Role models of greatness.

Here you will discover the back stories of kings, titans of industry, stellar athletes, giants of the entertainment field, scientists, politicians, artists and heroes – all of them gay or bisexual men. If their lives can serve as role models to young men who have been bullied or taught to think less of themselves for their sexual orientation, all the better. The sexual orientation of those featured here did not stand in the way of their achievements.

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Raymond Burr's Fabricated Hetero Life

Many gay actors invest enormous amounts of energy to remain closeted, but few deceptions were as convoluted as that of Canadian-born Raymond Burr (1917-1993), known for decades as TV’s Perry Mason. He believed he could conceal his homosexuality by creating an imaginary life to hide his thirty-five-year relationship with Robert Benevides. Burr told everyone he was married three times and had a son who died of leukemia at the age of ten. However, a few years after his death, Burr’s sister admitted that her brother was married only once (the marriage was annulled after a few months) and never had a son.

Burr was leading a secret gay life at a time in Hollywood when an acknowledged homosexuality was career suicide, so he fabricated a tragic biography for himself in which he was mythologized as a heartbroken husband and father. There was even an invented affair with a teenage Natalie Wood, 21 years his junior.

At the height of his popularity in television and film, he frequently gave speeches to the American Bar Association, by virtue of his famous portrayal of lawyer Perry Mason. Burr was driven to embellish this elaborate façade when he found out in 1961 that a member of the American Bar Association had given the FBI documents indicating that Burr was "a noted sex deviate." Burr’s response was a classic case of gay panic.

Burr’s television persona, Perry Mason, was a defense attorney who was the main character in works of detective fiction by celebrated author Erle Stanley Gardner. Burr played this role for an astonishing five decades. He won fame, fortune, and numerous awards for portraying Mason for nine years on TV, followed by 26 made-for-TV movies. When TV Guide asked Burr shortly before his 1993 death to name a single regret, he answered, “It was accepting the role that made me famous: Perry Mason. It dominated my life. Perry took over, and it became a burden.”

In 1993, Burr’s close friend, actor Charles Macaulay, told Mary Murphy of TV Guide, “Raymond Burr really was Perry Mason. The two were one and the same.” Maybe so, but Raymond Burr had other interests. He was an innovative breeder of orchids, an award-winning vintner, a respected Beverly Hills art dealer, and foster father to more than twenty children.


The 6'3" actor began work as a teenaged lounge singer, and soon thereafter Dragnet’s Jack Webb gave him work as a radio actor, which led to theater work. At age twenty, Burr became a member of a Toronto-based repertory theater. However, his real fame was achieved as a TV and movie actor.

In 1954 he played the menacing wife-killer Lars Thorwald in Alfred Hitchcock’s classic, Rear Window. Two years later, the tall, rotund actor appeared in Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the first of the Godzilla movies. That same year Burr auditioned for the title role in CBS’s upcoming Perry Mason series. At the audition, Perry Mason creator Erle Stanley Gardner witnessed Burr’s reading and exclaimed “He’s Perry Mason.”

After the CBS drama premiered in 1957, Raymond Burr was suddenly a big star and one of television’s highest paid actors. He spent much of his income to support a philanthropic lifestyle. Burr famously opened his home and wallet to out of work actors. As well, he supported more than twenty foster children. Without publicity, and at his own expense, Burr made trips to Korea and Vietnam to support and speak with our soldiers serving on the front lines. He was awarded an honorary law doctorate from the McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, California, on the basis of his association with the role of TV lawyer Perry Mason.

Burr’s generosity took other forms, as well. When William Talman, who played the forever losing prosecutor Hamilton Burger on Perry Mason, was busted during a raid at a pot party (in the nude no less), he was fired by CBS. They used the morals clause in their contract to dump him. But Burr tirelessly worked on behalf of Talman to get his job back. Burr refused to remove Talman’s coffee mug from the rack on the set and forbade Talman’s dressing room to be cleaned out or his space on the studio parking lot to be reassigned. Eventually the executives at CBS relented and Talman was back on the show, but his career would have been finished if it had not been for Burr’s intervention.

Nine seasons, 271 episodes, and two Best Actor Emmy wins later, the Perry Mason series came to an end. This gig was followed by the highly successful Ironside NBC series (1967-1975), in which Burr played paralyzed police detective Robert Ironside.













It was on the set of Perry Mason that Burr first met Robert Benevides, the man who would become his companion and partner. Burr and Benevides discovered a mutual interest in the hybridization of orchids. Together they started a nursery with orchid ranges in Fiji, Hawaii, the Azores and Southern California. Over a twenty-year period, their hybridization was responsible for more than fifteen hundred new orchids being added to the worldwide catalogue. Also with Benevides, Burr opened a successful Rodeo Drive art gallery.

By the mid 1980s, the portly actor and some of his series co-stars returned for the first of twenty-six, two-hour made-for-TV Perry Mason movies. It was about that same time that Burr and Benevides began growing grapes in Sonoma County, California. Their first releases came to market in 1990. To this day, Robert Benevides oversees the award-winning Chardonnay and Cabernets at Raymond Burr Vineyards. These wines have won a number of gold medals and even a Sweeps prize at the 2008 San Diego Wine Competition.

Diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer in 1992, Burr retreated with Benevides to their Sonoma Valley ranch, where the TV icon spent his final days dispersing his wealth through charities, gifts to friends, and the development of grant and trust programs. In the last two weeks of his life, Raymond Burr hosted farewell parties for his friends and foster children. He was buried in New Westminster, British Columbia, the town where he was born, and where a Raymond Burr Performing Arts Center operated until 2006.

Fred Steiner, composer of the Perry Mason theme, died this past June at the age of 88. He wrote numerous TV themes, including music for the Rocky & Bullwinkle Show, Gunsmoke, The Danny Thomas Show, and “Park Avenue Beat,” the name of the Perry Mason theme music. Have a listen to this distinctive composition.




49 comments:

  1. I happened to research on Raymond Burr for a travel article http://travelboldly.blogspot.com/2013/07/fiji-orchid-make-perry-masons-former.html I was writing about the Fiji Orchid guest house on Viti Levu in Fiji. I found Burr's story very compelling especially the lengths he went to conceal his secret life. He was a revered figure in Fiji and the orchid gardens he established are still giving joy.

    Perry Mason reruns continue to be one of my favorite television shows.

    Thanks your post.

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  2. Met Raymond in 1989 at age 16 at the Leonardo Divinci Airport in Rome. He was deplaning and I was on my way to Athena. He was soooooooooooo wonderful and nice. My only regret is that I didn't sit with him for coffee or tea as I was in transit. Missed opportunity! Wish I were born in 1940 so that I could have had the chance to know people like Raymond Burr, Gary Cooper, and Anthony Perkins.

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  3. What an extraordinary actor, generous and compassionate talent. I feel so privileged to have been able to enjoy Raymond Burr's TV and movie productions for over 50 years--- and remain doing so thru the reruns which enable younger generations to do so as well.

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  4. he was a great man who deserves to be praised to the skies. he stood by talman when the latter was dying of lung cancer.

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  5. Great man .. Indeed still watching his tv series . Great partner too robert benevides .. True great love

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  6. I watch Perry Mason every day at 10:00 AM and again at 11:30 PM. I don't care how many times I've seen the episodes, I always enjoy them thoroughly because of the force of Raymond Burr's personality and his unique, beautiful speaking voice. If they ever take Perry Mason off the air, I shall be devastated. Fabricated identity? I don't think so. I believe Mr. Burr was just what he appeared to be. A perfect role model for men gay or straight, I should think. LOVELY guy! God bless him!

    - Orlando Woolf

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    1. Perry Mason episodes are all available on DVD, and the shows are even sharper than they were in the 1950's! I have most of his shows. You can buy used DVD's of his shows for a very nominal price through Amazon. I have bought them for years and I am quite happy. I also truly enjoy Raymond Burr's talents as Perry Mason.

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    2. I too love the reruns I watched in the fifties, sixties. So glad to see them again & again.. You summed up his unique personality very well, he came across as a good man & was just that. I love Rayond Burr/Perry Mason!!

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  7. This is the first time in decades I've read the Talman story. But, you left out the punchline I read way back when--he was found not guilty (or whatever) because he wasn't apprehended with any pot on him since he had nothing on him.

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  8. I have lived watching the Perry Mason shows for over 40 years, and I must say I believe you have Mr. Burr's height mistaken with William Hopper's 6'3". I believe he was closer to 6'1". He is one of my absolute favorite actors, and his booming voice is just so commanding. I have shared my love for all things Perry Mason, which I got from my mother, with my children. And so he will continue to live on for future generations.

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  9. Loved this man loved his Perry Mason Role, was a incredible actor.

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  10. I am a relative of an actress who frequently appeared on Perry Mason. She told me that Burr would often scour the actors' retirement homes giving jobs to the needy. He was so generous and loved by all who knew him that everyone honored his privacy. A good man as well as a wonderful actor.

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    1. Wow that's so cool.The more I read about him the more I like him.In impressed with his generosity.I used to wonder where they got some of the actors.

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  11. Just caught up with this site which is terrific! In 1988, I spent a few minutes with Mr. Burr preparing as host of an annual Charity Dinner in San Francisco for which he was the unpaid guest speaker. He surprised us by giving an unrehearsed totally off the cuff yet brilliant appeal on behalf of the charity, Shaare Zedek in Jerusalem. He started off by saying that he knew the medical center very well, he had visited there for treatment 20 years before when on tour. We were all so grateful for his time and depth of knowledge. Just before he left, he told me that a check was in the mail. Sure enough, a few days later, the charity's office received his personal check for $10,000. An amazingly modest, thoughtful and generous man.

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  12. Dr. Donna Wintons JamesJune 24, 2016 at 1:14 PM

    I to grew up watching Perry Mason. He was indeed the lawyer that I would have wanted to defend me eve though he was not a real lawyer!!! He was very burly and manly---- never showed a feminine side!!! I still watch the old reruns and my daughters still laugh at me saying mom you have seen these episodes over and over again----still I continue to watch my Perry Mason

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  13. He was a wonderful person and motivated and inspired many to become attorneys. I watch perry mason every and just love every episode. His friendship with talman was heroic. We were so blessed to have him in our lives.

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  14. I have watched Perry Mason and Ironside for as long as I can remember. This world was blessed to have such a wonderful loving man and we need more like Raymond Burr
    I don't know of any actor or actress with a big heart ad Raymond.

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  15. Just found out through this post that Raymond burr was gay. It is a shame that such a great actor and human being such as mr.burr had to hide his true self in order to be accepted. I wish we could all be more understanding of each other and not to condemn before we actually know the real person inside.

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    1. I agree sir,i am not gay but i have a child hood friend that is and he is one of the best ppl u would want for a friend,i for one could carless what one does in the bedroom if u treat me good i will treat u good n we will be friends,i really hate lik u do that mr burr had to hide is life,but ill tell u this he had to be one happy man cause he always gave so that had to really make him feel good all the time...

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  16. My husband and I love watching Raymond Burr on dvds of Perry Mason both the early shows and the later movies. I also love the handsome detective Paul Drake. These shows still give pleasure to so many!

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  17. Such a great show! I have loved watching Raymond Burr for decades! We are blessed to have so many episodes to watch! It beats the heck out of the modern shows who try to get the 100 episodes, go to syndication, and go on vacation. Thank you Mr. Burr, truly a giving man!

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  18. Love him! Thank you for giving us so many episodes to enjoy! Truly a giving man! And so good looking!

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  19. Even though some of his clients were completely indefensible, Burr made you believe it could be done, great man-Bill S

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  20. Great site I just found it. Raymond Burr will always be Perry Mason. He was an extremely talented actor and a wonderful human being.

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  21. A most cherished memory, watching Perry Mason & Ironside with my WWII DAVFW father. Thank you for honouring Raymond Burr and respectfully celebrating the relationship he shared with Robert Benevides.

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  22. Raymond Burr added dignity and compassion to the character of Perry Mason which did not appear in Erle Stanley Gardner's books. The platonic relationship between Perry Mason and Della Street is almost impossible to believe. Mr. Gardner set very strict moral standards for his show. A wonderful group of actors makes the "Perry Mason" T.V. series an enduring pleasure to watch after so many years since the shows were first performed.

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  23. I will always love Perry Mason/Raymond Burr.I love his intellect most but his humor compassion and style are all part and parcel of a very gifted and remarkable human being.I am moved to tears when I think of him.He also signifies truth and justice alive and well which I think all good people yearn for.He fights for those ideals and he fights for US.I love the black and white which I find comforting actually.I remember it as I grew up in mom n dads (my) home.I love his voice-always assured but kind, calm and capable.His eyes which are bright and astute, seeing what the wrongdoers try to hide-always prompting them to 'fess up.I pray they never take him off the airways! Respectfully submitted.

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  24. Everyone's going on about "Perry Mason" - but right now I'm watching reruns of "Ironside", in which Burr was brilliant. I always loved his innate calmness, the deep voice - even the irascibility of Ironside!

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  25. Raymond Burr as "Ironside" was brilliant, I miss Raymond and his supporting cast mates...A true classic.��

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  26. I'm watching a rerun on me TV right now, he was an amazing actor

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  27. I was too young to see perry mason when it ran but discovered the reruns two years ago just recently seen episodes I never knew about he eas brilliant as mason saw ironside when it aired but did not like the character too mean and nasty but I had a crush on barbara anderson shame he fabricated so much of his life but it was neccessary otherwise we would never witnessed his acting because of homophobic era back then he is missed truly a gift to the world.

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  28. I just discovered the reruns of perry mason two years ago as I was too young to experience the show wjen it aired just saw episodes I did not know about two days ago. I wish mr. Tallman and mr. Hopper had lived longer to appear in eighties movies they made the show better also watched ironside with my parents as a child but did not like the character far too mean and nasty but I had a crush on barbara anderson ever since I had seen her in star trek episode.happy burr had someone to love him don't blame him for fabricated life considering homophobia at that time his Secretary was lovely della she had a long life we just lost her may they all rest in peace hope to meet cast in heaven like all my childhood shows bonanza star trek and others God bless.

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  29. I can't help wondering if the person from the American Bar Association, who tried to ruin Raymond Burr's career by reporting him to the FBI, ever felt any regret after learning what a wonderful and generous person Raymond Burr really was. I hope so.

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  30. Great actor enjoy watching Perry Mason every night and on my day off during the day. Also saw Mr.Burr in the Godzilla movie. I always felt that Mr. Burr was a good man,but after reading this about him it just confirms how nice a person he really was.

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  31. The NY Times reported that Mr. Burr's death was due to kidney cancer as per his doctor, not pancreatic cancer. Whatever the cause, this great man was taken way too early.

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  32. Linda Gonales SacramentoMarch 25, 2017 at 10:13 PM

    I'm just sorry that Mr. Burr couldn't be open with his lifestyle.He is loved and would have been accepted by everyone. He obviously was a generous man with a big heart.I love watching Perry Mason. I'm watching him right now.commenting during commercials. He will be Remembered for years to come. It would have been nice to meet his partner Mr. Beneviedes and hope to one day visit his winery.

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    1. Not back then! It is not that accepted now and it was absolutely unacceptable in those days.

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  33. This man was incredible! I love Perry Mason. I watch it at 10:30 p.m. as well as 8 a.m. Raymond Burr lead a really full life he did so much in a short time. Most charitable person I've ever heard of.

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    1. I ordered all the tapes from all seasons.

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  34. absolutely love raymond burr.... i found out about him when i was 15 & reruns played on metv with him in them... he had such a compelling vibe i fell absolutely in love and read all about him....very pleased to read he was gay and lived a happy life with robert benevides.... & what a wonderful man he was! as a young gay man myself, he really is an inspiration... absolutely adore him. xoxoxox

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  35. The Raymond Burr Performing Arts Center was closed many years ago.

    http://raymondburr.blogspot.com/p/objectives-and-current-projects-raymond.html

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  36. the absolute best and Canadian to boot thankyou fellow Canadian for all you did

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  37. the best love my fellow Canadian

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  38. I have been watching reruns of Perry Mason and just love them! They are from the late 50s to 60s. It was on for about 9 years. I love the cars and old Los Angeles and Paul Drake. I had never heard the story about William Talman but thought it very interesting. Raymond Burr was very handsome and manly and had that beautiful deep voice. I was intrigued about Perry and Della’s partnership. There was not much information about Perry except he was in the Navy. Della was always free to go wherever and whenever Perry needed her. Separate rooms of course! I think all the present shows mess up by getting the two main characters involved very personally and there is way too much sex going on and not enough plot or story. The main complaint l have about Perry Mason is they smoke too much. Lol. I hope Raymond Burr had a happy life as I think he brought a lot of happiness to others. I heard he was very charitable and giving to others. I wish I could get lronside just to watch more Raymond Burr.

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  39. When I was just a kid in the late '50's, early '60's, the Perry Mason show was aired early Saturday evening. My whole family would gather in the den to watch Perry Mason and have what we called "Perry Mason Supper" -- grilled burgers, fried potatoes and Cole slaw. To this day my birth family calls that meal the Perry Mason Supper. We all still love to watch Perry Mason on MeTV.

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  40. I don't think there will EVER be an actor as talented and generous as Raymond Burr. God bless his soul.

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  41. When I was younger I watched Ironside and Perry Mason, I recently started watching Perry Mason again after I'd get my grandson off to school. What memories. I've been a fan for many years of Mr.Burr, and never knew he had a 🍷 Winery or was Bisexual and found him more interesting after reading this about him. I wish he had let his fan's known sooner. For me as well as so many others it's always been about the acting and how you feel about someone, not if they are gay, bisexual or straight. In my opinion he was a very talented man and deserved all the love and respect his heart could hold from his fan's. Both he and his partner. I wish I could afford a bottle of his wine and sit on my front poarch as the sun goes down and drink 🍸it in his memory, to all the good times he gave me as a younger adult as well as a senior now. He was the best. May his beautiful soul rest in peace. I'm sure it's the finest wine 💋lips have ever tasted.

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