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Was there a point when you said to yourself, “Oh man, this is going to come
out. What else can I do with my life?”
At one point, when the career was going really bad and I got a lot of bad
press, lots of rumors about this and talk about this, I thought, “Oh, the hell
with it. I’m just going to go back to Virginia,” where I always wanted to be
with the horses. I came quite close to that.
You must have had conversations with the executives at Warner Brothers
about the situation, right? Especially after the
Confidential
magazine articles
appeared.
No one at Warner Brothers ever said a word to me. But, Paramount
called my friend Tony Perkins [with whom Tab had secretly shared a long-
term relationship] in and said, “I don’t think you and Tab should be seen
together anymore.”
I will tell you one thing: when
Confidential
magazine came out, right after
that, I won the audience award as the most popular newcomer and Jack Warner
was there with his whole stable of people from all the awards Warner Brothers
had won, and the press from the world was there. And a guy said, “Smile Pretty,
Tab. This is for the next issue of
Confidential
.” I turned around and said, “Oh,
God.” And then, Jack Warner put his arm around me, pulled me back and said,
“Just remember this: today’s headlines; tomorrow’s toilet paper.”
That’s the only time anything might have been said.
Did any of the actresses who worked with you turn away from you?
No. I had great relationships with the actresses. They are the ones I
wanted to be with. There was a gay part of my life and there was the day-in,
day-out part of my life.
What was the lowest point in your life?
I’ve had a lot of different low points, but the first one that comes to
Conversations:
Tab, a consummate and lifelong
horseman, won a number of blue
ribbons in the 1970s in competition
on his horse, Nob Hill (seen here
jumping at a meet in Indio, California)