Morgan Fairchild chats about her new here! network film, her longtime AIDS activism, and her recent right hook to Bo Derek.

By Christopher Cappiello

“It’s Columbo with good hair and good clothes,” says Morgan Fairchild, laughing at her own description of the here! network's Donald Strachey mystery series of original films based on the Richard Stevenson novels about a gay private investigator in Albany, N.Y.

Fairchild plays a wealthy socialite and homophobic mother whose gay son is murdered in Shock to the System, the second film in the series, premiering this month on the gay network. Chad Allen returns as Strachey, a hot-headed, hard-boiled investigator who happens to be gay.

“I think it's great that the gay community has their own network,” Fairchild says with enthusiasm, “and it's nice that it's a network with regular programming. I think a lot of people in Middle America might expect that a gay network would be mostly porno.” She hopes that films like the Strachey series will help show viewers that LGBT people are “just like your next door neighbor,” with characters like Strachey who, “at end of the day, instead of going home to his wife, he goes home to his boyfriend.” As for Chad Allen, one of Hollywood's only openly gay leading men, Fairchild has nothing but praise. “I love working with Chad. He is so lovely, so polite and a real pro. I can't say enough glowing things about Chad!”

While Fairchild's role as a perfectly coifed, wealthy and powerful woman echoes some of her most famous primetime soap characters from the '80s on Flamingo Road and Falcon Crest, she is quick to point out the differences. “It isn't quite vintage Morgan Fairchild. Most of my characters are over-the-top vixens and she's so repressed. Also, it's unusual for me to play someone so homophobic.”

It's unusual because the beautiful blond actress has been an articulate and outspoken advocate for research and education on HIV/AIDS for a generation. Long before even Elizabeth Taylor joined the fray, Fairchild was on television trying to educate the public about the virus. “When I was a kid, I wanted to be a doctor or a paleontologist,” the Texas-born actress reveals. “I've always been interested in science, and one of my hobbies is epidemiology and tracking new viruses.” She recalls reading about 13 cluster cases of Kaposi's sarcoma in New York in 1979, “and I thought, 'That's odd. That's not one you see.' Then I heard they were all gay men and a light bulb went off. When Rock Hudson got sick, I'd already been warning my gay friends.”

The early years of the AIDS epidemic coincided with some of Fairchild's biggest television roles and she quickly became a kind of celebrity spokesperson, in spite of warnings from managers and agents. “I felt a moral imperative knowing there was so much fear. I thought it was important to get the fear out and get the funding for research.” She made appearances on Nightline, explaining retro-viruses to the general public, and spoke before Senate committees on research and education issues. “At one point the assistant secretary for health and human services said, 'You know more about this virus than these doctors!'”

During the Reagan era the outspoken actress made an unexpected alliance with Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop. “I got a phone call saying, 'The surgeon general wants to speak to you.' They were forming the Hollywood AIDS Task Force and he wanted to meet me.” At their lunch meeting at the Beverly Hills Hotel's Polo Lounge, Koop ended up dismissing his staff so the seemingly mismatched pair could talk in depth about the epidemic.

“In my book, the gay community owes a big thank you to C. Everett Koop,” she says. “He was appointed because he was anti-choice, but then AIDS came along and he treated it as a disease. He got people to not be afraid of people, but of the disease. He and I became allies on AIDS. He really stood up at a time and in an administration that was disinterested. He became a thorn in their side.”

In addition to Fairchild's AIDS activism, she has never shied from bringing LGBT themes to television. “I was one of the first people to play a gay character when I was on Roseanne [as Sandra Bernhard's girlfriend in a 1992 episode]. I thought it was important to do that. I just knew that the last person anyone expected to see come out of that bedroom is Morgan Fairchild!” she says, laughing at her own image as a man-chasing vixen. “I knew it would make people stop and think” about their stereotypes of gays and lesbians. Her recurring role as Chandler's mother on Friends also made her the wife of Kathleen Turner, who famously portrayed the transgender dad.

At 56, the articulate, surprisingly funny Fairchild still looks fantastic, with the porcelain skin of her youth expertly maintained. When asked if she has any beauty secrets for gay men, she is quick to reply, “Gay men aren't going to like my secrets: no drinking, no smoking, no drugs, and no sun!” After a loud laugh, she irreverently adds, “Crystal meth is hell on your skin.” She admits, “I was blessed with good skin in my youth. But as you get older, a lot of it is lifestyle. What you eat, drink. Smoking is horrible for the skin. I worry about my gay friends.”

As Shock to the System airs this month, Fairchild is shooting Fashion House, a new series with Bo Derek for Fox's new MyNetworkTV inspired by the hi-octane telenovelas of Spanish-language television. “It's soapy, Dynasty stuff,” she explains with relish. “Bo and I have some great bitch-slapping fights. I'm that real uber bitch. I give Bo a good right hook. All my gay friends are e-mailing me because they've seen the promos!”

From Flamingo Road to Friends, Old Navy ads to playing Mrs. Robinson onstage last year in The Graduate, it seems Fairchild can't be put in a box. “I'm so Aquarian! I love doing things people don't expect me to do. I love doing Pee Wee's Big Adventure. I love doing the homophobic mother.” Through it all, her dedication to fighting HIV/AIDS has earned her a loyal following. “I know I have a lot of gay fans and I really appreciate them. During The Graduate [tour], every opening-night party someone would come up to me and say, 'I'm a drag queen and I've done you in my show!' (laughs loud) Or, 'I learned how to do eye makeup from you.' Or, 'Thank you for your work on AIDS.' That means a lot to me.”