Male Prostitution - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

The male prostitute or hustler is a frequent literary and cinematic stereotype in the West from the 1960s onwards, especially in movies and books with a gay perspective, in which he may be a stock character. The male sex worker is often portrayed either as a tragic figure, as in the film Mysterious Skin in which a male prostitute has a history of molestation, or as an impossible object of love or an idealized rebel. Though less frequent in cinema and in novels, the male prostitute with an exclusively female clientele (the "gigolo" or male for female "escort") is generally depicted as less tragic than the gay hustler. The film My Own Private Idaho, starring Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix, focuses upon the friendship between two male prostitutes. Rob Schneider stars as a gigolo in his slapstick farce Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo and its sequel. Wiktor Grodecki's controversial film Mandragora tells the story of young runaways who are manipulated into the dark underground world of prostitution, drug addiction and AIDS. Another well known movie featuring male prostitutes is Midnight Cowboy. The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone offers an older woman and a young gigolo in a tragic tryst. The TV series Hung is about a Detroit high school baseball coach who, due to financial pressures, turns to prostitution.