Before actor Tony Tripoli got cast as a gay clothing designer who works for Bo Derek on the new nightly soap "Fashion House," he was best known for being one of comic Kathy Griffin's "best gays." He and best friend, writer Dennis Hensley, often appeared on Griffin's Bravo reality show "My Life on the D-List" last year.

That was then.

He and Hensley had a falling out with Griffin, ending more than a decade of friendship. In an exclusive interview Tripoli did with me for the Sept. 26, 2006 issue of Frontiers Magazine, he talked about the bust-up and being an out actor in Hollywood. Here are some excerpts:

The exposure on D-List let to the Fashion House gig which casts him as Hans, a gay fashion designer, who works for Derek’s character, an evil fashion label owner who goes head-to-head with her rival Morgan Fairchild.
"I play an actual gay guy on a show and I’m actually gay! A practicing homosexual who’s not ashamed of it," he says. "It’s huge to think about these gay and questioning youths flipping through the dial and to be able to see themselves in television shows. That’s great and profoundly impactful."

He has never spoken publicly about why he and Hensley fell out with Griffin and says he never planned to. But the tart-tongue comedienne, who made headlines over the summer by saying on Larry King Live that she split from her husband, Matt Moline, because he stole more than $72,000 from her. She also gave the impression, Tripoli says, that he and Hensley had been less than loyal friends..

"There’s no way to talk about it that won’t make her look bad," Tripoli says. " She wasn’t talking about us and I wasn’t talking about her. She’s chosen to start talking and mentioned in the press that Dennis and I dumped her in her hour of need. I think it’s remarkable that after a decade of friendship and loyalty, unparalleled in a town like this, it is incredibly sad and painful that she would say to the press that we abandoned her."

He says the friendship didn’t end over one specific argument. Instead, it was what he calls "a blossoming lack of kindness and gratitude on her part."
"Kathy is the sun in her world and everyone else is planets revolving around her. But she’s a brilliant comedienne. No one is funnier. She has created a niche for herself, the world that she wants to live in, and I applaud that. I want to live in a world that has a little more kindness."

With the Sept. 5 debut of Fashion House, it’s a whole new world for Tripoli whose already completed his work on the show. He filmed 65 one-hour episodes "which meant 62 round-trips from Los Angeles to San Diego. We made like three seasons worth of a regular show."

He says working with Bo Derek was a great experience but before they began working, Tripoli was a little concerned about working with the actress who is a staunch Republican.
"I wondered, ‘Am I going to spend the entire summer with this woman who thinks I’ll burn in hell forever? I was a little nervous. We’re her best friends on the show and I wanted it to ring true. But I’m a little ashamed that I went into it being a little nervous about that, it was really unfair. She was immensely kind and hysterically funny."

As for Fairchild, Tripoli could not have been more impressed.
"It’s criminal, criminal that they would have a gay man on the show and never let him have a scene with Morgan Fairchild! There should be litigation! There should be litigation!"

As for the future, Hensley is looking for his next acting gig and is also dabbling in stand-up, making his debut at the Laugh Factory in late August. "It’s another avenue to explore and honey, I got stories to tell. I just worked with Morgan Fairchild and Bo Derek. I used to sing on cruise ships. There’s enough to fill an act."
But ultimately, he has bigger ambitions.
"I want to be the gay Oprah!"