Arnold Schwarzenegger Was a Gay Porn Model
An Encyclopedia of Every Other Awful Thing Arnold Schwarzenegger Has DoneThis isn't strictly horrible unless you later present yourself, as Schwarzenegger did, as a paragon of wholesome, masculine, Republican uprightness and veto two gay marriage bills.
In 1977, he sat for an interview and 22-page nude photo spread for the gay magazine After Dark. (The issue Schwarzenegger modeled for also featured Ginger Rogers and Diana Ross. Click on the photo at right for the NSFW version.)
He also sat for Robert Mapplethorpe, and was given to more up-close-and-personal modeling: Spy reported that in 1975, he enjoyed a weekend visit to the estate of Spanish millionaire and gay playboy Paco Arce Gomez. Arce, a photographer himself, snapped some private photos of Schwarzenegger, including one where a stack of Playgirl magazines could be spotted in the background.
Schwarzenegger's biographer Wendy Leigh told Radar that Schwarzenegger also sought out the affections of wealthy gay British patron John Dixey, a "well-known aficionado of muscle boys" who "was very, very kind to Arnold" in the late 1960s.
"You have to understand," Leigh told Radar, "before Arnold came on the scene, it was common currency that bodybuilders were less than macho—it was absolutely given and accepted that they supported themselves by catering to the tastes of wealthy gay men."
That's a sentiment Schwarzenegger seemed to echo in a 1977 interview with the hardcore porn rag Oui: "I have absolutely no hang-ups about the fag business."
