Sexual harassment accusations against John Travolta making headlines – but are they true?

Everyone’s heard the whispers or read the tabloid stories about John Travolta having gay hook-ups or kissing his male nanny on the mouth.

This is a guy who has been a star for more than 35 years now and survived some major career ups and downs.

But lawsuits filed by a pair of male masseurs have resulted in a lot of press – including the front page of the New York Post. The Travolta story even relegated President Obama’s support of same-sex marriage to a bottom headline in that paper.

Good Morning America teased the Travolta story at the top of its show Thursday morning and The Insider and Entertainment Tonight led with it.

It’s all getting pretty ugly and the attorney representing the two masseurs promises there is more to come even as Travolta’s camp provided to TMZ and other outlets what they say is proof that Travolta wasn’t even in the same city on the date one of the accusers alleges he was sexually harassed.

Is Travolta the victim of a shakedown from these masseurs (they have remained John Does in legal documents) or is he a careless movie star used to having his way?

Then there’s this latest development which I wrote about for Gay Star News: A former Royal Caribbean Cruise Line employee named Fabian Zanzi says Travolta also accosted him.

Zanzi was in charge of VIPs on the cruise and claims that aboard a ship in 2009, Travolta offered him $12,000 for sex. Zanzi said he refused.

It’s not clear if he is suing the actor or not.

It will be interesting to see play out and if it has any impact on Travolta’s career. He has starred in classic films like Pulp Fiction, Saturday Night Fever and Grease and in popular films including Get Shorty, Look Who’s Talking, Broken Arrow, Michael, Phenomenon and Face-Off.

But his last big year at the box office was in 2007 when he was in the cast of a pair of major hits: Hairspray and Wild Hogs. He has completed the films Savages and Killing Season and is due to next star in Gotti: In the Shadow of My Father, according to the Internet Movie Database.

He has been married to actress Kelly Preston for more than 20 years and they have three children including a son named Jett who died in 2009.