George Maharis is arrested twice for alleged sexual contact with men. He keeps living anyway. Here is his timeline.
1958
He makes his film debut in The Mugger, after working in live television dramas such as Studio One and Naked City.
1960
He appears in Otto Preminger's Exodus. In October, Route 66 premieres on CBS. He plays Buz Murdock, driving across America in a Corvette. The network presents him as a leading man.
1962
He receives an Emmy nomination. He records pop albums during these years.
1963
He leaves Route 66 during its third season, citing fatigue. Producers doubt that explanation.
1967
On December 15, a Los Angeles vice-squad officer arrests Maharis in the men's room of a Hollywood restaurant. The officer states that Maharis made a pass at him. The lewd conduct charge is dismissed when he pleads guilty to disturbing the peace. He pays a $50 fine.
There is no victim and no complaint. The officer is there to make what cops call an easy arrest.
1970
He returns to series television as a lead in The Most Deadly Game. The series is short-lived.
1973
In July, Maharis appears nude in the second issue of Playgirl. He is 45. He is one of the first celebrities to pose fully nude for the magazine.
Six years after a public arrest, he chooses to be seen on his own terms.
1974
Police arrest him in the men's room of a gas station with another man. The charge is sex perversion. His bail is $500. His name appears in newspapers beside the word "perversion."
1975
He plays Robert Davenport in the television movie Murder on Flight 502.
1976
He plays Joey Quales in the miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man. He also plays Guy Woodhouse in the television movie Look What's Happened to Rosemary's Baby.
1978
He plays Evan Walsh in the television movie The Crash of Flight 401.
1978–1982
He guest stars on Fantasy Island several times, playing a different character in each appearance.
Early 1980s
He tours in the national company of Neil Simon's I Ought to Be in Pictures.
1990
He plays Charlie Cosmo in the Murder, She Wrote episode "Trials and Tribulations." It is his last television role.
1993
He appears in the film Doppelganger. It is his last screen performance.
2023
Maharis dies at his home in Beverly Hills on May 24. He is 94. He never publicly discusses his sexuality.
A Win Against the Closet
An intolerant, dominant culture sets out to destroy George Maharis, and it uses the closet to do it. Police arrest him twice. Newspapers across the country print his name beside the word "perversion." A man who is a network television star in 1962 becomes, by 1974, a public example of what happens to gay men who are caught.
He does not disappear. He returns to work the following year and continues for almost two decades, in television movies, a miniseries, guest roles, stage tours, and film. That requires courage, intelligence, and sustained effort, in an industry that has every reason to exclude him.
His story is usually told as a scandal. It is a record of survival. George Maharis lives to 94, and he outlasts the culture that tried to end his career. He deserves respect for that.
The story of George Maharis is a win against the closet and a win against hate.
— Behan
Sources
The Washington Post, "George Maharis, dashing star of 'Route 66,' dies at 94," May 28, 2023
Matthew Rettenmund, "George Maharis, Eternally Handsome 'Route 66' Star, Dies @ 94," Gr8erDays, May 27, 2023
IMDb, George Maharis biography and filmography
The Movie Database (TMDB), George Maharis filmography
Newspaper report, "George Maharis Arrested in Men's Room," 1974
Anna Lvovsky, Vice Patrol: Cops, Courts, and the Struggle over Urban Gay Life before Stonewall (University of Chicago Press, 2021