# What was the first depiction of an openly homosexual character? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 27, 2009, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993 "2009-03-27T14:49:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/1 "2009-03-27T14:49:48Z")
Movie, book TV? Openly gay. Who? ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/2 "2009-03-27T14:53:48Z")
Somebody in a Sapphic poem? ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/3 "2009-03-27T14:59:23Z")
In Greek myth, [Prosymnus](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosymnus) was a youth who agreed to guide Dionysus to the entrace to the underworld only in exchange for becoming the god’s over. Most of the (male) Greek gods were bisexual, of course, but here is a character not recorded as being anything but gay. There’s also Hyacinth, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/4 "2009-03-27T15:08:32Z")
On TV (in America, at least) it’s generally considered to be Jodie Dallas (played by Billy Crystal) on _Soap_. ---
**Author:** ![h.sapiens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e0b2c6/32.png) [@h.sapiens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/h.sapiens)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/5 "2009-03-27T15:20:01Z")
If you’re talking about regular characters in a series, it might be Jodie Dallas, in 1977. But Marty Morrison, a recurring character on Barney Miller, made his first appearance in 1975. There may have some earlier, but that’s one I know of. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/6 "2009-03-27T15:32:43Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Movie, book TV? Openly gay. Who? In film, how about **Diamonds are Forever**? With the two gay assassins. And Bambi and Thumper were clearly lesbian - at least until Bond ‘converted’ them. Or Pussy Galore in **Goldfinger**. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/7 "2009-03-27T15:39:19Z")
The TV show, **The Hot L Baltimore** , had a gay couple as regulars in 1975. It’s hard to tell when Marty showed up on **Barney Miller** , but that show premiered one day before **The Hot L Baltimore** and it doesn’t look like Marty was in the cast on that date. The gay couple, on the other hand, were part of **Hot L Baltimore** from the first episode. Charlie Chaplin’s **Modern Times** has a gay man (as defined by the prejudices of its day) as one of the people in jail with him. ---
**Author:** ![Dan\_Norder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@Dan\_Norder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dan_Norder)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/8 "2009-03-27T15:57:36Z")
Gligamesh and Enkidu were clearly more than just good friends, but that’d probably only make them bi. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/9 "2009-03-27T16:28:16Z")
The [Columbia Anthology of Gay Literature](http://jclarkmedia.com/gaybooks/chronologicalsurvey.html) does indeed start with Gilgamesh. [Homosexual milestones: 1972 to 1999](http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_medi2.htm) lists “1972: An ABC made-for-TV movie “That Certain Summer” featured Hal Holbrook and Martin Sheen as a gay couple.” preceding Hot-L Baltimore. [Gay Movie History](http://queerlion.com/?p=7): > [@](#): > > In early comedies of the teens and twenties, the possibility of homo behavior was a common joke. In “The Florida Enchantment”, two women dance off together, leaving their bewildered menfolk to shrug, and dance off together themselves. [A Florida Enchantment (1914)](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0003973/) > [@](#): > > A young woman discovers a seed that can make women act like men and men act like women. She decides to take one, then slips one to her maid and another to her fiancé. The fun begins. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/10 "2009-03-27T17:19:06Z")
The first film about overt homosexuality was Richard Oswald’s _[Anders als die Andern](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0009878/)_ (Different From the Others) (Germany 1919), starring Conrad Veidt, best remembered today as Major Strasser in _Casablanca_, as a musician who is blackmailed due to his homosexuality. Two other German films of note: _[Geschlecht in Fesseln](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0018935/)_ (Sex in Chains) (1928), about homosexuality in a men’s prison; and _[Mädchen in Uniform](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0022183/)_ (1931), about homosexuality in a girl’s boarding school. All three are available on DVD. In American films, there are gags in silent comedies involving flamboyantly effeminate characters, or characters caught in what is mistaken as a homosexual act (e.g., Chaplin in _Behind the Screen_, Laurel & Hardy in _Putting Pants on Philip_). The sci-fi musical comedy _[Just Imagine](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0021016/)_ (1930) takes a trip to Mars, a screwy place where a burly Martian man wants to marry the visiting Earth man. Male couples also make pre-Code gag appearances in Mae West’s _She Done Him Wrong_ (1933) and the Al Jolson musical _Wonder Bar_ (1934). _Children of Loneliness_ (US 1937) was an independently made (and little seen due to state and local censor boards) adaptation of the lesbian novel _The Well of Loneliness_, with an open lesbian character, and a closeted gay male character. Naturally, both are dead by the end of the picture. The copyright submission for the picture included this statement from the filmmakers: > [@](#): > > _Children of Loneliness_ is an educational and scientific presentation of an absorbing subject that deals with the manifestations, evil associations and mental complexes that affect and misdirect normal adults into channels resulting in homo-sexuality. It points out in vivid form and manner the fact that it is an acquired anomaly requiring only the influence of some exciting cause to become manifest, among such causes being those associated with fright, improper training, evil associations and mental complexes…In their effort to satisfy their desires these unfortunate people often stoop to the most loathsome practices. _Children of Loneliness_ points out the part that Society plays in the development of normal children into normal humans, and eloquently brings out the potent fact that society cannot cure those who have been so misguided by simply ignoring and refusing to discuss them…The story of these inverts is a tragic one and reveals the known fact that these people are mentally sick and their only hope lies in treatment by competent physicians… ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/11 "2009-03-27T17:38:14Z")
[This Wikipedia article](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pre-Stonewall_American_television_episodes_with_LGBT_themes) lists early television shows with gay characters. A character on a 1967 episode of _N.Y.P.D._ was the first openly gay character on American network television. ---
**Author:** ![Damfino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Damfino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damfino)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/12 "2009-03-27T17:52:48Z")
I don’t know about openly gay, but the character of Leonard, Vandamm’s sidekick, in Hitchcock’s _North by Northwest (1959)_, was effeminate enough, according to IMDB, to cause problems with the Hayes Code. There is also a line where he says something like, “Call it my woman’s intuition, but…” ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/13 "2009-03-27T18:22:02Z")
For anybody not familiar, the definitive treatment of gays in movies (til the time it was made anyway) [THE CELLULOID CLOSET](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Celluloid_Closet). Tons of clips. I believe you can watch it free on Netflix. [Boys in the Band](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_in_the_Band) was among the first to portray mostly gay characters in a generally positive light. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/14 "2009-03-27T18:25:35Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > [Boys in the Band](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_in_the_Band) was among the first to portray mostly gay characters in a generally positive light. Not all that positive – they were all screwed up because of it – but they were treated as people, not freaks to laugh at. I suspect it’s badly dated today. ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/15 "2009-03-27T18:42:30Z")
Here’s an early example from UK TV. [Mr. Humphries](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Are_You_Being_Served%3F_characters) in _Are You Being Served?_ screams gayness all the way up to eleven. The characterisation is perhaps aided by the actor John Inman being gay himself. However, as the Wiki link points out, some of the situations Mr. Humphries finds himself in support the argument that he was in fact a gay oriented bisexual. _Are You Being Served?_ was first shown in 1972. ---
**Author:** ![TWDuke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e495f1/32.png) [@TWDuke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TWDuke)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/16 "2009-03-27T18:43:29Z")
> [@h.sapiens](#): > > If you’re talking about regular characters in a series, it might be Jodie Dallas, in 1977. As a side note, Jodie was consistently identified as gay, he only had a relationship with a man in the first half of a season, after which he fell for two women and lived platonically with another. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/17 "2009-03-27T18:47:29Z")
In books, there was _The Hundred Days of Sodom_, by the Marquis de Sade. Mid-to-late 1700s. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/18 "2009-03-27T19:01:40Z")
> [@TWDuke](#): > > As a side note, Jodie was consistently identified as gay, he only had a relationship with a man in the first half of a season, after which he fell for two women and lived platonically with another. And fathered a daughter by one of them. Nevertheless, when challenged in court to admit that he was a “practicing homosexual,” his reply was, “I don’t have to practice, I’m very good at it.” ---
**Author:** ![HubZilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ccd318/32.png) [@HubZilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HubZilla)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/19 "2009-03-27T19:13:14Z")
Sodom and Gomorrah? :: d&r :: ---
**Author:** ![palindromemordnilap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/db5fbb/32.png) [@palindromemordnilap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/palindromemordnilap)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2009, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993/20 "2009-03-27T19:22:30Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > On TV (in America, at least) it’s generally considered to be Jodie Dallas (played by Billy Crystal) on _Soap_. Obviously not the first as previous entries indicate, but JD was significant as a gay character who was not a flamey caricature. Also he was a major character which was rare if not nonexistent. I remember thinking that Billy Crystal would be hopelessly typecast and would never be able to break out of gay roles. That cross-dressing hetero in Bosom Buddies who was not Peter Scolari also had a better career than I would have guessed. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-depiction-of-an-openly-homosexual-character/490993.md?page=2)