Remembering Sal Mineo

Salvatore Mineo Jr. was born in New York City to Sicilian and Italian parents who enrolled him in acting school at an early age.(1)A handsome boy with an infectious smile and dark eyes, Sal Mineo’s vulnerable look became a film director’s dream. His theater work in the productions The Rose Tattoo and The King and I found him cast with established performers such as Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach, and Maureen Stapleton.(2)Mineo’s theater performances led to a breakout role in 1955 alongside James Dean and Natalie Wood in the teenage angst drama, Rebel Without a Cause. Mineo’s performance as Plato, the sensitive neglected teen longing for companionship, earned him an Academy Award nomination.

Mineo’s star shone brightly from 1955 to 1959 as he was cast in nine more theatrical films, most notably with James Dean in Giant and with Paul Newman in Somebody Up There Likes Me. Mineo landed the lead part in The Gene Krupa Story about the rise and fall of the famous jazz drummer.(3)In the 1960 film Exodus, Mineo received another Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Mineo’s movie career began to stall in the 1960s, when he openly admitted that he was bisexual.

Mineo’s courage to openly express his alternative lifestyle may not have been viewed as a positive public relations scoop by Hollywood studios, but his revelation paved the way for future gay actors to express their sexual identity without inhibition. Mineo stayed visible by appearing as a guest in many popular television shows throughout the 1960s and ’70s. He made guest appearances in The…