Dare to Stare

Yul Brynner's Secret

When Yul Brynner was first trying to pursue an acting career, he needed to do something to make money so he decided to model. George Platt Lynes hired Brynner to pose nude for photographs (therake.com).  The article suggests that Brynner, at one time, had a friend, and “their relationship sparked lifelong rumors of Brynner’s bisexuality” (therake.com). Brynner was rumored to have been bisexual, Lynes was also gay and many of his photographs were of nude men. At the time, being gay was seen as a bad thing and many people had to hide it in fear of others finding out, and what they would do to them just for being gay and loving who they wanted to love. By posing nude for Lynes, Brynner could have potentially lost his chance at an acting career and much worse, since the laws at the time prohibited someone from being gay.

The Lavender Scare

Being open about your sexuality in the world today is something to take pride in and be proud of. However, during the 1900s, being openly gay was something that everyone in the LGBTQ community wanted but was afraid to do. It was not only an actual crime to be openly gay, but it was also frowned upon by businesses, organizations, and even fellow family members. All of this fear of being outed as gay in your community was known as the Lavender Scare (The people are...). The Lavender Scare was a way for people within a community to try and find those who were a part of the LGBTQ community and reveal their secret identity. During this time, the scare of Communism spread throughout the United States as the Cold War was starting. The Red Scare was the fear of Communism spreading throughout the United States, much like the Lavender Scare was the fear of homosexuality spreading. Senator Joseph McCarthy "revealed" hundreds of communists within the U.S., one of them being a male who had been outed as gay (These People are...). With this scare, many were forced even more to hide their sexuality from the public eye.

The Death of George Platt Lynes

During his lifetime, George Platt Lynes took many different types of pictures of many different types of people. Some of his most famous photographs consist of photos that were not even seen until after he died in 1955. These photos consisted of hundreds of pictures of nude male models posing for Lynes. These pictures were only seen by the public because Lynes had met Dr. Alfred Kinsey, who was a researcher of sexuality. They soon became good friends and Lynes willed all of the photographs to Dr. Kinsey after he passed (George Platt Lynes). Kinsey released the photographs to the public, and through them, people could see the mystery behind being queer in the 1940s. The fear of being gay in the mid-1900s lead men and women to hide their true selves from the public. Lynes, being gay himself, took it upon himself to show the true beauty behind being queer, and that it was not something to be ashamed of. The fear Lynes had of coming out overweighed his passion for photography and forced him to hide these pictures until after his death. Knowing that these photographs were such a big secret between Lynes and his models makes them that much more interesting, and the fact that the models were not afraid to express who they truly were inside.

You may be wondering why these events have anything to do with a photograph of a naked man staring at the camera, but what you may not realize is that each of these events helps me explain what Group of 3 Photographs of Yul Brynner  was doing culturally when George Platt Lynes created it. In the first event, Yul Brynner posing for Lynes was a risky move during the time. As a struggling actor, Brynner was taking a huge risk posing nude for a photographer who was within the gay community. Brynner was willing to risk what people may think of him in order to show that anyone could be gay and that as a masculine man, he could show that. The next event ties into the previous one to show that even Lynes, a renowned photographer, was willing to hide his passion in order to save himself from what could have happened if the world found out what his sexuality was. The fact that the models could trust Lynes with their secret identities makes the photographs more intimate to look at by showing the model's most vulnerable secret to the world. Through these events alone you may not understand the severity of being openly gay during the mid-1900s, but this last event will be able to show you just how big of a deal it was to be openly gay. The Lavender Scare shows how the public thought about queer individuals, in the fact that they considered being a communist was comparable to being gay. If it was discovered that you were gay, you would have to relocate to another town where no one knew you just so you could get a job. This ties back to the first two events since Brynner, the other male models, and Lynes himself were susceptible to being compared to a Communist and become outcasts.

Brown, Gretchen. “Lavender Scare: The Historic LGBTQ Witch Hunt.” THIRTEEN, WNET, 1 June 2022, https://www.thirteen.org/blog-post/lavender-scare-the-historic-lgbtq-wi….