Ep. - 1723 - GERBIL: INVESTIGATING A HOLLYWOOD RUMOR

Reality Life with Kate Casey

In this episode, Kate Casey interviews investigative journalist Allen Salkin about his 12-part podcast series, 'Gerbil.' They explore the or

Key takeaways

• The 'Philadelphia Gerbil Panic' of 1985 targeted KYW anchor Jerry Penacoli years before the rumor reached Richard Gere.
• Allen Salkin utilized LexisNexis archives, FOIA requests, and old ER records to trace the rumor's history over a six-year investigation.

Main topics

• Hollywood urban legends
• Investigative journalism techniques

Notable quotes

A rumor doesn't survive decades by accident.

Conclusion

The episode offers a deep dive into the mechanics of misinformation an

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:03) Welcome Speaker 2 (0:04) back for another episode of Reality Life with Kate Casey. When I was growing up, there was a story, an absurd story, that seemed to take on a life of its own. Jerry Pinnacoli was a rising star at KYW News in Philadelphia. Handsome, dynamic, his face on the side of city buses. And there was a rumor about him, about a gerbil in an emergency room. Something that no one would say out loud, but everyone somehow knew. It was ridiculous, and it was passed around like a casual dinner story. The kind of thing adults would mention without a second thought. And years later, I heard a different version of it. Same story and a new name. Richard Gere. A few weeks ago, I was on Juicy Scoop with Heather MacDonald, and the story resurfaced. And we talked about the anatomy of a rumor. How something like this gets built, why it sticks. And at some point, we wondered out loud why no one had ever made a documentary about it. Now, unbeknownst to me, my friend Aliza Rosen was about to launch a podcast series that she'd produced doing exactly that. Because here's the thing. This isn't one rumor. It's the same rumor told about at least two men decades apart in different cities with no internet to carry it and zero evidence it ever happened to anyone. And it's not dead. This past July, the White House communications director attacked Richard Gere on social media over a completely unrelated policy disagreement and reached for this exact rumor to do it. Decades later, it's still sitting there, loaded, ready to be used as a weapon. To understand why it landed at all, you have to understand the climate that this was born into. This wasn't just gossip in the 1980s. It was gossip with a double meaning. Rock Hudson had just died of AIDS. The country was terrified, and that terror got tangled up with a much older fear about who was gay and who was hiding it. So when a rumor like this attached itself to a man, it was never really about a gerbil. It was a way of asking a question that nobody would ask directly, and a way of punishing a man for an answer nobody actually had. And you have to remember what being out actually meant for a public figure at that time. This was an era when an actor, an anchor, Anyone whose face was their livelihood could lose everything the moment they were perceived as gay, not just roles, but insurance, studio backing, entire careers built on being relatable to a mass audience. So the whisper didn't have to be true. It just had to exist. And once it was out there, it did the job on its own. Casting directors got nervous, networks got nervous, and a man's private life became a professional liability he never got to explain or defend because defending it just made people talk more. And that's what got me thinking about this, not the gossip, not the staying power, because a rumor doesn't survive decades by accident. Something about it works. It came out directly out of the AIDS era panic, out of a moment when the entire country was trying to figure out who was safe and who wasn't. And it attached itself to a man who seemed a little too polished, a little too private, a little too hard to read. And that's the part that should make you uncomfortable. This wasn't just a dumb joke. It was a tool and it got used on couriers. Jerry Petticoat never talked about it. Not then, not now. Richard Gere has said almost nothing in 35 years beyond one guarded line to Barbara Walters in 1991. Speaker 1 (3:36) In my conversation today, Speaker 2 (3:38) Alan Speaker 1 (3:39) Salkin and I Speaker 2 (3:40) talk about the cost, Speaker 1 (3:41) what Speaker 2 (3:42) it actually does to a person to carry a rumor like this for decades, the whispers in a newsroom, the doubt in a room full of executives, the way a lie like this can quietly follow a career and never quite let go of it, and what it did to someone like Jerry Petticolli, and what it's likely done to Richard Gere in ways he's never had to say out loud. Journalist Alan Salkin spent six years trying to find out where this actually started. Not just the gear version, the whole thing, all the way back. LexisNexis archives, FOIA requests, old ER records, a trail that runs through Philadelphia newsrooms, Hollywood parties, and in probably a decades-old grudge involving Sylvester Stallone. He turned it into a 12-part series called Gerbil. And today he's walking me through exactly what he found. Here's my interview with Alan. Speaker 1 (4:33) As you know, I can't Speaker 2 (4:35) even believe this is happening because Heather McDonald and I, maybe three weeks ago, I was on Juicy Scoop and we talked about this very topic. And I'm thrilled to have you today, Speaker 1 (4:45) especially because I'm from the Philadelphia area. Speaker 2 (4:47) And I grew up hearing a story about Jerry Penicoli. That story I heard before anything having to do with Richard Gere. So the stars have aligned. And you've provided me exactly what I was looking for. So welcome to the show. Speaker 1 (5:03) So few women ever say that to me. So thank you so much. Happy to be here. You know, when we heard, we were like putting the finishing touches on the first few episodes. And when we heard you guys talking, we were like, oh yeah, we're going to go on your shows and tell you, we're giving you what you want. Speaker 2 (5:21) Exactly. Well, I guess the first question is, how did this story find its way to you? Speaker 1 (5:27) Right. So I was in a documentary called Bad Vegan. It was made by a documentary maker named Chris Smith, who's been involved in Tiger King and, I mean, 100 Foot Wave and a thousand others. He's very successful. And the reason he's successful is he sometimes understands his director and he can kind of like put, quickly understands people. And he didn't even want to, he doesn't, generally want journalists in his movies. But on the Bad Vegan story, people kept saying, well, this guy, Alan, he wrote this original Vanity Fair story about it. So you should really talk to him. He's pretty good. And so he really liked how I was. And we just started talking about ideas. And just, we were literally, it was the second interview I did. And he was... Speaker 1 (6:19) The gerbil thing, I probably brought it up first and we were just like, yeah, that's a thing. And then Chris just was so excited and he had resources and he gave me a little bit of money to kind of make a pilot of a thing. And we had tried making something with all these interviews I had for my book about the Food Network. I interviewed all these famous food stars. And I didn't have my podcast voice yet. I was a writer. I mean, I am a writer. Anyway, I could go on and on. I've been in a lot of documentaries, so I'm good on camera, but just me and the microphone is different than being interviewed. Speaker 2 (6:53) Right. Speaker 1 (6:54) So it sort of went from there. And I made a few initial calls and I was skeptical. You know, I say this in the first episode of the podcast, like, should I even do this? Is it mean to Richard Gere? All these questions. Is this even a story? And so some of the first things I did were what I always do, like who? I searched Nexus, the old news database. You have to have a good deal of anybody. LexisNexis. Yeah, you can still get it. It still has shit that's not on the internet anywhere else. So, and I tried to find, well, who first, you know, the first question is, when did this start in a way? Well, did he do it? I found what I thought was the first few mentions in newspapers and I started calling those people who had put it in the newspaper. Speaker 2 (7:38) So let's go back and... talk about the Philadelphia story component of this. You trace early versions to Philadelphia in the 80s before it became a Hollywood story. Is this the Pentecostal story? Speaker 1 (7:52) Yeah, so that episode two is called The Philadelphia Gerbil Panic of 1985, which I actually think that in and of itself is a movie, like a scripted film. Just like what the madness. that took over the city at this time. So I remember adults talking about it. Oh, yeah. And Speaker 2 (8:12) like, even my own mom, who is not like a rumor person, and she would talk about it too, which is heartbreaking because he was, Jerry Petticoat, he was like such a fixture in Philadelphia news and media. It's really heartbreaking. I mean, the kids like myself even knew about it. Speaker 1 (8:31) He was. Like Ron Burgundy, almost except up and coming Ron Burgundy in Philadelphia in the 80s, Jerry Petticole. And he was on KYW News, I believe. Speaker 2 (8:44) KYW News Radio 1060. Speaker 1 (8:48) Exactly. Yeah. And oh, I didn't know that the radio station, now I'm thinking I'm getting the call letters of the TV station wrong. Is it both? It was both. Okay. So I'm so worried about getting everything right, you know, especially in this story, because I can be accused of so many things. So yeah. And then, so I didn't know about, when I started this, I'd never heard of Jerry Panicoli. And I had this editor, Mark Rosso, who was... in town in LA promoting his book about Dennis Hopper in the 60s or something. And we were, he was having a party at the Dresden in LA. And he says, Jerry Petticoat, he starts telling me this story. And I immediately start recording on my phone. And it just blew my mind. So ultimately, Yes, there was. And he tells me, Rozo tells me that he has a roommate at Swarthmore College where he was in 85. Swarthmore, yep. Yeah, and that this roommate who now is extremely prominent person who I have to anonymize in the show. Wow. His college roommate was what they then called the candy striper, a volunteer at the hospital. Right. Where Jerry Penicoli supposedly came in for his... quote unquote gerbilectomy, and that this guy came straight from his shift to their dorm room and told them, you wouldn't believe what I saw tonight in the emergency room. A candy Speaker 2 (10:16) striper wouldn't be in an emergency room. Like this is the first part of it where you're like, huh? Speaker 1 (10:22) You know what? I don't know. Probably not. But you can see them maybe mopping. I don't know. You're totally right, actually. Speaker 2 (10:30) No, Speaker 1 (10:30) there's Speaker 2 (10:30) no way. Speaker 1 (10:30) There's so many such bad. But Rosso is a very established journalist himself. This other guy he mentions is very prominent. And then he has this roommate who I talked to who is a lawyer in L.A. And they're all going by their real names, all telling me this story. Speaker 1 (10:49) So I'm like, okay, I got to explore this. And oh my God, it turns out every newspaper in Philadelphia wrote about it. Yeah. I'm Speaker 2 (10:59) telling you, everyone talked about it. Everyone. Like I'd go to someone's house and the parents would be talking about it and in front of kids. Like that's how twisted this is too. Speaker 1 (11:09) Yes. This Speaker 2 (11:10) was talked about in front of children. We all talked about it. Speaker 1 (11:14) Dan Savage, the sex columnist in my first episode. says, oh, it happened around the time of American Gigolo because that's when he was in seventh grade, which was 1980. And it does not add up. I'll say that. No, that doesn't sound right to me. But I believe it's because our sort of psychosexual development at that age is like, well, putting a penis in there sounds so weird. I guess a gerbil is, you know, at 13 years old, you don't totally understand what the hell this is all about. Speaker 2 (11:44) I don't think I looked at it. You know, I was so young and I'm a girl. I didn't really fixate on the sexual part of it. It was more like, he's a weirdo. Speaker 1 (11:55) Right. Just like... Well, now, so then what's the context, right? Jerry Panicoli was... You could not have been a successful anchor in Philadelphia in 1985 if you're gay. I Speaker 2 (12:07) would like to caveat this too. And I've said this before and people probably think I'm crazy, but I think... To know Philadelphia news is to know, it is, they do a spectacular job. The news media is at the top of the heap. There are people who would move to Philadelphia purposely to get a job in that market because they were the best of the best. Speaker 1 (12:29) Yes. So it was a rigorous news climate. Highly, Speaker 2 (12:34) highly competitive. If you are a star there, you can be a star. Anywhere. You're going straight to New York, you're going to be big time. So I think that's important to kind of imagine too, is this ruthless, Speaker 1 (12:47) ruthless climate. Right, which I do talk about as that is a possible motivation. So Jerry Panicoli is closeted at this time. Speaker 2 (12:58) Which, by the way, my uncle worked for CBS in Philadelphia. So I think that maybe this is a big part of my memory too, is that... Perhaps that was talked about too because my uncle worked in the news media. What's Speaker 1 (13:13) his name? Do you want to say his name? Speaker 2 (13:14) His name was Richard Swayze. He's passed away. Speaker 1 (13:18) Well, there is, in the episode, we talk about the potential that this was sabotage. That somebody wanted to take down. Because the competition, like you say, was so intense that anybody would have done anything to beat. Jerry Panicoli was a king at the time. He was, you know, his face was on the side of the buses. Speaker 2 (13:38) Super handsome, very dynamic, and was sort of, I think, he was ahead of his time. Because he was a really good newscaster, but he also had a charisma. You know, I think, you know, now I would assume talent managers are looking for people like that. Speaker 1 (14:01) Oh, yeah. And he was on a morning show, too, where he would interview people and stuff. Yes, Speaker 2 (14:06) I remember. So Speaker 1 (14:06) he wasn't just an anchor. Yeah. Yeah, Speaker 2 (14:07) so he could interview a movie star, but also then deliver, you know, political news. And I think... That would be of great concern to some of the older generation who are more of like the Walter Cronkite era kind of newscasters. Like this guy had charisma. Speaker 1 (14:28) And the gerbil rumor sort of historically is a way to kind of label someone as gay. Speaker 2 (14:36) Right. And Speaker 1 (14:37) so again, back to, you also will remember that homophobia was just... The worst. And it was not even controversial. It was just what it was at that time. And Philadelphia was not the most tolerant of places. Speaker 2 (14:53) Absolutely not. And then I remember discussions in... The media, like people were so concerned about AIDS and this idea that if somebody was gay, they have AIDS. And if they have AIDS, if you even touch the spoon that they're eating or something like that, you're going to catch it. It was an insane time. Speaker 1 (15:15) Right. So go back to 1985 when this hits. I trace it to the first rumors about pentecostal are basically in. September or so, August, September, 1985. Well, Rock Hudson dies that year of AIDS. And that is the kind of nuclear moment when, and people now, you know, I have to get into this in a later episode, like AIDS was gigantic and everyone was scared of it, even straight people, because it was whatever, it was said to also potentially be a straight disease. Speaker 2 (15:51) But Speaker 1 (15:51) yes, the gays were, you know, Anyway, it was a lot of terror. And so these, you know, when people see that, oh, there's a podcast about the gerbil rumor, they're like, why are you attacking Richard Gere? And it's like, no, this is, let's talk about AIDS. Let's talk about how. Speaker 1 (16:11) fear sort of crystallizes and manifests in this sort of thing and is summarized in this weird alchemetic way in people's brains that, oh, that guy, you know, we don't trust him. Also, remember, Rock Hudson was not known by the general public to be gay. Speaker 2 (16:34) No. Speaker 1 (16:35) So, nor... was Jerry Panicoli. So, but the suspicion of, well, who's gay? Who's lying? Speaker 1 (16:46) Right. And so, well, there's that guy. And so he's probably known by some people in Philadelphia, his friends, that he's gay. Speaker 2 (16:53) So Speaker 1 (16:54) here we go. It's just a way to alchemize. Speaker 2 (16:57) Also, thinking back to that time too, this discussion of closeted professionals and marrying women and them having some sort of