Growing up, Michael Ferguson loved horror films. In 1974 he read about the release of Andy Warhol’s Blood for Dracula and Flesh for Frankenstein. “When I heard they were gross, X-rated, and sexually perverse, I became very interested,” he says.
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Ferguson’s discovery of Dallesandro came at a time when he was coming to terms with his homosexuality. “The fact that he was open or appeared to be open to the attentions of both male and female audience members made me that much more attracted to him,” says Ferguson, who calls Dallesandro “this great, virtually unexplored, and sometimes barely acknowledged male sex symbol. At the time of Stonewall he gave an emerging gay subculture almost an icon. He was the first overtly sexualized male in the movies.”
Ferguson himself briefly pursued an acting career in Hollywood, but soon returned to Woodstock, where he ran a movie theater for ten years and wrote about films for the daily paper. Later he began writing for cult-movie magazines.
The two arranged a meeting at Dallesandro’s home in Los Angeles. Though the actor initially kept Ferguson waiting outside for an hour, they ended up talking for 23 hours straight. Shortly after the article appeared, Companion Press, a small publisher aimed at the gay market, contacted Ferguson about writing a book.
Ferguson, who’s 36, moved to Chicago three years ago and spends his days at a clerical job at a university. After hours he’s working on a book about male film stars, “from Valentino to DiCaprio,” who have a strong gay following. Between their current book tour and Dallesandro’s work on the documentary, the two speak often.
