Alexandra Paul protected her gay Baywatch co-star as his “beard”

“Baywatch” actress Alexandra Paul was happy to help her boyfriend and co-star Jaason Simmons back before he could safely come out as gay.

Speaking to People on Monday at the premiere of the upcoming documentary series “After Baywatch: Moment in the Sun,” Paul said she was Simmons' “beard,” telling the magazine she had led the tabloids to believe the two were a couple at a time when being open and proud of your figure could be dangerous.

“In the 1990s, 30 years ago, it not only had a negative impact on the career of a gay actor in Hollywood, but also on life on the streets,” she says. “You weren't as safe.”

Paul said Simmons was careful to keep his private life private while playing the attractive Australian lifeguard Logan, a character Paul described as “a straight guy who [with] every woman on the show.”

“It just shows what a good actor he is, because yes, he was gay,” she said. “He and I were very, very close on the show and I became his beard, so to speak.”

Paul recalled that they had “so much affection for each other” on set and in private that it was not too difficult for him to pretend they were in a romantic relationship.

“We just let them think what they thought,” she recalled, adding, “It was like people saw us together and then it came naturally. So we just went with it, because I was only 22, 23 at the time.”

As Paul and Simmons maintained their ruse, “After Baywatch” director Matthew Felker recalled that coming out as gay actors in the '90s was “like a sport for paparazzi.”

“They hunted [Simmons] like an animal,” he told People.

Simmons came out publicly in 2008 when he announced his relationship with his then-fiancé, Irish actor John O'Callaghan, in the Australian magazine New Idea.

In an interview with TooFab in 2014, the actor said he was grateful for how much his “Baywatch” co-stars respected his privacy.

“Everyone knew, I just didn't talk about my private life, I'm quite shy and introverted,” he told the website. “When you're on a show like that, you have to adapt a lot. I did it in small steps. I was in a relationship the whole time and they were all informed and it was fantastic and no problem.”