I'm a free-lance media whore living in Los Angeles, CA, specifically North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley.
You can learn about everything I'm up to by checking out my website-
www.DennisHensley.com
I just had a really cool thing happen. I entered a script in HBO's SHOUT GLBT short film contest and they chose my script as one of the winners and gave me a little money to make it. So this spring I made my film, Reunion, with a really talented cast and crew and it premiered May 2 in Miami. It screens July 12 at Outfest in LA. It also has its own MySpace page--be its friend by clicking on the poster below!
I make my living primarily as a writer. I've written two novels, Misadventures in the (213) and Screening Party. You can purchase them by clicking on the cover-
I'm currently trying to get my third book off the ground. It's going to be about my years as a cruise ship entertainer and it's tentatively going to be called Happy Places. I need to be working on it right this second but instead I'm here on MySpace. Feel free to drop me a line and bug me about how the book's coming.
I co-host a weekly syndicated radio show called Twist that caters to the GLBT crowd and the GLBT friendly. It's like Casey Kasem meets The View but gay. It airs on weekends in a bunch of markets around the country and you can also listen to it on-demand at www.prideradio.com
I also produce and appear in a regular video blog for the site OutzoneTV.com The site is a collaboration between Bravo and Planet Out and my vlog's entitiled Driven to Distraction and it's about all the things in the culture that keep me from getting anything noteworthy accomplished...things like Ashlee Simpson's nose and Mario Lopez's ass. Just click below to check out my latest vlog-
Speaking of Bravo, die-hard Bravophiles may recognize me from the first season of the Emmy=nominated reality show Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D List. I was one of the Main Gays, along with my roommate and BFF Tony Tripoli, who you may also know as one of Bo Derek's beleagured designers on MyNetworkTV's Fashion House.
Since selling my first story--about my harrowing dance audition for Madonna's Blond Ambition Tour--to Movieline in 1990, I've made my living primarily writing for magazines. Other titles include Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire, Glamour, In Style, The Advocate, Instinct, Us (before it was all about Nicole Richie and her fat ass), British Premier, TV Guide, LA Confidential, Time Out New York and Seventeen. I primarily do celebrity profiles but in the past few years I've been doing a lot of travel writing for Outtraveler.com and pop culture-related features for MSNBC.com
In 2002, I got the opportunity to travel to the Argentina set of the film Testosterone, a film I co-wrote with director David Moreton. It was one of the most exciting and creative experiences of my life and I'm really proud of the movie. You can catch it on Logo. They play it a lot. Or you can purchase it by clicking below-
David and I have another screenplay called Tom Foolery that's currently being ignored by some of the biggest names in Hollywood. Feel free to option it.
After years of trying to kick in the door to TV writing, I finally got a gig writing on the Lifetime comedy show, Lovespring International. It's a semi-improvised comedy about a group of misfits who work in a dating service. My job was to help craft the detailed story outlines that the actors would base their improvs on. Unfortunately, LifeTime TV cancelled it. What a shame. But you can download all the episodes by clicking the link below-
What else? I love to go to the movies and theater, I love watching reality shoes with my friends. I love to dance--I still take the occasional hip-hop class at Crunch and like to two-step on occasion, preferably to a song by Reba or Trisha Yearwood, my favorite singer in the world. I wrote and recorded my own CD in 2000, The Water's Fine, which you can check out by clicking the link below-
I've always wanted to make a living doing the creative things I love. Sometimes things go your way and sometimes it seems like you can't get arrested. I do know that I'm happiest when I'm really cooking creatively so I've just decided to keep on trotting it out till the bitter end and enjoy the cool stuff that comes along...like connecting with interesting, fun people on MySpace.
