before stonewall documentary transcript

Stonewall Uprising | American Experience | PBS And Vito and I walked the rest of the whole thing with tears running down our face. Many of those activists have since died, but Marcus preserved their voices for his book, titled Making Gay History. I was proud. A year earlier, young gays, lesbians and transgender people clashed with police near a bar called The Stonewall Inn. And then as you turned into the other room with the jukebox, those were the drag queens around the jukebox. Daniel Pine I didn't think I could have been any prettier than that night. Martha Shelley:When I was growing up in the '50s, I was supposed to get married to some guy, produce, you know, the usual 2.3 children, and I could look at a guy and say, "Well, objectively he's good looking," but I didn't feel anything, just didn't make any sense to me. This was in front of the police. We heard one, then more and more. We had no speakers planned for the rally in Central Park, where we had hoped to get to. View in iTunes. Martin Boyce:I heard about the trucks, which to me was fascinated me, you know, it had an imagination thing that was like Marseilles, how can it only be a few blocks away? Narrator (Archival):This involves showing the gay man pictures of nude males and shocking him with a strong electric current. Martin Boyce:All of a sudden, Miss New Orleans and all people around us started marching step by step and the police started moving back. Quentin Heilbroner Martin Boyce:Oh, Miss New Orleans, she wouldn't be stopped. It was fun to see fags. Jerry Hoose You were alone. At least if you had press, maybe your head wouldn't get busted. I grew up in a very Catholic household and the conflict of issues of redemption, of is it possible that if you are this thing called homosexual, is it possible to be redeemed? But it was a refuge, it was a temporary refuge from the street. People started throwing pennies. Martha Shelley:In those days, what they would do, these psychiatrists, is they would try to talk you into being heterosexual. There was at least one gay bar that was run just as a hustler bar for straight gay married men. Somehow being gay was the most terrible thing you could possibly be. William Eskridge, Professor of Law:All throughout the 60s in New York City, the period when the New York World's Fair was attracting visitors from all over America and all over the world. John O'Brien:Heterosexuals, legally, had lots of sexual outlets. Jerry Hoose:I was chased down the street with billy clubs. I guess they're deviates. But I gave it up about, oh I forget, some years ago, over four years ago. Homosexuality was a dishonorable discharge in those days, and you couldn't get a job afterwards. The medical experimentation in Atascadero included administering, to gay people, a drug that simulated the experience of drowning; in other words, a pharmacological example of waterboarding. [1] To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in 2019, the film was restored and re-released by First Run Features in June 2019. And I just didn't understand that. We were all there. This 19-year-old serviceman left his girlfriend on the beach to go to a men's room in a park nearby where he knew that he could find a homosexual contact. Dick Leitsch:Well, gay bars were the social centers of gay life. Tires were slashed on police cars and it just went on all night long. This documentary uses extensive archival film, movie clips and personal recollections to construct an audiovisual history of the gay community before the Stonewall riots. My father said, "About time you fags rioted.". You see these cops, like six or eight cops in drag. That wasn't ours, it was borrowed. We don't know. Jerry Hoose:Who was gonna complain about a crackdown against gay people? I was wearing my mother's black and white cocktail dress that was empire-waisted. William Eskridge, Professor of Law:Gay people who were sentenced to medical institutions because they were found to be sexual psychopaths, were subjected sometimes to sterilization, occasionally to castration, sometimes to medical procedures, such as lobotomies, which were felt by some doctors to cure homosexuality and other sexual diseases. Doric Wilson:There was joy because the cops weren't winning. Dick Leitsch:It was an invasion, I mean you felt outraged and stuff like you know what, God, this is America, what's this country come to? Dick Leitsch:We wore suits and ties because we wanted people, in the public, who were wearing suits and ties, to identify with us. Getty Images And all of a sudden, pandemonium broke loose. It was done in our little street talk. Don't fire until I fire. And I said to myself, "Oh my God, this will not last.". Eric Marcus has spent years interviewing people who were there that night, as well as those who were pushing for gay rights before Stonewall. John O'Brien:We had no idea we were gonna finish the march. There was all these drags queens and these crazy people and everybody was carrying on. Diana Davies Photographs, Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations Before Stonewall 1984 Directed by Greta Schiller, Robert Rosenberg Synopsis New York City's Stonewall Inn is regarded by many as the site of gay and lesbian liberation since it was at this bar that drag queens fought back against police June 27-28, 1969. Revisiting 'Before Stonewall' Film for the 50th Anniversary | Time Jorge Garcia-Spitz Lynn and Louis Wolfson II Florida Moving Image Archives And if we catch you, involved with a homosexual, your parents are going to know about it first. Yvonne Ritter:I had just turned 18 on June 27, 1969. Today, that event is seen as the start of the gay civil rights movement, but gay activists and organizations were standing up to harassment and discrimination years before. Your choice, you can come in with us or you can stay out here with the crowd and report your stuff from out here. There may be some girls here who will turn lesbian. And it would take maybe a half hour to clear the place out. Slate:The Homosexual(1967), CBS Reports. Ed Koch, mayorof New York City from1978 to 1989, discussesgay civil rights in New York in the 1960s. TV Host (Archival):That's a very lovely dress too that you're wearing Simone. 400 Plankinton Ave. Compton's Cafeteria Raid, San Francisco, California, 1966 Coopers Do-Nut Raid, Los Angeles, California, 1959 Pepper Hill Club Raid, Baltimore, Maryland in 1955. So anything that would set us off, we would go into action. Oddball Film + Video, San Francisco Before Stonewall (1984) - IMDb Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:I had a column inThe Village Voicethat ran from '66 all the way through '84. Alexandra Meryash Nikolchev, On-Line Editors Martin Boyce:And then more police came, and it didn't stop. Review: 'Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community' Do you want them to lose all chance of a normal, happy, married life? All the rules were off in the '60s. On this episode, the fight for gay rights before Stonewall. Martin Boyce:In the early 60s, if you would go near Port Authority, there were tons of people coming in. [7] In 1989, it won the Festival's Plate at the Torino International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. This Restored Documentary Examines What LGBTQ Lives Were Like Before So gay people were being strangled, shot, thrown in the river, blackmailed, fired from jobs. But we're going to pay dearly for this. In the sexual area, in psychology, psychiatry. You gotta remember, the Stonewall bar was just down the street from there. The film combined personal interviews, snapshots and home movies, together with historical footage. Never, never, never. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:We told this to our men. And that's what it was, it was a war. The music was great, cafes were good, you know, the coffee houses were good. by David Carter, Associate Producer and Advisor And it's that hairpin trigger thing that makes the riot happen. Oh, tell me about your anxiety. What finally made sense to me was the first time I kissed a woman and I thought, "Oh, this is what it's about." Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:As much as I don't like to say it, there's a place for violence. Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community is a 1984 American documentary film about the LGBT community prior to the 1969 Stonewall riots. And a whole bunch of people who were in the paddy wagon ran out. Just making their lives miserable for once. It was one of the things you did in New York, it was like the Barnum and Bailey aspect of it. The film brings together voices from over 50 years of the LGBTQ rights movement to explore queer activism before, during and after the Stonewall Riots. Before Stonewall - Rotten Tomatoes Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:I never bought a drink at the Stonewall. Doing things like that. People cheer while standing in front of The Stonewall Inn as the annual Gay Pride parade passes, Sunday, June 26, 2011 in New York. Jerry Hoose:I was afraid it was over. Danny Garvin:We became a people. John O'Brien:I was very anti-police, had many years already of activism against the forces of law and order. Martin Boyce:I had cousins, ten years older than me, and they had a car sometimes. and I didn't see anything but a forest of hands. And so there was this drag queen standing on the corner, so they go up and make a sexual offer and they'd get busted. Directors Greta Schiller Robert Rosenberg (co-director) Stars Rita Mae Brown Maua Adele Ajanaku I hope it was. Interviewer (Archival):Are you a homosexual? I learned, very early, that those horrible words were about me, that I was one of those people. John O'Brien:And then somebody started a fire, they started with little lighters and matches. John O'Brien:All of a sudden, the police faced something they had never seen before. They call them hotels, motels, lovers' lanes, drive-in movie theaters, etc. Stonewall Forever Explore the monument Watch the documentary Download the AR app About & FAQ Privacy Policy ", Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:And he went to each man and said it by name. WPA Film Library, Thanks to The scenes were photographed with telescopic lenses. Trevor, Post Production Original Language: English. Beginning of our night out started early. They are taught that no man is born homosexual and many psychiatrists now believe that homosexuality begins to form in the first three years of life. WGBH Educational Foundation [7] In 1987, the film won Emmy Awards for Best Historical/Cultural Program and Best Research. Franco Sacchi, Additional Animation and Effects Absolutely, and many people who were not lucky, felt the cops. They could be judges, lawyers. Fred Sargeant:The press did refer to it in very pejorative terms, as a night that the drag queens fought back. He brought in gay-positive materials and placed that in a setting that people could come to and feel comfortable in. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:We would scatter, ka-poom, every which way. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:We didn't have the manpower, and the manpower for the other side was coming like it was a real war. And she was quite crazy. Dick Leitsch:There were Black Panthers and there were anti-war people. Martin Boyce Slate:Perversion for Profit(1965), Citizens for Decency Through Law. On June 28, 1969, New York City police raided a Greenwich Village gay bar, the Stonewall Inn, setting off a three-day riot that launched the modern American gay rights movement. The mayor of New York City, the police commissioner, were under pressure to clean up the streets of any kind of quote unquote "weirdness." Fred Sargeant:Three articles of clothing had to be of your gender or you would be in violation of that law. John Scagliotti Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community Patricia Yusah, Marketing and Communications So in every gay pride parade every year, Stonewall lives. Martin Boyce:Well, in the front part of the bar would be like "A" gays, like regular gays, that didn't go in any kind of drag, didn't use the word "she," that type, but they were gay, a hundred percent gay. And they wore dark police uniforms and riot helmets and they had billy clubs and they had big plastic shields, like Roman army, and they actually formed a phalanx, and just marched down Christopher Street and kind of pushed us in front of them. Linton Media Dick Leitsch:So it was mostly goofing really, basically goofing on them. A New York Police officer grabs a man by the hair as another officer clubs a man during a confrontation in Greenwich Village after a Gay Power march in New York. Some of the pre-Stonewall uprisings included: Black Cat Raid, Los Angeles, California, 1967 Black Night Brawl, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, August 5, 1961. Heather Gude, Archival Research And I ran into Howard Smith on the street,The Village Voicewas right there. A sickness that was not visible like smallpox, but no less dangerous and contagious. William Eskridge, Professor of Law: The 1960s were dark ages for lesbians and gay men all over America. In 1924, the first gay rights organization is founded by Henry Gerber in Chicago. For the first time, we weren't letting ourselves be carted off to jails, gay people were actually fighting back just the way people in the peace movement fought back. It's a history that people feel a huge sense of ownership over. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. How do you think that would affect him mentally, for the rest of their lives if they saw an act like that being? And it just seemed like, fantastic because the background was this industrial, becoming an industrial ruin, it was a masculine setting, it was a whole world. "BEFORE STONEWALL" - MetroFocus It eats you up inside. Participants of the 1969 Greenwich Village uprising describe the effect that Stonewall had on their lives. Other images in this film are And as I'm looking around to see what's going on, police cars, different things happening, it's getting bigger by the minute. Lester Senior Housing Community, Jewish Community Housing Corporation Danny Garvin:It was the perfect time to be in the Village. Before Stonewall. Virginia Apuzzo:It's very American to say, "This is not right." I actually thought, as all of them did, that we were going to be killed. Liz Davis We went, "Oh my God. Charles Harris, Transcriptions Eventually something was bound to blow. Raymond Castro:So finally when they started taking me out, arm in arm up to the paddy wagon, I jumped up and I put one foot on one side, one foot on the other and I sprung back, knocking the two arresting officers, knocking them to the ground. Even non-gay people. They were not used to a bunch of drag queens doing a Rockettes kick line and sort of like giving them all the finger in a way. And when you got a word, the word was homosexuality and you looked it up. Seymour Wishman And the harder she fought, the more the cops were beating her up and the madder the crowd got. What Jimmy didn't know is that Ralph was sick. But we went down to the trucks and there, people would have sex. They would not always just arrest, they would many times use clubs and beat. (Enter your ZIP code for information on American Experience events and screening in your area.).

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