Brad Davis (1949-1991)

Brad Davis in his backyard sauna.

Querelle star Brad Davis was everything you’re not supposed to be: a hustler, a drug addict, a bisexual. Though he was widely recognized for his role in Midnight Express, his career never really went very far beyond the one Fassbinder movie and the imaginations of many, many gay men.

Incidentally this  photo was taken by Helen Mirren of all people.

Helen writes in her lovely coffee-table book, “In The Frame, My Life In Words and Pictures": 

“Two of my greatest friends in Los Angeles were Brad Davis and his wife. Brad had a sauna in the garden shed of his house in Studio City, and he would force all visitors in there. Brad was a great free spirit, and anyone who knew him treasured him. When I first met him, on a film for television, he had come out of rehabilitation from going AWOL with drink and drugs.

He’d had a great success with Midnight Express and could not handle that and the pressures of Hollywood. Once he was over that glitch, which almost destroyed his career (Brad never did anything by halves), he was a wicked angel of a person.”