‘The Sound of Music’: a queer history
Does the musical keep some secrets?
Published in
8 min readMar 10, 2021
Update: I re-wrote this post.
In 1965, the reviews were horrific. It’s “schmaltz,” they said. But the world fell in love with a strange nun with a boyish haircut.
What was the appeal of The Sound of Music? Even with the Rogers and Hammerstein soundtrack, it wasn’t expected to become the biggest movie in history. I’m thinking over the themes of gender. Is it a lesbian story?
It started out as a vehicle for Mary Martin
Little recalled now, she was the 1950s Broadway star who’d become a celebrity from roles ranging to Annie Oakley to Peter Pan. In 1954, her performance as Peter was broadcast on NBC and became one of the biggest events in T.V. history.
Her unusual talent, however, didn’t translate well to film. She was pretty, and charismatic, but not in a traditionally ‘feminine’ style. She was married with children, but…
