While Leonardo DiCaprio, Armie Hammer
and Clint Eastwood are united in downplaying whether J. Edgar Hoover
was gay, J. Edgar writer, Dustin Lance Black, has said the FBI
boss “was not straight.”
In
remarks to GQ, DiCaprio, who played the title role, and
Eastwood, who directed the film, said they cannot say with certainty
that rumors that Hoover was gay are true, adding that the audience
would need to make that call.
Hammer, who plays Clyde Tolson,
Hoover's co-worker, life-long confidant and alleged lover, also got
word to downplay Hoover's alleged sexuality.
“If you talk to the Federal Bureau of
Investigation (FBI), there are staunch believers that these two men
carried out a very professional relationship and they were sort of
inseparable pals,” Hammer told E!
Online at the film's premiere.
In an interview with gay blog
Towleroad,
Black, who also penned the film Milk and the play 8,
was a bit less coy on the subject.
“Well people have been speculating
about J. Edgar's sexuality for generations now,” Black said.
“People have been saying 'Oh, he ran around in cocktail dresses!'
That, to me, didn't ring true and in my research proved not to be
true. But also in looking into his record as a heterosexual he
failed miserably. And so it becomes quite clear when you look at
what he did and didn't do that whether or nor he ever consummated it,
this was a guy who was not straight.”