Monday, June 26 | 6 Movies
Queer characters have graced the silver screen since the industry’s inception—but you had to look for them in the early years, as they often languished in exaggerated, silly and/or tragic roles. Due to a variety of factors, including constraints placed on studios from 1934-1968 by the Production Code and societal gender expectations, gay characters in Hollywood endured stereotypical, diminished depictions for decades as the community struggled for acceptance offscreen.
Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s 1995 documentary The Celluloid Closet, based on Vito Russo’s 1981 book, charts the evolution of the treatment of LGBT+ characters onscreen from the industry’s infancy through the mid-1990s. Through interviews with historians, creatives and stars like Tony Curtis, Shirley MacLaine, Tom Hanks and Whoopi Goldberg, the movie celebrates the steps taken towards increased, positive representation while leaving viewers hopeful that will continue to flourish in an encouraging way.
TCM honors The Celluloid Closet with a screening of the documentary this month, along with five films from 1933-1961 that highlight queer characters.
Gay roles proliferated in pre-Code Hollywood, but none so front and center as Queen Christina (1933). From the time she was crowned monarch at age six through her abdication of the throne at age 28, the headstrong Swedish ruler (Greta Garbo) devotes herself to her country but shows little interest in marrying and producing an heir. While the picture retains some historical anecdotes—she wore men’s clothes and enjoyed lesbian relationships—MGM added a romance with Spanish envoy Antonio (John Gilbert), who first meets the Queen dressed as a man in a bar where she’s gone to escape her royal restrictions.
Queen Christina was a pet project of Garbo’s, and the star shared many similarities with the ruler: both women had female lovers, refused to follow gender expectations and renounced their careers. As with the other pre-1960s films screening tonight, the romantic focus of Queen Christina shifts from the source material’s homosexual relationships to heterosexual ones. While the monarch’s lesbianism is hinted at, mostly through her interactions with lady-in-waiting Ebba (Elizabeth Young), the star attraction is her romance with Antonio. (The start of this affair also toys with gender norms, as Antonio—and later his valet—initially believe Christina to be a man.)
Though studios got away with more daring content during the pre-Code period, homosexuality was still strictly forbidden. That didn’t stop MGM and director Rouben Mamoulian from trying; in fact, producer Irving Thalberg actively pushed the envelope. He asked screenwriter Salka Viertel if she’d seen the 1931 German film Mädchen in Uniform, in which a girl falls in love with her female teacher, and inquired hopefully: “Does Christina’s affection for her lady-in-waiting indicate something like that?”
On the censorship front, the Studio Relations Committee (SRC) picked up on “a tinge of lesbianism” in Christina’s relationship with Ebba. Concerned, they suggested MGM make it clear that Christina opposes Ebba’s marriage because it will take her away from the city, as if a small adjustment would eradicate any hint of homosexuality. In the end, the bigger issue, for both the SRC and censor boards, remained Christina’s three-day “intimate sex relationship” with Antonio, allowing the homosexual inferences to squeak by.
15 years later, placing gay characters in lead roles still proved difficult onscreen. In Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope (1948), roommates Brandon (John Dall) and Phillip (Farley Granger) conspire to prove their intellectual superiority by staging the perfect murder. After strangling their classmate and stuffing his body in a chest, they invite various friends and relatives of the victim, along with former housemaster Rupert (James Stewart), over for a dinner party—brashly using the chest as their table. As questions start to arise over their friend’s absence, the pair’s plan begins to unravel.
Like other source material touched upon in this article, Patrick Hamilton’s 1929 play directly identified its main characters as gay. Growing up, Hamilton attended private schools where bullying and homosexuality were commonplace; these experiences, in part, shaped “Rope.” Many have inferred that the infamous 1924 Leopold and Loeb murder influenced the author, as well.
Hitchcock hired plenty of queer creatives to work on Rope, including stars Dall and Granger and co-writer Arthur Laurents. However, knowing homosexuality was forbidden onscreen, the subtext, while there, was consciously played down. “Nobody used the word ‘homosexual;’ it was referred to as ‘it’ by Hitch, by the studio, by everyone,” Laurents recalled. “They just pretended it wasn’t there, but they wanted it there.” That said, the hints placed in this uniquely long-take structured film surfaced in clichéd ways, such as a mother fixation, which likely went over the heads of most viewers in 1948. Additionally, in his characterization of the leads, Hitchcock consciously crafted a correlation between homosexuality, delinquency and mental illness, a connection medical professionals publicly accepted as fact at the time.
Censor-wise, the Production Code Administration (PCA) focused most of their attention on Brandon’s “perverted and distorted emotional enjoyment” of the murder, but they did note “a possible flavor in some of the dialogue that a homosexual relationship existed” between the leads. They didn’t, however, suggest any specific lines to remove. As with Queen Christina, more pressing expurgations allowed subtle allusions to slide by.
By the mid-1950s, though studios possessed a little more leeway to portray gay characters onscreen, it was still only insinuated and certainly required a fight. In Tea and Sympathy (1956), private school student Tom (John Kerr) finds himself bullied by classmates and authority figures for not subscribing to their version of masculinity; the only person to show him any sympathy is the headmaster’s wife Laura (Deborah Kerr). Eventually, the crushing crescendo of rumors and pressure to conform leads Tom to take drastic measures in an attempt to prove his manhood.
The Production Code required the film to tone down the overt references to homosexuality found in Robert Anderson’s 1953 play. Anderson was brought on board to adapt his work, with a caveat: “It would be unacceptable to the author that the charge be tampered with or compromised so that the boy be accused of being a ‘sissy,’ and the clear cut issue of homosexuality be glossed over.” It was a valiant effort, but Anderson lost the fight. After a year of back and forth, an added hetero-affirming epilogue and a page-by-page review to eradicate the remaining “inescapable inference” of homosexuality, the PCA finally gave their blessing.
Despite the battle, the fact that Tea and Sympathy placed a gay man front and center, with a story illustrating the difficulties he faced, delivered an impact. “Even among attempts to deny and obfuscate lay clear moments of visibility and revelation,” Scott McKinnon wrote in “Gay Men at the Movies.” Unfortunately, one small step forward didn’t erase the fact that the way the film responds to Tom’s plight served to perpetuate myths, like heterosexual sex as a cure for homosexuality.
Ironically, in terms of censorship, the movie leaned on one banned inference, adultery, to “solve” another. “What would have once been presented as a sin has become a therapeutic means of preserving the new status quo,” Eric Schaefer noted in his book “Bold! Daring! Shocking! True!” Deborah Kerr also bemoaned the hypocrisy, accusing the PCA of being “very difficult about the homosexual angle, which is, I understand, their objection. Adultery is OK, impotence is OK, but perversion is their bête noire.”
While Tea and Sympathy showed the potentially deadly effects of rumors, The Children’s Hour (1961) emphasized it even more. Based upon Lillian Hellman’s 1934 play, The Children’s Hour stars Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine as Karen and Martha, two friends who run a private boarding school for girls. When one of their pupils starts a rumor about the women being lovers, it circulates amongst students and parents, leading to a lawsuit and the loss of their livelihood and reputation. Eventually, the girl’s lies are revealed, but it proves too late to right all the wrongs.
The Children’s Hour was first adapted for the screen as These Three (1936), which reworked the story into a heterosexual love triangle due to Production Code restrictions. Director William Wyler long wanted to helm a more faithful version of Hellman’s work, and by the early 1960s, he was able to—sort of. Following society’s changing attitudes, a 1961 amendment to the Production Code allowed for the “sensitive” representation of homosexuality if treated with “care, discretion and restraint.” In reality, this meant continuing the stereotypes of the day, though movies could be more overt in their references. In “Queer Images,” Harry M. Benshoff and Sean Griffin noted that films placing homosexuality in a negative light were more likely to receive approval under the amendment; indeed, The Children’s Hour, which ends in tragedy, was one of the first movies given the green light. (That said, the picture does, just barely, reference the prospect of leading an openly gay life.)
As with Tea and Sympathy, The Children’s Hour took one step towards Hollywood’s “new maturity” while still propagating damaging stereotypes and sensationalizing violent consequences of homophobia. By this time, though, some reviewers started wondering what all the fuss was about. “It is incredible that educated people living in an urban American community today would react as violently and cruelly as they are made to do in this film,” The New York Times’ Bosley Crowther wrote. Looking back on this comment and the plot from a modern perspective, sadly, this is not at all surprising.
Released the same year as The Children’s Hour, the British film Victim (1961) provided a more sympathetic view of homosexuality. One day, married, successful barrister Melville Farr (Dirk Bogarde) is visited by Barrett (Peter McEnery), a man Melville shared a relationship with. Barrett seeks Melville’s help: He’s being blackmailed over a photo of them together, and he stole money to pay off the criminal. Melville initially evades Barrett until a tragedy impels the lawyer to bring the blackmailers to justice, even if it means he’ll likely lose his career and marriage.
At this time in the United Kingdom, blackmail was a significant concern in the gay community; Variety reported that 90% of UK blackmail cases involved queer people. This was due to a law that made homosexuality between consenting adults illegal. The 1957 Wolfenden Report recommended the decriminalization of homosexuality, but it would be another 10 years until the Sexual Offences Act 1967 officially overturned the law.
Director Basil Dearden and writers Janet Green and John McCormick appealed for tolerance and refused to sensationalize the subject through sincere, compassionate characterizations of the movie’s gay characters. British historian Stephen Bourne recalled Victim “had an enormous impact on the lives of gay men who, for the first time, saw credible representations of themselves and their situations in a commercial British film.” That said, the movie was still a product of its time. For instance, Melville’s avowal to shun his homosexuality, as if one can flip a switch, and reunite with his wife are offered up as a positive outcomes.
While Victim premiered to acclaim at the Venice Film Festival, the picture was denied a Code certificate in the US because it candidly discussed “the psychology of homosexuality,” and the underlying story presented “an overtly expressed plea for an acceptance of homosexuality, almost to the point of suggesting that it be made socially tolerable.” Pathé-America lost their appeal but decided to release the movie anyway.
Victim was groundbreaking in many ways. For one, it was the first English-language film to use the word “homosexual.” It also paved the way for change. In 1968, Lord Arran, who introduced the Sexual Offences Act, commended Bogarde for his sensitive performance and informed him that the movie helped swing public opinion from 48% to 63% in favor of reform. “It is comforting to think that perhaps a million men are no longer living in fear,” he wrote Bogarde.
