After and during his rise to stardom with the help of Douglas Sirk, Hudson was also being tried out as Universal's hottest new leading man. While Rock was given opportunities to play the swoon-worthy romantic lead with Sirk, a handful of other directors were making him the headlining "every-man" of their films, with very mixed success. This week, we cover the top (there's really just one) and the bottoms of this period of his career spanning 7 films from 1952-1961: The Lawless Breed (Raoul Walsh, 1952), Giant (George Stevens, 1956), A Farewell to Arms (Charles Vidor, 1957), Something of Value (Richard Brooks, 1957), Twilight for the Gods (Joseph Pevney, 1958), The Earth is Mine (Henry King, 1959), and The Last Sunset (Robert Aldrich, 1961). While most of these movies are scraping the bottom of the classic Hollywood barrel, Giant stands out as a true triumph of film-making and an example of Hudson's star power being used correctly. Why did Universal put Hudson in so many movies? How might his whirlwind marriage with a producer's secretary have impacted his image? Did Hudson almost certainly sleep with Sal Mineo? This and more on this week's Cinema Very Gay!
