Thom Bierdz: tragedy turns soap star into author and prolific artist...

As if tipping you off to my current piece in The Advocate wasn't enough, here is a tip to check out a story I wrote for the new issue of LA-based Frontiers. It is my interview with a very special man named Thom Bierdz. Some of you may remember him from the three years he spent playing Phillip Chancellor on "The Young and the Restless."

Since he was a closeted soap star, it was ironic that Thom was a hearthrob to so many female fans.
“At one time there were 7,000 girls to see me in Toronto—but they weren’t there to see me,� Bierdz remembers. “They were there to see my character Phillip. I knew that I was gay, and I didn’t think they were there because they knew who I was, so I never got too involved in that. I was always a little removed.�

But after Thom left the show in 1989 to pursue movies, the worst kind of tragedy struck:Back home in Wisconsin, Thom's chronically troubled youngest brother Troy beat their mother Phyllis to death with a baseball bat in the kitchen of the home where they grew up. Things were never the same personally or professionally for Bierdz, who, six years ago, also discovered the body of his other brother, the charismatic Gregg, who unexpectedly committed suicide.

He also became obsessed with delving into his mother’s murder and his brother’s history of mental illness, which not only resulted in a reconciliation with the sibling who ended their mother’s life, but also produced the haunting and painfully honest memoir "Forgiving Troy," an “art-o-biography� that mixes Bierdz’s writing with his paintings.

Here are some of Thom's paintings:

Except for appearing on an episode of Matlock and returning briefly to the soap, his acting career was all but over. But his creative output had just begun. Bierdz became a prolific and respected artist who has made hundreds of paintings of varying mood and style.

“After my brother killed my mother, my priorities really shifted,� he says. “I went really introverted and spent a lot of time examining what was really important to me. Acting became very difficult for me. I was always an introvert, and I just seemed to get more nervous as I got older. I wrote for a while and the painting happened by accident, and people were just very interested.�

The handsome Bierdz, 41, lives with his boyfriend, actor Steve Callahan (pictured, left) - who was terrific in " East Side Story" - in the mid-Wilshire section of Los Angeles. Their home is filled with Bierdz’s paintings.

Bierdz is so prolific that he is hired to paint on-the-spot at various events, including the recent Thalian’s Ball, where he received an award from organizer Debbie Reynolds and his painting that night earned $6,000 for charity. "Forgiving Troy" can be purchased at www.thom bierdz.com, where about 400 of Bierdz’s paintings can be viewed as well as a video of him visiting his brother in prison. I promise you, it's a really engrossing and deeply personal read.

Well-done Thom!