Tea and Sympathy (1956)
“Years from now when you talk about this, and you will, be kind.” This is the famous quote from Tea and Sympathy— a movie that was once a play — and that has not aged particularly well. It was generally thought that Tea and Sympathy could not be made into a movie because it hints, somewhat circuitously, at homosexuality. But Vincente Minnelli (Judy Garland’s ex-husband at the time) — who was gay — tackled it in technicolour, adding a moralistic ending that admonishes Deborah Kerr’s character for sleeping with a student at the university where her husband teaches — even though she sleeps with him only to rehabilitate him. Deborah Kerr’s character is in love with John Kerr (who plays the boy; they are not related) but her primary purpose in sleeping with him is to confirm his manliness. The other boys call him “Sister Boy" because he likes to sew, plays a girl in the school play, and is literally ‘light in the loafers.’ I was this boy 15 years after this movie was made. The difference was that I didn’t need Deborah Kerr to rehabilitate me, as I was gay. This film pre-eminently showcases the now trendy idea that sexuality and gender are two separate things. I used to believe this, but no more. Gay men and lesbians have fought valiantly and stupidly to separate gender and sexuality— the result being the ‘trans’ movement — which is somewhat necessary, but less honest. For though a boy like John Kerr in Tea and Sympathy may be feminine and heterosexual, that does not stop people — and will never stop them — from associating male femininity with homosexuality (and masculine women with lesbianism). Why? Well we gay men offer our asses to other men, always have, always will. These are the startling facts about what we do in bed; and they are associated with non-gender conforming ways, so it’s not enough to tell feminine little boys they are not gay, but simply non-gender conforming. That is what my mother told me, so I know. Because I carried my Raggedy Andy doll in my bicycle basket the other boys made fun of me. My mother said: ‘the other boys only laugh at you because they want to do that too.' This was kind, but untrue. Later when I told her I thought I was gay she said that just because I played the piano and was ‘light in the loafers’ (literally, it’s a way of walking) I could still be straight. These are stalling tactics in a homophobic culture, not revelations that confirm that gender and sexuality are not connected. It’s a little difficult for me to buy the last third of this film. John Kerr absolves to visit the town whore (well that’s what she is, she’s the girl that works at the malt shop and sleeps with everyone) Ellie Martin (played by Norma Crane). Ellie is the character in this movie I most identified with. She’s a hard-talking, cynical smoker, and when she receives John Kerr in her flat (a red bedroom is vaguely visible in the background) she is wearing a low cut dress and evidently wants to get down to business. “Are you going to leave your coat on?” she queries. And when John Kerr hesitates at fulfilling his masculine duties, she says: “Hey, are you here on a bet?” Ellie is a sexual woman, the piece of trash everyone hates -- not like Deborah Kerr who speaks with a British accent, wears pink sweaters and defends John Kerr for not being able to have sex with the town ‘bad girl,’ airily positing: “For him there has to be love.” Anderson is not a great playwright; much here is stolen from A Streetcar Named Desire. Deborah Kerr (like Blanche) was once married to a handsome young man who used — like John Kerr — to “listen to phonograph records alone in the choir room,” and was not traditionally manly but instead “tender and considerate.” But Blanche’s young man in Streetcar is caught kissing another man, and therefore clearly gay -- which was the origin of his tenderness and vulnerability. It’s fascinating that Vincente Minnelli chose to film the final seduction scene in what has been described as.a ‘sylvan glade.’ The first shot is John Kerr reclining dreamily, on his back (as 'odalisque’) in a glistening bower, wearing a white shirt with rolled up sleeves. It’s all very Midsummer Nights Dream: I was immediately reminded of James Bidgood, a gay photographer in New York City who — if he had been living during COVID-19 — might have to be praised for making productive use of his spare time without leaving his apartment. He invited young men to his little den of iniquity, asked them to get naked, and then photographed them in resplendent overgrown garden settings, bathed in pink and blue and yellow light — as martyrs, fauns and young Gods, The photographs are surrealistic camp, porn, fantasy. Bidgood was a window dresser by trade, and his settings are inspired by the beauty of the boys he photographed. He allows that beauty to transport him to a fantasy world of flowers, fairy trees, asses, penises and the glowing skin of youths who appear untouched, but not by him. Tennessee Williams said (and I am paraphrasing) ‘the only thing that really makes me happy is ejaculating on a beautiful young man’s chest’ — a truly noble sentiment. It should be enshrined above Anderson’s cloying: “when you speak of his, and you will, be kind” For the kindest thing one can do for world is to be inspired by physical beauty and create it’s visual or written equivalent in art. It is not about making the physical spiritual, but about making the spiritual physical, that is, making what is tender and kind into something you can touch and feel and kiss and well — spill your load upon. (To coin a phrase.) I’m sorry for lapsing into obscenity. No I’m not. Oh yes, and by the way, this all must all happen in a sylvan glade, don’t you see? And the boy must relaxing on a swing, surrounded by twinkling leaves that barely manage to catch the light.
