The Greatest Gay Love Stories Never Told

Lush Life
The Love Story: The historical record may not show that jazz composer Billy Strayhorn had a notorious love affair to be remembered down through the ages, but a man who wrote such beautiful love songs must have known something of romance himself.

Billy Strayhorn is considered to be largely responsible for the lasting success of jazz legend Duke Ellington. So why have most people not heard of him? Well, being an openly gay black man amidst the heavy-hitters and glitterati of the Harlem jazz scene wasn’t exactly easy, and Stayhorn died at only 51 from cancer and alcoholism.

But the man responsible for such numbers as “Lush Life,” “Chelsea Bridge” and “Take the A Train” had to have known something about love, and what better way to approach the life of a great composer than by musing on his muse? We picture Strayhorn falling deeply in love with a working-class man (like My Beautiful Laundrette) and writing some of his greatest songs as a result.

And really, to get a chance to visit the time of Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Lena Horne and more would be magical, and this quiet, spotlight-dodging outsider might be the perfect tour guide to one of the most exciting periods in American music history.

The Pitch: Ray meets My Beautiful Laundrette
The Cast: Rockmond Dunbar as Strayhorn; Taye Diggs as his man.

Pedro
The Love Story: AIDS activist and reality television pioneer Pedro Zamora joined the cast of The Real World to help raise HIV awareness. What he didn’t expect was to fall in love in front of America.

When The Real World: San Francisco premiered in 1994, roommate Pedro Zamora was the first authentic gay person that most Americans had ever seen on television. A Cuban immigrant who was HIV+, the hardships faced by Zamora within the microcosm of the show and within society at large became the series’ most prominent and emotional storyline.

But while Zamora participated in the show in order to raise HIV awareness, he also unexpectedly found love under the harsh television lights. Zamora had been friends with fellow activist Sean Sasser for years, but when they wound up living in the same city, their relationship blossomed into something more. Though at first Zamora requested that he be allowed to date Sasser off-camera (which the producers granted), eventually their relationship became solid enough to withstand the scrutiny of reality television and the two brought their romance into the spotlight.

The reactions of the various roommates were as fascinating as the love story itself, with straight roommate Judd Winick coming to Zamora’s side as his closest confidant in the house. David “Puck” Rainey, on the other hand, was downright hostile to Zamora, and the loftmates responded by evicting Puck from the house in order to lessen the strain on Pedro’s system.

In a television first, Pedro and Sean exchanged vows in a commitment ceremony on the show. But sadly, following filming, Zamora’s health deteriorated rapidly. He died on November 11^th, a day after the last Real World episode aired.

Pedro Zamora and Sean Sasser are historic figures in terms of visibility of all kinds (gay, interracial, HIV), and their story is romantic, bittersweet, and inspiring. It’s criminal that it hasn’t been adapted into a feature film.

The Pitch: Philadelphia meets The Truman Show
The Cast: Newly out Degrassi actor Adamo Ruggiero as Pedro, Darryl Stephens as Sean