Scotty Bowers knew the Golden Age of Hollywood more intimately than anyone else.
Now 94 years old with curly white hair, his gait and wrinkled face age him. But as he recounts his tales of deep behind the scenes in Tinseltown, he breaks into a smile and with a laugh he could pass for a younger man.
For decades, Bowers set up celebrities and others in the film industry with sexual partners – or had sex with them himself. He says he set up Katherine Hepburn with up to 150 women over the course of 50 years; was part of a three-way with Cary Grant and Randolph Scott, who he claims were lovers. Bowers’ list goes on and on.
He first opened his little black book for a 2012 memoir and this week his career as a fixer to the Hollywood stars of the 1940s is the subject of a new documentary.
Scotty Bowers (center) claims he was a ‘pimp’ for the Hollywood elite during the Golden Age of cinema starting in the mid 1940s. He started his career at the age of 23 in 1946 when he moved to Los Angeles after the Second World War. His first job in LA was at a gas station, where he pumped gas and eventually organized sexual trysts for celebrities
Bowers, now 94, (pictured with his wife Lois) is having his stories of sexual intrigue retold in a new documentary film, Scotty and The Secret History of Hollywood. Bowers and Lois were married in 1984
Bowers started his career as a ‘pimp’ for Hollywood stars in 1946 at the age of 23. The former US Marine had moved to Los Angeles after the Second World War and was working as a gas station attendant on Hollywood Boulevard.
After a chance sexual liaison with actor Walter Pidgeon, who picked him up after they met at the gas station, Bowers soon started hooking up Hollywood stars and producers with men and women according to their sexual desires and preferences, or so he claims.
‘Everybody’s needs were met,’ Bowers says in his book, released in 2012. ‘Whatever folks wanted, I had it. I could make all their fantasies come true.’
The documentary, Scotty and The Secret History of Hollywood, shows Bowers walking out of his house on Kew Drive in the hills of Los Angeles. The view of the city is beautiful and a rainbow appears to touch down right in the middle of the city.
‘Look at that beautiful rainbow,’ he says. ‘I created the rainbow in Hollywood, the rainbow was at 5777 Hollywood Boulevard called Richfield and that was the f***in’ end of the rainbow for a lot of people.’
Bowers was raised in rural Illinois and served in the US Marines during World War II. In his memoir, he claims he had numerous sexual relationships with adults for money as he grew up
Though he claims he set up celebrities over the course of at least 50 years, Bowers never said a word about any of the meetings until he wrote his memoir, Full Service: My Adventures in Hollywood and the Secret Sex Lives of the Stars in 2012
After his first meeting with Pidgeon, the actor told all his friends and the Richfield gas station on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Van Ness Avenue soon became the place where A-listers of all kinds came for a ‘trick,’ as Bowers called liaisons.
Bowers never said a word about his side job until he published his memoir, Full Service: My Adventures in Hollywood and the Secret Sex Lives of the Stars, which was co-written with Lionel Friedberg.
‘I’ve kept silent all these years because I didn’t want to hurt any of these people,’ Bowers told The New York Times after his book released in 2012. By then, all the celebrities he wrote about had died.
‘I never saw the fascination,’ Bowers added. ‘So they liked sex how they liked it. Who cares?’
Bowers’ extravagant and often graphic tales of sexual encounters with and among the Hollywood elite in his memoir are the focus of the documentary, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival.
‘I didn’t find Bowers’ book to be offensive in that it outed people,’ film director Matt Tyrnauer told Vulture. ‘I think he was making a larger point about Hollywood and the hypocrisy of the period. A lot of people had diverse sexualities but were part of a system that insisted on putting out the “white picket fence” morality. That’s in the past.’
In his memoir, Bowers (second from the far right) tells extravagant and often explicit tales of sexual encounters he has with stars including composer Cole Porter and director George Cukor
By the time he published his book, all the celebrities that he mentioned had died. He said: ‘I’ve kept silent all these years because I didn’t want to hurt any of these people’
Bowers got his start as ‘Hollywood’s favorite pimp’ after he met actor Walter Pidgeon (pictured in about 1940) in 1946, who paid him $20 to have sex with him after Pidgeon stopped by the gas station where Bowers worked
During the 1940s and 50s, Hollywood studios required their stars to follow strict guidelines.
‘When I first arrived [in Los Angeles] the stars were owned by the studios, which were heavily invested in them,’ Bowers writes in his book. ‘Naturally, they needed to protect their investments. But people still wanted to have sex. And I was there to help them get it.
‘Also, you have to remember that there were lots of gay people working at the studios at the time. Those behind the camera could be more open in their private lives but the actors and major directors and producers had “morals” clauses in their contracts, which they would have violated by being openly known as gay or bisexual.’
But with Bowers, the stars were safe. He refused to give out information to gossip magazines and tabloids and when the magazine Confidential offered him $1,000 each for three different stories if he confirmed certain information he knew was true, he refused.
In a 2012 interview with CBS Sunday Morning, Bowers told Anthony Mason that someone called him a hustler to director George Cucker. ‘Yes, but he’s a gentleman hustler,’ Cucker responded, according to Bowers.
‘The way he said it, that meant something,’ Bowers said.
When Bowers set up a star for a ‘trick,’ he refused to be paid, instead telling the star to pay the person they were sleeping with.
‘I didn’t believe in being an outright pimp. Sort of a pimp, but not an outright pimp. There’s a difference, you know,’ he laughed to Mason.
Bowers claims he was part of a three way with actors Cary Grant (left) and Randolph Scott (right). The two actors were rumored to be lovers, despite the fact that Grant’s daughter, Jessica, has refuted those claims
Bowers also says he slept with actress Vivien Leigh (pictured in about 1940) in her house, where she lived with her husband at the time, Laurence Olivier
Though trysts were initially at the homes of the celebrities, as Bowers’ operation gained ground, he organized meetings on the premises, letting people have sex in the station’s bathroom and letting other ‘clients’ meet in a trailer that was kept on the property by a friend of Bowers’.
When those were both busy, he could also arrange for a discounted room at a nearby motel where he had made friends with the manager.
‘It’s hard to believe, unless you were there, how much fun that gas station was. People disappearing up in the trailer and going in the washroom and doing this and that and the whole thing was fun,’ Bowers says smiling in a clip from the documentary.
Bowers himself certainly participated in the fun and he made some money as well. A romp with Bowers would cost $20.
Though he preferred women, he slept with plenty of men and participated in orgies and three ways, including three ways with Cary Grant and Randolph Scott.
Through his friendship with Scott and Grant, Bowers started bartending, which brought him into the world of glamorous, private Hollywood parties where he got even more insight into the sexual lives of Hollywood’s elite.
Bowers claims he slept with A-listers including actress Vivien Leigh, composer Cole Porter and director George Cukor. He also set up the Duke and Duchess of Windsor with other people, Edward with men and Wallis with women.
Despite the fact that Spencer Tracy (left) and Katherine Hepburn (right) appeared to be in a very public romantic relationship, Bowers said Tracy was gay and Hepburn was a lesbian. He even claims to have introduced Hepburn to up to 150 women over the course of 50 years
Bowers claims he also set up the Duke and Duchess of Windsor (pictured in 1936) with other people, Edward with men and Wallis with women
But with the onset of AIDS in the 1980s, Bowers’ career as a pimp came to an end.
‘AIDS had launched itself in a vicious war against humanity,’ he wrote. ‘It brought an end to the sexual freedoms that had defined much of life in Tinseltown ever since the birth of the movies. I, too, underwent a major change. Tricking – whether for others or doing it myself – gradually slowed to a snail’s pace. Sex used to be about having fun and a good time. The advent of AIDS didn’t change that per se, but now sex could come at the cost of your very life. So, things changed. A lot.
‘The wild and woolly days were over. The drag parties and gang bangs and swingers’ evenings and orgies became a thing of the past. But life went on.’
Bowers had remained single throughout all his ‘tricking’ except for a longtime girlfriend named Betty who he lived with from the 40s. The two had a child together and Bowers said she knew he slept around. However, in 1981, he met a woman named Lois Broad who was ‘simply a sweet, uncomplicated woman’. They were married in 1984 and have been together ever since.
Bowers’ career as a pimp ended in the 1980s with the onset of AIDS. He wrote in his memoir: ‘Sex used to be about having fun and a good time. The advent of AIDS didn’t change that per se, but now sex could come at the cost of your very life’
But Bowers’ memoir doesn’t only recount his years of sexual intrigue in Hollywood. The book also details his life growing up in rural Illinois during the Great Depression and his life in the US Marines as a paratrooper.
Bowers also claims he had numerous sexual relationships and trysts beginning at the age of seven or eight, with what appears to be sexual assault from an adult neighbor. In his memoir, Bowers casually brushes off the initial interaction as his ‘first sexual encounter’, but their relationship continues and Bowers adds he was ‘grateful’ for it.
He goes on to describe graphic scenes from his childhood, teen and young adult years, where he has numerous sexual encounters with adults who all paid him. Those payments, he claimed, helped him to support his family who struggled during the difficult economic time.
Bowers also claims his sexual life in Hollywood began on weekends while he waiting deployment during World War II, meeting Hollywood stars on the street and being solicited for sex.
Despite questions of Bowers’ authenticity, his friend, author Gore Vidal endorsed the memoir.
‘I have known Scotty Bowers for the better part of a century,’ Vidal said in his review. ‘I’m so pleased that he has finally decided to tell his story to the world. His startling memoir includes great figures like Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. Scotty doesn’t lie—the stars sometimes do—and he knows everybody.’
And in an interview with LA Weekly in 2012, Bob Benevides confirmed that Bowers was the one to set him up with his longtime partner, 13 years his senior, actor Raymond Burr.
In his memoir, Bowers said all the trysts and meetings were for one reason only. He said: ‘I’ve had many occupations during my life but, to be honest, what really drove me was a desire to keep people happy. And the way I did that was through sex. Arranging sexual liaisons for folks from all walks of life became my raison d’être’
Others, however, are less inclined to believe Bowers. Cary Grant’s daughter, Jennifer Grant, has said her father was amused by the rumors that he was gay or bisexual, but he wasn’t actually.
James Curtis, who wrote a biography of Spencer Tracy, Katherine Hepburn’s romantic partner, also doesn’t believe Bowers’ claims that Tracy was gay and Hepburn was lesbian.
‘Bowers is full of glib stories and revelations, all cheerfully unverifiable,’ Curtis wrote in Spencer Tracy: A Biography, which was published in 2011.
But whether Bowers is telling the truth or not, director Tyrnauer said hearing Bowers’ story is still worth telling (though Tyrnauer does, in fact, believe Bowers).
‘He’s talking about what you don’t usually hear older people talking about, which is sex,’ he told Vulture. ‘All these people lived in a society where homosexuality was shunned and they had to live lives in the shadows. Now they’ve lived to a period of tremendous openness by comparison, and it’s interesting to see.’
Bowers said he only had one goal in mind for all his ‘tricking’.
‘The gas station was the portal that eventually took me into an exclusive world where high-class sex was everything,’ he wrote in his memoir.
‘I’ve had many occupations during my life but, to be honest, what really drove me was a desire to keep people happy. And the way I did that was through sex. Arranging sexual liaisons for folks from all walks of life became my raison d’être.’