Special Guest William Boyle // Sarahfest Bonus Episode II
Welcome to another special Sarahfest bonus episode of Swerve South! In this episode, Theresa is joined by author William Boyle to discuss Vincente Minnelli’s 1956 “male-centric” melodrama, Tea and Sympathy. The film centers on Tom Robinson Lee, a sensitive young man who finds himself at odds with the hyper-masculine, conformist culture of his all-boys boarding school. Struggling to fit in with his classmates, Tom instead finds companionship with his headmaster’s wife, Laura, and over the course of the film, her role in Tom’s life evolves from maternal figure to romantic interest. Theresa and Bill dig into the film’s Lynchian qualities that reveal the violence and sordidness lying just beneath the surface of its idyllic 1950s New England setting. Often seen as a minor film in Minnelli’s oeuvre, this fascinating conversation pays homage to Tea and Sympathy’s searing indictment of toxic masculinity, tender exploration of identity, and covert depiction of queerness.
For more of his brilliant film commentary, check out Bill’s blog series I Wake Up Streaming in the Southwestern Review.
Show Notes & Extras
On Tea and Sympathy & the Queerness of 1950s Melodrama:
Revisiting Tea and Sympathy: Sexual Paranoia in Fifties America, Christopher Sharrett
Queer & Now & Then: 1956, Tea and Sympathy, Michael Koresky
Queer & Now & Then: 1955, All That Heaven Allows, Michael Koresky
Melodrama: An Aesthetics of Impossibility, Jonathan Goldberg
On David Lynch, Otherness, & 1950s Nostalgia:
You Got Your Good Thing and I’ve Got Mine: David Lynch as Queer Artist, Kyle Turner
BREAKING: David Lynch Has Thoughts on the Dark Side of Fifties Suburbia, David Lynch
Idyllic red roses and white picket fence from the opening sequence of Blue Velvet.
A scene from Twin Peaks set in the nostalgic 1950s-style Double R Diner.