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Published by The Hollywood Reporter
Everyone knows the story about Richard Gere. Few know how it started. For four decades, a salacious and unproven rumor has shadowed one of Hollywood’s biggest stars. Investigative reporter Allen Salkin spent six years chasing its origins — and uncovered a story about gossip, power, politics, the internet and the peculiar wiring of our own brains. New episodes every Thursday.
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Could Jerry Penacoli — Philly's golden-boy newsman, be the Gerbil rumor's actual patient zero? Eyewitnesses and archival tape tell a wilder, sadder story than anyone remembers. Did the rumor jump cities before it infected Gere?
Say "gerbil" to someone and watch their face. Everyone's heard the rumor. Nobody knows where it came from. Reporter Allen Salkin isn't sure he should be the one to dig into it, but a tip from the daughter of an '80s ER doctor changes his mind.
The Richard Gere gerbil rumor won’t die. Why? Did a movie star really show up at a hospital in the 1980s with a rodent in his rectum he’d inserted for sexual pleasure? Investigative reporter Allen Salkin spent six-years examining documents and interviewing Hollywood players, doctors and everyone involved to answer everything — including why it matters more than ever. The Hollywood Reporter will release the first two episodes of Gerbil on Sept. 17, and installments will be released weekly on Thursdays after that.
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Observed September 19, 2026.
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