Signorile was born in Brooklyn, New York and spent his early childhood in the 1960s and 1970s in New York City and Staten Island. He attended the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, where he majored in journalism. It was in those years that he came to realize his own gay sexual orientation, but still remained closeted to many friends and to family.
In the mid-80s, shortly after graduating from college, Signorile moved to Manhattan. Among his first jobs he worked for an entertainment public relations firm that specialized in "column-planting" -- getting clients, which included movie companies and Broadway shows, into New York City's gossip columns, such as the popular Page Six at the New York Post and Liz Smith (journalist), then at the New York Daily News.
He was somewhat open about his own homosexuality by that time, but he had not looked at it in the broader context of politics and culture in America. His political awakening came as the AIDS epidemic expanded in the late 80s and more friends were getting sick and dying.
He became a gay activist and the co-founder of Queer Nation. Michelangelo was dubbed by Time magazine as the man who invented "outing" in his column for the now defunct magazine Outweek. In his new book Outing Yourself: How to Come Out to Your Family, Friends, and Coworkers, he offers step by step tips on coming out.
In his previous book, Queer In America: Sex, the Media, and the Closets of Power, he examines three closets that keep gays invisible: the media in New York, politics in Washington, and entertainment in Hollywood. Michelangelo is also a monthly feature writer for the national magazine publication OUT.
His work, which range from essays on rural life in gay America to a dissection of violence in the community is a touchstone for a new generation of gays and lesbians and a clarion call for mainstream America.
"I consider truthful discussion of the lives of homosexual public figures as legitimate and significant in the larger aim to give courage to millions of gay people who stay in the closet ot of fear and shame."
