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tony-ward.com   MENU   Home Gallery Biography Interview Guestbook Friends Contact	1996 with chisel.com - crew   Reprint from the Interview by the CHISEL crew Tony Ward and Rick Castro   Tony Ward - Tells All    "I do what I want, with who I want, when I want."   Tony Ward stars in the newly released Rick Castro and Bruce LaBruce film HUSTLER WHITE. While most famous to many as the six year partner of MADONNA ( as seen in the videos for JUSTIFY MY LOVE,CHERISH, and the book SEX) Ward is well known to gays for his earlier photo work. COLT STUDIOS published a series of hot photos of the young Tony Ward under the name of "Franco Kier". Subsequently under his real name he was photographed by such big names as Bruce Weber and Herb Ritts for magazines such as IN TOUCH and BLUEBOY. After that it was the fashion pages, starting with a German VOGUE swimsuit layout, and, on to the runways of the big name designers. Three or four years ago he made the jump to TV commercials and music videos such as George Michael's FAST LOVE, that have been his recent living. Ward expresses great pleasure when reminded of his particularly big profile in the gay community. He comfortably explains that in his life he has had both sexual relationships, and important emotional commitments with men. As well he is rarely without a girlfriend. He says "I do what I want, with who I want, when I want". He just refuses to accept a limiting label of homo-hetero-bi, on himself. Tony had been shopping around for a Hollywood role for a while, but not finding what he wanted. But when Rick Castro gave Tony the script for the controvercial HUSTLER WHITE, the response was yes within hours. Rick Castro is the Co-writer and director of HUSTLER WHITE. He had been using hustlers for his photography models and during these sessions they would tell him stories about their lives. He said "I never knew if the stories were accurate or not, but it didn't matter, because they were like urban myths. They became true by the repeated telling." Rick took those stories to producer Bruce La Bruce, and they collaborated on bringing them to the screen as HUSTLER WHITE.   On Hustler White   ...the opening scene you are getting banged silly by that big long haired hippy...    After the San Francisco Premier of Hustler White, Tony sat down for a conversation with his Director Rick Castro and Gaywave's publisher Doug McClelland. Doug: Hustler White is your first film, and you seemed very natural playing Monty the Hustler. Did you do research for the part? Tony: Not research really. The hustlers were great. I would just go and watch them. I loved just watching them. I mean.. I've always watched hustlers and been fascinated with that. My research was just the way I began modelling. I was discovered on my college campus by a man that used to hunt young men for Jim French the COLT MAGAZINE photographer. He found me and introduced me to Jim French and we did the photo shoot for COLT MAGAZINE. My studio name was Franco Kier. Rick: Oh I never knew that. Tony: Yah. Rick: That's interesting. Tony: Yah, I was Franco Kier. Rick: Who came up with that name? Tony: Jim French. Rick: Really? Tony: So at the beginning I was very very young and naive. I had grown up poor in San Jose, and I was bodybuilding at the time, working out at the gym, doing a bit of training people. I had always wanted to be photographed, my bible at the time was MUSCLE AND FITNESS. Rick: Now its CITY OF NIGHT. Tony: Right! I didn't know how to begin modelling and I was very very naive. This guy, a middle aged man, comes up to me and says "you're beautiful, I want to photograph you". Sounds great! Hey sure! You know I've never had my body photographed, and I thought if someone wants to take pictures of my body, well excellent. You know, he promised he'd make me a star. I was really innocent and I just started "trading out". He was probably not a professional photographer. He probably never even had film in his camera. We progressively got to the point where he asked" Can you take your clothes off for some pictures?" I was kind of nervous and scared, but I wanted to please him, you know. I wanted to do the right thing to be a star, so I did it.   ... being the object of blow jobs and other things for photographers to get pictures for my first portofolio....   He introduced me to other San Francisco photographers and I ended up "trading out" with them too. Being the object of blow jobs and other things for photographers to get pictures for my first portfolio. So I wasn't a hustler, but I started out doing scandalous things. Doug: Did you have any problems doing the sex scenes in Hustler White? In the opening scene you are getting banged silly by that big long haired hippy. Tony: No not at all. I mean that this is a fantasy. Doug: Your fantasy? Rick: No, my fantasy! Tony: Any time I've had any sexual encounters with men, it has always been with an older man. It's always, you know, always been a more mature man. Its always somebody older than myself and I don't know why. Maybe its a father thing. I didn't grow up with a father. The first person who ever said I was beautiful was this man Joe.                           On Madonna   Doug: I feel silly for bringing this up but everyone who I told that I was going to be meeting you said "Ask him about Madonna!" Tony: Right. Rick: You always know when people are about to ask him that question, because they always start off with "this is a silly question" Doug: Inquiring minds want to know I guess. Tony: Well she was a great lady. She still is a great lady. We had a relationship for six years, like everyone else has relationships. It ended. That's it. I love her, she loves me, we're still good friends. That's it, simple. Doug:The footage of you in Madonna's "Justify My Love"video was great. Tony: Well thank you.   On Tattoos   ... Ok, but I think you just really want to see my chest...   Doug: In the movie you show off some great tattoos, Tony. How about showing them to us. Tony: Ok, but I think you really just want to see my chest. This one that says "Mr Ward" on my chest was done about two weeks before the movie. Its early American style. It's my family name, it's to remind me of who the hell I really am. This is my first tattoo here on my right shoulder. A screaming skull laughing in the face of death. This one on my left shoulder is two lines and was done with a knife and a razor blade, and filled in with ink. On my back are gimini stars, and a devil to watch my back and protect me. The hands on my back are my hands, done from a photograph of me reaching up to the sky. On my arm is a totem, a picture of me and my girlfiend De Dee and my baby. I have this little tattoo on my ankle, kind of prison style. Doug: I brought you a chisel.com T-Shirt. Tony: I want a Chisel T-Shirt, let me put it on. Thanks. Doug: Finally, how would you sum up the movie Hustler White? Rick: Hustler White is a romantic comedy about hustlers on Santa Monica Blvd. It shows Santa Monica Blvd in Los Angles, this paradise for a very short period, in a very special time in Los Angles, when the dick ruled all. It is an exagerated, romanticized view of the oldest profession in the world. Go to the film and judge for yourself. Doug: Thanks guys.   On Jesse Helms   Bud Cockerin ... he should have the wrath of God against him... Doug: What did you guys think of the audience response to Hustler White at last nights film festival showing? Rick: Oh, let me tell you! I didn't know what to expect. I have to admit I was a little nervous about it because I heard this whole horror story that had happened at last year's festival with the movie FRISK. It caused this riot, and I even heard of lovers that broke up because one loved FIRSK and one hated FRISK. San Franciso tends to have a politically correct element going on and I'm not exactly the type of person who hangs a rainbow flag out of my window. The film touches on a lot of subjects that some people may find offensive, while some people just find it completely slap stick. But last nights San Francisco crowd was one of the best responses we've had to a screening so far. Tony: Definetly better that at the Sundance film festival. Rick; Anything would be better that Sundance was . Tony: We played hustlers, not johns, so they just glossed right over us . Doug: So you've done alot of other festivals? Rick: I'll give you a little synopsis. We premiered at Sundance, on Feb 20. The Egyptian Theatre was sold out, despite its terrible sound qualities. There were a lot of film industry people there. During each challenging scene (I'm sure you can figure out which scenes) we would lose certain members of the audience. Tony and Bruce have a deep soul kiss at one point, and we even lost people in that scene. We're talking about a real industry around here. Then MIRIMAX decided that they could not market us. This is not goting to be the next " PRIEST" There were also people who thought it was a really amazing film, and understood what we were doing. But because of the industry quality of Sundance, a lot of people just said oh its no commercial, no thanks, never mind its just porno. We have also gone to Berlin where some people loved it and some were appalled.In Dublin you could hear a pin drop for the entire movie. The second the credits rolled, those queens were out of that theatre so quickly. In London it was like a rock concert, standing room only. It was really great. At the Copenhagen experimental film festival Hustler White was mild compared to some of what they showed. Things I would never see in America and in Oslo we sold out, and got a very strong favourable response. Doug: And out of all which has been best? Rick: San Francisco was the best. Doug: One of the things I enjoyed about the film, was the "fuck you" attitude, especially at the end. Rick: Oh yeah, the end is kind of a Hallmark Card. Tony: In London we had a really great lesbian response. Rick: Yes my next film is all about lesbians, it's called BERKINSTOCK. Doug: There are no lesbian hustlers on th street like Hustler White. Rick: No there ain't. Doug: Why? Rick: Because lesbians are romantic, while gay men romantisize the idea of hustling. Which is what we did. To me its the most romantic idea of stratling your wears and getting paid for it, and wearing hustler white jeans and having this nice basket. A great fantasy that could never be a reality. Doug: You have performance artist Bud Cockerin in the film. Rick: Yes, Bud performs at some of the fetish clubs in Los Angles and San Francisco. Ron Ethier who plays the mortician in drag is also a very well known performance artist. Senator Jesse Helms denounced him from the senate floor saying he should have the wrath of God against him. His career took off right after. Doug: Talking about careers taking off, Tony is this the first step in a climb to the top of movies, or just a dabble? Tony: I hope I can just dabble the whole way through . This is a great beginning, I'm wery proud of this movie. I hope I can keep doing films out of fun. It would be a pleasurabe experience to keep doing it as long as it's fun. Rick: He's being modest. His career is skyrocketing. Doug: Tony you've been photographed alot. When you're walking down the street in San Francisco do people come up to you? Tony: It's starting to happen. Doug: Do they ask you to autograph their biceps? Tony: That's yet to happen. Doug: Tony how do you feel about the attention you get from gay men? Tony: I appreciate pictures of men sexually and I'm glad they appreciate pictures of me. Rick: Tony's gettin a lot of coverage, here's the latest issue of FACE. You can see there is a big article about Tony and the movie   © www.chisel.com previous index next