We used to go see my dad’s kids from a previous marriage. They were quite a bit older and they lived in San Francisco. We went up to visit my brother Mike.

It was the summer of love in San Francisco and my parents drove up Haight Street to see all the hippies hanging out. I got to see that! I got to see thousands and thousands of hippies hanging out. The music, and everyone was getting high, to my parents that looked like a zoo!

We drove up from Los Angeles and all along the way, particularly in Santa Barbara, we saw hippies hitch hiking up to San Francisco. It was crazy. The roads were packed, it was huge!

It seems like things were changing for the better. I was very much in favor of the things that were happening. My parents were democrats and they hated Nixon. I remember my father being horrified when Ronald Reagan was elected governor, horrified!

He hated that son – of – a – bitch.

And he hated him even more because they were fellow movie actors. Reagan had been the president of the screen actor’s guild and my father knew him. My father used to say that Reagan wasn’t bright enough to be governor. He used to say that Reagan was right wing, uptight.

And when he became president my dad was apoplectic. It was unbelievable to him. So I was raised in a very liberal household. My parents were mixed-race. I was pro-anything for minority rights.

My parents were not particularly religious, either. So I took all kinds of religion classes in high school and college. I studied world religions. Politically I was, of course, very liberal. And I knew I was gay since I was a child and so I was pro-gay rights.

This was also the time of emerging gay rights. The first time I went to a gay bar in West Hollywood there was a huge gay rights rally. My friend took me. I remember this was the time of the whole Anita Bryant scene.

This was all very empowering for young man from high school who was coming into his own. I began to feel that I deserve rights just like anyone else, and I was witnessing the beginning of this movement. The timing was good for me.

On the other hand my older brother came out in the late nineteen fifties and he didn’t have the advantage of this perspective.