"I got to Georgetown," explained Crowley, "took one look at the joint, and heard all those broad a's... " He didn't finish the sentence, but Icancd towards me and started to laugh: "It was like Wellesley in drag..."

He ended up in Hollywood, where for eight years he was Natalic Wood's secretary and close friend. She encouraged him to write, but most of his projects-including a TV situation comedy pilot starring Bette Davis as an interior decorator-were kicked around. Eventually he came to New York and wrote Boys. He had a lot of trouble getting it produced, but once he succeeded, the play took off. It has been produced successfully all over the world.

"The only place it flopped," Crowley said, "was Paris. But when I heard they translated the line 'Who do youhave to fuck to get a drink around here?" as Who do you have to ravish to get a drink around here?"-then I knew there was trouble in River City." He laughed. "I hear the theatre there had fur walls..."

Boys has now become a full-time activity, and Crowlcy has had little time for much else. He doesn't read many books, because. "As Gore Vidal said. 'No one in our generation has read a book since 1945." But he does keep up with films and old American movies.

"Garbo knew what she was doing when she painted that line above her eyelid," he said. "And Mac West! I saw her at a party a while ago. She came up to me and said. 'Mr. Crowley,"-and here he imitated Miss West-"'Honey-I wrote your play forty years ago. It was called Drag and it closed after one performance in Pat terson. New Jersey. '"

"I TRY to keep up with the world in which we live," said Crowley, "but it's pretty hard sometimes. You get involved with a project and you close in. You can't even have a personal relationship-get laid or-have sex. My day from morning to night has been in the cutting room. That Rap Brown thing comes through and we're standing there talking about the titles."

"Have you heard about the New York bombings?" I asked.

"Can't you see it?" he said, He motioned a marquee with his drink-free hand: " The House on Eleventh Street, starring Signe Hasso."

He talked a little about the criticism Boys in the Band had gotten from homosexuals. "The Mattachine society hates it," he said. "But people pick up on the Michael character more than anything." (Michael is the most self-hating and destructive of the "boys.")

"Some of the other characters are well adjusted. Hank has made a very serious commitment in leaving his wife for Larry. And Harold [the freaky birthday boy] is very well adjusted to his homosexuality: he knows his neuroses and lives with them. I'm not saying that Harold's way is the healthiest way of life, but at least he's not in the dark about himself. Michael is a conflicted character. He doesn't know what he wants, and still hangs on to vestiges of his childhood-like the church and its teaching that homosexuality is a sin."

The big mystery in Boys. of course, is the character of Alan. Michael's straight friend from Georgetown days, who shows up unexpectedly at the birthday party Michael is throwing for his homosexual friends. Michael hopes that Alan is actually a "closet queer," so that his own guilt at being a homosexual will not be as strong.

The movie ends with Alan's sexual personality still unrevealed.

"I don't really know about Alan," said Crowley. "Maybe he is a homosexual, maybe he isn't. I think everybody has drunk at that fountain at one time or another. Or at least thought about it. Maybe Alan came to the party because he wanted to-maybe not. If he had gotten down and sucked a cock at the end of the movie, you would just have yawns... You can't top mystery, can you?" Crowley nearly doubled over with laughter, and put his last drink down on the coffee table.

The press agent came in and reminded Crowley that he had a plane to catch. The promotional tour was brief-just Boston, New York, and Los Angeles, where he would stay with Natalie Wood. "I'm not going to Dallas." said Crowley and giggled.

"God, Kael [the New Yorker critic], Morgenstern [ Newsweek ] and Hollis Alpert [ Saturday Review ] were all in one room in New York watching the picture last night. I nearly had a heart attack..." He started to lean over, his eyes bright and watery: "Is that a banana split or isn't it?" He paused and looked down at his feet, then looked up and said, in imitation of the manner of Busby Berkeley heroes: "Man, that's box office!"

"Are you nervous about the film's critical reception?" I asked.

"You see me shaking don't you?" he said and looked around the room in semi-mock paranoia. "Uh... I hope I'm not acting out of pro por -tion..."-his voice rose-"I hope I'm not overreacting!"

I told him that I thought there was little chance Boys in the Band would be a total flop. "I guess that's what Otto Preminger said after Hurry, Sundown, " he answered quickly. "Let's put it this way: If it's a hit, I'll get another job. And if it's a dog, I won't even be able to get Zanuck's maid on the phone." He started to laugh again, catching my eyes as he did so. Crowley and I were both still laughing-tipsily, loudly-when the press agent came to take him away to the airport.