The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson: The Pretty Boys and Dirty Deals of Henry Willson

Henry Willson was one of the quintessential power brokers in Hollywood during the late 1940s and 1950s when he launched the careers of Rock Hudson, Lana Turner, Tab Hunter, Natalie Wood, and many others. He was also a true casting couch agent, brokering sex for opportunity on the silver screen. While this practice was rampant across Hollywood, for gay actors and film professionals the casting couch was a dangerous cliff: a public revelation could and would ruin a career. The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson is an incredible biography as well as a harrowing look into Hollywood at a time of great sexual oppression, roaming vice squads searching for gay and/or communist activity, and the impossibilities for gay actors of the era.

Robert Hofler survived a forty-year career in journalism, working as an editor at Life, Us, and Variety, among many other publications. He is now the theater critic for The Wrap and lives in New York City. Hofler is also author of the books Sexplosion: From Andy Warhol to “A Clockwork Orange”—How a Generation of Pop Rebels Broke All the Taboos, Variety’s “The Movie That Changed My Life,” and Party Animals: A Hollywood Tale of Sex, Drugs, and Rock ’n’ Roll Starring the Fabulous Allan Carr.