Director Stephen Kijak on Rock Hudson’s one true love, cut scenes & his creepy talent agent
Tribeca Festival, the documentary Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed is now available on Max for home viewers to relive the hunky Hollywood star’s rise to fame, gay trysts, and groundbreaking AIDS announcement in 1985, making him the first major celebrity to disclose their HIV status.Filmmaker and documentarian Stephen Kijak (whose other documentary subjects include The Backstreet Boys and Lynyrd Skynyrd) watched dozens of Hudson’s film roles, interviewed friends, colleagues, and former lovers, and meticulously examined archival photographs and other ephemera to piece together an all-encompassing examination of Hudson’s life.Everyone knows Rock Hudson’s Hollywood story, but this new doc explores the life he was forced to keep a secret.Born Roy Harold Scherer, Jr.
in 1925, Hudson’s dream of stardom was a far cry from his rural upbringing in Winnetka, Illinois. After a stint in the Navy, he headed for Hollywood, where he met the notorious agent Henry Willson, known for shepherding young men into the spotlight (Tab Hunter was another client).We caught up with Kijak to learn more about how the film came together and what he learned about Rock Hudson along the way.QUEERTY: With so much information to draw from, where did you begin the creative process for the film?KIJAK: It’s an archival process.
I start with the estate collection — a lot of it was just absorbing visual material —home movies, photographs and snapshots, and all the studio stills and ephemera.
