Speaker 1: Hey, this is Leon Napok. I'm the host of Fiasco,
Speaker 1: but you may also know me from the podcasts Slowburn,
Speaker 1: Think Twice, Michael Jackson, and Backfired the Vaping Wars. I'm
Speaker 1: excited to be sharing with you the next season of Backfired,
Speaker 1: titled Attention Deficit, which is now available exclusively on Audible.
Speaker 1: Backfired is a podcast about the business of unintended consequences.
Speaker 1: In the first season, my co host Ril Pardess and
Speaker 1: I dove deep into the world of vaping and how
Speaker 1: the well intentioned quest for a safer cigarette went awry.
Speaker 1: Now we're tackling ADHD and how the push to destigmatize
Speaker 1: this hard to define childhood diagnosis has led to an
Speaker 1: explosion of stimulant use in kids as well as adults.
Speaker 1: It's a story about the promise of psychiatry to fix
Speaker 1: our brains and the power of the pharmaceutical industry to
Speaker 1: shape how we and our doctors think about what's wrong
Speaker 1: with us. To hear both seasons of Backfired, go to
Speaker 1: audible dot com slash Backfired and start a free trial
Speaker 1: that's audible dot com slash Backfired. Fiasco is intended for
Speaker 1: mature audio. For a list of books, articles and documentaries
Speaker 1: we used in our research. Follow the link in the
Speaker 1: show notes. Previously on fiasco.
Speaker 2: It's mysterious, it's deadly, and it's baffling medical science.
Speaker 3: The Food and Drug Administration has recommended that any man
Speaker 3: who has had sex with another man since nineteen seventy
Speaker 3: seven not donate blood.
Speaker 4: You had many people from the radical right expressing really
Speaker 4: extreme measures.
Speaker 5: And I do believe that AIDS is a violation of
Speaker 5: God's laws.
Speaker 6: How many of us have to die before you get
Speaker 6: off your ass?
Speaker 7: We had no other resources but ourselves.
Speaker 4: Rock Hudson magnificently proving the power of love and faith
Speaker 4: in a great performance and lovely.
Speaker 1: When Rock Hudson appeared in the romantic comedy Pillow Talk
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty nine, he was already one of the
Speaker 1: most famous leading men in America.
Speaker 8: A Beverly Hills, California, It's Rock Hudson honored again with
Speaker 8: Photoplays Gold Medal the most Popular Actor Award.
Speaker 1: Hudson was the very model of the mid century American man, Tall, stoic,
Speaker 1: and transcendently good looking. According to Life Magazine, he was
Speaker 1: a towering hunk of handsomeness.
Speaker 9: Rock Hudson, six Street four of Fighting Man, Enter, Tame
Speaker 9: a Wildcat, Beauty makes will read this is Rock Hudson.
Speaker 9: My new picture, Pillow Talk, brings me together with Doris Day.
Speaker 1: But the Pillow Talk was a milestone in Hudson's career,
Speaker 1: his first romantic comedy and the first of several starring
Speaker 1: roles opposite Doris Day. The premise of the movie was
Speaker 1: that Hudson's character was pretending to be gay as part
Speaker 1: of a ploy to win Day's heart.
Speaker 10: Don't you find me attractive?
Speaker 4: Why yes, ma'am, of course.
Speaker 6: Then why haven't you ever ever what? I'm sorry, foolish.
Speaker 1: The characters made repeated references to homosexuality, all of them
Speaker 1: disguised in wordplay and innuendo.
Speaker 4: Either you're not.
Speaker 9: Telling the truth or or what. Well, there are some
Speaker 9: men who just they're very devoted to their mothers, you know,
Speaker 9: the type that likes to collect cooking recipes, exchange bits
Speaker 9: of gossip.
Speaker 1: But there was a layer of irony to Pillow Talk
Speaker 1: that few audience members would have known to look for.
Speaker 11: Here's a real life gay man playing a straight man
Speaker 11: who at one point is pretending to be a gay
Speaker 11: man to Lord Doris Day into bed.
Speaker 1: This is Mark Griffin, author of the Rock Hudson biography
Speaker 1: All That Heaven Allows.
Speaker 11: So it's definitely a hall of mirrors, like you know,
Speaker 11: several layers of surreal.
Speaker 1: As a star in the Hollywood studio system, Hudson was
Speaker 1: an expert presenting a broadly appealing and inoffensive version of
Speaker 1: himself to the world, but the details of his private
Speaker 1: life were known to many of the people he worked
Speaker 1: and socialized with.
Speaker 11: It was sort of this silent agreement that nobody was
Speaker 11: going to talk about homosexuality unless you were among your
Speaker 11: own and you felt very safe in discussing that.
Speaker 1: Hudson's sexuality was something of an open secret in the
Speaker 1: film industry, and everyone, including Hudson, knew that it would
Speaker 1: ruin his career if moviegoers ever found out about it.
Speaker 11: There was this ironclad expectation that a star, especially one
Speaker 11: of that magnitude, would never do anything in his private
Speaker 11: life to embarrass his bosses or worse. At that time,
Speaker 11: there was a morals clause in each contract player's contract
Speaker 11: which forbade engaging in any behavior that might be deemed
Speaker 11: socially unacceptable or immoral, and from there on in for
Speaker 11: much of his career, Rock is working what I would
Speaker 11: describe as a sort of very dangerous tight rope act.
Speaker 1: The main threat to Hudson's career came from the tabloid press.
Speaker 1: Hudson's agent is rumored to have once given a journalist
Speaker 1: damaging information about another one of his own clients in
Speaker 1: exchange for killing a story about Hudson's sexuality. Another time,
Speaker 1: there was gossip going around that Hudson might be romantically
Speaker 1: involved with an actor named Jim Nabors. The truth was
Speaker 1: they were just close friends, but Hudson was so worried
Speaker 1: about the potential fallout that he stopped talking to neighbors entirely.
Speaker 1: The stakes of keeping Hudson's identity as secret were perhaps
Speaker 1: highest during the pillow talk era, but even as time
Speaker 1: passed and his leading man days started the dwindle, Hudson
Speaker 1: worked hard to maintain his public image. As long as
Speaker 1: he did that he could live his life the way
Speaker 1: he wanted to in private. One of the people who
Speaker 1: got to see Hudson in that context was Ken Jilson,
Speaker 1: a longtime fan who turned into one of Hudson's friends.
Speaker 1: Jilson had worked at a movie theater when he was
Speaker 1: a teenager, and he had loved Hudson's movies ever since.
Speaker 12: We would play these Rock Hudson movies Lover, Come Back
Speaker 12: and things like that, and I had the strangest feeling
Speaker 12: when I would look at the screen that I knew him.
Speaker 12: I can't explain that.
Speaker 1: When Jillson and Hudson met in the early seventies, it
Speaker 1: turned out that Hudson had just installed a home movie theater.
Speaker 12: He had a complete movie theater in his home with
Speaker 12: thirty five millimeter projection equipment. And I said, well, you
Speaker 12: know what, I used to work in a movie theater.
Speaker 12: I know how to run the machines. I'll teach you
Speaker 12: how to do it.
Speaker 1: Jillson and his partner grew close to Hudson. They even
Speaker 1: convinced him to become the first investor in their gift
Speaker 1: trapping business. Over the years, he would invite them to
Speaker 1: dinner parties at his Beverly Hills estate, which boasted a
Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty degree view of Los Angeles and
Speaker 1: which Hudson called the Castle.
Speaker 12: It had a whole two story Spanish hacienda field to it,
Speaker 12: and he had a piano in the movie theater. And
Speaker 12: he loved to have his friends over and entertain. They'd
Speaker 12: all come over, people like Carol Burnett, and they would.
Speaker 1: Sing, could I wave the years?
Speaker 12: And I'll do like little shows on the stage.
Speaker 13: It was really cool, tears away when your eyes.
Speaker 5: Are drunk.
Speaker 14: Seek.
Speaker 1: By the time he was in his mid forties, Hudson
Speaker 1: was spending less of his time making big movies and
Speaker 1: more of it on stage, acting in musical theater.
Speaker 12: He was in several musicals and he did on the
Speaker 12: twentieth Century. He did Camelot and he couldn't I mean,
Speaker 12: he could sing okay, And he just was in seventh
Speaker 12: Heaven on the theater stage.
Speaker 1: He even released an album of covers called rock Gently.
Speaker 15: Now that the Summer is come and gone, I'll say
Speaker 15: goodbye now that the Winner.
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty four, Hudson got a chance to catch
Speaker 1: up with a couple he had first gotten to know
Speaker 1: decades earlier in Hollywood, Ronald and Nancy Reagan. As Mark
Speaker 1: Griffin writes in his book, the two former actors invited
Speaker 1: Hudson to the White House for an official state dinner
Speaker 1: to honor the President of Mexico.
Speaker 5: President Missus del Madrid Mikaza Essukazza.
Speaker 1: At the event, Hudson chatted with the first Lady and
Speaker 1: took photos with her.
Speaker 11: And of all people, Nancy Reagan noticed that when they
Speaker 11: were posing for photos that he had a blemish on
Speaker 11: his neck, and that she advised him to have it checked.
Speaker 1: Hudson would later tell friends that after he was diagnosed
Speaker 1: with AIDS, he went home and cried for a week.
Speaker 1: There were so many unknowns, how long he could keep working,
Speaker 1: how quickly the disease would progress. The one thing was obvious,
Speaker 1: Hudson would be living this part of his life the
Speaker 1: same way he had lived so many others in private.
Speaker 1: I'm Leon Napock from Audible Origins and Prologue Projects. This
Speaker 1: is fiasco.
Speaker 16: Just what is wrong with Rock Hutson? The nature of
Speaker 16: his illness has become clouded in mystery and confusion.
Speaker 4: Rock.
Speaker 13: The news media are clamoring for information. What do you
Speaker 13: think I should do?
Speaker 17: They are violating the laws of nature, and nature is
Speaker 17: striking back.
Speaker 18: Luis, does anybody in the White House know about this epidemic?
Speaker 5: I think we just have to do the best we
Speaker 5: can with this problem. I can understand both sides of it.
Speaker 1: In this episode, what happened when one of Hollywood's biggest
Speaker 1: stars became sick with AIDS and what it took to
Speaker 1: get President Reagan to pay attention to the epidemic. Michael Gottlieb,
Speaker 1: an immunologist at UCLA, was used to getting referrals for
Speaker 1: new patients, but it was a new experience for him
Speaker 1: when a dermatologist in Beverly Hills called him on behalf
Speaker 1: of an A list celebrity and.
Speaker 13: She mentioned his name, Rock Cuts, in which of course
Speaker 13: a name I knew. So I climbed into my Dodge
Speaker 13: Aspen that leaked and drove to U Cannon Drive or
Speaker 13: Rodeo Driver or one of those places.
Speaker 1: Gottlieb met with Hudson at the dermatologist's office, and.
Speaker 13: Then they left me alone with Rock, and he and
Speaker 13: I talked, and then I examined him. He showed me
Speaker 13: this capasi sarcoma lesion that he had on his left forearm.
Speaker 1: Gottlieb went through his standard questions, just like he would
Speaker 1: have with anyone.
Speaker 13: Else, and so at one point I asked Roc to
Speaker 13: hop up on the exam table, and as he did that,
Speaker 13: I had to look up because he was so tall,
Speaker 13: and I said, my, you're tall, and he sort of
Speaker 13: shrugged in a boyish way and said yeah, six ' four.
Speaker 1: After a short exam, Gottlieb confirmed what his new patient
Speaker 1: had already guessed.
Speaker 13: I told him I thought he probably did have AIDS.
Speaker 13: He knew what it was. We talked about the sexual
Speaker 13: transmission of whatever was causing this, and he had already
Speaker 13: prepared three or four anonymous letters to go to people
Speaker 13: with whom he had had intercourse, telling them that they
Speaker 13: had been exposed to someone who had AIDS, and he
Speaker 13: was going to mail them once he had confirmation.
Speaker 1: Got Leeb diagnosed Rock Hudson with AIDS on June fifth,
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty four. By that point, more than five thousand
Speaker 1: other Americans had received the same diagnosis, and roughly three
Speaker 1: thousand of them had died, but President Ronald Reagan had
Speaker 1: never once mentioned the disease in public. Reagan had met
Speaker 1: Rock Hudson back when they were both working actors, but
Speaker 1: while Hudson was able to make the leap to leading man,
Speaker 1: Reagan never quite broke through. His most notable role came
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty, when he played a football player in
Speaker 1: Canute Rockney All American, the movie that gave gave him
Speaker 1: a lifelong nickname, ask him to go.
Speaker 5: In there with all it win, just one for the Kipper.
Speaker 1: Even though Reagan was never especially famous as an actor,
Speaker 1: he was able to parlay his name recognition into a
Speaker 1: career in politics. In nineteen sixty six, he ran for
Speaker 1: governor of California.
Speaker 15: The biggest shot in the arm for the American Republican
Speaker 15: Party in the election of Ronald Reagan as governor of California.
Speaker 1: Reagan was unapologetically right wing on issues like crime and welfare,
Speaker 1: but when it came to gay rights, Reagan's views were
Speaker 1: not totally caught and dry. Here's historian Rick Pearlstein, author
Speaker 1: of the book Reaganland.
Speaker 6: The first scandal of Reagan's gubernatorial term in nineteen sixty
Speaker 6: seven happened when several of his aides trapped one of
Speaker 6: his aids that they considered a bureaucratic rival in a
Speaker 6: gay relationship in a motel room, you know, using listening devices,
Speaker 6: and leaked it to the press.
Speaker 4: Drew into a publishery board that homosexual reignan been uncovered
Speaker 4: amongst your administration.
Speaker 6: And when this got out, people thought that Reagan's future
Speaker 6: political ambitions might be checked by this scandal, and instead
Speaker 6: Ronald Reagan said, you know, this is ridiculous. I'm not
Speaker 6: going to, you know, through my administration and hold this
Speaker 6: kind of witch hunt. This is stooping to destroy human beings,
Speaker 6: innocent people.
Speaker 1: According to poles from this time, the vast majority of
Speaker 1: Americans said they did not know any gay people personally.
Speaker 1: Reagan was not one of them. He actually had friends
Speaker 1: he knew were gay.
Speaker 6: But the same token he made the same kind of
Speaker 6: homophobic jokes everyone did. Or he would say, I have
Speaker 6: no problem with gay's working in state government, but of
Speaker 6: course they shouldn't be working for the Department of Parks
Speaker 6: and Recreation. You know, the suggestion that you know, gays
Speaker 6: were forging through the bushes to kind of, you know,
Speaker 6: do naughty things.
Speaker 1: Reagan reportedly panicked when his son, Ron Junior told him
Speaker 1: that he wanted to be a ballet dancer, fearing that
Speaker 1: it meant he might be gay. At the same time,
Speaker 1: Reagan made a point of opposing an anti gay ballot
Speaker 1: initiative in California that would have given the school board
Speaker 1: the right to fire people over their sexuality.
Speaker 8: Politicians from Jimmy Carter Torontald Reagan argued, which Hunt said
Speaker 8: one cheering celebrant. It's obvious gays have a lot of
Speaker 8: friends in California.
Speaker 6: He very specifically debunks the operative argument of the anti
Speaker 6: gay right side in this huge, defining political fight, which
Speaker 6: is that gays were trying to recruit young people, you know,
Speaker 6: into their awful tribe. And he specifically said being gay
Speaker 6: isn't a choice, which was a very progressive view for
Speaker 6: the time.
Speaker 1: It all gave the impression that Reagan had a certain
Speaker 1: amount of personal tolerance for gay people, but he was
Speaker 1: also quick to tell angry constituents that his position wasn't
Speaker 1: so much about tolerance as it was about opposing government overreach,
Speaker 1: and he.
Speaker 6: Would always reassure them that while he was, you know,
Speaker 6: against this specific initiative, you know, as an unwarketed government
Speaker 6: intrusion for lives of individuals, he was absolutely opposed to
Speaker 6: gay people quote unquote promoting their lifestyle, and that he
Speaker 6: didn't believe sodomy's statutes should be overturned and that sort
Speaker 6: of thing.
Speaker 1: As President, Reagan preferred to delegate most policy specifics to
Speaker 1: his cabinet secretaries and other officials. A lot of Reagan's
Speaker 1: closest advisors were part of the Republican establishment, and as
Speaker 1: strange as it may sound now, they were worried that
Speaker 1: aligning too closely with social conservatives like Jerry Folwell would
Speaker 1: alienate moderate voters. Still, they had to give them something.
Speaker 1: In the new administration, here again is Rick Pearlstein.
Speaker 6: And the solution they arrive at is to make their
Speaker 6: most prominent patronage hire this guy. See ever Coop.
Speaker 19: Ronald Reagan's choice for a surgeon general one of the
Speaker 19: most controversial decisions taken by the new administration.
Speaker 6: I think for precisely the reason that the surgeon General
Speaker 6: is his very powerless role traditionally that a lot of
Speaker 6: presidents didn't even bother to fill, you know it kind
Speaker 6: of like manages, you know, quarantine expections at ports and
Speaker 6: things like that.
Speaker 1: Coop had made a name for himself touring the country
Speaker 1: as an anti abortion advocate. As surgeon General, he was
Speaker 1: best known for his crusade against smoking and for his
Speaker 1: distinctive appearance picture Colonel Sanders in a Navy uniform.
Speaker 6: He has this biblical temperament where everything is just kind
Speaker 6: of black and white. He had this kind of prophetic
Speaker 6: mean to him. George will described him in a gushing
Speaker 6: profile as resembling an Old Testament prophet who has just
Speaker 6: discovered his neighbors making graven images.
Speaker 4: Cigarette smoking is clearly identified as the chief preventable cause
Speaker 4: of death in our society.
Speaker 8: He attacked family planning programs for converting adolescent innocence into
Speaker 8: sexually active teenagers.
Speaker 3: Coop said pro.
Speaker 8: Abortion statements by Protestant denominations show their superficial theology, lack
Speaker 8: of morality, and an insensitivity to the eventual reward for
Speaker 8: their deprivative.
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty two, a reporter at a White House
Speaker 1: briefing asked Reagan's Press Secretary Larry Speaks about the mysterious
Speaker 1: disease that had emerged in California, New York, Miami and elsewhere.
Speaker 1: There were already hundreds of diagnosed cases, but Speaks said
Speaker 1: he hadn't heard about it.
Speaker 18: Does the President have.
Speaker 19: Any reactions with the announced from the Center for Disease
Speaker 19: Control of Atlanta that AIDS is now an epidemic of
Speaker 19: six over six hundred cases. It's known as gay play.
Speaker 12: Oh it is.
Speaker 18: I mean, it's a pretty serious thing that one and
Speaker 18: every three people that get this have died. And I
Speaker 18: wondered if the President is aware.
Speaker 13: I don't have it?
Speaker 15: Are you you?
Speaker 18: You don't have it? Well, I'm relieved to hear that you.
Speaker 14: Didn't answer my question.
Speaker 15: How do you know?
Speaker 18: The president of the work the White House looks on this
Speaker 18: as a great joke.
Speaker 20: Now I don't know anything about it, leans Ter.
Speaker 18: The president, does anybody in the White House know about
Speaker 18: this epidemic?
Speaker 15: Lauri, I don't think so.
Speaker 20: I don't think any There been no personal experience here, Leicester.
Speaker 1: These comments came against the backdrop of a struggle over
Speaker 1: AIDS funding that was playing out across various federal agencies,
Speaker 1: but the President stayed out of the fray. At this point,
Speaker 1: he had never even said the word AIDS in public,
Speaker 1: not in a speech, not in a press conference, not
Speaker 1: in any recorded conversation. It was not until June of
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty three, at another White House briefing that Reagan's
Speaker 1: press secretary indicated that the President was at least aware
Speaker 1: of AIDS.
Speaker 20: President has been involved in brief down the AIDE situation
Speaker 20: a number of months ago in a cabinet meeting, and
Speaker 20: we have recently, as said, twelve million dollars be reprogrammed
Speaker 20: for research on age. That's extent of the president's INVOLVMA,
Speaker 20: which has been.
Speaker 19: Laurie, does the President think that it might help if
Speaker 19: he suggested that gays cut down on their cruising.
Speaker 21: Told you.
Speaker 1: It's worth mentioning here that the reporter asking this question,
Speaker 1: the same one you heard in the earlier press conference,
Speaker 1: was a conservative provocateur named Lester Kinsolving. So while it
Speaker 1: may sound like he's righteously standing up for people with AIDS,
Speaker 1: it's more like he was worried that the disease would
Speaker 1: spread to straight people. He wanted the president to condemn
Speaker 1: the gay community for endangering everyone else.
Speaker 18: I didn't hear your answer.
Speaker 20: I just was acknowledge engineer and your interest in this set.
Speaker 19: You don't think that it would help if the gays
Speaker 19: cut down on their cruising.
Speaker 20: We're researching if we come up with any any any
Speaker 20: research that shed some light on whether the gay should
Speaker 20: cruise or not. Crude were not available to you.
Speaker 1: Through the end of his first term. That was the
Speaker 1: extent of Reagan's involvement in the AIDS epidemic. Confirmation to
Speaker 1: his press secretary that he had been briefed on the
Speaker 1: matter for Michael Gottlieb Rock Hudson's new doctor these were
Speaker 1: exhausting years. Gottlieb had been taking care of people with
Speaker 1: AIDS as long as anyone. He had co authored the
Speaker 1: first ever article about it, the one you heard about
Speaker 1: in Episode one, that was published in the CDC's newsletter
Speaker 1: on New Diseases. As more and more of his patients died,
Speaker 1: Gottlieb grew increasingly frustrated by the lack of urgency around AIDS,
Speaker 1: and so he began wearing two hats, one as a doctor,
Speaker 1: the other as an activist. In that capacity, he pushed
Speaker 1: for more research funding and attention to an epidemic that
Speaker 1: was still being largely ignored.
Speaker 13: The stigma outweighed everything else. As AIDS and all its baggage,
Speaker 13: Gottlieb was in a tricky position. As far as he
Speaker 13: could tell, The UCLA Medical Center was like most hospitals
Speaker 13: and cities dealing with major AIDS breaks. None of them
Speaker 13: wanted to be known as an AIDS hospital, And the
Speaker 13: more Gottlieb used his platform to talk about AIDS, the
Speaker 13: more he felt the scrutiny of UCLA administrators. In retrospect,
Speaker 13: it might seem strange that a hospital wouldn't want to
Speaker 13: draw attention to the fact that its doctors were working
Speaker 13: at the forefront of a major new disease, But Gottlieb
Speaker 13: says administrators were worried about their bottom line, that being
Speaker 13: known as an AIDS hospital would scare away patients with
Speaker 13: other conditions. If I was too proactive, you know, questions
Speaker 13: might have been raised as to my loyalties or the
Speaker 13: reasons for my being so proactive amongst the faculty at
Speaker 13: my institution. Then I was frustrated by the obstacles put
Speaker 13: in our way.
Speaker 1: When Gottlieb first met Rock Hudson and realized he had AIDS,
Speaker 1: he understood right away what a big deal it was,
Speaker 1: or at least could be. If Hudson's died diagnosis ever
Speaker 1: became public, he would be by far the most famous
Speaker 1: person known to have AIDS. Real attention might finally be
Speaker 1: paid to the cause Gottlieb had been dedicating his life
Speaker 1: to for now. Though Hudson wasn't very sick and he
Speaker 1: didn't have kapasis sarcoma legians that he couldn't cover up,
Speaker 1: he had no intention of sharing his diagnosis with the world.
Speaker 13: He was doing okay, he had very little ks. It
Speaker 13: wasn't even worthy of treatment that was so minor it
Speaker 13: wasn't in any cosmetically sensitive location. Now he could continue
Speaker 13: his work.
Speaker 1: Gottlieb continued to check in on Hudson's symptoms and update
Speaker 1: him on the latest developments in AIDS research. There were
Speaker 1: some experimental treatments being tested in the US, but Gottlieb
Speaker 1: had very little faith in them. Then he heard about
Speaker 1: a French drug called HPA twenty three that had shown
Speaker 1: some promise against leukemia in mice.
Speaker 13: That was a very large leap of faith to think
Speaker 13: that it might be effective against HIV and man. However,
Speaker 13: the French doctors were making it available to certain American
Speaker 13: patients who were traveling there to receive it as intravenous infusions.
Speaker 1: Hudson's condition was worsening, so Gottlieb thought the treatment was
Speaker 1: worth a try.
Speaker 13: Yes, it was a long shot, but he was willing
Speaker 13: to fly to Paris and take this experimental drug.
Speaker 1: So Hudson made the trip to Paris, ostensibly to attend
Speaker 1: a film festival. After receiving the treatment, he flew back
Speaker 1: to the United States to appear in the hit TV
Speaker 1: show Dynasty.
Speaker 5: And You feel wonderful, Yes, product very you shouldn't.
Speaker 15: Why not because you got a long way to go
Speaker 15: before you can feel so damn good about yourself.
Speaker 13: I remember, you know, seeing Rock on Dynasty and saying
Speaker 13: to myself, you know, he really shouldn't be on TV
Speaker 13: right now because he looked so well.
Speaker 1: In the summer of nineteen eighty five, Hudson met up
Speaker 1: with his old friend and pill Talk co star Doris Day.
Speaker 1: She was hosting a new TV show about animals on
Speaker 1: the Christian Broadcast Network, and she brought Hudson on as
Speaker 1: a special guest.
Speaker 4: He look great.
Speaker 1: Day would later describe being shocked by Hudson's appearance at
Speaker 1: the taping. He was only fifty nine, but he somehow
Speaker 1: looked older, and he sounded weak and tired.
Speaker 5: We really had fun making movies, Yeah, didn't we?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 14: What was your favorite movie?
Speaker 6: What was my favorite? I think I like Pillow Talk?
Speaker 15: Yeah?
Speaker 22: Did you No?
Speaker 5: I liked High Stage in Zebra.
Speaker 1: At a promotional event for the show, reporters noticed the
Speaker 1: changes in Hudson's appearance. Hudson's agent told them he was
Speaker 1: in perfect health and at the weight he had shed
Speaker 1: was the result of a new diet, but the actor's
Speaker 1: appearance still made national news.
Speaker 3: It takes it's no.
Speaker 23: Expert to see that something is seriously wrong with a
Speaker 23: fifty nine year old actor. Here he is just a
Speaker 23: few years ago on a Live at five set, and
Speaker 23: here just last week with a former co star, Doris Day,
Speaker 23: down considerably from the two hundred pounds Hudson normally carried
Speaker 23: on his six foot four inch frame.
Speaker 1: Michael Gottlie was watching all of this press coverage and
Speaker 1: seeing Hudson's reps lie about his patient's health made him
Speaker 1: acutely aware of the tension between his two roles as
Speaker 1: a doctor and an activist.
Speaker 13: My primary job is to be a physician and to
Speaker 13: hold to the tenets and the oaths of our profession.
Speaker 13: And the patient is number one, and he's entitled to
Speaker 13: his privacy and what other people say publicly, whether it's
Speaker 13: the truth or a lie, as of no consequence to me. Yes,
Speaker 13: As someone who's interested in social justice, someone who sees
Speaker 13: HIV AIDS as a cause, Yes, of course, it would
Speaker 13: be a shot in the arm to have a celebrity
Speaker 13: diagnosed with AIDS and go public. On the other hand,
Speaker 13: it's not going to go public through me without his permission.
Speaker 1: A major potential benefit of a famous person disclosing his
Speaker 1: diagnosis was that it would help educate the general public.
Speaker 1: Misinformation about AIDS and how it could be spread was rampant.
Speaker 1: Even though the science said AIDS could only be transmitted
Speaker 1: through blood or other bodily fluids, there was still widespread
Speaker 1: fear that one could get it just by touching someone.
Speaker 1: The confusion was fueled in part by comments made in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty three by a high ranking official at the
Speaker 1: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci.
Speaker 7: Doctor Anthony Fauci, writing in the Journal of the AMA,
Speaker 7: says his study shows some children have picked up AIDS
Speaker 7: within their families, and that means, says doctor Fauci, the
Speaker 7: scope of the syndrome be enormous.
Speaker 1: Children were getting AIDS from their parents through in uterotransmission,
Speaker 1: but Fauchi didn't know that for sure, and he speculated
Speaker 1: that it might be spread through close physical contact. Rick
Speaker 1: Pearlstein again, and this was really a panic watershed. This
Speaker 1: is when cops and firefighters start wearing masks and gloves.
Speaker 3: People are afraid of AIDS because they don't know much
Speaker 3: about it except that it kills. So when a person
Speaker 3: contracts the disease.
Speaker 5: He often finds people try to get away from him
Speaker 5: or to get rid.
Speaker 6: Of him, you know, kind of panicked newspaper articles Long
Speaker 6: Island Grammar dead of AIDS, which was from her blood transfusion.
Speaker 6: But it was easy to kind of imagine from the
Speaker 6: headline that she was just kind of like walking around
Speaker 6: and came too close to someone or something like that.
Speaker 17: This man is also a flight attendant. He does not
Speaker 17: have AIDS, but he lost his job anyway. He has
Speaker 17: swollen glens and that caused the airline to suspect he
Speaker 17: might have the disease.
Speaker 3: I am a healthy gay man and I went through
Speaker 3: the same discrimination.
Speaker 6: This is really when the Christian right itself really kind
Speaker 6: of begins to go gaga. You begin to see vigilante violence.
Speaker 6: You have this terrible controversy over the holding of a
Speaker 6: gay rodeo and reno in which a minister there says,
Speaker 6: I think we should do what the Bible says and
Speaker 6: cut their throats.
Speaker 24: Well, you could have typhoid Mary's.
Speaker 4: They are violating the laws of nature, and nature is
Speaker 4: striking back.
Speaker 6: And it's very easy to conclude if you're a normal
Speaker 6: American reading normal newspapers and not just the Christian right
Speaker 6: that we have this kind of invasion of the body snatchers,
Speaker 6: invisible population among us that might even devour the earth.
Speaker 1: By the time Rok Hudson made his appearance with Doris
Speaker 1: Day in the middle of nineteen eighty five, thirteen thousand
Speaker 1: Americans have been diagnosed with AIDS. More than half of
Speaker 1: them had died. Meanwhile, the President was facing increased pressure
Speaker 1: from Congress to act more decisively against the disease. Some
Speaker 1: of that pressure was coming from lawmakers on the right,
Speaker 1: who seemed to be more worried about protecting the healthy
Speaker 1: from the sick than about providing additional funding for AIDS
Speaker 1: research or patient care.
Speaker 13: We want to identify every person who's a carrier, and
Speaker 13: we want to be open and honest about this disease
Speaker 13: before it becomes a really serious national health threat.
Speaker 1: Some of Reagan's conservative allies tried to convince the president
Speaker 1: to increase testing and surveillance and to ban people with
Speaker 1: HIV from entering the country.
Speaker 24: But more controversial are proposals to find and segregate those
Speaker 24: exposed to AIDS, to prohibit those with AIDS from working
Speaker 24: in healthcare, to make it a felony for those in
Speaker 24: an aide's high risk group, to knowingly donate blood, and
Speaker 24: to prohibit children with AIDS from attending school.
Speaker 1: The people pushing these policies felt like they had a
Speaker 1: potential ally in the administration who's well positioned to help
Speaker 1: their cause Surgeon General see Effett Coup.
Speaker 6: When AIDS begins to raise up as a public is shoe,
Speaker 6: the Christian right actually reaches out to the Vagan administration
Speaker 6: and says, why aren't you letting see if Ittt Coops
Speaker 6: speak out on this issue, assuming that he's going to
Speaker 6: be an ally of theirs, and as a matter of fact,
Speaker 6: as he writes in his memoir, he'd been very explicitly
Speaker 6: instructed that he wasn't to say a word about AIDS.
Speaker 1: In response to growing fear of AIDS transmission among the
Speaker 1: general public and mounting criticism from multiple sides about the
Speaker 1: lack of federal response, the White House decided it was
Speaker 1: time for the President to say something, so in September
Speaker 1: of nineteen eighty five, the Press Office started putting together
Speaker 1: some talking points, But when a copy of the President's
Speaker 1: briefing was circulated to the White House Council's Office for review,
Speaker 1: a lawyer named John Roberts, suggested several passages be taken
Speaker 1: out or changed. In a memo, Roberts and a colleague
Speaker 1: flagged a talking point that said scientists didn't think AIDS
Speaker 1: could be transmitted through casual or routine contact. Their legal
Speaker 1: opinion was that the president should not be taking a
Speaker 1: position on quote a disputed scientific issue. Years later, Roberts
Speaker 1: explained his reasoning during his confirmation hearing to become Chief
Speaker 1: Justice of the US Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: I have to remember this was at the very beginning
Speaker 2: of the AIDS coming into public consciousness, and I was
Speaker 2: just concerned that the President not be giving out medical
Speaker 2: statements if people weren't absolutely sure that.
Speaker 3: It was correct.
Speaker 1: In any event, the talking point about casual contact was
Speaker 1: removed at the end of the day. Who could argue
Speaker 1: with going above and beyond to protect America's kids?
Speaker 5: What do you need? Please be seated? I have a
Speaker 5: statement here.
Speaker 1: At a press conference on September seventeenth, nineteen eighty five,
Speaker 1: Reagan defended his administration's response to the AIDS crisis and
Speaker 1: called it a top priority.
Speaker 5: It will amount to over half a billion dollars that
Speaker 5: we have provided for research on AIDS in addition to
Speaker 5: what I'm sure other medical groups are doing this.
Speaker 1: It was the first time Reagan had ever said the
Speaker 1: word AIDS in public, four years after the first cases
Speaker 1: emerged and two years after his press secretary first said
Speaker 1: he was aware of it. Then Reagan said something that
Speaker 1: made public health experts wins. When it came to the
Speaker 1: school's issue, the President said he could understand both sides.
Speaker 5: I also have compassionate and I think we all do
Speaker 5: for the child that has this and doesn't know and
Speaker 5: can't have it explained to him, why somehow he is
Speaker 5: now an outcast and can no longer associate with his
Speaker 5: playmates and schoolmates. On the other hand, I can understand
Speaker 5: the problem of the parents. It is true that some
Speaker 5: medical sources have said that this cannot be communicated in
Speaker 5: any way other than the ones we already know in
Speaker 5: which would not involve a child being in the school.
Speaker 5: And yet medicine has not come forth unequivocally and said
Speaker 5: this we know for effect that it is safe, and
Speaker 5: until they do.
Speaker 1: In truth, doctors had come forth and said exactly that.
Speaker 1: But the president's comment gave anyone who wanted it permission
Speaker 1: to be afraid. During the summer of nineteen eighty five,
Speaker 1: Rock Hudson's health was rapidly deteriorating. Days after his appearance
Speaker 1: with Doris Day in California, he flew back to Paris,
Speaker 1: hoping to receive another transfusion of the experimental drug HPA
Speaker 1: twenty three. Hudson had booked a room at the Ritz Carlton.
Speaker 1: When he got there, he collapsed in the lobby and
Speaker 1: was rushed to the American Hospital outside of Paris. The
Speaker 1: scene made headlines around the world.
Speaker 16: Just what is wrong with Rock Hudson? The nature of
Speaker 16: his illness has become clouded in mystery and confusion. Yesterday
Speaker 16: it was reported that Hudson had liver cancer and possibly A's,
Speaker 16: but today the hospital denied the cancer story and said
Speaker 16: nothing about the A's rumor.
Speaker 1: Hudson's pr rep, who had accompanied him to the hospital,
Speaker 1: insisted that everything was fine and he looks wonderful.
Speaker 4: I must say, you guess you did?
Speaker 1: He said, how are you?
Speaker 15: I said, I'm fine.
Speaker 1: Tomorrow, nearly four thousand miles away in Washington, d c
Speaker 1: Ronald Reagan watched the coverage as he himself recuperated from
Speaker 1: cancer surgery. It was then that he asked his physician
Speaker 1: to explain AIDS to him for the very first time.
Speaker 1: Behind the scenes, Rock Hudson's handlers were desperate. They tried
Speaker 1: to get their client transferred to a French military hospital,
Speaker 1: where they believed he'd be able to get his experimental
Speaker 1: drug treatment, but because he was not a French citizen,
Speaker 1: Hudson was denied the transfer by the commanding General. Hudson's
Speaker 1: agent thought that if the White House intervened, the military
Speaker 1: hospital in France would admit his client. Agents sent an
Speaker 1: urgent telegram to Nancy Reagan saying that Hudson's life could
Speaker 1: depend on getting into the hospital, but the First Lady
Speaker 1: declined to intervene on Hudson's behalf, though the President did
Speaker 1: call him that day to wish him well. In the end,
Speaker 1: it turned out that Hudson was too sick to receive
Speaker 1: the HPA twenty three treatments anyway, so his team scrambled
Speaker 1: to get him back home. And someone called Hudson's doctor,
Speaker 1: Michael Gottlieb.
Speaker 13: And he said, we're making arrangements for Rock to come
Speaker 13: back to you. We've chartered this seven forty seven. They've
Speaker 13: pulled out all the seats from the first class compartment
Speaker 13: and they have bolted in a hospital bed and he's
Speaker 13: going to be flying back to Los Angeles at a
Speaker 13: cost of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: When Hudson's plane landed in Los Angeles, hundreds of reporters
Speaker 1: were there waiting for him.
Speaker 24: In the darkness before dawn. On Air France jumbo jet
Speaker 24: arrived in Los Angeles, bringing Rock Hudson home for what
Speaker 24: maybe the last time.
Speaker 1: Cameramen with telescopic lenses were perched on rooftops at the airport.
Speaker 1: They filmed Hudson as he was wheeled to a helicopter,
Speaker 1: which took off for UCLA Medical Center. At this point,
Speaker 1: Michael Gottlieb had been seeing Hudson in secret for over
Speaker 1: a year. Now it looked like the secret was about
Speaker 1: to come out.
Speaker 13: It's two or three in the morning, and I'm standing
Speaker 13: on the roof waiting for him, and the skies are
Speaker 13: a wash. In helicopters, there's news crews flying back and forth,
Speaker 13: and so it was a dramatic moment, not knowing what
Speaker 13: his condition's going to be, but knowing that you're going
Speaker 13: to have to bring out the full court press if
Speaker 13: he's going to survive, and the first time I look
Speaker 13: at him, I just see he's mortally ill.
Speaker 1: Hudson was delirious. Gottlieb got him hooked up to an
Speaker 1: IV and treated his nu missists pneumonia with antibiotics. When
Speaker 1: Hudson was lucid, Gottlieb knew that it was time for
Speaker 1: the conversation.
Speaker 13: I'm getting flooded with calls from the press or somehow
Speaker 13: coming through to my office, and so then I have
Speaker 13: a conversation with Rock. The news media are clamoring for information.
Speaker 13: What do you think I should do? And sitting by
Speaker 13: his bedside, you know, we have a conversation about the
Speaker 13: fact that in Paris they made an announcement that you
Speaker 13: had aids. What do you want me to do here?
Speaker 13: Do you want me to confirm that? And he says, look,
Speaker 13: if it will do some good, go ahead.
Speaker 1: With the green light from Hudson, UCLA Medical Center alerted
Speaker 1: the media that there would be a press conference.
Speaker 13: It's kind of a pivotal moment. And I'm an ordinary guy.
Speaker 13: I'm thrust in the limelight, not exactly by choice. I'm
Speaker 13: a guy who expected to spend his life with patients
Speaker 13: and in the lab and not a public figure. Am
Speaker 13: I ready for prime time? I didn't train for prime time?
Speaker 1: Given how famous rock Hudson was, the announcement was staged
Speaker 1: in a way that, to Gottlieb, seemed conspicuously muted.
Speaker 13: So they organized a press conference in the auditorium of
Speaker 13: the Neuropsychiatric Institute, which is on Westwood Boulevard. It's kind
Speaker 13: of out of the way. We're not doing a press
Speaker 13: conference in front of the medical center like other hospitals
Speaker 13: would do for acceptable diseases. In this instance, they send
Speaker 13: out this junior professor, Michael Gottlieb, to break the news
Speaker 13: without anyone being there to provide moral or other support.
Speaker 10: Let me introduce rock Cousin's attending physician at UCLA, doctor
Speaker 10: Michael Gottlieb, who is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in
Speaker 10: Immunology in the UCLA School of Medicine.
Speaker 1: Finally, the national media was clamoring for information about AIDS,
Speaker 1: but instead of taking the opportunity to educate the public
Speaker 1: or answer questions, all Gottlieb felt he could do was
Speaker 1: read a short statement.
Speaker 22: Rock Hudson was transferred from the American Hospital in Paris
Speaker 22: to the UCLA Medical Center early today, mister Hudson is
Speaker 22: being evaluated and treated for complications of acquired immune deficiency syndrome.
Speaker 13: And it's a very brief statement which I read, and
Speaker 13: then we didn't take questions. Sorry, I cannot do.
Speaker 22: That at this time.
Speaker 13: It's a total embarrassment because you've invited the press to
Speaker 13: hear some news of substance, and I felt constrained. I
Speaker 13: felt as if there was a lot to say with
Speaker 13: regards to Rock Hudson, with regards to AIDS, and it
Speaker 13: was an opportunity that was missed.
Speaker 1: Nevertheless, the announcement had an immediate seismic impact.
Speaker 21: Hudson, in becoming the first celebrity to have a publicly
Speaker 21: acknowledged case of age, has brought a new round of
Speaker 21: attention to the fatal disease.
Speaker 1: Now that a household name had gotten sick, America's attention
Speaker 1: was on AIDS. As journalist Randy Schiltz later wrote, there
Speaker 1: were two clear phases to the disease in the United States.
Speaker 1: There was AIDS before Rock Hudson, and AIDS after the.
Speaker 8: Fact that Rock Hudson has AIDS.
Speaker 13: Is that going to help public awareness? Now? We would hope.
Speaker 22: That people across the country would take note and.
Speaker 20: Perhaps stimulate their interest to find out more about the disease.
Speaker 1: The announcement provoked two seemingly contradictory reactions. First, that Hudson's
Speaker 1: diagnosis was tantamount to coming out as gay. That even
Speaker 1: though Gottlieb hadn't said anything about Hudson's private life, the
Speaker 1: rumors that had circulated about him were all but confirmed. Second,
Speaker 1: the news that Rock Hudson had AIDS meant that it
Speaker 1: wasn't just a gay disease after all. The convoluted logic
Speaker 1: of this response was rooted in the belief that Hudson,
Speaker 1: as a beloved public figure, was somehow different from other
Speaker 1: gay people. Among AIDS activists, the announcement was received with
Speaker 1: a measure of ambivalence. There's lots of sympathy in the
Speaker 1: gay community for Rock Hudson, said one activist, but also
Speaker 1: some annoyance too that it takes a famous person to
Speaker 1: call the public's attention to this illness. After Hudson's disclosure,
Speaker 1: AIDS started to become a popular cause among many Hollywood
Speaker 1: A listers. At a star studded gala in Beverly Hills
Speaker 1: that September, Hudson's friends raised more than one million dollars
Speaker 1: for AIDS research.
Speaker 20: Hudson sent a statement read by actor Burt Lancaster.
Speaker 21: I'm not happy that I have AIDS, but if that
Speaker 21: is helping others, I can at least know that my
Speaker 21: own misfortune has had some positive work.
Speaker 1: Just two weeks later, Rock Hudson was dead.
Speaker 14: The carner arrived at Hudson's home in bel Air at
Speaker 14: ten forty five this morning. As friends gathered and emotions
Speaker 14: ran high. News cameras were kept at a distance as
Speaker 14: the body was moved into the Corner's van.
Speaker 15: Towels were used to cover up the windows.
Speaker 1: Ken Jilson, the friend who had taught Hudson how to
Speaker 1: use a movie projector, was enlisted to help plan his
Speaker 1: memorial service. At first, he was imagining a large event
Speaker 1: at Forest Lawn Cemetery, but then he got a call
Speaker 1: from a friend that Elizabeth Taylor was taking things in
Speaker 1: a different direction.
Speaker 12: And he goes, guess what, Elizabeth has changed the whole thing.
Speaker 12: We're going to have a memorial in his backyard, and
Speaker 12: we'll have Margarita's Mariachi's, and it'll be a very upbeat
Speaker 12: thing in the backyard with one hundred people I'll send
Speaker 12: telegrams to people, and that's what it will be.
Speaker 1: The Margherita's and Mariachi Memorial was set up in Hudson's
Speaker 1: backyard with the one hundred and eighty degree view of
Speaker 1: Los Angeles. It was guaranteed to be a media circus,
Speaker 1: but special precautions were taken to keep things under control.
Speaker 12: And they had a lot of security to try to
Speaker 12: keep the paparazzi away, and there were helicopters, and what
Speaker 12: they had done, which was very smart, they put a
Speaker 12: big white tent in the backyard so that the whole
Speaker 12: event could not be filmed from the air.
Speaker 1: Despite these measures, a photographer dressed in camouflage tried to
Speaker 1: climb up the side of the canyon behind the house,
Speaker 1: and the neighbors sold access to her yard to reporters
Speaker 1: for three hundred dollars each.
Speaker 12: And Carol Burnett spoke. But Carol Burnett was so destroyed
Speaker 12: when she finished her speech, she just ran out of
Speaker 12: the house and couldn't deal with it. And no one
Speaker 12: could believe it that, wow, this guy fifty nine years
Speaker 12: old is really gone.
Speaker 1: The New York Daily News canvassed local rock huts and
Speaker 1: fans for their reactions to his death. Most said their
Speaker 1: favorite of his films was Pillow Talk. Some said they
Speaker 1: had heard rumors about him even before the announcement. Only
Speaker 1: one said she would have nothing to do with the
Speaker 1: man anymore. I think about him the way he is
Speaker 1: on the screen, said one woman. That will always be
Speaker 1: Rock Hudson. Hudson was approximately the ten thousandth person with
Speaker 1: AIDS to die in the United States. He was the
Speaker 1: first to be commemorated with an official statement from the
Speaker 1: White House. Nancy and I are saddened by the news
Speaker 1: of Rock Hudson's death. Reagan said he will be remembered
Speaker 1: for his humanity, his sympathetic spirit, and well deserved reputation
Speaker 1: for kindness. The statement studiously avoided any mention of how
Speaker 1: or why Hudson had died. Still, Hudson's death had an
Speaker 1: immediate impact on national AIDS funding. Literally within hours of
Speaker 1: his death.
Speaker 3: And on hearing of his death, the House of Representatives
Speaker 3: agreed to double the amount of AIDS funds for research
Speaker 3: next year. There will now be one hundred and ninety
Speaker 3: million dollars.
Speaker 1: According to an analysis by The Los Angeles Times, Media
Speaker 1: coverage of AIDS more than tripled in the six months
Speaker 1: after Hudson's death. At the same time, the controversy over
Speaker 1: kids with AIDS attending school was continuing to heat up.
Speaker 1: The most prominent case involved a name you may have
Speaker 1: heard before.
Speaker 3: These people are raising money and signing petitions in a
Speaker 3: fight to keep Ryan White out of their school.
Speaker 1: Ryan White was thirteen years old. He had contracted HIV
Speaker 1: through the Factor eight he used to manage his humophilia.
Speaker 1: Many of his classmate's parents wanted him banned from attending school.
Speaker 21: He has a spill on a table, a chair, something,
Speaker 21: Your daughter comes in.
Speaker 22: They say they wipe, but your daughter comes in touches it.
Speaker 14: Hey, what's to say she is not going to get it.
Speaker 1: The attention garnered by Rock Hudson and Ryan White led
Speaker 1: to increased awareness of AIDS and how it could be prevented,
Speaker 1: but it also generated a lot of fear and misinformation
Speaker 1: and knew so called safety measures that were not based
Speaker 1: in science. In Indiana, Ryan White's school forced him to
Speaker 1: use a separate bathroom and disposable utensils. In Hollywood, concerns
Speaker 1: about Rock Hudson's Dynasty kissing scene with Linda Evans led
Speaker 1: to a panic about possible transmission through saliva. The Screen
Speaker 1: Actors Guild even created new rules around open mouthed kissing
Speaker 1: scenes for its members.
Speaker 24: Caution is also advocated by Screen Actors Guild president ed Asna.
Speaker 4: How wonderful be if everybody stopped kissing on film until
Speaker 4: we know more about this horrible disease.
Speaker 1: Rock Hudson was a beloved movie star and Ryan White
Speaker 1: was an innocent kid. What they had in common was
Speaker 1: that neither of them fit the stereotypes widely associated with
Speaker 1: AIDS and homosexuality. Hudson and White made it clear that
Speaker 1: AIDS could happen to anyone. In so doing, they helped
Speaker 1: turn the disease into a cause among a lot of
Speaker 1: influential people.
Speaker 6: This songs for.
Speaker 12: Elton.
Speaker 25: John dedicated a song to him at Farm Made four,
Speaker 25: while Donald Trump and Michael Jackson visited his mother yesterday.
Speaker 16: And consoled her.
Speaker 25: Hollywood loved Ryan and White. The brave young man who
Speaker 25: battled that dread disease and the infectious prejudice surrounding it,
Speaker 25: inspired stars around the world.
Speaker 6: His story.
Speaker 1: About four months after Rock Hudson's death, Reagan asked Surgeon
Speaker 1: General see Everett Coop to prepare a formal report on
Speaker 1: the AIDS epidemic. The President was finally giving Coop the
Speaker 1: go ahead to speak to the American people about AIDS,
Speaker 1: but when it came to federal funding, Reagan was less
Speaker 1: inclined to change his tune. Here again is historian Rick Pearlstein.
Speaker 6: And this is right around the times. You know, he's
Speaker 6: basically proposing his budget, and the headline in newsday is
Speaker 6: sharp cuts and AIDS funding socked. And for fiscal nineteen
Speaker 6: eighty seven, he proposed spending about thirteen percent less than
Speaker 6: the original nineteen eighty six level. So he's simultaneously calling
Speaker 6: for cuts and ordering a major government report on AIDS.
Speaker 1: Coop had spent years following White House guidance not to
Speaker 1: discuss AIDS publicly. Many of his servative allies expected that
Speaker 1: his report would be similarly restrained, but much to their surprise,
Speaker 1: that was not at all what Coop had in mind.
Speaker 6: He spends nights and weekends at a stand up desk
Speaker 6: in the basement of his townhouse, poring over every version,
Speaker 6: carefully choosing every word. Anthony Fauci reviewed every draft, surely
Speaker 6: with his earlier gaff right very much on his mind.
Speaker 6: Fauci was quoted in the post, I was encouraging him
Speaker 6: to push it to the limit of what he could
Speaker 6: get away with.
Speaker 3: The nation's most senior medical official has added his voice
Speaker 3: to the increasingly vocal concern about AIDS.
Speaker 1: When Coop released his report in October of nineteen eighty six,
Speaker 1: he appeared to put his role as a public health
Speaker 1: official ahead of any political loyalties. He wrote that the
Speaker 1: country was fighting a disease, not people, and delivered information
Speaker 1: about the epidemic in extraordinarily plain language.
Speaker 6: He talks about seamen. He mentions anal sex right. He
Speaker 6: talks about unprotected sex. He talks about condoms. He says
Speaker 6: that sexual education and as frank as possible, should begin
Speaker 6: an early childhood.
Speaker 4: We're talking about death here. We're talking about death now.
Speaker 4: Many people, especially our youth, are not receiving information that
Speaker 4: is vital to their future health and well being because
Speaker 4: of our reticence in dealing with the subjects of sex,
Speaker 4: sexual practices, and homosexuality.
Speaker 3: Coop says he's not advocating avoiding specific lifestyles.
Speaker 4: If you are going to indulge in certain types of
Speaker 4: sexual activity, there are ways to protect yourself.
Speaker 1: Coop was now one of the country's most prominent advocates
Speaker 1: for comprehensive sex education. If his explicit and straightforward approach
Speaker 1: thrilled many AIDS experts protectors, it also infuriated many White
Speaker 1: House officials who are wary of alienating Reagan's base.
Speaker 6: This kind of civil war is breaking out over see
Speaker 6: every Cooper.
Speaker 16: Here's doctor Coop fronting for the homosexual lobby, and we
Speaker 16: would like to see him dismissed as a public statement
Speaker 16: by President Reagan.
Speaker 6: There is growth sentiment in the White House that Reagan
Speaker 6: should deliver a major address to the nation about AIDS.
Speaker 1: If the President were to go on TV and endorse
Speaker 1: Coop's ideas about AIDS prevention, he could go a long
Speaker 1: way towards changing cultural norms about condoms and sex education.
Speaker 1: But Gary Bauer, one of the President's top domestic policy advisors,
Speaker 1: thought that idea was ridiculous and beneath the office of
Speaker 1: the president.
Speaker 6: Quote, I'm not sure I want to take the president
Speaker 6: on nationwide TV saying well, the only two ways to
Speaker 6: avoid AIDS are abstinence and masturbation. I mean, there are
Speaker 6: some things that are presidential in things that are not.
Speaker 1: On the whole Reagan took Gary Bauer's advice. Though he
Speaker 1: did start referring to AIDS as the number one public
Speaker 1: health priority of his administration, he did not speak about
Speaker 1: condoms or attempt to turn his advisors against abstinence only education. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: Rock Hudson's death had further multiplied private AIDS fundraising. In
Speaker 1: his will, Hudson had designated two hundred and fifty thousand
Speaker 1: dollars to start an AIDS foundation, and his doctor, Michael Gottlieb,
Speaker 1: co founded that organization with a group that included some
Speaker 1: of Hudson's Hollywood friends. The foundation AMPHAR became the country's
Speaker 1: leading AIDS charity. AMPHAR planned its first major benefit to
Speaker 1: take place in Washington, d C. In May of nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty seven. Michael Gottlieb went to Washington to attend the
Speaker 1: event alongside Elizabeth Taylor.
Speaker 13: The interesting thing to me was we'd come into these
Speaker 13: senators chambers and she would introduce me as the discoverer
Speaker 13: of AIDS, and they would pay no attention to me whatsoever.
Speaker 13: Elizabeth would be all gussied up and totally made up,
Speaker 13: and her hair perfect and wearing her jewels, and they
Speaker 13: just ate it up.
Speaker 1: Before the event, Taylor communicated privately with the President an
Speaker 1: old friend from Hollywood, and convinced him to give the
Speaker 1: keynote address. The knight of the gala May thirty first,
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty seven was warm and brief. Forty four thousand
Speaker 1: Americans have been diagnosed with AIDS and nearly twenty seven
Speaker 1: thousand had died. The event was set up in a
Speaker 1: big tent that was decorated with red and pink flowers.
Speaker 4: Gentlemen, the President of the United States and Missus.
Speaker 5: Reagan, I want to talk tonight about the disease that
Speaker 5: has brought us all together. It has been talked about,
Speaker 5: and I'm going to continue the The poet W. H.
Speaker 5: Auden said that the true men of action in our
Speaker 5: times are not the politicians and statesmen, but the scientists.
Speaker 5: I believe that's especially true when it comes to the
Speaker 5: AIDS epidemic.
Speaker 1: Reagan's speechwriter had met with public health experts and political
Speaker 1: advisors while he crafted the address. Safe and at first,
Speaker 1: the President's remarks seem to closely track with the medical
Speaker 1: community's advice.
Speaker 5: America faces a disease that is fatal and spreading, and
Speaker 5: this calls for urgency, not panic. It calls for compassion
Speaker 5: not blamed. We're still learning about how AIDS is transmitted.
Speaker 5: But experts tell us you don't get it from telephones
Speaker 5: or swimming pools or drinking fountains. You don't get it
Speaker 5: from shaking hands or sitting on a bus or anywhere
Speaker 5: else for that matter. As dangerous and deadly as AIDS is,
Speaker 5: many of the fears surrounding it are unfounded. These fears
Speaker 5: are based on ignorance.
Speaker 1: Michael Gottlieb listened to these words with relief and satisfaction.
Speaker 13: I was excited, but then he gives you a kick
Speaker 13: in that. You know what.
Speaker 1: The speech took a turn about three quarters of the
Speaker 1: way through.
Speaker 13: That same speech, announce the travel ban against people with HIV.
Speaker 5: I've also asked HHS to add the AIDS virus to
Speaker 5: the list of contagious diseases for which immigrants and aliens
Speaker 5: seeking permanent residents in the United States can be denied entry.
Speaker 5: They are presently entry for.
Speaker 13: Other inciting a great deal of displeasure among the crowd.
Speaker 5: Let me turn to what the States can.
Speaker 1: Do once again. Reagan seemed to be siding with the
Speaker 1: most reactionary voices in his administration for the AIDS activists
Speaker 1: in the room. It was enraging to hear the President
Speaker 1: talk about acceptance and compassion and keeping people with AIDS
Speaker 1: out of the country. In the same breath, the President
Speaker 1: gave his first major speech on the subject to night.
Speaker 26: One that drew both cheers and jeers. The proposals, which
Speaker 26: were championed by conservative factions in the administration, were unpopular
Speaker 26: with many in the audience. Demonstrators outside marched in memory
Speaker 26: of those who died of AIDS and called for more
Speaker 26: research money We.
Speaker 1: Got the The activists inside the amphar benefit who booed
Speaker 1: Reagan made national news, as did the hundreds of protesters
Speaker 1: chanting and lighting candles outside. The groups that had begun
Speaker 1: in New York, San Francisco and across the country were
Speaker 1: now larger, bolder, and more professionalized. They were tired of
Speaker 1: waiting years for incremental political developments. They were tired of
Speaker 1: waiting years for the results of drug trials that were
Speaker 1: conducted in complete secrecy. They were not going to wait anymore.
Speaker 15: Now that the summer is come and gone, I'll say goodbye.
Speaker 15: Now that the winter is coming on, I'll say goodbye.
Speaker 15: I'm not the first man or.
Speaker 1: The last on the next episode of Fiasco, a new
Speaker 1: activist or organization forms and mounts a revolutionary fight for
Speaker 1: access to experimental drugs.
Speaker 6: We've tried to be good little boys and girls.
Speaker 26: We've tried to work within the system.
Speaker 13: We just want to.
Speaker 6: Raise the issues.
Speaker 4: We are dying.
Speaker 15: For every star that falls to work on Lew and
Speaker 15: Low for every Dream.
Speaker 1: Fiasco is presented by Audible Originals and Prologue Projects. The
Speaker 1: show is produced by Andrew Parsons, Sam Graham, Felsen, Madewin, Kaplan,
Speaker 1: Ulla Colpa, and me Leon Nafock. Our researcher is Francis Carr.
Speaker 1: Editorial support from Jessica Miller and Nora waswas archival research
Speaker 1: by Michelle Sullivan. The vice president of Audible Studios is
Speaker 1: Mike Charzik. The editor in chief for Audible Originals is
Speaker 1: David Blum. This season's music is composed by Edith Mudge.
Speaker 1: Additional music by Nick Sylvester of Godmode, Billy libby Joel Saint,
Speaker 1: Julian and Danning, Noah Heckt and Joe Valley. Our theme
Speaker 1: song is by Spatial Relations. Our credit song this week
Speaker 1: is I'll Say Goodbye by Rock Hudson. You also heard
Speaker 1: Could I Leave You. Performed by Carol Burnett. Music licensing
Speaker 1: courtesy of Anthony Roman. Audio mix by Erica Wong, with
Speaker 1: additional support from Selina Urabe. Our artwork is designed by
Speaker 1: Teddy Blanks at Chips and y Thanks to the Vanderbilt
Speaker 1: Television Archive. Additional footage courtesy of ABC seven Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Peter Yass and Dan Works. Thanks for listening,
Speaker 1: See you next week.