Timothy Scott: Death of a Dancer

February was next level. We were going to see a show that was nothing short of an event. I loved Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Cats even before I saw it, and not in an ironic way. I played that original Broadway cast album until the vinyl almost melted. The song memory instantly unforgettable junior Face. My friend Mario and I would listen to it over and over on the stereo in his family room, and when Betty Buckley would hit that big note, I would grab the nearest sofa pello

and bite it. Look, I was only thirteen years old. I honestly didn't know how else to channel the urges it tapped into. When I finally saw the show as a much more sophisticated four year old, my expectations were actually exceeded. That's set, the costumes, and that dancing. My parents and I sat in the very last row of the balcony, so the cats who came into the audience didn't come anywhere near us. But so what, It was

still impossibly exciting. Afterwards, I went back home to Bethesda, Maryland with an official cat's sweatshirt, the one with the two yellow cat eyes on the back. I wore that sweatshirt to Pile Junior High almost every day for the rest of the winter. I ended up writing a letter to every member of the cast twice. I only received a couple of responses, but I was absolutely thrilled that one of them was from Mr Mustaphel's himself, Tim Scott,

this dancer. When he did twenty four consecutive weets, he took my breath away. I didn't know that those wild spins were called forwetas, or even how spell the word. All I knew was that I was watching someone defy the laws of physics. Tim Scott's letter to me was short, but gracious. I was just so happy that he answered.

But back then I had no idea of the offstage drama that was quietly building for Tim Scott and for many in the cast of Cats, for the Broadway community at large, and especially for the gay men who were in essential part of that community. AIDS was discovered first and young homosexual meant there is no cure and it is often fatal. By the fall of two when Cats

opened on Broadway, AIDS had become a health crisis. By the end of the decade, it would claim the lives of over one hundred thousand Americans and would devastate the arts world. In the original cast of Cats alone, AIDS would cut down four dancers at the very top of their careers and in peak physical form. The tragedy of the whole thing, isn't it. That's a microcosm of the big picture. You've got to show that's about youth and vitality, and these are people who were taken down in the

prime of their lives. This is the story of one of those dancers. It's a story of talent, beautiful, beautiful dancer. You can't imagine all of the tricks that he did. It was just absolutely incredible. It's a story of dreams I'll never begin, he said, you know what, I just want to be the best dance so I could possibly be and be on Broadway. Most of all, it's a love story. One night he turned and looked at me, and I looked back at him, and there was this long,

meaningful moment. So I like to say that I fell in love with him when he was dressed as a cat from CBS Sunday Morning and I heart I'm Morocca and this is mobituaries, this moment. Timothy Scott, February eight, death of a dancer. My parents splurged and they brought me the five dollar souvenir programs and inside there's an autograph best Ken page. Oh my goodness, oh wonderful look at that. And I had to thank you for stopping on Seventh Avenue when it was really cold in February

signing my souvenir program. Uh, we'll see, we didn't know it, but this day was gonna happen. I'm talking to well, really gushing over actor Ken Paige, who played the role of Old Deuteronomy in the original Broadway cast of Cats. When I saw Ken Paige and Cats, I was already a fan of his from the musical review ain't misbehaving. I'm going right now and write you might know Ken Paige best as the voice of the evil Oogie Boogie in Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. It's good book

and attention now, bogie Man. But I'm talking to Ken today because of his connection to CATS co star Timothy Scott. You see, Cats wasn't the first time Ken and Tim worked together. They both began their professional stage careers as teenagers at the legendary St. Louis Municipal Opera Theater commonly known as the Muni, the oldest and largest outdoor musical theater in North America. He was in the dance ensemble

and I was in the singing ensemble. He danced. I don't say I moved well, and I will never be At this day. There's a beautiful fountain between a rehearsal space and the backstage, and he was sitting up at the top and the water was sort of running through his feet and everything. And he said to me, he said, you know what, I just want to be the best dance so I could possibly be and be on Broadway. And I said, yeah, me too. I want to be I want to be on Broadway too. You know, I

was eighteen, so he must have been probably seventeen. As it turns out, their dreams of Broadway were not far fetched. Timothy Scott Schnell was born on September in Morton Grove, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. Tim had something of a late start. A lot of dancers start training as early as four years old. Tim Scott didn't start taking dance lessons until he was a teenager, but it was clear from the get go he was un natural. He went straight from

high school into show business. After the Muni, Tim Scot moved to New York City. Success came quickly. Broadway impressario Michael Bennett cast Tim in the first international company of a chorus line. Soon after, Tim was touring nationally in Bob Fosse's smash musical review Dance Him. We Got Spent Sleeps joke Scott Whils another incredible bonny gigs, but I am not allowed to mention on television. Tim was what's

called an ensemble dancer. Back then, they were called gypsies, which actress Bonnie Franklin defined at the nine Tony Awards maybe I'd better explain to the audience at home and that the term gypsy lovingly applies to all danswers in the Broadway theater. They were called that because they traveled from company to company, from chorus line to chorus line, constantly auditioning for their next gig. This was and is the life of a dance sir. In Tim toured with

the popular comedy Mine duo Shields and Yarnell. Yes, and this was the time when mimes could be superstars. To be a Pepper Pepper all you gotta do. The next year, Tim danced on a ceiling in a big Dr Pepper commercial. Yeah. Then in came the casting call for Cats. I think we all had a sense that it was a really big deal. We didn't really know what the show is about, you know. I asked my agent, so, what can you

tell me what it's about? And she goes, Cats, and I'm like, yeah, but what's the store And she goes, it's about cats. That, my friends, is the one and only Betty Buckley, the woman who caused me to bite that sofa pillow all those years ago when she hit that note, Oh I love that. When I first met you and you told me that story. I was so touched by that. That's amazing to me, so great. She was called in for the pivotal role of Grizabella the

Bedraggle to pass her prime glamour cat. And so I went into audition and they told my agent that they weren't going to consider me because I radiated health and well being and they wanted someone who radiated death and dying. Lucky for us, she got the role, joining a cast that included Ken Paige and Tim Scott. So the first day of Cats, I walked up to him and I said, well, I guess you're officially one of the great best dances on Broadway, and particularly in that role. That was a very,

very coveted role. Tim was cast as Mr Mustapheles, the conjuring cat. Here he is singing, we can die like a flying tuck me. In a show that was focused on spectacular musical numbers and not a whole lot on plot, Tim's role was one of the most challenging. It required a dancer with extraordinary technique, but Tim had something more than that. He had presence. He had these amazing eyes. His eyes were like blue beans. He also had this sort of mysterious nous about him and he was always there.

The first time I saw him dance, I found it un Kenny that I had this rush of joy through my body that was completely spontaneous and it was not an intellectual experience of like, oh that guy dances really well. It was like this kind of breathless, exquisite joy watching him and I was like, who's that kid, you know, I mean, why is he able to do that? Okay? Sidebar Cats is more than anything a dance show for the actors who had limited background and dance, like Betty

Buckley and Ken Paige. Rehearsing for Cats was like Marine Corps basic training. The Winter Garden Theater was there Paris Island. There were five of us that were like normal people, you know, and the rest of them were like amazing. Betty and I both had to do the full on dance class, you know, and you had to do it.

I had to do cart wheels across the floor in front of this incredible company of dancers and Cats and Campaige and I just clung to each other and I was like I'm going to die and he was like, I'm right with you. And it was like so humiliating old Deuteronomy and Chris Sabella are not cartwheeling cats we should be clear about. No, that's we should be clear. Well, you have no idea now. When the show finally opened in October two, it didn't get great reviews, But so

what reviews are about? The here and now cats? As the commercial tagline pointed out, was now and forever. Catch now and forever At the Window Garden Theater, it was the show to see and be seen at Andy Warhol, Diana Ross, Frank Zappa, Carrie Grant, Mary Tyler Moore. Those are just a few of the big names who showed up. Then it swept the Tony's Betty Buckley one for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. I want to thank my mom and my dad and my brother no him and

my other brothers and that brother. She thanked Norman, even though he wasn't in the show, his life was about to be changed by it. Oh. I was very much a country boy. I probably still am at heart, you know, my most essential self. It was an exciting time for me, but I was also a little lost amongst all the hubbub. On the other side of the break, Grizabella's younger brother and Mr Mustaphile's meat. What was it like having your

little brother backstage with you at Cats? Well? At first, I mean I was really happy that he was there. And my brother and I, you know, have been at points in our lives very close. That's Betty Buckley talking about her little brother, Norman Buckley back in the early eighties when she was starring in Cats. Norman was new to New York. Sister and brother may have been close,

but Betty didn't know that Norman was gay. We grew up in Texas with a military father, and you know, it wasn't something that was certainly discussed or we even considered. So he was staying at my apartment when he first came to New York and was coming out as a gay person, and I didn't know what was going on. So he left some of his journals out for me to see, and I read some entries and was shocked,

was like, what is this? And so there was some big confrontations between he and I, and I can freely admit that I don't think I handled those very well. Norman describes himself as a country boy back then. What was he like? Was he innocent? Was he very boyish, totally innocent. Oh my god, that's why I was scared, wet behind the ears, delicate artistic boy. Yeah, I knew he was twenty seven, but still to me, he was

always my little baby brother who was a vulnerable, sweet kid. Today, Norman Buckley is an accomplished TV director, having worked on over forty shows, including The o C, Gossip Girl, and Pretty Little Liars? Does It Not Really? But the Sluttier than Better? Back then, Norman was working as an editing room assistant on the movie Easy Money, just across the street from the Winter Garden Theater. I would generally, uh, just visit with her earn her dressing room until she

had to go back on stage. Norman's favorite place in the theater was the cat walk high above the stage. That's where he'd watched the end of the show when Grizabella ascends on a giant tire to the heavy side layer the equivalent of cat Heaven, at least I think that's what it is. That's actually the first time I had an encounter with Tim Scott, because that was where he would make his big entrance for his big number as Mr Mustapoles. He was lowered on a rope from

that same cat walk. For a long period of time, he didn't even register that I was up there with him. And then one night he turned and looked at me, and I looked back at him, and there was this long, meaningful moment. Tim may have been dressed as a cat with lots of cat makeup, but Norman was spellbound. He had very intense eyes. He was kind of otherworldly looking. I was much taller than him. Norman was six one, Tim seven. We looked a little bit like Mutt and Jeff.

Some days later, after the show, Norman and his sister Betty shared a big Checker taxi cab with Tim. During the ride, Norman and Tim experienced another wordless moment of connection. This was a much more profound encounter. At that moment, I thought, oh, this person is going to be significant in your life. You really thought that there very much, so I can remember it as though it happened yesterday. I looked at him, I took him in, he was

taking me in, and I thought, this is it. The very next night, Norman mustered his courage and stood in the doorway of Tim's dressing room at intermission, and I said, do you want to have dinner, and he said, yes, it was like great, and that was it? Is that the kind of thing you could have imagined your self doing even six months before. I can't even imagine myself doing that now. So it's I think I met him

the next night on the corner. I still didn't want to tell my sister that I was seeing somebody in her show. Norman says. The chemistry was instant. Was he funny, very funny. He had a great sense of humor. I laughed a lot his jokes. It's got to be at least one laugher in the relationship. But Betty was concerned. In New York City, the whole gay scene in the nighties, you know, was wild, and I was terrified for him. I was just basically scared, and we didn't know what

AIDS was quite yet. In fact, when AIDS was first reported, it wasn't even called AIDS. A mystery disease known as the gay plague has become an epidemic unprecedented in the history of American medicine. The lifestyle of some male homosexuals has triggered an epidemic of a rare form of cancer. A mysterious, newly discovered disease, which affects mostly homosexual men. When did the disease become real to you? Well, you know, it's that trajectory that you see so wonderfully portrayed in

Long Time Companion. It really was the thing where people started whispering, and things started popping up from the newspaper, and people started making calls saying, did you hear about this thing that's going around? That's ken page again. He's referring to the nine movie Longtime Companion, directed by Norman Renee, who ultimately died from AIDS himself. The film opens on

the morning of July three. The characters wake up to the ominous New York Times article by Lawrence k Altman, the first in a mainstream publication to make reference to the disease that would be called AIDS. They immediately begin phoning each other, Hello, have you seen the paper? Oh? I was just shipped to help. Have you got it? Yeah, the page, you can't miss it. Did you see the paper? I missed that? Oh well, just listen. Rare cants are

seen in forty one Homosexuals. By the time Cats was in rehearsal, concern was burgeoning into a sense of alarm. Then you started to hear did you know so? And so I heard they're not well, they have they have that gay cancer. Right. There was fear everywhere. Ken remembers when early in the epidemic he was working in Los Angeles and went to pick up a friend at the airport. Ken was stunned by the friend's appearance. He was a good twenty five pounds lighter and blessing. He was saying, well,

I got this rash. I want to get in the sun so I can get rid of this rash. And I feel bad about it to this very day, thinking to myself, I don't know do I want him staying in my house. He came to me for solace and comfort, but I was afraid of what that all meant. And I can honestly say that I don't think I handled it as well as I could have. But it was

typical for what everybody was experiencing. Even after the generic sounding acronym AIDS Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome was coined in September of two, it felt like the full force of blame for the disease was being placed squarely on gay men. Of course, being gay was already stigmatized. The American Psychiatric Association had only removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders in ninety three, and in two only one state, Wisconsin, had a law on the books making it illegal to

fire people simply for being gay. Coming out of the closet, never easy to begin with, was even scarier when it seemed to carry a death sentence for me. Just realizing I was gay at the time. I was twelve years old when AIDS was first being widely reported, wasn't just fraught, it was frightening. I vividly remember a day in eighth grade when a teacher finally talked to us about AIDS. The girl who sat in front of me turned around, looked straight at me, and said, that's what you're going

to get. Many years later she reached out to me on social media to apologize. Of course I forgave her. It was junior high. We were all incredibly mean to each other. Once Norman and Tim were officially a couple, Betty gave her blessing, so I was really relieved in so many ways that Tim was his first great love. When she did find out about the relationship with Tim, she was very approving, I told her, and she hesitated for a moment, thought about it, and she said, well,

you picked the right one. She said, I can see this. I loved Tim, and of course I love my brother, so ultimately I was like, well, it's not money of my business, and I have to say I love them both. So there we go. But while Betty may have been relieved, Tim Scott him self was increasingly worried. Dates was always a specter that kind of hung over our relationship. Tim had actually been involved with someone who was one of the really early AIDS cases that young man was dying.

During previews of Cats, Tim would go from the theater sometimes to his hospital room and sit with him. Now bear in mind, in AIDS test was still three years away and any life saving treatment was fourteen years away. We had a hair dresser named Paul Lopez who worked on eight Misbehavior, and he got sick and he wasn't feeling well, like on Wednesday, Mattnee. He wasn't doing well. Thursday he came in. They said, you really aren't well.

You should go home. Friday he went into the hospital Saturday, Sunday he was unconscious by Monday, and he died on Tuesday, and that was from Wednesday. Not even a week later, he was gone. The federal government wasn't slow to act. It didn't act at all. On October fifteenth, two, just a week after CATS opened, President Reagan's Press Secretary Larry Speaks, was asked about AIDS by a reporter named Lester King, Solving.

Here's how that exchange went. Have any reactions with the announce from the Center for Disease Control Atlanta that a d S is now an epidemic in six six hundred cases. It's known as gay play. Yes, I mean, it's a pretty serious thing that one and every three people again this have died. And I wondered if the president where I don't have it? Are you do you? You don't have it? Well, I'm relieved to hear that you don't

answer my question. How do you know? That's right? Speaks and much of the White House Press Corps, we're treating AIDS and its victims as a joke. President Reagan himself didn't utter the word AIDS, and then only in response to a reporter's question, until the fall of over four years into the devastation. When Tim's contract with CATS ended that same year, the couple decided to move west and begin a new chapter in Los Angeles. Not long after

their move, they drove up to Malibu. We went out to Zuma Beach one day and he said to me, very tentatively, I really can't imagine my life without you, and I want to stay with you for the rest of my life. And I responded, I want to stay with you for the rest of my life. It was this really solemn moment. I like to think of it as a vows. I considered myself married to Tim. There was no legal way to do that at the time,

and it was a commitment. And I'm so happy that had happened before he became ill, because there was no question but that I would see him through it. And I think he felt that on the other side of the break. Tim Scott's last show, the Ultimate tribute to the dancer What I did doing what we Love. That's her anthem, what I did for love. I'm visiting tonight at the home of Tim Scott. I'll knock on the door now, Hello, Hello, would you like to come in? I would like to come in. I'm watching home video

of Norman Buckley and Tim Scott. It's sometime in late or early and they're joking around giving a tour of their so me two bedroom apartment in West Hollywood. Here is Kennedy. Here we meet their cat, who just happens to be named more. Look at the cat's eyes. Really looked like the eyes on the back of my cat sweatshirt. Tim and Norman seem happy. Why shouldn't they be. They're young, thirty years old. They make each other laugh, and career wise,

things are going well for both of them. At the time, Norman was working as an assistant editor on a horror movie called Trick or Treat starring Gene Simmons of Kiss He's a rook and Roll and during this period, Tim scored two film gigs. He was cast in the four D spectacular Captain Eo, shown exclusively at Disney Parks. This was, at the time the most expensive film per minute ever made. Tim is part of the enormous On so Bold, dancing behind Michael Jackson. Tim was also cast in the movie

version of the musical A chorus Line. It's a bit part. He plays boy with headband. Seriously, that's his screen credit. But so what? It was a job on a movie up We even get to hear him sing briefly, God, I really blew it, I really blew it. What I love about it is that it's very brief, but it very much captures Tim's spirit. It's a short, lovely cameo. And then, ten years after he toured internationally in the stage production of A chorus Line, Tim was cast in

a European tour of the show. Okay, since it's come up a couple of times, let's talk for a moment about a chorus line. This musical is the ultimate tribute to dancers just like Tim, not stars, not household names, dancers struggling and auditioning for roles in the chorus, not doing it with the expectation of becoming rich and famous, but doing it for the love of dancing. Tim was cast in the role of Mike, a dancer who's up

for any challenge. Perfect for Tim. I mean to have Tim's technique, his splits and jumps and turns and all of that quite spectacular. This is Broadway legend. Bi orch Lee, you are in the original King and I Yes, How old were you? I was five, by the way, I was fired at eight because I outgrew my costume. By York went on to play Connie in the original Broadway cast of A chorus Line. A good ten, cak what ten?

That's the story of my life. A chorus Line was conceived by the legendary dancer turned director Michael Bennett, who would himself die from aids by orc. The keeper of the chorus Line Flame has been directing revivals and road companies of the show for decades. It is a tribute to the dancer. The audience comes in, and what Michael wanted to convey was that they were peeking in on an audition, because no one has ever seen an audition

outside of the people who are involved. One song that Tim Scott sang many times as part of the ensemble of A chorus Line is what I Did for Love. It's a song about the short and sometimes painful careers of dancers. It pops up towards the end of the show after one of the dancers has had a serious accident and has to drop out of the industry altogether. The director asks the remaining dancers what they would say

if they learned that they could never dance again. The character of Morales starts the song off kiss Today You could love The suitetness and the sorrow. Wish me luck the same to you. But I can't regret what I did for love. What I did for love the message of the song. Whatever life throws at these artists, they'll face the future with the same bravery and undefeated optimism with which they pursued their careers, however short they may be. It's about survival, but also doing what we love. That's

her anthem, what I did for love. To do it because you love it. Whether you're dancing, singing, acting, or whatever you do, we do it because we love it. I think there's something really special about Tim Scott's last show being the show that pays tribute to the dancer. Yeah. A few weeks into their European tour, by Orc noticed that Tim Scott was losing stamina. At the time, I did not know that he was ill. I think we were in Surich and he wasn't feeling well. He had

no energy at all. Tim was having holistic medications mailed to him on the road. He'd tried crystals, meditation and other alternative remedies. They weren't working. He eventually left the tour, left the tour and he called me and he said, you know, I don't want to do this anymore. He said, I'm too old. I don't want to be the dancer anymore. I want to come home. Tim was still only thirty one. He went to the doctor and they did an indoscap.

He had a very light case of pneumacist this pneumonia, which was one of the ways that they diagnosed aids at the time. And I said, okay, well, we'll take it a step at a time. But we essentially knew that it was a death sentence. The question was just how long we hoped for some type of miraculous cure. We hoped something would happen, As with so many terminal conditions, though Tim's illness didn't move in a straight line. By December,

he was experiencing an upswing. On Christmas Eve that year, he and Norman, underneath their Christmas tree in their West Hollywood apartment, take turns opening Presence. What is it? It's a book from from Norma, the Great Towns of California, Oh great, Oh, the best American short Stories more Slacks. I don't want to sentimentalize it, and I don't want to romanticize it, but it was a wonderful period of time.

It sounds counterintuitive to say that, but it was a wonderful period of time because we were so deeply connected at that point. The next morning they celebrate at a friend's home. Tim teaches the friends three daughters a dance. Okay, there, but I have to say, the girls don't seem all that focused, and I kind of want to jump into the video tape and tell them you're getting a free dance lesson from the original broad White. Mr Mustapholes. Pull

it together. Okay, I'm back now. Not long after that Christmas, Tim and Norman took a road trip. We drove across the Southwest and we went to the Grand Canyon and he went out on this rock. It was very precarious. I was like, oh, please, don't go out so far. I don't go out so far. And he went out on the end of this rock and did this pirouet. But after returning to Los Angeles and especially virulent case

of pneumonia sent Tim to the hospital. It was at that point I said, we have to tell your parents, we have to let them know. And his mother immediately flew out. She was this wonderful Italian woman who was a wonderful cook. And took care of us. Tim's parents, Richard and Rosemary, stayed at a motel nearby. Tim's father, Richard Schnell, was still working as a technical writer for Motorola. Rosemary Schnell was a homemaker. Tim was their only child.

When he gave his parents the news about his diagnosis. Do you think that his mother suspected in any way they knew something was up? They couldn't have been better though in their response. They were lovely people, and I feel enormous gratitude to them. They accepted me, they loved me. They remained close to me for the rest of their lives. So many people during that period of time did not

have the support of their parents. For many people in the theater, it was their chosen family, not their biological one, that rallied around them. The community had to help themselves. Women like bi orch Lee, who had grown up performing with so many gay men who were like brothers to her, played a special role. He became angels when we started hearing about all of these people. We started taking care of them, just being with them to go to get

their medicine or to feed them, helping them. They because people were afraid these were our friends, and so we didn't have any fear. My best friends all died of AIDS. Most of my closest male friends that I met doing Guys and Dolls and Pearly and the Whiz and so forth, they all died. They all died. This is can Paige again. It was devastating, and many many other friends who to bury degree. Some went home just disappeared. Others had no

home to go to because their families rejected them. Some of us as friend group at that time, which is something else I'll always treasure those of us who gathered and rallied and supported each other, and if someone fell ill, you just gathered around them and did whatever you needed to do, including burial. Burial became a terrible challenge for the bereaved. Early on in Manhattan, only one funeral home, Reddens on Fourteenth Street, was willing to accept the remains

of the victims of AIDS. Now, it's hard to know how many people died during the early years of the epidemic. Families, churches, hospitals often lied about the cause of death. That's how deep the stigma was. And as David France, author of How to Survive a Plague, has reported some gay men, when they detected a lesion or another symptom of infection, would kill themselves. Many of the dead ended up in unmarked Potter's fields like Heart Island off the Bronx, the

final resting place for the ostracized and abandoned. When Tim Scott wasn't in the hospital for an infection, he was at home. Betty Buckley was just down the street. I don't remember that. I that I was as supportive as I aspired to be. There wasn't a lot I could do. Yeah, I remember finding this puppy, this beautiful little ducks and puppy that I thought would be great to give to Tim. I gave him this puppy and he didn't want a puppy, so I was I thought I was doing something to

make him feel, you know, really comforted and engaged. But it was a wrong choice. I don't know. He had lost a lot of weight, but I didn't see that. I didn't see that at the time. While I was there with him, he was just the person I loved, and I never really took in the fact that he was vanishing right before my eyes. Finally, on Halloween, while Norman was driving him home from his latest hospital visit for pneumonia. Tim made an announcement and he said, that's it.

I don't want to go back to the hospital again. Tim would spend his remaining days at home. I've always felt that there was a beautiful symmetry to the relationship that Tim and I had. We were together for five years, and during the first two and a half years, I would say that he was the one who was taking care of me. He was the one that was helping me come into my own and during the second too and a half years of our relationship, I became the caretaker.

During those weeks, Norman rarely left Tim side. If you're going to go through some major life trial, you would want to go through with my brother, Norman. It was incredibly admirable and inspiring watching him be there for this person that he loved so much. In the middle of one night, Norman woke up to find Tim sitting bolt upright in bed, wide awake, staring out into the distance, and I said, what's going on. He said nothing. He said, I'm just trying to measure where we are relative to

that space out there. And I said, well, what space you're talking about? And he said, Oh, it's not anything I could explain to you. It's just a lot more than we know. And I said, well, I'm sure that that's so. And he said, so are you ready for your big test? And I said, well, I really know what you mean by that, but I guess I'm as ready as I ever will be. And he said, okay, we'll go back to sleep, and he patted me on the arm and I went back to sleep. And then when I woke up, he was in a coma and

he never woke up again. That was the last time I ever spoke to him. As difficult as that period of time was, it was also extraordinary. I felt deeply loved by him, and I deeply loved him. And it's funny, you know, you don't think about these things for a long time, and then you talk about them and suddenly the emotion comes back over you again. What do you think he meant by are you ready for your big test? Are you ready to be on your own? Are you ready to except that you have to let go of me?

Who knows? You know? I mean he was also on pain killers. You know, there's there's all kinds of possibilities that maybe he was just hallucinating, but at least he was hallucinating in a particularly profound poetic way. Tim's parents and friends gathered and took visuals as he remained comatose for about ten days. It was Norman who was with Tim during his final moments. He took his last breath, I could see like his eyes, his eyes were very blue, and then all of a sudden, there was just this

point of life, that swimp. It was almost like I saw the life force leave him. And he died at six thirty in the morning on February Is it for gay men your age particularly difficult that a lot of your contemporaries are no longer with us? Died many years ago? Kin, Paige and I were sitting together sometime years after Timid died, and I said, Uh, where's all the game in my age? And Kin said to me, Norman, they all died. Were a small number of survivors, the people our age, they're gone.

It really hit me like a ton of bricks when he said that four from the original Broadway cast of Cats died from aids. Tim was thirty two, Stephen Guelfer was thirty nine. Read Jones, who was wonderful in the role of Skimble, Shanks was thirty five and Renee Clemente was thirty eight. As a successful TV director of popular shows featuring picture perfect teens and people in their twenties, Norman Buckley regularly works with young people who have little

knowledge of the outbreak of the AIDS crisis. It's hard to explain to the younger generations just what a hollacious period of time that was in terms of the loss. I'm very aware that when I talk about my experiences, that people can only understand certain things when they've experienced those things themselves, and I have compassion for that, so I try to just be patient. Ken Paige has a tougher message for younger generations. What I want to say

to them is, don't be stupid. It's not gone. There's just ways of handling it. Don't be cavalier. Don't take it for granted that you're well and you're gonna be well, and there's a pill and as this is that you can do anything you want. Don't be stupid. People paid for what you know. People paid for the cocktails and the pills and the things that you have that make you able to not worry about how you have sex. Someone paid literally their lives for that. Don't forget that.

Never forget. When Cats returned to Broadway in ken Paige was in the audience on opening night, but for him it wasn't as much a revival as it was a remembrance. M I went to the opening night. Rosie O'Donnell was sitting there to night left, and I said, oh god, she goes. What's it like for you, she asked me. I said, I just see ghosts. I said, there's so many people up there with the makeup and all. It

was pretty much the same. I said, I see Renee Clamente, I see Read Jones, I see Tim Scott, I see Stephen Guelfer right there in front of me on the stage. I was happy they were doing it, and I supported the revival and on no no, But it was also very difficult to sit and watch because you couldn't not

go through the memory. Tim Scott was cremated. For his final resting place, Tim's parents and Norman decided on that very spot in Arizona where Tim had once pirouetted, and so we went out to the Grand Canyon, the five or six of us, and we went out on the end of that rock, which in retrospect is totally crazy, is uh. I look at pictures of it now and I think, oh my god, we can have all fallen

off and joined him with this episode. I wanted to pay tribute to all those artists whose names didn't make headlines when they died, and so I wrote to Tom Viola, the head of Broadway Cares Equity Fights AIDS. It's one of the oldest and largest groups raising money to support artists living with HIV AIDS. I wanted to know what

he might have to say about Tim Scott. I didn't know Tim Scott well, he wrote, but with Cats being such a smash hit when it opened, and Tim being so blazing hot as the original Mr Mustopheles, he was one of the eighties most beautiful and popular Broadway dancers. Plus he was a very sweet guy. Tim's passing from AIDS was truly one of the deaths that galvanized to the community into the very early efforts to do something that culminated in the founding of Equity Fights AIDS and

Broadway Cares. Will let Ken Page the wise old deuteronomy of Cats have the final word. Those of us who have survived aids this that the other even whatever, just age. If we don't tell the story, who does? Because you

can only tell it if you were there. And if we are not responsible in telling it and passing it on when people ask like you have, then it dies literally and it's too valuable a story, whether it's in one person named Tim Scott or in any of the number of people we named from cats, or the greater number that we're in the theater New York at the time, or the even greater number that was the world population that we lost. We who have survived have to tell

the story. I hope you've enjoyed seas and three of Mobituaries. If you were with us the first two seasons, thanks for sticking around. If you haven't heard our previous seasons, I hope you'll do a little delving. Either way, feel free to spread the word about mobids me. I ask you to please rate and review this podcast. You can also follow Mobituaries on Facebook and Instagram, and you can follow me on Twitter at morocco and check out Mobituaries.

Great Lives Worth Reliving the New York Times best selling book, now available in paperback and audiobook. It includes plenty of stories not in the podcast. This episode of Mobituaries was produced by Francisco Robina. Our team of producers also includes Aaron Shrink, Wilco, Martinezcaceto, and me Morocca. It was edited by Moral Wolves and engineered by Josh Hahn, with fact checking by Naomi bar Our production company is Neon Houm Media. Our archival produce sir is Jamie Benson. Our theme music

is written by Daniel Hart. Indispensable support from Craig Swaggler, Dustin Gervais, Alan Pang, Reggie Basio and everyone at CBS News Radio. Special thanks to David France, Tom Biola, Bill Keith Richard, j Alexander, Megan Marcus, Molly Raleigh, Steven Spanbauer, and Alberto Robina. The Invincible. Aaron Shrank is our senior producer.

Executive producers for Mobituaries include Steve Raizys and Morocca. The series is created by Yours Truly and as always, thanks to Rant Morrison and John carp for helping breathe life into Mobituaries