October 6, 2026
Michael Kearns, a legend fixture in the gay community who later became one of the first actors to publicly acknowledge he was HIV positive, died October 5.
He was 76.
His death was announced on Facebook Tuesday by his close friend, performance artist Tim Miller, who wrote:
“I am mourning my beloved Michael Kearns. AIDS performer-warrior. Big brother. Friend since 1984. Truly one of a kind. The world is a smaller place … I love you, Michael.”
Born January 8, 1950, in St. Louis, Missouri, he attended the Goodman School of Drama in Chicago.
By 1972, he had relocated to L.A. and begun a varied career as an actor, making his stage debut in (future Dreamgirls scribe) Tom Eyen’s The Dirtiest Show in Town.
Among his early mainstream credits, he guested on The Waltons (1974) and appeared in the much-loved broad comedy The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977).
He had vastly more credits in the theater than on TV or in the movies, almost always weaving political activism into his work. This was reflected in the many grants he received from such prominent orgs as the Brody Foundation and PEN Center USA West.
In a publicity coup, he was briefly known as “Grant Tracy Saxon,” and presented as being the author of the best-selling The Happy Hustler (1975). The book’s true author was Thom Racina, but Kearns — a date mate — was better equipped to promote it, including posing nude.
He took time out from performing in the play Tubstrip to plug the book, which also entailed doing the TV talk-show circuit via Donahue and other mainstream shows.
Kearns reportedly took 10% of the book’s earnings. In those days, books actually sold — and that one was said to have moved 3 million copies.
Having played the part, he became a real-life hustler in part to fuel a drug and alcohol problem, dabbling in hardcore porn in L.A. Tool & Die (1979) with Richard Locke, Paul Baressi, Will Seagers and Casey Donovan, as well as some others.
While posting nude, he did some terrific work with shooter Don Hanover. I asked Michael about this several years ago, and he replied with characteristic wit:
“Gawd. I feel like Gloria Swanson. I cannot remember if any of his photos were in Mandate, to be honest. I know they appeared in a P-Town weekly. A spread, if you'll excuse the expression. People have sent me some of his pics to autograph which are, I must say, some of the best ever taken of me. We had faces then.”
He got sober and returned to more traditional gigs, which included guesting on Cheers (1983), appearing in the Joan Collins/Jon-Erik Hexum made-for-TV movie Making of a Male Model (1983) and playing a porn actor in Brian De Palma’s Body Double (1984).
Some of his other mainstream appearances: The Fall Guy (1985); Murder, She Wrote (1985); Crazy Like a Fox (1985), Days of Our Lives (1985) and Knots Landing (1991).
In 1991, reflecting his activist’s heart, he made the bold decision to come out about being HIV positive on Entertainment Tonight. He co-founded Artists Confronting AIDS (ACA) with James Carroll Pickett and has worked with PFLAG.
He continued working, appearing in an AIDS-themed episode of Life Goes On (1992) and in the AIDS-themed films And the Band Played On as Cleve Jones (1993) and It’s My Party (1996), and even on three episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210 (1996).
In 2021, he told The Los Angeles Blade of working with HIV (and often playing characters with HIV):
“It was a new kind of cliché. They had to always make me look horrible. The ghastlier the better. They could not have an HIV character who looked normal — as I did when I arrived at the set. Finally, I had enough and refused to do that anymore.”
A more realistic take on HIV/AIDS informed his two greatest works, the one-man shows Intimacies and More Intimacies, in which he could be seen acting out the parts of a disparate array of people with the virus.
He wrote plays, screenplays and traveled the world performing onstage.
Acclaimed as a writer, he produced the must-read memoir The Truth Is Bad Enough: What Became of the Happy Hustler? (2012) and recently performed in It Must Be Him: A Genderful Musical Memoir (2023), his sixteenth solo show.
Kearns was also an in-demand acting teacher for many years.
Along with his supremacy in the area of the arts, one of the most incredible things Kearns did was successfully adopt a daughter, Katherine, in the ‘90s as a single, HIV-positive gay man. (Read his 2018 interview with her here.)
He is survived by her.
Five years ago, writer Rob Watson wrote the following summation of what Kearns’ place in queer history, and it feels the perfect way to end his obit:
“He is the godfather of LGBT+ authenticity. In earlier days, he may have represented sex, he may have walked us through a period of darkness and death into the arms of the creation of the new family. He has now brought us home, and when we look at him, we see a new quality. Wisdom.”⚡️
His memory WILL be a blessing