•v4 David A. Gerstner 57. Minnelli, "The Show Must Cio On," Stage (September 1936): 33 35, quote on 35. 58. Lambert, "Notes on Vincente Minnelli." 50. In the biography of his father, Bert Lahr is described in this scene as costumed with a papier-mache ax while "posed preposterously next to a scrawny tree. . . . He wore a checkered hunter's shirt and a toupee matted on his head. He began raising both hands delicately toward his chest and then unleashing an outrageous sound." In the meantime, I Sea l.illie anxiously awaited her cue when she could "throw boards, brooms, anything 1 could get my hands on" at the singing woodsman, lohn Lahr, Notes tin a Cowardly Lion (New York: Knopf, 1969), 163-64. The Production and Display of the Closet Making Minnelli's Tea ami Sympathy David A. Gerstner lo make Robert Anderson's nl„„ •/■ .. . JI,spiay Tea and Sympathy mta 2 Him,1 MGM had lo convince the Motion Picture A.-. • .• , . ure Association of America MPAA), the Production Lode Administration (Pca\ i -'W, and even the Catholic Legion of Decency that the film would clearly punish ,1 , ., ., . . v "M1 tne sexual transgression of the married woman, and that U would not overth , , , cc , l,y °r covertly make any reference to homosexuality. In effect, the centerpiece 11 . ■ , , 1 s 01 Uie play had to be removed. No matter how MGM attempted to rewrite u • ■ ,, ,, ., ue tne narrative to satisfy the Code, Tea and Sympa- thy would either be the nl ' , ■ . ■ , , , , P,dv n was on Broadway or it would be morally objectionable. In his m,,m 1 1 ,, , 11,0 summarizing the making ol the film, Geoffrey Snurlock f Joseph Breen'c M PA A president Eric I ^ ** dinXt0r °'' PCA) P°""Wl °l" '° two unacceptable basicTSt°n ** ,rea"1,cnl rmu,vi,,8 "1CSC „„f,„ 1 ' e,err>ents of the play would make it necessary to write an entirely new story and 1 thf particular pi ty"' C Wou'tl socm 10 ma'ce pointless the purchase ol Tea and Sympathy I 1 Broadway in Septemb ^ C"USed qU'te ' ^ '' "^'^ °" ' '953- Aside from the publicity surrounding Deborah Kerr, firs1 Ncw York ^ perfo ^ , .ght for heterosexual male jugular. The play challenged not only the social doxology ' ound.ng masculinity, but also, worse, it waved the threat of latent *** 2p « Ve,y feas of those "hose ^security matched the hyp£ in the ^ama. As one reviewer put it after seeing .he fl* " mjmake more than one adult male squirm in his seat with unhappy *** nes of youth."'Situated within *- . ........ . . - -^¥' .cviewer put it after seeing the nu»-■ ■ f'"°re than °ne adult male squirm in his seat with unhappy 2 of youth.3 Situated within the context of ,95os America, Tea aniSf^ ^was nsky business. Risky, but SUCu,sill|. M ,„ studios and indepe*^ MOM, Paramount, Warner, Twentieth Century-Fox, and Samuel vied for its film rights. According to lene,, midmcmos l"M, each studin'c j.-iv - .■ Code's ng io letters and memos found in the ',roducUOn u)ldthevitter' MGM, each studio's difficulty in making this film circulated Qf Co* ance (implied or otherwise) of homosexuality. In fact, both ?° ^ jnr contestation (homosexuality and the woman's sexual transgress bricated with homophobia and fear of the efteminization 0 ^ up0'1 Through a series of public and private discourses (which are ^ ^ and within a historical relationship of urban male middle-class ^ at gender and political effeminization), the making of Tea an M points to what critic-' .......curses (which are »1 relationship of urban male middle-class a • f Tea aiw D) (flic gender and political effeminization), the making or ■• spg(#U# °> t MGM points to what critical theorist Eve Sedgwick terms t > homosexual closet. Not only is the film a marker of the ^ p''^1^ but the spectacle of the closet is generated, displayed, and rem ^ through the discourses of the making of the text and, more p the making of the film's structured silence. VincCllte ^'"^i5 Caught in the confines of 1950s production regulations, ^xS&. ft1 was put on the job to make a film that abided by these co°* ivety W"^ aestheticization of the text-his color-coding of the text-e ^ within and against the enforced proscriptions of the PCA an ^ ^ poSSibl£ Decency. Minnelli's use of an aesthetici/.ed mise-en-scene m ^^sW?*, realize the anxiety-ridden intersections that exist between the ^oS**^ tices surrounding the making of the film (what to do about ^ ^ ^fffi and the transgressive woman) and the social conditions in W «j ^ ^ ti^ sive practices were situated (in what ways do the homosexu ' ) SV/"P rl !' gressive women threaten American masculinity?). Tea ana of ^ ^ the site of contestation not only in the multiple changes Ho P ^tiol* 1 the uv-1 bp fe but also , which b, ..vn only in the multiple changes ^ ■ also in the wrenching changes in political ge ^ted. lich both the MGM producers and MinneUi par prep Sch' Tea mid Sympathy tells the story of Tom, a young boy at Chi tc ^^fa(1 in New England. He lives in the home of the school coach, 1 -ho"' >on^.Laura^lei akinc; Minnelli's Tea and Sympathy 177 atlil ls We" established by her marriage to Bifl-her All the " W,th the hoys is limited to serving them "tea and '"Volv letics "1 his ™' rC^ecniig wl!1U •'>0yS W'10 ''VC W'[h t)lem are inv0,ved schooJ Hn h°Usellold. Th 31 COnsiders a femily tradition at Chilton, especially aiicj f8 r°'H,st men- l y°U"S Sd°nS that dwdl there are' 011 tho one hand> 0lks°nes r„ .. I 16 regular guys. Tom, on the other hand, prefers Bach eybal] and football. In both the play and the film, Tom is le tfow ''gS t0 Voll 8 ageni tila Cs lnfatUated ,°' Bll's masculinity. He is not just a young boy who er'sf °f ln'wives- His being caught in a "feminine" activity '°CJc,I'stin Icfcname Sister Boy, and he becomes the target of rumor and 'efii.i *>■ in tart k ■ r , j,Q ar guys th ' ne Is considered so far outside the parameters of (he %1"18 init'atesated by having their pajamas torn off, Tom is ig-l '^the , hum«iatedl beir,R .! 6 Pla)'. 'Jom 5er lUrj (]Ueer-" His h °f h'S "Iong"naired" proclivities, is accused of th*.c,°n the bPH.iS °mosexua'ity is confirmed when he is reportedly seen '"til.*- . Vclui with 'i "i a known homosexual teacher from the school. In by two of the school s volleyball players in a sewing circle ' a,1d ToJ 1 Tom- The oft-quoted final line ("Years from now... and you will. . . he kind ) will, howevei, carry I because he is not properly humiliated. , M>o J,11' WillCli leads to a sexual liaison. In Laura he finds the one ">fida ^Pnthizes with ^ ;hi,i 1 ;,,you difFerenP about "'is Clllnien(J an0lk1USi°nS' The p,i,y's endin8 0,1 tilis note docs not neccssariJy be >le'lds itself S°,Ute °f fina] theterosexual) desire. Rather, theplaypoten-ch Wit,) ^Ura Jl "dea of loosing one's own sexual object (i.e., Tom may 0,ees migi,t b u P°int'but we arc given n0 indication ofwhat his c)-' The film, however, through the addition of a prologue and (II »,'0se*Uale/aniÍng Story)> wil> in 'act turn out to be a fait accompli of K Df 'standardSa; SedlPr0l°8ue and regulations. ^^íor,!* Sets *e body of the narrative in a flashback. Tom has re i ts th .ji r " f°r a lon-uo...................... i............i. m,v.,in,r I .aura and the by : "at fo|| r a ten-year reunion, and he recalls meeting Laura < tit ÍntroV-in °Wed" The epil°gue immediately follows the famous final scene Vd,,^'^ a letter fro m Laura to ' Tom in which she tells him that what hilt °r.fors 0n8 and that she has realized the error of their ways. She must ' So'"e undisclosed place where she will never he seen or heard 17& David A. Gerstner from again. In effect, Laura defends the production of the closet by letting Tom know that his quest and struggle lor manhood, while inappropriate «n the way they handled it, is good as long as he ends up married and is able to repent for the wrong they committed. Tom gets away with marriage and Laura serves time in the eternal void. While Vito Russo is right that the "visibility [of gays] has never really bee" an issue in the movie," he omits the historical discourse of production of the very closet he discusses in his book. His suggestion that the film version of 1» »fi.il, however, m m/ d Sympathy "mutes" the homosexual text of the play is d-eX- terms of a historical analysis.5 Russo's contention that, "at no time W eration given to making the homosexuality in Tea plicit"6 elides the underpinnings of a discourse of production that a^ ^ ^ ha and Sympathy auction that actually consider the possibility of including the homosexual in the n m. ced throng uality is "muted" in the film insofar as that "muting" is prociuc hyperbolic cacophony of silencing that homosexuality. g tnc The making of Tea and Sympathy is precisely one ol the places ^ ^ ^ Hollywood institution reveals itself making the closet, live SedgWi ^ "spectacle of the homosexual closet" as the "open secret." "Close ^ ^ 8 itself," she suggests, "a performance initiated as such by the spec ^ofl<0 silence, but a silence that accrues particularity by fits and starts, in 1 the discourse that surrounds and differentially constitutes it. ' « 0rma' It is in the making of the film that the reinforcement of the p0rts five," or compulsory heterosexuality, is maintained. The normativ , ce, and sees itself through its own mythic binarisms (male/female, s ^ normative/nonnormative, homosocial/ homosexual). This is to say ...... „ ,-..h* the nLL ticular relationships are sanctioned within the normative. and bet*,een sexual marriage contract there lie relationships between men < j,,. • sexualrc women-tions the homosocial—that purportedly do not participate m ^ ^ The homosocial works coterminously with the normative ^ ^st nary structures to the extent that the normative guards the homosoc t - the n° both sexuality and violence. But it is the homosocial that guards ^ ^0 tive binaries by defending them against degrees of difference Variation the established order motivates suspicion on the part of these asS^nC<~^0( the The degree of difference is decidedly valuable to the well- el si0g .rd- by t eXp°s -d m normative because the normative maintains its mythic binaries ■ locate0 what is outside the social order. The degree of difference is u homosocial through the marked outsider.8 . The ■t obvioL n The plays contextual relationship to McCarthyism is mosi e^\iW public postwar discourse (articulated through the speech act of smea Making Minnelu's Tba and Sympathy iyg scoreti I],, "n"1C(l Personal character by appearance and gesture. It under-a"d Sy 1C °St ma'iiacal fear of loss of control on the side of the Law. Tea hunt ° ? ";,8ged the insidiousness and the case with which these witch-niate ]\\ ^3*^ns col|ld proceed. Laura, at one point, reminds Tom's room-'1S We" as the audience), "how easy it is to smear a person."'^ The 'VenC|'ln^'enient °' nU)ra' discourses of sexuality and gender relations in were n Unt^er 8reat stress between 1920 and 1950. Middle-class values sPi"an V"-^lowaix'a m°re liberal stance, but conservative organizations also f°und ,rCSP°nSe to thisliberal swing. In the 1950s, Tea and Sympathy Organ' re,e8ated to the list of literature condemned by the National oflone^T Decent Literature (alongside From //ere fo /;///, 77/c t#// alrea. esSt and Caterer m the Rye). 1 )uring this time, the Legion of Decency Neyy rjgj" ;1 ^''^"g'ehold on Hollywood film censorship. Focused on FDR's late 1 ' UK' '°ftisl Policies, the Republicans denounced Communism in the red lo ^ W'* accusations of "red" infiltration in government positions. But la nc . John J0hnfi^On,y color of anxiety. ut''i^f) * °iSWe" n°tes that, as early as AD 121s, markers of identification were a to locate "1 cessarily b CIe8rees of difference," pai 'ticularly those which could not [Je\vs] t Seen- °»e of the rulings of the Fourth Lateran Council "ordered ^osvvel] > C" C'0tnm8 which |would distinguish] them from Christians." " areaj was [. n t0 Si,y tnat where identification of difference in homogenous later, tj, ^ lne W'earing of the "Jewish badge" was enforced. Centuries Oe\v,„y ls Woi'ld demand the placement of an identification "badge" °rder t0 c| ' C,lm"l;l'' homosexual, etc.) on concentration camp prisoners in II js °tci ni"lc the marked prisoner's treatment and/or punishment. c')lorC(H|^C'Se!y the signing of these markers throughout history (often of (ho,-,, 3n ^orced upon the body) that allowed for the easy identification Jsc who w "1;"k'ng tl eedeo-" to be seen. During the McCarthy era, locating and f'0|i" oft] 6 mosexual was necessary in order lo prevent the "effeminiza-ac>stheti--. C erican male. The tilm Tea and Sympathy, through Minnclli's ^f\r\e a ^ Colo,'i"g> brings to the surface the frenetic attempt lo staiiif> and 1„ ^ ' nt'ty with a predetermined color. fi- K. ql 'y:50s a debate took place between the Catholic traditionalist HindfL eiton and 'he aesthete ;ournalis( Robert Lynd over the meaning to expres C Weari|ig ofthe color pmk. Chesterton noted "the current tendency ^entja]] Paily Poli(ies by means of Shirts,"11 and added that pink was "the ti,;it is i,IK' "egalive colour because it is the dilution of something and glowing or nothing."1' This "anaem|ic|" color is a wobbly 28o David A. Gerstner rs, "There is middk-of-the-road color, especially in political matters. ~- ^ ^ore ton continued, "a merely pink humanitarianism which I disi e than the real Red Communism."'1 minds h's Lynd refutes Chesterton in his essay "In Defence of Pink- Lvn a ^of reader that pink is chosen in most English-speaking societies a perfection,"14 particularly as it is linked with high society or t ie -For Lynd this class position finds itself in relationship to "pink iurn< j^ling ism": "1 have never blinded myself to the fact that in politics I am < ^ ^ ^ sentimentalist! 1 have said to myself, 'If only everybody were as p« this nonsense in the world would end in a week. If only everybo y like me, how well everybody would get on together.'' 1 p We recognize pink as the feminine marker of gender from 'J'r^1'/t soCjet>r-markers of identification come under careful scrutiny in a mascu ,j A careless positioning of a feminine code onto/into a niasculin ' ^ spell the difference for the well-being of one's manly virtue. And as ^ Sinfield and George Chauncey reveal in their historical accounts ^ middle-class masculinity in turn-of-the-century England and enpoW spectively), the fear of women or the potential threat of feminizes a serious reconsideration of male (self) representation of virility. ^ ^ Sinfield points out that, historically, "effeminate" behavior " jaiin cepted in circles of the English leisure class and intellectuals. Bet°'^ morally 1895, Oscar Wilde's behavior was not necessarily seen as deviant ^ ^ ^f objectionable. As Sinfield shows, however, the upshot of ^'lceS , san 1 1 111 ftiZ'-' sodomy was that the effeminate male would no longer merely . d su ch effete figure of an intellectual or eisure class. the homosexual. While "[e)fleminacy preceded the category rf its ual . . ." it would now "[overlap] with and [influence] the pe development."1 In urban centers of America at the turn of the century, as ,1S Chains the n industrial work force, women teaching the bovs of America was in Gay New York, the male middle class witnessed women enteim ^ t in school' H'he »ive (distressingly) the presence of the "invert" in public spaces. w,0re the male figure who had a "female soul," dressed in women s ^ makeup, and most often took .1 woman s name.) These inescap :,able so . I^teros^11' factors aroused an anxiety over the very "manhood" of the mat e(.arne tb8 In the era of Theodore Roosevelt, defining American manhoo .^.jouP' major order of business. Men consumed themselves with muSCU .^.^jon 0 sports, prizefighting, and hunting as an antidote to the ove Ll*s Tba anx> Sitmpathv * Making Minnbllis apers, boys' clubs, and m, . . . the cause was taken up in newspa . ^ construc_ ba*yard lots throughout the nation.'"8 All the phyaca J^.^ of the 1,011 «f the homosocial was in response to this percei wouW be Am«ican male. Of course, the scapegoat lor this no g^ .n ^ of the invert, who marked what the American male m fe elimi. "C£ ^ Amcrica's cultural : invert, who marked what the American male rnus ^ e,im,_ llavior and self-representation. The turn-of-the-c cultural nate softness, effeminization, and overciv.lrzation ^ ^ and habits would move into high gear under the auspi played an impor- era. The cataloguing of social markers oy g ^ politica, le in the way post-World War II America^ ^ stridently Para Eisenhower s !arUndT ^sbrgenderplayedani^ - era. The cataloguing of social markers oy g ^ pohtlca, la,lt «& in the way post-World War II America wo stndently ^meters. Tea and Sympathy highlights this delic tensive version of 1950s male anxiety. during the first What becomes apparent in this evolvement of m ^ gender ha,f <* the twentieth century, where it intersects ^ fcy , male ideWification, is that American culture and pel** hofflosexual._both of ^ class as being threatened by women ^ condition for the *W, ironically, must necessarily maintain the norm ^ ^ asocial precisely through their difference. W ^ b£tjnU, more dit-01 ^-identified anxiety, the once easily .dentil ^ ^ exel.wed fic* to see. He was more difficult to see as effeminate (and anY sort of homosexual desire were fearfulo ^ ^ •*y read as homosexual) and so acted ^ wr „, iV>'° t0'0rs inl° tne service of its mise-en-scene. While Anderson these col ^ C°'°rs 10 characters' "essence," Minnelli engulfs the characters in Send agnations, at once immersing and suffocating them within the Co'or •, r° CS tiycy i1rc culturally forced to play. Yellow is marked as Laura's l,lllr; directly suggests La Mra»'ed by yelIow luras "essence [as] gentleness."" In the film curtains in her kitchen; at other times she will be ellovř ii)o David A, Gerstner sitting in her yellow chair in her living room or surrounded by kitchen bowls. cling'n°'° Anderson marks blue as the color for men who are despera c > ^o0(j ge their boyhood, unable to manage the cultural conditions of B» puts Tom in a blue suit before his date with Elbe (the "town whore: ^ ^ b,uC states, "Put me in a blue suit and 1 look like a kid."12 !°m w pajamas, pants, and shirts throughout the film. ^at the)' Minnelli, however, disperses these colors throughout the t ^^.J jfld blend into variant hues in order to associate the characters psyc in , . ue narrJ1' emotional states. 1 le weaves the yellow and blue motifs throtign , pe order to formulate inlratexlual references to the internal psyc garde*1 characters. In the beginning of the film, for example, we see Laura in ^ while we hear Tom sing a love ballad from his bedroom window. - ^ c0ttrse, vene in the garden, Tom comments on her "green thumb" (gieen> ^ being the admixture of yellow and blue), at which point she rea -prise that this stunning fecundity only blossomed after her arrival a ^ ^ Green also syniboliz.es blues need for yellow and yellow's nee «oeC-This sought-after balance of blue and yellow represents, in the fill"' ^ing essary" link between the socially constructed gender extremes. ^ ]jfe. blue in Laura's life is foregrounded in Laura and Bill's inadequ-' ^ ^ Laura, when she first encounters Tom in her garden, cornmen ^ 0f garden needs more blue. Tom, however, will compensate for Uj> ^ j,e blue by giving her a package of blue forget-me-not flower se places on the dashboard of her blue/green car. eds, her g a.*11 Later, Laura will bring some yellow roses to Ellie, grown tro ^ ^j,. and wrapped in blue paper, after she overhears Tom's phone ca^ Ellie, lishes his appointed rendezvous (in order to prove his manhoo When Tom is about to leave for Ellie's place, Laura is dress^^n^et thc evening gown. Tom's blue suit still represents the "little boy" a g red1 who,««' •gula' line ngulatory control of the social order, desperately seeks to beeoH* ^ guy." blue is both the little boy and the social demand of that bojs into the enforced masculinity of blue. This blending of blue a.-- ^^e) Laura's urgent plea to imbue the hypermasculine structur behavior. Tom's acceptance of yellow fulfills the acceptance of and 1&* :cwit»"s' gentleness, as well as to inject herself with the blue that is missing Minnelli considered film a painter's canvas upon which the a< colors would work in harmony, yet never achieve an exact relation her dmi xtt-i,Ľ ship to of the Making; M1 nnki.li \s Tha and Sympathy 291 colors in tri , ■< to his st),,jJ. rCal" worIcl- His 'we of Whistler, Van Gogh, and Matisse points niomentjj ,C. 0'n8 or these painters' use of color to aesthelicize fleeting s'niiiIateS °f l'niC a'K' space" Tiu'se Painters' brushstrokes did not seek to C°'01' Of th"0.. 3n lc'cntica' rcplic;i of "reality"; rather, they rendered the nu'stbc • ^vwk\" as (hey saw it. When Minnelli staled that the film S'tuati0n °nSK'erec'a "situation as real life'' it is in the context of placing that "^"Ppon'^"1 ^mma^ers P0'111 of view. The cinema afforded Minnelli Peier J | ' toexplore his painterly aesthetics in "real life." ar8Hes th SPca'<'n8 111 terms of normative masculinist representation, ttiainta- ■ C"ltniatlc representation depends upon a "realist" aesthetic to SU8gests "' e°'°Sica' masculinist meaning. "Our culture asserts," Lehman 6*ed rels -"^ lL'ilii'st representation participates in reinforcing the belief of a as(,.0n 'U'0n bclwee n the male bodv and connotations of masculinity—to be wealf»° 'S to I'^e a strong man, and to be a weak man is to look like a subtCllcj Hollywood film depends upon "realist" representations to SteHe °rniat've Practices of masculinity, Mirmelli's aeslheticr/.ed mise-en-Se°tati0 nS8ression <>f the "real") serves to disrupt those normative repre-a„. . s' Hirough his process of aesthetidzation, Minnelli makes visible isculinity by placing his men within a textual place that "u,lcn uie anticipated Hollywood equation of "realist" mise-en .1 stron8 and powerful" men. In effect, those "real" men are made "dla|ious and, indeed, hyperbolic in th mnstruc witn'n Minnclli's aestheticizeel text. '" 'Kmersion Airier Sceneeq'.'"'!,"" l,le l° '°°k rid" Stl°ng 3nd Powerful" men. In effect, tliose ,v lV,leH pi 0Us arld, indeed, hyperbolic in their masculine constructions In reaCed within Minnclli's aestheticizeel text. igns a sWnpathy, Uinnelli's dispersion and reassigning of color re-ijlneUi fil ai dictates of marking and foreclosing identity; color in a di; '-«-n:,» meaning. His colors blend with one another, play •■hereby, ironically •Oys" a%nS the cultural dictates of marking an* lorS blend with ^neUi film refuses to stabilize meaning. W ^ ^ thcrc. ^ ls«minate at multiple emotional levels 01 ^ for girls, wu play with the historical a nd cultural assumpu-^ and identity. OOVs"UL., , . . Vvi,h .i,.. , . ' .' ")tL "Stoncal and cultural assumption S to totalize representations of meaningand identity. tllis ess;iy s ° "'<*s of the discursive practices within the making of this film and the 0 As Seut> :............■........______ ., ________u.....1 within Holly*0 _ .-.s » ■bit that is carried by those practices as they are constituted within lo^uaj closet I wick later posits: "the establishment of the spectacle of the h°m°^ clse's aUth° .up -someone presiding guarantor of rhetorical community, of authority ^iCS, —over world making discursive terrain .. . extends vastly beyon tion issues >fhoiH oso ei» ality por son1 pus homosexual" (230). 8. I'd like to thank Ed O'Neill for numerous discussions on and homosexuality as well as for allowing me to read his unpublishec P ^ $9} Queers." Delivered at the Berkeley Conference on Violence and Cinem ^ g4 ^ 9. Robert Anderson, Tea and Sympathy (New York: Random House^' ago; UP . pi-ess- idon: 10. John Boswcll, Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Honwsext vcrsity of Chicago Press, 1980), 274. . | jbraficS' 11. G. K. Chesterton, As I Was Saying (1936; Freeport, NY: Books 01 19(16), 109. 12. Ibid., 110. j 13. Ibid, (emphasis added). 1. M- ™ 14. Robert l.ynd, "In Defence of Pink," in his to I tefence ofl'h'k (Lon 1937), 2. 15. Ibid., 6- 7. 16. Alan Sinlield, The Wilde Moment: Effeminacy, Oscar Wilde, ""'^c>. Gtf] ment (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994); and George - York (New York: Basic Books, 1994). 17. Sinfield, Wilde Moment, 74. j 18. Chauncey, Gay New York, 113. j-jon1"51" ,1. 19. John D'Emilio, Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities: The M"k'"s p(eSi,\9^' Minority in the United States, 1940 1970 (Chicago: University of ChiiMb0 ,„r M"' Making Mi*"*8 '» Anteri^/t Emil,° and ''s,e,,e B. Freedman, to/mate Maftera: /4 H/store of Sexuality 2i Quote Y°lk: HarpCr and KoW'1988)' 293-Hopk^j Q . lnStePhcn J. Whitfield, '/'/«• OaVare o/f/ie fJaW War (Baltimore: Johns serial Versity Pr«s, 1990), 43. I'd like to (hank Marc Siegel for pointing out this tVveen And !.S°n' accorci'"g to Shurlock's memo, which recounts the transaction be-a'id Hur0p^'S°n and (j'o|dwyn, originally conceived of the film version for "art house" 'tonin, n lr ■ .1.0 hidJights the centrality of the "charge of ^•yuotedimbid. which «cou»» - 24 Anderson, according to Shurlocks ffl» ■ ,flhe film version 01 { Anderson and Goldwyn, originally concerned ^ ot ,1C charg European markets. This transaction also tug B ^ ad(]cd) ^omosexuahty" as "malicious:' Seeab^^U^^.^ 25. MPAA h°mo"exuaeii" ™ar«Ct$' This transact,on a" 25' MPAA ma'lc'ous" See above, note 4 (emphasis added;. fllll)' Schar ■ "'emo' November 2,1953. When MGM finally had won the rights to the feoio A' > W'(Boston: Little, Drown, 1979) (emphasis added). 28- loo/- v, )'rec,e'/ /y Vmcente MinneUi, 249. sPaceof ;,tler ^ 'Cport c'Klr'>' had much to do with "homosexuality" ňnding i' n)ent|onc(j a,"Cel'10American vemncukr. The word "homosexual" in theiuticle is e utteranj" y °ncc r° suggest its possible existence. But even here in the LookMidc, >c'iťved by s 1S mPed with the "new" social anomalies of heterosexuality: "It is ?°re Pettin t,,:" ,1K1'e ,,onu>scxl,a,'ty is increasing, and there probably is much 'ieved b dncl ineck,n8' between young men and women today." Homosexuality is ^Pothe^k °'nc" to he on the "increase," bul this 'believed" is at best merely a 3o' Tho,iv Ci'"Se 'l Certain,>' rei,1'h'is unseen, '^ej, Sep, Pryor' "MGM Solves Its fea ana Sympathy Script Problem," New York W°rd "OiJio W 25,1955 ícmP'wsií; added). While Berman is technically right thai the 'nferenCe, J"ls 1101 mentioned in the play, queeris used as well as nnher bktani '"Virion is all about. ■ '-l,.,rV. ( 3l- ^cl,,,,, ., he Mspicion is all abom. . Pvvasfi.u iLe,,ls *al there were two camps at MGM regarding Schary. One ush li>r the "message film" and his undermin-<""nP saw J,j, °f t,lc traditional MGM entertainment vehicles, while the other . 33-Mise- Progressive,y moving the studio forward. y^'n t|le 11 sc*-'"e is understood here as everything thai the director chooses to put q^neJIfj Uge * ranic (props, wardrobe, lighting, bodies). While this essay focuses on 16 "illrative ° r 35 a strat3fy,or iiosi/icticizii?^ the sociohistoricaJ conditions of ^ody a ' 'n)', ''"ger Project considers Minnelli's use/choice of (in particular) the C'SSily "Atelod a" 'mp0rtailt ™riable in the nesthetieization of the text. Peter Brookss eV("';l's (tin- "na' lj(>c!'', Revolution" begins to reconsider the body as the site thai Sec the performance in melodrama) its historical and disciplined inscrip-"H' '-'"'ist;,,,^'^ Melodrama: Stage, Picture, Screen, ed. Jaeky Bratton, h'm (Jook, 34. A nu ' r,'cd'"'" 'London: British Film Institute, 1994), » -2+ a ol ] lollywoocl films made during this period, such as F.dward I >myt-