ShareThisBy HEIDI BENSON
San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Unlike his friend Nora Ephron, Armistead Maupin doesn't feel bad about his neck. Sure, it's a little creaky -- a touch of arthritis -- but he looks on the bright side. "I wake up in the morning with the loveliest guy in the world, with incredibly geezery aches and pains," Maupin says with a laugh.
His point is, he wakes up. And he does so with his husband, Christopher Turner, a Web site entrepreneur in a cozy aerie, tucked in the woods above Parnassus Avenue in San Francisco at the top of a zigzag of brick steps.
The house has a spectacular view of the city, as does Maupin, creator of the beloved "Tales of the City" series.
Started in 1976 as a newspaper serial following the adventures of the various eccentrics living at 28 Barbary Lane, "Tales" ran for years in The Chronicle, spawning six books and three television miniseries.
After 18 years, Maupin has returned to Barbary Lane with a new book, "Michael Tolliver Lives," which is another love song to Maupin's adopted home.
San Francisco returned the compliment. Mayor Gavin Newsom has declared June 12, the day of the book's release, "Michael Tolliver Day in San Francisco."
Unlike its predecessors, the new book is written from the point of view of Tolliver, the sweet male Southern belle.
"I was nervous that people following the series might be thrown off by a first-person novel that has all the characters treated equally," says Maupin.
But as the book took shape, he couldn't resist giving preferential treatment to some of the characters.
"They started auditioning for me, begging for a place in the chorus line," he says. These folks are still kicking, despite the devastation of AIDS and advancing age, and therein lies the theme of Maupin's newest "Tale."
"I wanted to illuminate the process of growing older as a gay man, and make it easier for people who think life is over," he says. "Gay men who are growing old are incredibly lucky to be here."
Maupin's life hasn't been untouched by AIDS; like so many, he lost a loved one. The optimistic outlook he has today has been hard won.
"But if I'd known that 63 was going to feel this good, I would have been a lot more cheerful along the way," says Maupin. He and Turner, who is 27 years younger, were married this year in Vancouver, British Columbia.
The walls of Turner and Maupin's terraced Arts and Crafts cottage are lined with paintings, photographs and mementos.
Among the treasures displayed on a beautifully figured oak table by the front window is a gilt-edged edition of "Mademoiselle de Maupin." French writer Theophile Gautier's 1835 novel is the story of a woman seeking truth and beauty through cross-dressing. The character is one of the inspirations for Anna Madrigal, the transsexual landlady in "Tales of the City" who was played on film by Olympia Dukakis.
Through "Tales of the City," Maupin became an activist.
"We've had a revolution over the years, and I'm really happy to have been part of it," he says. "My whole career has been motivated by my determination that people shouldn't have to be in the closet. I'd spent time there myself."
Some newer fans of "Tales of the City" may not know how far he has come. Growing up in a prominent North Carolina family, Maupin was an "adamant young conservative." He began writing while in college, with a column in the Daily Tar Heel at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill that was "part Art Buchwald, part William F. Buckley."
After serving in the Navy, Maupin returned from Vietnam a vocal supporter of the war. Through his father he went to work for North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms. "It's my so-called dark secret. I was Helms' golden boy," he says. "I think I've done enough to atone."
In a twist Maupin relishes, Helms later condemned the film of "Tales of the City" on the Senate floor.
A move to California helped spur Maupin's self-acceptance -- but not right away.
His own coming out was gradual, and San Francisco, he believes, made all the difference. "It opened my heart," he says. "It let me examine my own bigotry. And it let me have a good time doing it."
Maupin has more than returned the favor. After all, in his seven Dickensian "Tales" -- inspired by his own adventures and those of his friends -- the real protagonist is the city by the bay.
(E-mail Heidi Benson at hbenson(at)sfchronicle.com)
