The Children’s Hour

The politics of sexuality and censorship in the first Hollywood film to feature a lesbian character in a lead role.

The Children’s Hour (1961) was the first mainstream US film to feature a lesbian character in a leading role. Julia Erhart explores how the film’s conception, production, and reception reveal deep insights into the politics of sexuality and censorship in midcentury America and into social and political tensions around gender and sexuality today.

Julia Erhart is associate professor of screen and media at Flinders University.

Julia Erhart is associate professor of screen studies at Flinders University.

"This discussion of The Children's Hour is terrific. [Erhart] provides a fascinating take on the soundtrack, both in terms of the potentially "coded" music and the meaningful silences. Highly recommended." Choice

“For fans and scholars, even those on intimate terms with The Children's Hour, this book yields abundant new insights and information. Among its many strengths is the author's discerning reading of reception, which recovers and engages with a queer intelligence manifest in the popular discourse about the film. Julia Erhart compellingly reactivates a queer classic for the contemporary moment.” Lee Wallace, University of Sydney and author of Reattachment Theory: Queer Cinema of Remarriage