Bruce Weber: Acclaimed Photographer and Filmmaker Has Weaved a Web of Hollywood Relationships, Academy Award Nominations and A New Sexual Aesthetic

Produced by R. Couri Hay

Some of fashion’s most iconic photographs were taken by an even more iconic photographer and filmmaker: Bruce Weber. In fact, many of his now famous subjects including Mae West and Madonna are internationally known mostly because of how others were able to view them through Bruce’s lens. Who else could get Elizabeth Taylor to be photographed with a wild bear touching her beloved baubles?

Now, for the first time in years, Bruce spoke to us about his journey from a small town to befriending some of the biggest names in the world of fashion and Hollywood and becoming a star in his own right for changing the American landscape when it came how the country viewed sexuality – there would be no Kylie Jenner wearing a see-through dress on the red carpet if Bruce did not come before. Talking to Bruce is like listening to stories from a bygone era of big stars, dreamy landscapes and a whole other set of sensibilities.

Married for almost 50 years to his wife Nan, though he has had relationships with men throughout the years, Bruce has his own views on attraction. “I could fall in love almost every day. I feel sorry for people who can’t do that” says Weber. Throughout his career, he has brought a free-spirited sexiness to the forefront of American culture. One of his favorite stars to capture today is Harry Styles, who has also been changing up the accepted aesthetic of menswear. “I’m interested in photographing him because I think he’s really talented and I really like him. I mean, this whole idea of what’s gay and what sort of gay sensibility is really the sensibility that I had about finding people.”

His life has also consisted of a long line of dogs which he says have greatly enriched his existence. In addition to being involved in canine charities such as Arf, which is based in the Hamptons, as well as The Humane Society of New York and the Bully Crew, which helps train dogs so that they can better get along with people and children, he also shared his love of dogs with one of his great friends, the socialite C.Z. Guest and her daughter Cornelia, the debutante of the decade in the 80s and our previous cover girl. He recalls the first time he met Cornelia down in Palm Beach, who was picking him and his dad up for lunch in her really cool, old wagon. She looked at him and asked, ‘where are the dogs?’ Once his dogs were invited, Bruce knew they would be friends for life. Today, many of his photographs have been auctioned off to benefit some of the charities he is involved with.

“You know, you meet so many people when you’re walking your dog, or you meet a lot of people who want their dogs photographed. And so, it’s a nice thing in one’s life.”

One person whom he was always drawn to – his parents thought too much so during his youth – and who also shared his love of animals, was Elizabeth Taylor, who would become a dear friend. Upon realizing that Taylor had been photographed with almost everything and anyone, including elephants and even everyone’s favorite dog, Lassie, Bruce knew one special creature that she hadn’t yet shot – a gentle, specially trained bear named Bonkers. Though he had to make sure that Elizabeth wouldn’t be bothered that Bonkers was used to being the biggest star in the room.

“I said, he’s a little like you. He’s a big star and film and he has his own trailer. It’s very hard to be able to bring a bear into civilization, but we shot at her ranch outside of LA. and that’s where we did some pictures together. And she had a magical way with animals the moment she was in the picture with him. It was wild to see his paw and her hand next to each other on the Burton diamond. I was just kind of tripping out.”

It’s not hard to believe that Bruce was beside himself, especially since he was once so obsessed with the glamourous movie star that his parents made him see a psychiatrist, something which their mutual friend actor Roddy McDowall advised him not to mention upon meeting. The two became so close, however, that once Elizabeth found out about his childhood feelings, she laughed it off. Though he told her they could never be together because they would wind up having 100 different kinds of animals in the house, they remained good friends.

“She was a very, very generous person and helped a lot of our friends when they were sick. And she really gave me a lot of courage to stand for myself in the world of fashion and art and photography and all that. She had a really good sense about stuff. You know, we always talked about making a little film together, but I knew by that time she might not be able to. It was really hard for her to walk and do any sort of physical activity.”

This unexpected relationship was not lost on Bruce who grew up worshipping the world’s most beautiful and glamorous star. “I was sitting on Elizabeth’s bed one night talking to her, and her grandson Quinn, who worked for me as an assistant was there, and I literally slapped myself in the face. I thought, gosh, am I lucky? I realized that having people in your life that you love and that love you really helps you get through things. And I was so lucky because I had a camera.”

It was that camera, after all, that introduced Bruce, a self-described shy person, to the life he has been able to lead: shooting celebrities and working with top designers – many of whom he helped discover – and befriending so many, including non-movie stars.

Taking photos also helped Bruce put things into perspective. He recalls his dad always photographing things and making films while his family was at peace in the family’s garden. These memories have helped him reflect on the loving times they shared, even though he also saw the dysfunctional side from the other side of the lens. When he wound up having a show at the Whitey years later, his father’s photographs were on the wall next to his and Bruce remembers turning to his dad and telling him how great his images were and how he wished he could take pictures like that.

Though he prefers for things in pictures to be in his words ‘a little off’, Bruce credits his first test subjects, his parents, to helping him give the perfection aesthetic which many of his future famous subjects and clients were after. “My dad was very athletic, and my mom was beautiful, and they were in great shape. My mom played a good set of tennis.”

He also enjoyed taking photos of his good-looking, all-American roommate at Tennessee University, who came from a farm in Illinois and built his own motorcycles. With his little Pentax camera gifted to him by his mother, Bruce brought his vision to life and realized that this whole photography was pretty nice.

Being the boy in school who would wear half of his cloths in the shower, Bruce has more than made up for his more demure days with some of the most well-known campaigns he is known for shooting, especially the Calvin Klein shoot he did for Obsession fragrances. He even turned to his sister at one point during the shoot and asked if everyone could at least put clothes on for lunch. The thing he remembers most, however, was everyone’s comfortability level with themselves.

“You do realize that this absolutely could never happen today. People are too inhibited. They’re too nervous about anything like that. But it was a wonderful time when there was a great freedom of expression. Not just something simple like just being nude, but also in a painting or photography or film or sports or anything. People really love to see people expressing themselves and I think that feeling has been kicked around a lot and suppressed by the work that’s sort of available for many people to do.”

Though it seems like so many of today’s stars are wearing little else but underwear on the red carpet, Bruce points out a big difference in today’s world. “Just in those days, people just didn’t even think about it. They were about sharing in that way that meant more than just focusing on creating a sensation.” It was this uninhibited, natural behavior which led him to a shoot of naked women on a swing and the photographs produced fetched over $100,000.

“I had met a woman in Brazil who I was crazy about and we did these nudes on a huge swing we built. I later found out that she was four months pregnant or five months pregnant. It was such a different time. The way people express themselves with their bodies, even in dance, It’s funny now. You could go to a place where there’s music and everybody’s dancing. You don’t even know any of the people you’re dancing with, but everybody’s just having such a good time. And that’s the way it was then, and it probably still is somewhere like that.”

Many people might not know that his career actually started off in front of the camera because as Bruce, a former model explains, what better way to learn about photography? Though he might not have been the best subject – he arrived late and brought his dog with him, a big no no back then – he made up for it by assisting the photographer with his equipment which allowed him to witness firsthand what it was like to be the one looking through the lens. He does still get a chuckle thinking about those days of modeling and fondly remembers some of the photos taken of him by Francesco Scublock. He was even a former cover star, with a photo of him appearing on the front of a GQ type magazine for teenagers, something which his boarding school roommates would tease him about it as well.

He would also exhibit his own views through another visual medium, film. A mix of old home movies, on-screen text depicting formative sexual experiences and cheeky footage of frolicking dogs, Bruce’s first short film, Backyard Movie, showed at the film festival at Lincoln Center. He also photographed River Phoenix for the film, who he was crazy about. As every photo or film he makes has a story behind it, Bruce takes us behind the scenes of this acclaimed and breakthrough short.

“Sometimes when you make a film, you’re so nervous that it’s not going to have a good projection, that you forget what your film is even about. I had met a guy from Cuba, but he strangely had blonde hair, and he was a great, great athlete, and had the most perfect body. He was on a trampoline in the back of our house, jumping up and down with one of my dogs and a policeman came by and he said, ‘excuse me, Bruce, is there a guy jumping in the air who’s nude here?’ And I went, no, not really. My dog is jumping up and down. Then two other women, they looked up and they saw the sky, and all of a sudden, this guy kind of started popping up and he said, I was really afraid they were going to have a heart attack.”

His first documentary, Broken Noses, which won a Grand Jury Award at the Sundance Film Festival, was shot with a small team and his good friend, cameraman Jeff Price. They made what he describes as “a little home movie” about a guy who wound up taking care of kids who were just left at his doorstep and becoming like a father to them.

Next up was a well-deserved Academy Award nomination for Let’s Get Lost, a film about jazz trumpeter Chet Baker. “I have always loved jazz music and we always tried to follow him, but he couldn’t come back in the country at that time because of his drug addiction. When I found out he was in town, I went down to a jazz club listened to him play and asked him if I could do some pictures and he asked me to come over to his place the next day. I went with my assistant Jeff and we hung out with him and I had him do a song for me called Blame It On My Youth by Oscar Levant. I loved that song. I think that a lot of us could go well, that’s kind of like my life, I guess.”

Another visionary who he wanted to bring to life through film was Paulo di Paolo, an Italian photographer who surprised the world when he quit his art at the age of 40. In The Treasure of His Youth, Bruce would ensure that di Paolo’s legacy would still live on. As to why he quit his career, Bruce believes it was due to meeting a beautiful socialite woman whom he fell in love with, as well as a dislike for the paparazzi. “He just didn’t want to be a part of that kind of life. Even in his photography, whether it was about agriculture or the people living out in the county, he made them really stand out. And I think that for him, he just couldn’t handle the heartbreak. The heartbreak said, what if people don’t like my pictures?”

To many, the documentary seems to be about both Paulo and also the filmmaker’s love affair with Italy. “When I was growing up, that was my Hollywood. That was the Hollywood that I loved because of my grandparents and my parents and my sister coming back from all their many trips in Italy before I got a chance to first go there. I finally went there with a bunch of kids from boarding school, and it was really great. Then I went back alone, and that was the trip that I really learned about Italy. I traveled alone, I met people, I took pictures.”

He also intertwines his story and Paulo’s story together. “It’s also about photography in the moment. In the film, he talks about seeing this little boy who is in rags, starving, and about how it’s such a good picture, that he almost can’t take it. You see somebody sleeping on the street and you want to take it so that you make people realize that we’re so forced to making everything so wonderful and beautiful, and then there’s this big sense of reality.”

According to Bruce, the treasure of the film is that you can look back at your youth and find something you did that you carry with you and continues to impact you. “Treasure of His Youth comes from us sitting in the editing room and really trying to think of what the hell this film is about. Those things that you look back on are the things that you build your life on. And I felt that he did that with his work. His treasure and my treasure are totally different, and that’s what’s wonderful. “It’s great to be a character and to have characters in your life and to be that way and to live it.”

For Bruce, this is just the beginning. He’s currently working on a book which he considers and all-American journal and also features other people’s work and poetry. He also has an upcoming exhibition in Prague and is currently working on a short film.

More than anything, he wants his fans and collectors to know how much he appreciates them. “I’m really, really thankful to the people who’ve collected my books and collect my work to show me that admiration, because that’s what you sort of do when you take a picture. It’s a gift. It’s a gift for somebody. And I want people to want to get out themselves and take pictures and give something back.