Queering the Oscars: Knowing Our History in “Changing Our Minds"

For Pride Month, Team Experience is looking at LGBTQ+ related Oscar nominations... 

dr evelyn hooker

by Eurocheese

When this series was announced, my first goal was to find a film that was completely new to me on a subject outside of my cinematic wheelhouse. Watching this film served as a reminder of how little I know about LGBTQ+ history. While I’d heard the name Evelyn Hooker before, I’m ashamed to admit I couldn’t have told you what role she played in history, much less the impact she had on the state of gay rights today. If the same is true for you, dear reader, I highly recommend carving 107 minutes out of your day to learn a bit about her impact in the Oscar nominated documentary Changing Our Minds: The Story of Evelyn Hooker (1992). I want to offer a trigger warning though as this film delves into difficult topics and images.

The sliding doors nature of Hooker coming to study homosexuality is mind-boggling if you stop to picture a world where her findings never existed...

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Mrs. (H)Arris Goes to Paris: 1992 Edition

by Cláudio Alves

Originally published in 1958, Paul Gallico's Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris, also known as Flowers for Mrs. Harris, is the first book in a series about the adventures of an English cleaning woman in her sixties. This particular novella concerns the widowed charwoman who, after falling in love with her employer's French fashions, becomes fixated on the idea of buying a Dior dress for herself. As the title suggests, she goes to Paris to achieve that goal, embarking on what can only be described as a midcentury fairytale. Way before Lesley Manville decided to step into Mrs. Harris' shoes for the 2022 production, the story was already adapted for the screen. Beyond filmed media, there's even a musical that premiered in Sheffield's Crucible Theater in 2016.

As we wait for the new movie to arrive in theaters, let's look back at one of those previous incarnations. Specifically, the 1992 TV movie Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris, starring Angela Lansbury in the titular role…

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