"The Gay Architects of Rock," an October, 2017, article in the New York Times by Jim Farber[1] includes a remembrance by Jock McLean, a former assistant to George Harrison. McLean recalls picking up Harry Nilsson and driving him to a meeting at Harrison's house. At the time, Nilsson was being courted by Apple to join the Beatles new record label under the Beatles' manager Brian Epstein. As McLean recalled:

 

George was talking about how wonderful the whole thing was going to be, trying to convince Harry to join the company. It was all great until Harry said, "The only thing is, I don’t think I could be managed by a gay man."
[...]
In a heartbeat, Harry was out of the house. George, like all the Beatles, was extremely supportive of Brian. To them, Brian was the man.

 

McLean's story is intended to show how George Harrison and the other Beatles respected Brian Epstein and their devotion to him. But it has often been quoted on the internet to disparage Harry Nilsson.

 

At the time the event above is said to have occurred, Harry had a close relationship with Gil Garfield, a gay man who was one of Nilsson's earliest supporters. Harry and Gil cowrote several songs together including "Paradise" which was recorded by the Ronettes in 1965. Nilsson's relationship with Garfield, though, may have been rocky since the two didn't work together again after those early years and Garfield never spoke of Harry in later interviews.

 

If Nilsson did have a negative attitude towards gays, it seems to have abated by the early 1980s when he actively supported Wallace Albertson's campaign for a seat in the California State Assembly. In 1972, Albertson was a founding member of the Gay Caucus of the California Democratic Council. She actively supported LGBT causes until her death in 2015.

 

In 1991, Nilsson recorded a new version of his "Blanket for a Sail" for the Disney album For Our Children, a compilation of children's music benefiting the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.