He’s now in his 90s and living in a house in the Hollywood Hills. Scotty-full name Scotty Bowers-appears in the documentary. A fire station stands today at the site of Scotty’s old gas station. Sharing their stories “corrects a persistent myth” about the sexualities of some of the period’s most famous names, he says. By operating his sexy gas station, Scotty helped closeted Hollywood stars “live authentic lives” and experience sexual freedom, Tyrnauer says. Tyrnauer tells Vanity Fair that Scotty’s brothel was frequented by stars who were secretly gay or bisexual.
The documentary, titled Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood, shines a light on a character who’s popped up in many Old Hollywood celebrity biographies-a pimp known only as Scotty. At least, those are the claims made by a new documentary out from documentarian and Vanity Fair special correspondent Matt Tyrnauer. In the late 1940s, a former Marine with a “free-wheeling outlook on sexuality” made a name for himself among Hollywood’s most glamorous stars by running an inconspicuous brothel out of a gas station on Hollywood Boulevard and Van Ness (now a fire station). It has been updated throughout to reflect the latest information. Editor's note: This story was originally published in August 2010.
