Patrick was born to migrant workers in Texas. Because his parents moved around the southwest constantly, looking for work, he never went to one school for an entire year until his senior year of high school in Roswell, New Mexico. The only cultural constants in his life were books, movies, and radio. His mother made sure he learned to read, and arranged that he start school a year early. Unsocialized due to constant displacement, he always made poor grades, and dropped out of college after two years. Having experienced no live theatre but a few school shows, he fell in love with stage work while washing dishes at the Kennebunkport Playhouse one summer. Stopping off in New York on his way back to Roswell, he stumbled into the Caffe Cino, the first underground or Off-Off Broadway theatre, on September 14, 1961. He remained there working for free in any required capacity, supporting himself with temporary typing jobs while observing and participating in the production of dozens of plays. Having long been a poet, in 1964 he got an idea for a play, "The Haunted Host," and because of the casualness of the Cino, was allowed to mount it almost at once. It was something of a success, and playwrighting became his main focus.

Patrick is the author of over 60 published plays.

1960s

, and Adult Video News magazines; and had his short stories included in numerous anthologies.

Additionally, Patrick has appeared in the documentaries, Resident Alien (1990) (with Quentin Crisp) and Anatomy of an Icon (2008); and in the videos: O is for Orgy: The Sequel and O Boys: Parties, Porn, and Politics, both produced by the O Boys Network.

Most recently, he has written his memoirs, Film Moi or Narcissus in the Dark, and the plays: Hollywood at Sunset and Michelangelo's Models.

He reviews adult gay-male videos for several publications and maintains 70 pages of photographs at Caffe Cino Pictures.

He retired from theatre in 1990, and has lived in Los Angeles since 1993.

In 2010 he published a DVD of his lecture, Caffe Cino: Birthplace of Gay Theatre.

Plays

• The Haunted Host (1964)
• Joyce Dynel (1969)
• Salvation Army (1969)
• Fog (1969)
• Camera Obscura (1969)
• Pouf Positive
• Kennedy's Children (1974)
• One Man, One Woman
• Play-By-Play

• The Golden Circle
• Tools Not Rules
• My Cup Ranneth Over (1976)
• T-Shirts (1979)
• Mutual Benefit Life
• Mercy Drop
• Blue Is For Boys (1983)
• Untold Decades (1988)
• Michelangelo's Models

• Bread Alone
• The Trial of Socrates
• Judas"
• "The Trojan Women" (after Euripides)
• The Last Stroke
• Hello, Bob
• Evan on Earth
• All at Sea (book and score)
• Hollywood at Sunset
• "The Trojan Women" (after Euripides)

Collections and Anthologies

• Robert Patrick's Cheap Theatricks
• Mercy Drop and Other Plays
• Gay Plays: A First Collection (edited by Hoffman), includes T-Shirts
• Contra/Dictions
• The Mammoth Book of Gay Short Stories
• Flesh & the Word 2 & 3
• Best Gay Erotica 2009 & 2010

Poetry

• "Benedicktion," published in RFD magazine #104

Screenplays

• Ghost Story (TV) (1972)
• High-Tide (TV) (1990)
• Robin's Hoods (TV) (1994)

Plus numerous ghost-written works

Film and video roles

• Resident Alien (1990)
• O Is for Orgy: The Sequel
• O Boys: Parties, Porn, and Politics
• Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon (2008)

Awards

• Show Business Magazine Best Play Award, 1969
• Glasgow Citizens Theatre Best World Playwrighting Award, 1973
• The International Thespian Society Founders Award for Services to Theatre and to Youth, 1980 (first openly gay recipient)
• Blue is for Boys Weekends in the Borough of Manhattan, 1983 and 1986
• Robert Chesley Foundation Award For Lifetime Achievement In Gay Playwrighting, 1996
• West Hollywood Gay and Lesbian Advisory Board's Rainbow Key Award for having been instrumental in the creation of gay theatre and the off-off-Broadway movement, 2008