas.

Lifar was not openly gay, but his many liaisons with men were well known in the ballet world.  He also sought out the attention of wealthy women who served as his benefactors.

He died in 1986.

See also: The Chilean Bad Boy