He is known as one of the greatest ever interpreters of Shakespeare, who was awarded an Oscar and made a knight, but John Gielgud is to become known for something rather more counter-cultural: a gay porn film he wrote for Peter de Rome, which may finally go into production.

De Rome was a film-maker who made gay pornography in New York from the 1960s onwards, at a time when homosexuality was illegal, and became the subject of the recent documentary Peter de Rome: Grandfather of Gay Porn. He died earlier this year. The film’s producer David McGillivray, in conversation at a recent retrospective of pulp director Pete Walker, revealed details of a collaboration between De Rome and Gielgud.

“Peter de Rome knew everybody when he was working, including John Gielgud, and John was so impressed with Peter’s work – which of course was porn – that he wrote Peter a screenplay. Nobody knows anything about this script, it’s not in the John Gielgud letters, it’s not mentioned in the biographies, it’s an unknown script. John Gielgud’s only screenplay. So next year, we are going to make that … It’s called Trouser Bar. John Gielgud was obsessed with trousers, loved corduroy and leather. And so he wrote a film set in a menswear shop.”

Kristen Bjorn, “the Peter de Rome of the 21st century” according to McGillivray, is to direct it. He added: “The Guardian and the Indy are just going to go weak at the knees.”

But it may meet some opposition along the way. “The John Gielgud estate is furious,” he continued. “They won’t let us do it, but they don’t have a leg to stand on. So they’re going to be very upset about this, but we’ve got the BFI behind us.”

In a statement to the Guardian, the BFI said that while they have given support to De Rome’s work since the director donated his Super-8 films to the BFI National Archive in 2006, since releasing a DVD entitled The Erotic Films of Peter de Rome, they have “no involvement with the unmade film, Trouser Bar.” They are set to screen Peter de Rome: Grandfather of Gay Porn next month, featuring a Q&A with McGillivray.

Gielgud, who never formally came out as gay, suffered a nervous breakdown after he was caught cruising in a Chelsea public toilet in 1953 – an incident that didn’t damage his career as he initially feared, but which he never spoke about publicly. The events were turned into a play in 2008, Plague Over England, by Nicholas de Jongh.

As well as the Trouser Bar screenplay, Gielgud once offered to provide a voiceover to Kensington Gorey, a De Rome film which remains unfinished – but with the caveat that he remain uncredited.

(the guardian)