The first time that I watched Sam Shahid’s Hidden Master: The Legacy of George Platt Lynes, it was part of my Outfest coverage from last year. I couldn’t believe that this was yet another artist that I had never heard of, and director Sam Shahid presents the portrait of a man whose work was so ahead of its time that he hated most of his commercial success. Shahid captures Lynes’ work with such precision, and we must embrace the essential sensuality that Lynes snapped with his camera. It’s about survival.
The first line we hear from someone in this documentary is, “He made his fantasies into a reality.” What a bold, enviable statement.
“The man who delivers that line is the head of the George Platt Lynes Foundation, and I think that it was my fantasy also,” Shahid admits, at the start of our conversation. “When I discovered his photographs, it felt like a fantasy come to life.”
Why are so many queer and gay artists left undiscovered? Lynes’ work was celebrated and beloved in the New York City artist scene of the 1930s and ’40s, but a wider audience is still in the dark about not just Lynes’ photographs but who he was. Shahid has an easy explanation for that. As I watched Shahid’s film again, I couldn’t help but wonder what his Instagram would look like if he were alive today.
“He lived at the wrong time, and no one would publish the work he loved,” he says. “We have been to almost thirty festivals, and it gets brought up every time. Why hasn’t everyone heard about this man? As someone says in the film, it had to do with his content. He wanted to be remembered for the things that he couldn’t show in public–he hated all the fashion stuff. If George would be alive today, he would be recognized.”
Shahid’s film also shows how boldly Lynes lived when he became entangled with Monroe Wheeler and Glenway Wescott, and it shows how, even in his personal life, Lynes knew what he wanted and pursued it without apology. People are often critical of those who are involved in “non-traditional” relationships, and Hidden Master details how these three men supported one another emotionally and sexually. The next time someone suggests that being in a throuple is a newfangled notion, point them in this direction. Shadhid was adamant on showing honest intertwined with sexuality, and I couldn’t imagine this film without it.
“When I was doing a rough cut and I showed it to some other filmmakers, and they told me to cut the sex out of it,” Shahid says. “I couldn’t believe it. I wanted to keep it pure, and I needed to be honest about his life. Some people who told me that we didn’t need to know about those parts of his life. It was interesting when we interviewed people who knew him. They are from a different generation. If I asked someone if they had an affair with George, for instance, they might not answer the question. Bernard Perlin was very up-front about a lot of things, and he was one of the first people we interviewed in the ten years that it took to make this film. George’s nephew suddenly died, so I am thankful that we were able to include him in this.”
It’s important to note that cocktail parties were one of the only ways that gay men could connect in a relaxed way because of the privacy it provided. Shahid uses archival footage to show how New York City’s scene allowed queer people to be themselves behind closed doors, and it really reminded me of a bygone era that we don’t have anymore.
“George loved parties,” he says with a smile. “In the ’30s and ’40s–even when I arrived in New York City in 1969–it was very fashionable for gay men to get together after work and have a few drinks with each other. They don’t have them anymore, and younger people don’t know what they are missing. That’s how a lot of people met George before he photographed them. I think it was comforting for them, and that’s how we formed communities. I don’t hear about cocktails parties anymore. I wanted to make sure that we played with that and showed what it was like. It was a club unto itself, and a lot of gay men felt like themselves when they went to those places. We couldn’t find any photographs at the party, so we used archival footage. On the last day we were going through the photographs, though, we found the contact sheets with that party. When you see the black-and-white photographs–the one with Diana Vreeland–that was that party and George was there. I told the editor that we had to use it and splash back to that glamorous party. I love that we made a film that was so much about New York.”
When we spoke about favorite Lynes photographs, I showed Shahid “Filling Station,” which features a young man in a uniform but his uniform is see-through. When I saw the film again, I mistook the model playing as a milkman, and Shahid reveals that he has a copy in his possession. There is something so wholesome and classic about the silhouette, and even the model, Jacques d’Amboise, has an all-American look.
“If you look at it, you see through the outfit,” he says. “The Whitney showed that same photograph, but it was taken with underwear or something on. Since there were two versions of it, I made sure that the one I showed–and the one I owned–was the original. Paul Cadmus designed those costumes.”
After Lynes gave a lot of his photographs to the Kinsey Institute, he also turned over a box with instructions that it never be opened. Shahid and I talked about loving that no one knows what’s inside, and I even hope that there is a queer heist film where out actors like Matt Bomer, Tituss Burgess, and Joel Kim Booster try to snatch it. At the end, I hope, Booster gives a rousing speech about how we need to retain the artist’s wishes to retain a little mystery in the world. Maybe I can write the screenplay and Shahid can direct?
“That’s a great idea,” Shahid say. “The film premiered theatrically in New York, and that came up as a question. Will that box ever be opened? Rebecca Fasman, the woman responsible for that box, was in the audience, and she said that there is a letter that George wrote Kinsey that gives strict circumstances to never open it. It probably never will be. The only person who can get permission, interestingly enough, is his son, Josh, and he has said that he wants no part of it. I love that it’s still sealed.”
Hidden Master: The Legacy of George Platt Lynes is available now to rent.
