It was 1953 when Marlon Brando found himself in a compromising situation.
The actor, who had returned to Hollywood from New York City to begin filming, was featured in another photo – a photo that remained underground for over 50 years. It wasn’t until 2004 that the pornographic photo was posted on the internet, showing the star performing a sex act with an unidentified man.
For decades, many people wondered who the other participant was or if the erotic photo was real. Burt Kearns told Fox News Digital that it was legitimate but that it was a prank.
Marlon Brando offered to have sex with Barbra Streisand before they became friends
An erotic photo of Marlon Brando performing a sexual act on another man has been the stuff of legend for over 50 years. (Getty Images)
“This has been discussed for 40 years,” said Kearns, author of the new book. “Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel.”
“It’s come up before,” he said. “It’s even in some legitimate Brando biographies. They’re saying, ‘This is ridiculous.’ … They misrepresent it. It was published in a book about 20 years ago. Now you can find it on the Internet, and apparently, yes, it’s real.”
According to Kearns, the photo was taken at a party in New York City. It was “just for fun.”
Author Burt Kearns says the photo was taken as a “joke” at a party in Harlem. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
“It was a party that was organized by one of the people who founded the drag balls in Harlem, which later became vogue balls in the ’80s,” Kearns said. “(The unidentified man) was one of the first people who ran those. And yes, obviously the photo was real.”
“Brando laughed at that,” he said.
In his book, Kearns wrote that within a few weeks, the photograph was in wide circulation. Actor Roddy McDowall was quoted as saying he saw the photograph openly sold at kiosks along the Seine River in Paris. Kenneth Anger, the controversial author of “Hollywood Babylon,” alleged to an interviewer that he had a copy of the photograph and had tried for years to persuade a publisher to print it, but was unsuccessful.
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Actress Anna Kashfi slapped her ex-husband Marlon Brando as he left a courtroom after Brando won a long-running battle to extend visitation rights to their 3-year-old son. (Getty Images)
In the book “Brando Unzipped”, published in 2006, author Darwin Porter wrote that Brando’s first wife, Anna KashfiThe photo was intended to be shown in court as evidence of his “wickedness” during their bitter divorce and child custody fight that began in 1959.
Kearns said Brando was not bothered by the photo. Instead, Brando prioritized his acting, which led to a career in Hollywood that lasted decades without discrimination.
“It wasn’t a big deal to him,” Kearns said. “What can you do to somebody? Can you cancel them? How can you cancel somebody if they don’t care if they’re cancelled or not? Part of it has to do with Brando’s mastery of the press and the media.”
Burt Kearns has written a new book, “Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel,” about the late Oscar-winning actor. (Applause)
“You could see that the gossip columnists and entertainment reporters in the ’50s didn’t know what to think of this guy. (They) would make up stories about his life; he would just ignore them. He wouldn’t answer their questions. (For) every movie he did, he would say, ‘This is my last movie. I’m getting out of here. I can’t stand this town. It’s ridiculous.’ And the only thing that saved him from being canceled was the fact that he was so talented.”
Marlon Brando smiles while holding his Oscar award, which he was given for “Best Actor” in 1954. (Getty Images)
“He got three Academy Award nominations for ‘Best Actor’ for his first four films,” Kearns continued. “Then he made ‘The Wild One’ … and after that, he got an Academy Award for ‘Best Actor’ for ‘On the Waterfront.’ And there’s no denying that this guy was changing Hollywood. He was a revolutionary talent, so he was able to get away with it.”
Brando died in 2004 at the age of 80. Despite his expressed contempt for acting, many film buffs still consider him one of Hollywood’s greatest leading men.
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There has been speculation about Marlon Brando’s sexuality for years. (Silver Screen Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
As a sex symbol, Brando’s love life made newspaper headlines. In his lifetime, he married three times and fathered 11 children. He also openly spoke about his bisexuality to a French journalist in 1976, as quoted in People Magazine“Like many men, I have had similar experiences and I am not ashamed. I have never cared much about what people thought of me.”
Marlon Brando married three times and fathered 11 children. (Getty Images)
Kearns’ book mentions that Phil Black, a female impersonator who hosted a Harlem party that Brando attended, allegedly challenged the star to take the photo. Porter quotes actor Tom Ewell as claiming that Wally Cox, Brando’s childhood friend “went along with it.”
Kearns told Fox News Digital that although there had been speculation over the years about Brando and Cox’s relationship, it was a purely friendly one.
Bert Kearns said of actor Wally Cox, “He looked a bit like Woody Allen with his glasses on.” (Getty Images)
“Marlon Brando met Wally Cox when he was about 9 years old, when he lived outside of Chicago,” Kearns said. “He met him in elementary school, and Wally Cox … was a skinny little guy. … When Brando moves to New York City In the 1940s, he’s walking down Sixth Avenue in Greenwich Village with his sister. Who comes walking down the street? Wally Cox. (Brando) says, ‘Hey Wally!’ And they mingle like they hadn’t been apart in 10 years.”
Intimate details of Marlon Brando’s friendship with Wally Cox emerged after his death. (Getty Images)
“Marlon Brando used to say that Wally Cox was more than a friend to him, more than a brother,” Kearns said. “People used to say he was his lover because Marlon Brando … was very open about his sexual affairs and his relationships with men and women. … But it seemed that … the relationship between Brando and Wally Cox was much different than that. They were soul brothers. Brando loved him like he never had a brother.”
Kearns said Brando, an intensely private star, was devastated when Cox died of a heart attack in 1973 at age 48. A grief-stricken Brando pleaded with Cox’s widow and urged her to scatter Cox’s ashes in places they had once frequented together. She agreed.
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Patricia Cox Shapiro, widow of Wally Cox, holds some photos of her late husband and Marlon Brando. (Spencer Weiner/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
“He found out 20 years later that Brando never scattered the ashes,” Kearns said. “He kept them by his bed. He carried them in an urn in his car. He talked to them as he drove. He stole a pair of Wally Cox’s pajamas and kept them with him.”
“When Brando died, some of his ashes and Wally Cox’s ashes were scattered together in Death Valley,” Kearns said. “So, their friendship lasted for eternity. … People think they were lovers, I think they were much more than that, and that undermines them.”
Cox’s second wife, Milagros Tirado “Millie” Beck, and Cox’s third wife, Patricia Cox Shapiro, reported that Los Angeles Times He did not believe that the two actors were lovers.
From left: Yul Brynner as Capt. Mueller, Janet Margolin as Esther, Wally Cox as Dr. Ambach and Marlon Brando as Robert Crane are shown on the set of “Morituri” in 1965. (Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
“I never felt that. I felt true brotherly love,” Beck said.
“I never saw that (evidence),” Shapiro said. “I saw two guys have a pillow fight. First of all, I knew Wally very well. Even if Marlon had group sex, Wally never participated in them. I had complete confidence in Wally. They did a lot of athletic things together, like swimming, motorcycles, hiking, Indian wrestling.”
The other relationship Kearns wanted to talk about was the one between Brando and James Dean.
James Dean starred in “Rebel Without a Cause” in 1955. (Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
“Everybody used to say that Brando and Dean were lovers,” Kearns said. “Well, if you look at the story … do you really see that? No, James Dean loved Marlon Brando, but who did he love The character from ‘The Wild One’. He loved Johnny Strabler. And after Brando played the role, he moved on. … He says, ‘I moved on from that, and this Dean kid keeps bothering me.'”
“There was a famous scene at a party where Dean sees Brando and starts chasing him from room to room,” Kearns said. “And Brando coolly shuts him off and finally says, ‘Look kid, I really think you should see a psychiatrist or an analyst and talk about this because you have to be yourself.’”
“Brando said he thought the kid would grow out of it, and that he would eventually become a great actor because he could identify with his own upbringing in the Midwest … and the issues he had with his parents. But then Dean died unexpectedly, and he could never work it out.”
Marlon Brandon, James Dean and an unidentified woman are pushed in a wheeled wicker chair by two men on the set of director Henry Koster’s film “Desirée” in 1954. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Dean died from injuries sustained in a car accident in 1955. He was 24.
