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^Kearns' `Intimacies' Explores HIV-Positive Characters (New York)<

^By Frank Rizzo=

^(c) 1991, The Hartford Courant=

NEW YORK _ Michael Kearns never thought his private status as a person

carrying the AIDS virus would be the focus of national television coverage.

But that was before actor Brad Davis (``Midnight Express'') died last month

at 41 of complications from AIDS.

Davis kept his HIV-positive status a secret for six years because he feared

he would not otherwise find work (HIV is the human immunodeficiency virus that

causes AIDS). In a scathing statement released by his widow after his death,

Davis accused the Hollywood community of being hypocritical, raising money for

AIDS at high-profile galas while at the same time discriminating against people

with AIDS.

Kearns, a stage actor whose numerous television appearances include

``Cheers,'' ``Murder, She Wrote'' and ``The Waltons,'' decided to go public

with the fact that he has the AIDS virus.

Kearns was in New York this week performing his one-man show,

``intimacies,'' which depicts characters who are HIV-positive.

``(Davis) merely reconfirmed everything I've always said,'' said a buoyant,

energetic Kearns over salad and coffee near the theater in Greenwich Village,

where he is performing through Nov. 3, prior to a San Francisco run. ``Of

course, what lacked punch was obviously it was said from the grave. How much

more powerful would it have been if he said this while he was alive? But people

live in this state of fear that perpetuates itself, and it becomes the truth

.... I understood his fears so much that it inspired me to be fearless.''

Kearns, who has kept his HIV status private for 2{ years, decided to go

public when he was approached several weeks ago by NBC's Faith Daniels to

appear on ``A Closer Look.'' Daniels wanted him to talk about the issues Davis

raised from the point of view of being an openly gay actor.

``But I realized that I could not possibly go on that show and not talk

about my HIV status,'' he says. ``I was either not going to do the show,

because I would have been a fake, or I was going to go on and tell the truth.''

The response to his appearance on that show, as well as a subsequent one on

``Entertainment Tonight,'' was ``unreal'' and supportive, he says, from family,

friends and ``complete strangers, just ordinary people.''

The 41-year-old Kearns, who grew up in St. Louis, says he is concerned,

however, ``that people would be coming to the show to see someone who was

HIV-positive, as opposed to coming to the show to see an actor. But at this

point, I have to make that compromise.''

In ``intimacies'' and its follow-up show, ``more intimacies,'' Kearns has

created a dozen characters, many of them not white or gay, and most

lower-class. Among his characters: Big Red, a black female streetwalker; Mike,

a hemophiliac; Phoenix, a blind, homeless junkie; Father Anthony, a priest;

Fernando, a macho flamenco dancer; Paul, an abused, deaf, gay boy and Patrick;

a yuppie Hollywood accountant.

Kearns says that although his decision to go public with his HIV status was

dramatic, his ``coming out'' as a gay actor was evolutionary. All through his

20-year career, the tall, handsome actor with traditional all-American looks

was advised to keep his sexuality in the closet.

``I've been told to `cool it.' Stop playing so many gay characters. What are

you doing to yourself? You could be this. You could be that. You could have a

(television) series. You could be a movie star. Just shut up. Play the game.

Play by the rules. Don't rock the boat.' But I really didn't take well to that.

It's the classic situation of someone telling you no, and you do the opposite.

And I never regretted for one minute saying that I was gay.''

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He says the only thing that has changed over the years is that, spurred by

the death of Rock Hudson, he has taken a higher public profile as a gay actor,

becoming involved in gay and AIDS-related theater and support groups in Los

Angeles.

``The only thing that I gave up (by being publicly known as a gay actor) was

what other people wanted for me. Not what I wanted for me,'' he says. ``I

didn't necessarily want to be a movie star. I wanted to be an actor. Period.

Now, of course, I'm worried about being known as the HIV-gay actor.''

Kearns says he has been working on a new multi-character, one-man show

called ``Rock,'' ``as in rock the boat, as in rock solid, as in between a rock

and a hard place, and as in Rock Hudson. But I'm not going to play Rock

Hudson.''

Kearns says he has special connections with Hudson. In early 1983, Kearns

had a brief, intimate encounter with the actor, who struck Kearns as ``sad,

tragic, melancholy, self-hateful, vulnerable and doomed.''

And when Hudson died in October 1985, many in the media turned to Kearns

because he was an openly gay actor in Hollywood. (Besides Harvey Fierstein,

famous for his ``Torch Song Trilogy,'' Kearns couldn't name any other gay

Hollywood actors whom he knew were definitely public about their sexuality.)

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``Hopefully, Brad Davis did not die in vain,'' he says. ``Hopefully, I'm

not coming out as HIV-positive in vain. All these fund-raisers are fine, but at

the same time, the consciousness has to be raised. It's not enough to just

raise money and to go back to your old behavior the next day.''

As he speaks, a couple of young men at a nearby table get up to leave. They

call over to Kearns, smile and say: ``Good job. Keep it going.''

Kearns beams. ``Unbelievable, isn't it? See, that's what keeps me going.

Totally. People wonder, `How can you do it?' That's how. That's why I can do

it.''

^Distributed by the Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service=

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