Episode 22: Joe Gage’s KANSAS CITY TRUCKING CO. (1976)

“Have you ever wondered about truckers… or about how men get it on… with each other?” asks the trailer for Kansas City Trucking Co., Joe Gage’s 1976 story of a straight trucker whose consciousness is raised on his first cross-country haul to Los Angeles. A truly landmark film, Kansas City Trucking Co. had a seismic impact on gay male visual and sexual culture, establishing a new vision of blue collar masculinity virtually overnight — along with a pair of new icons to go with it.

Over the course of this episode, we’ll dig into the film’s genesis and genre roots, the exciting audio process known as SurrounduSound; and the promotional blitz that introduced the world to the Gage Men.