Secrets of a Gay Marine Porn Star. Rich Merritt
have picked up clues. As I’m writing this, things pop into my head: I recall that Jennifer came back a few weeks after the initial interviews and for the first time she brought up the issue of photographs. SLDN hadn’t said anything about pictures. Later, when they found out, I could tell they were upset. Pictures would be too dangerous, they said. But at the beginning, they just said “cover story.” I don’t know how they could have thought this could be a cover story without photographs. But Jennifer asked, “What are we going to do about the pictures?”
Most of the people who had participated in the interview were not willing to have their picture taken, even with their faces hidden. I, on the other hand, said to Jennifer, “You’re going to cover my face in the photo and call me ‘R’ in the article? Then, fine. Of course I want my picture taken.” But only two other guys, another Marine officer and a Navy officer, agreed to a photo session.
A few weeks later photographer Matt Mahurin came out to take the pictures. We spent several hours with him. He took some off-duty photos of Brandon and me a few days later. But his first shots were of the three of us officers in uniform taken in Balboa Park. For the pictures of us in uniform, at one point he posed the three of us in a line, saluting. I instinctively felt it would make a fantastic photo and envisioned it on the cover.
The other Marine officer Matt photographed was my very good friend, who was nicknamed “Bossy.” Bossy and I were both decked out in the full Marine dress blue uniform. Bossy, however, had forgotten his white gloves. Matt wanted a photograph with our gloves on, so I gave one glove to Bossy, put one on myself, and then Matt posed us close together side-by-side in a shot where only our gloved hands were visible.
Matt then said he had to get some solo shots of me, although he didn’t say why. He came up with the idea that I should salute, and that that the salute should cover my face. He lay on the ground and took a shot directly up. I thought he was catching only my chest, shoulders, and head.
A homeless vet walked by our little group in the park. “Cap’n,” he said, “your salute is all fucked up.” He was right. My arm was deliberately canted so that my face would be completely covered. As salutes go, it was all fucked up.
“We know what we’re doing,” Bossy said dismissively. The vet mumbled something about being a retired master sergeant and never having seen such a fucked-up salute on an officer and walked away. We resumed the photo shoot before the sunlight disappeared.
Matt had read a rough draft of the article and during the session someone asked him what the story was about. “Well,” he replied, “the story’s about Rich and his friends.”
That startled me. Oh my God, I thought, this story is about me? An eight-thousand-word article is a New York Times cover story about me!
On one hand, it was exhilarating. But now more than ever the porn thing was haunting me. I had an impulse to call Jennifer and tell her not to write about me. Obviously I didn’t give in to that urge. Maybe it was ego. I had spent so much of my early life living up to the expectations of others and here, just maybe, now it was my turn. And it was a subject that I was passionate about, something that was pertinent to my life and thousands of others. I knew that it would help a lot of people—I was desperate to be a part of it.
A few weeks before the story appeared, the fact checker called and started asking questions. I was on the phone for almost an hour and I started to feel uneasy. Afterward I made a list of things that she had asked about. By the time I was finished I thought, “I’m toast!” There were key things I had told Jennifer that made me completely identifiable: General’s aide. Commanding Officer. Captain. Southern California. From a Southern religious family. Had done overseas tour. Had been on ship. Initial “R.” It wouldn’t be difficult to connect the dots. Anyone who knew me and read these things, would know I was the “R” in the story.
The magazine was scheduled to come out, so to speak, on Gay Pride Day. I still had six weeks left on active duty after that. They wouldn’t wait for me to be out to publish it because, obviously, the New York Times doesn’t change its publication schedule for a personal issue that arises. I felt that I would be safe because I had submitted my resignation already. I knew the Marine Corps would rather just let it slide. They would rather just let me slip quietly out the door rather than make a big issue out of this. Yeah, the Times cover story was going to be a big deal, but it would be a much bigger deal if they came after me. I was counting on that.
Two weeks before the article appeared, I was in Los Angeles for an SLDN pool party/fund-raiser. At this party I met a freelance writer named Max Harrold. By now, there was a definite buzz in the air about the upcoming New York Times Magazine article. Max approached me, “This sounds really fascinating,” he said. “When do you get out of the Marines?”
I told him that I’d be officially out in the fall. I could almost see the wheels turning in his head. “Can I do a story on you when you get out?” he asked eagerly. “We can reveal your identity and I’m pretty certain I can sell it to The Advocate or one of the other magazines.” I liked the idea as long as I was safely out of the Marines. I agreed that as soon as I was officially out of the service, I would give him an interview.
As time grew closer to the date of publication of the New York Times story, my immediate concern was that the Marines would find out I was the “R” from the story while I was still in the service. I tried to talk myself out of my fears. I kept telling Brandon, “Oh, there’s nothing to worry about. They don’t say who I am.” But, although I hadn’t seen an advance copy and I had no idea what was going to be in there, I had a nagging feeling the Marines would find out who “R” was.
Saturday, June twenty-seventh fell during Gay Pride weekend in Los Angeles and I knew we’d be able to get an early copy of the Sunday New York Times there. As Brandon and I were driving up, I was well aware that it was already on the stands in big cities. I can’t even describe the excitement. The anticipation. The fear. The anxiety. All of that.
We finally got up to LA and, without stopping, went directly to see my friend Tim Carter. The first thing Tim said is, “Rich, you’re finished. You’re history.” He handed me a copy. The first surprise was the cover. There I was saluting—alone! All the while, I had been thinking they were going to use the photo of the three of us standing in a line.
Tim was beside himself. “Look, this is you!” he said immediately. He started talking about General McCorkle, the man I had been the aide to, “You don’t think that he’ll be able to look at this and see that it’s the side of your head?”
I looked at the cover very closely. You couldn’t see my face but you could see everything from my ear back. I thought I was unrecognizable. “No,” I said to Tim. “I don’t think you can tell that this is me. For one thing, I look six feet tall. I’m only five seven.”
The illusion about my height wasn’t the only abnormality in the photograph. At first I didn’t notice the glaring defect. A friend and fellow Marine who was also quoted in the article called me the following day.
“You’re wearing only one glove!” He exclaimed. “What were you thinking?!” He was right. I hadn’t noticed it, but there I was…a one-gloved Marine. I was out of uniform, the worst mistake a Marine can make. Well, almost. Fuck, I thought. I forgot to get the glove back from Bossy. Besides, I thought Matt was only taking the shot from the chest up! My ungloved left hand was visible. What was worse, my left thumb wasn’t along my trouser seam as I had been trained for so many years to stand at the “position of attention.” If it had been, my bare hand wouldn’t have been visible. I had been concentrating so hard on covering my face with my right hand, I hadn’t paid attention to my left.
But tonight I didn’t notice the glove issue—I was too focused on the content of the story. I read it quickly and admitted, “Yeah, they’re going to know it’s me.”
Jennifer started the article off by talking about me, later weaving in the other people. But she kept coming back to me, to my story. Still, I thought the piece was beautiful. I felt Jennifer had captured everything that we revealed to her. She had grasped the situation fully. There are a lot of issues about gays in the military