Chad Allen: From outed to "Third Man Out"

Chad Allen became a teen heartthrob through his roles on such TV shows as "St. Elsewhere," "My Two Dads," "NYPD Blue" and "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman." Now he's returning to television in the first of six TV movies based on author Richard Stevenson's gay detective, Donald Stratchey, for here! TV.

In the first film, "Third Man Out" (debuting September 2 on here!), Strachey is on the trail of the killer of outspoken gay activist John Rutka (played by Jack Wetherall, Uncle Vic from "Queer as Folk"), who made it his cause to out prominent citizens, thereby creating a long list of enemies. Strachey is helped by his longtime partner, Timmy Callahan (Sebastian Spence). The pair's relationship is unquestionably the best part of the film.

I spoke to Allen about the movie, outing and being a teen idol ... and then not. He was a little late, as he had just been rear-ended -- not, as he put it, in the "fun, gay way."

Let's get started so we can get you to the hospital. That's all right. At least to the chiropractor.

Actually, the beginning of the movie took place in the hospital. I know I got hit in the beginning of the movie.

That's right, some woman slugged you.

I just saw here!'s new trailer for all their movies and stuff, and that segment is the first shot you see of me. Nailed by a chick -- first time for everything.

OK. If you say so, we'll believe you. Let's get into the movie. First of all, why don't you tell our readers exactly what the movie is about and what drew you to it?

"Third Man Out," is just a great old-fashioned noir detective story. It's based on a series of books called the "Donald Strachey Mystery Series." What drew me to it is that they're just like classic old noir mysteries. It's like watching the "Columbo" series or some of that old '30s and '40s noir detective stuff. I love that! Like, I couldn't remember the last time I watched something where the guy was actually called a "private eye." I just love the words "private eye."

The twist is: The detective, after a long, hard day sleuthing, goes home to the man instead of the woman. He climbs into bed with his long-time, committed partner, and they have this amazing life together. It's a very funny relationship in its own right, kind of fuel for storytelling, and it becomes kind of part of things. He's always getting the partner's type and he's always getting caught up in the mystery a little bit.

The thing that drew me to it, more than anything else, is the loving relationship between Timmy and Donald. It's a fantastic relationship, and we haven't had the opportunity to have that many great, romantic, intense, committed gay relationships represented on TV. And that's part of what here! is so excited to be able to do. You know, to go back and revisit all the classic genres of storytelling -- be it mysteries or adventures or so on -- and then just make them gay. I'm all for that. And this is the first time I've gotten to play gay.

Actually, I wondered about that. What about the last role you did on "NYPD Blue"?

I was actually a straight boy.

You were a straight boy? I think most people who watched the show assumed the character was gay.

As it was scripted, it was intended to be a straight character who was very nebbish. He pretended to be gay and picked up male johns, then robbed them, of course. If you look closely, there are a couple of references early on. It's not that big a thing in the show, but he had actually, at least, purported to be attracted to women

That was back in 1999.

Right.

You've played gay onstage, haven't you?

Yeah. I always joke that I had to produce my own stuff in order to play a gay character, because I was always being told I wasn't gay enough to be gay in TV. Because a lot of the characters were, you know, sort of sidekicks.

I played a gay character who gets kicked out of the Army in "Biloxi Blues." That was the first show I ever produced. And I then I played in a really great show, "Change at Babylon," that was produced first at the Tiffany Theater here, I think in '98, maybe '99. Then we took it to a couple of other theaters. I played a drugged-out circuit boy who ends up overdosing and dying and then has to come to terms with his incomplete relationships with his family from the netherworld. It's an interesting piece.

You know, in looking over your work, where are the light comedies, Chad? "My Two Dads" may have been the last thing you've done that was a light comedy.

Yeah, I know. I love the drama, I really do. You know, I think Strachey has his funny moments. And there is a lighthearted side to the character, especially in the relationship -- I really enjoy that aspect. I think when Strachey is around his partner, he becomes very lighthearted and sort of fun and gay. And as soon as they're away, he's back into his sort of dark, detective-y kind of world.

That's the thing that I love most about the character -- getting to play that spectrum of his personality traits, all in one guy. Because that's what I'm like. When I'm just hanging out and feeling really comfortable and having a good time, I'm fun and funny and really out of character -- being goofy, and even a bit "campy" (but don't tell). And then outside of that, I think most people who first meet me assume that I'm a very serious kind of guy. [Laughs.]

My partner and I both thought that the relationship between your character and Timmy was the best part of the movie.Thank you. I agree.

Sebastian Spence, who plays your partner, your lover, your whatever ...

Partner for life ...

He's straight. You had a great relationship onscreen, and it came across that you probably had a wonderful working relationship offscreen. Do you think it would have been different had your partner been played by an openly gay actor?

Yeah, I think we would have had a hell of a lot more fun making the love scenes. [Laughs.] Um, I think it would have been. You know, Sebastian won't mind me saying, this was not an easy project for him to do. I would not say he's homophobic by any means, but he comes from a very conservative background, and this was not something that he readily was just sort of open to understanding how to be comfortable with. Certainly this was the first time he'd held a man like that. We had to work to get comfortable with the physicality of those two characters. Now, luckily, we developed a great trust between us, a good friendship, and it made it a lot easier.

When all was said and done, he thanked me for helping make him so comfortable so that we could portray the relationship -- which, like I said, was the most important thing to me. We really had nothing if we didn't pull the relationship off, so we worked at it. But it wasn't easy. I have to assume that had some of those barriers not been there, it would have been just that much easier. But the point is, we were able to do it and we did a good job, and it all worked out.

I admire anybody who's got the balls to be open as an actor right now. In Hollywood itself, we still live in a time where it's scary for a lot of actors who haven't made it yet to be out and open. But there are more and more every day who I meet and see, and I admire them so much. And I think it would have been great if we had cast [an openly gay actor], but we don't cast within those parameters.

Nor should you.

Cast the best actor who comes into the room, period. And if he's gay, then great.

Did you have any input into the casting?

I didn't, no. The limitation we had is that we had to choose a Canadian actor because of the way the contract was set up. Shooting there, you're limited in the number of Americans you can bring over. We did have to choose a Canadian, and we did talk about a few different actors. And certainly, Sebastian was the best.

Has he been contracted to do the other five movies?

I believe that option lies with here! I don't know, I probably shouldn't comment on it. I have been contracted to do all of them -- that I know.

And when does the next one start filming?

We have been speaking about doing one or maybe even two more sometime in the next six months. I know we have to get one off by February, according to my contract.

And speaking of projects, what is happening with the projects you have with your own production company, Mythgarden? Specifically, "Save Me," which I talked to Robert Gant about around two years ago, I believe.

["Save Me" takes place in an "ex-gay" ministry that's run by a character played by Judith Light. Chad Allen and Robert Gant's characters meet there and start a relationship.]

If you talked with him about it two years ago, you were right at the beginning, because Robert and I first started talking about making it almost exactly two years ago. We are still in the preproduction phase of that. We are looking at November for a possible shoot. Right now Judith is on a project in New York, and that's hamstringing us, but we have financing put together and we are closing in on the director. We really have spent the majority of the past two years working on the script. We hope to have that done by the end of winter. But, gosh, making movies takes so much time. I think the average for making a film from conception to the completion of production is five years.

How different is that from television? I think of you more as a television guy. Is the pace quicker?

It still takes a long time to get a project set up. We have two television projects going right now, and it takes a long time. One we're working closely with Logo on, and the other with here! We're also in negotiations on a movie out of Mythgarden called "The Way Out," which is an amazing love story between two senior citizens in an old-folks' home. It's a wonderful project that gets into the issue of elder gay housing and some of the other issues our community faces. We're co-producing it with David Duchovny, who actually conceived the story himself. I'm very excited about it, as is here!

And speaking of the community and here! and Logo and Q, what is your feeling about having three competing gay networks?

Awesome.

Do you think the community can support three?

I don't know. I don't really care. I know that it's really good for us. The truth is, there's definitely room for a network on free cable, there's definitely room for a network on pay cable. here!'s doing an amazing job. I'm very impressed with everybody who's working there, with their reasons for doing it and why they want to succeed and how they're going about doing it. I think it's a fantastic mission. I'm impressed with the programming they have.

I don't know if the market can bear [all three]. We don't know, because we haven't done it yet, it's brand-new. So we'll see, we'll find out. I know there are a hell of a lot of gay men and women around this country who don't have access to the kind of programming and entertainment options that we get by going down to the video store or the local arthouse movie theater -- all this stuff we have by living in the cities. That doesn't exist for a lot of Americans, so these new television options are a fantastic way for us to reach out to our own.

Talk about an opportunity for us to really galvanize our community, to speak to each other, to encourage everybody in the country to get involved in some way with the myriad of causes that need support in our community and sort of galvanize our strength politically. And not to mention, to take care of our youth and get the message out there (which is my hope with Mythgarden) that we can love ourselves and each other just a little bit more.

That makes sense. Let's get back to the movie for a second. Part of it was about outing, and nobody knows more about outing than you do. How did it make you feel when you found out that was part of the storyline?

I really didn't think about that part of it too much. A lot people assumed that because of my experience, I must have been, "Whoa." But to be perfectly honest, it was just a part of the book. I was much more interested in the characters and relationships.

But I think my opinion on outing has been well stated. I think it's just a bunch of nonsense for anybody to want to put another individual into a place where they do one thing or another with their lives. I got an e-mail from Richard Stevenson, who's the author of the "Donald Strachey" books, and he said that while they consider outing to be passé, there is strong evidence that it's back. That there are a lot of organizations around the country that are starting to assert that it's a good thing for us politically. I don't know if it is or isn't. I believe it's a bad thing for the human soul. There's my opinion.

Now a question you may not want to answer: If you had not been outed, would you have come out?

Almost assuredly. I wouldn't have chosen it that year, because I clearly wasn't ready to talk about it. I did not perceive it as good news about who I was at the time. So I chose to say nothing, and it was another couple years before I decided to publicly acknowledge my sexuality. And at that time it was not the outing, or the photos in "Globe," that played any role whatsoever in my decision to come out. It was a decision by me to speak to those kids who were writing me letters wanting to know if I was gay or not, needing somebody to look up to. That meant more to me than anything else.

I just have never been the kind of person who understood how you live in lies and secrets. And I am a politically minded person. I think, assuming that my career had gone forward, I probably would have eventually come out at any rate. But who knows, maybe I would have become Tom Cruise real quick ...

You could have become a Scientologist.

I'm not saying that Tom Cruise is gay. I just meant that I would have become superhumanly famous and ...

You know, there was a time that you were superhumanly famous, being on the cover of Tiger Beat and such. How did you deal with the transition from being a teen idol to being just an actor?

Actually, I think it was an opportunity to take some time off. After the teen-magazine phenomenon, I didn't think I wanted to be an actor at all. I actually quit. I finished high school. I was coming out at that time personally, and I thought, "Well, screw this. What do I want to be an actor for anymore?" My thinking was to go away to New York and study literature and be gay! Live your life. I didn't want people snapping pictures of me -- I really hated that stuff.

I went back to high school and did everything there was to do. I was in high school sports, I was student body president. I was in every club you can imagine, desperately trying to make up for lost time and be a real person.

And I accidentally fell into the theater program. In my high school, theater was for the geeks, the losers, the gay kids who couldn't help it, and it was not a respected place to be. But it was a gay literature teacher who ran the drama program, and so I was always drawn to the theater department. And I would take very small parts in plays, because I didn't want to be accused of being an actor.

But the truth is, I've loved acting since I was a little boy. It saved my life. It's been the way that I've learned and trusted to express myself since I was a child, so I loved it. And I refell in love with acting in that rinky-dink theater program, and when high school was over, I knew that's what I wanted to do. And I was almost immediately cast in "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman."

I had to make a decision whether I wanted to go back to New York and go to school there and leave this all behind, or go back to work as an actor. I took "Dr. Quinn" under one condition: When the producers told me the series was picked up, I said: "I am not interested in being the teen-magazine idol of the show. If that's what you are looking for in this character, please ask someone else, because I won't be doing any of that." They understood, and they said, "We want you, whatever you want and however you want to do it." I said, "OK, then I'll join on," thinking that it would be a year or so and then I would get on with my plans at NYU.

Are you in touch with any of your old castmates from any of your shows?

Shawn Toovey just called me. He played my little brother on "Dr. Quinn." He just moved back to L.A. after finishing college. I can't wait to give him a brotherly helping hand.

Jane Seymour and I are still really, really good friends. We're in touch and see each other from time to time. She regularly attends screenings or presentations of movies or things that I'm involved with, and I go to her art shows and so on. So we're very close.

I bump into Shannon Doherty every now and again -- it's always fun to say hi.

A couple of old actors did a TV Land segment last night, talking about "St. Elsewhere," my first series. I was there for four years. So many great actors came out of that series -- it's fun to bump into them from time to time. I worked with the producers from "St. Elsewhere" on "NYPD Blue," and I get to catch up on that -- it's really fun.

It's been neat to have been -- and I don't mean to toot my own horn -- but I've been at this for 26 years, and I've been blessed to be part of some great television over the years. I look at it and I go, you know, "That's cool." Who knows where it's going to be from here, where it's supposed to be. It's been fun to have been participating in so many different shows, in five or six top-10 television series over the past 20-odd years. That's neat!

Would you consider going back to doing regular series television?

Yeah, I would! I didn't think I would, but after what I have been through this year. ... You kind of go through a period of needing to be away from it for a while, and then you've got to get yourself back in. I would love to do a series again.

Would you want to play a gay role, or wouldn't it matter?

It wouldn't matter to me. People say to me, "You wouldn't want to be typecast as gay." I'm like, "I've done one gay movie." I would love to do a bunch of gay movies, you know. I feel like I've just barely begun to explore that, to explore my sexuality in terms of my filmmaking and TV-making. And it's fun for me. I would love to play gay characters.

Would you want to do a drama or a comedy?

I've been developing a couple of ideas. One of them is a comedy, a single-camera comedy, HBO-style. And another is a drama. I still love drama, but I am having fun lately exploring the funny side of things. I don't like the sitcom format, but I do like this newer single-camera comedy format, like some of these shows we're seeing: "Entourage" or "The Comeback," or some of the HBO stuff -- "Sex and the City"-style. That's really interesting to me. But the traditional sitcom formula is not really appealing to me.

Well, we won't tell Paul Reiser [star of "My Two Dads"]. He'll be upset with that.

I love Paul.

I know we have to get you to the chiropractor, but before I let you go -- you have a movie coming out in 2006, "End of the Spear."

We should talk again before that comes out, because it's really too much to get into fully right now. It is an amazing project. I play a Christian missionary in 1956 -- a true story. It really is a fantastic deal. We could spend a whole hour just talking about that film and my experience making it, because it was an incredible one. But it will be out in January.

I think that now, Josh should rush you off to the chiropractor and you should get the truck to the auto-body shop, and that will be that. I appreciate your taking the time to talk to me.

It was nice speaking with you, Richard. Take care.

© gay.com by Richard Kravitz