Queens at Heart (1967)

[Music] ladies and gentlemen you're about to see the results of a six-month psychological project a research project that took us all over the country in my office today i'm jay martin we have four contestants in a recent beauty contest now for reasons which will become very clear we're going to use first names only would you please introduce yourselves misty vicky sonia simone misty what you do bag teller and vicky cosmetician window display now let me ask you this vicky when you go to business do you dress in a dress like that or a skirt and sweater what you usually wear i usually wear a white shirt tie sports jacket are those your own eyelashes no and sonia is that your own hair no that's a very lovely dress too that you're wearing simone what did you buy oh i made it myself ladies and gentlemen the reason for using first names only for these very very charming contestants is that right now each one of them is breaking the law the contest in which they were runners-up was a masquerade actually in the vernacular it's called a drag ball you see each of our contestants is a man in just a moment we'll be back to talk to them individually [Music] so [Music] foreign so [Music] [Applause] [Music] sonia you were born a male why did you first notice these female tendencies i was 13 years old sonia do you take female hormones yes i do and what have they done to you they have developed my body and they also uh um develop my bust and slow the growth in the hair in my body you said they've developed your bust do you wear brazil when you work no when i work well do you ever wear a thin t-shirt i i wear a shirt or a sweater when you wear a sweater you say that your busts are developed is it they show us through now what about dates you have dates with men do you ever have dates with men who don't know that you're a man most of the times they don't and what do they do when they find out well they don't really care what about your plans for marriage well first of all i intend to have my sex change how are you going to do that i'm out you take a trip and certain amount of money and surgery you go to surgery that's very expensive i understand well it's a couple of thousand dollars what about your wardrobe that must cost a lot of money my whole salary goes to my wardrobe do you make any of your own clothes sometimes let's talk for just a moment about your sex life have you ever had a date with a girl no when you have a date with your boyfriends uh what do you do you go to movies we go out dancing here and there you know everywhere inaudible how many times would you must you go out with a boy before you let him kiss you not much that same night you crazy it should be obvious to you that you don't lead a normal life in terms with which we're familiar would you say that you're a happy fulfilled person well i'm i'm very happy but i'm not quite fulfilled until i get my sex change and become a complete woman then i'll be happy completely simone hold are you 20. when did you first discover that you were effeminate well i think we ought to clear up what's feminine what's gay but what's the difference well a gay person is a boy that is attracted to another boy or a girl that's attracted to another girl and feminine anybody can be feminine there's lots of married men that have feminine instincts you know they have a lymph wrist or they walk a little more feminine than the other man now simone you openly admit that you're a homosexual what do your parents think about this well i think my parents really don't know i could you could say i live a double life that on weekends i dress up like a girl and then when i come home on sunday afternoons or so i'm i look like a normal boy in a neighborhood and i i think as long as this happens my parents don't suspect any things i have girls from work i i go out with during the week and the girls do call a house have you ever had sexual intercourse with a girl no girls don't attract me sexually i like girls that are pretty and all i like to be seen with pretty people but sexually girls just turned me off i'd say do you have any brothers or sisters i have an older brother does he know that you're homosexual no what do you think he'd do if he found out probably kill me how old are you i'm 20. well then you're old enough to be drafted yes have you been drafted no what happened oh i guess i had a horrible experience when they called me down there i just stood out from the rest of the people minus i didn't want to be drafted so i just add a little more makeup to my face and they spotted me i stood out from the crowd were you dressed as a girl no but i had my hair up it was combed differently than the rest of the boys and i had a little makeup on my face and the guards had caught me at the door and they escorted me up personally to the main place where we had to be seated from there on i was just sent to different psychiatrists and what did the psychiatrists ask you well they asked me am i happy the way i am and they asked me uh do my parents know and do i want any help from them and am i happy and i answered all their questions now during the week when you're at work you say you do go out with girls when do you go out with boys on the weekends sometimes during the week i'd take a day off in the evening and i'd go to a gay bar in the city and i'd meet people maybe i'd go home with a boy every time i go out to a bar i don't intend to have sex or so well when you meet somebody at a gay bar this would tell me that he was probably homosexual is that true or not i only go to gay bars well do you ever go out with straight people i do and we go to straight bars you take female hormones i started on it and what has it done to you i put on a weight how about your breasts oh they don't start forming for about two or three weeks so i couldn't tell you when was the first time you went out with a boy well is this when i was dressed as a boy or as a girl let's say you were dressed as a girl well it was at a drag ball two years ago when i first started going dressed as a girl and this boy hadn't thought i was quite attractive he came over to me and started talking and asking me all sorts of questions and he asked me to go out after the ball so what happened well we happened to go to a motel where i have dressed that night for the ball and we started to party what do you mean by that well we both got undressed and he kissed me i kissed him we got in bed pulled the sheets over us and we started feeling each other what happened when he found out you had a well he knew this before but he wasn't bothered he was so hot you know and boys like to get the other people especially pretty ones well how does he do it well uh either i'd go peep just sense that or hit you know where me and my back or my front your front seymour we've determined that you do in effect lead a double life on the weekends you dress as a woman during the week you hold on a full-time job are you happy oh yes i am what would make you even more happy if i'd be able to have a change from man to woman what does that involve first of all it involves a lot of money doctors charge a lot of money for this operation where would you have the operation well in casablanca it's uh starts for about two thousand dollars and up what is the actual surgical procedure oh it's it's not castration anymore like they used to do in the olden days uh with it cut off a man's testicles or so but um nowadays they keep everything on you except they just stick it inside and this way it's a little better and it's when you say a little better what does it mean still have an excitement like you usually do it might take a little longer but you still have your excitement when you're castrated you have no excitement whatsoever could you have normal sexual relations as a woman you could but you couldn't give birth that's the only difference would you like to adopt a child uh i don't think i'd want to adopt a child i think knowing they might be able to change my my my body but not my mind and i'd always have this little comeback in me knowing that okay i was once a boy and now i have a kid of my own it wouldn't sound right to me but i would like to get married seymour told us earlier that you make a lot of your own dresses do you wear anything tight and slinky i do it time what happens if you're wearing a very tight slinky satin dress and you see somebody who appeals to you and your maleness becomes apparent i try to get rid of it before i put that slinky dress on how do you do that oh there's lots of ways of wearing a heavyset girdle you wear a girdle you're a rather tall girl aren't you yes how tall would you say you were six feet but you're one of the taller drag queens around but i'm one of the more beautiful ones too darling simone do you know any other boys who dress up like girls who are taller than you are oh yes i know when it used to be a truck driver you ought to see her now she's about six two and a 48 bust would you say that your business your work is the sort of work that attracts homosexuals well uh a lot of arty fields like dancing singing and display work and a different field said our arty attract a lot of homosexuals to work there and uh i happen to know my whole crew is gay how do you know that well we all talk about it and we're so easy to spot anyhow vicky you say you're engaged what does your fiancee do he's a photographer is he homosexual or is he straight no he's straight masculine let me ask you this question if he's masculine wouldn't it be more normal for him to go out with a girl true but i'm the nearest thing to a girl and i'm going for a change in when you say you're going for a change you're going to have an operation yes now several of the other people we've interviewed are going to have the operation tell me something about it from your standpoint well it's uh a step away from loneliness and suicide because most of the homosexuals and drag queens they get to a certain age and they don't want to live no more so i've just about hit that age have you ever felt that you wanted to end your life oh many times and i just think about changing to a woman hoping that would be an escape when did you first feel that you were not part of the world around you oh 14 15. had you been effeminate in school yes i was an outsider were you the butt of jokes and barbs for the other children yes but what they say there goes the the fairy there goes the little miss wonder and this upset you yes was there anybody in those early days that you could talk to and tell about how you felt no not until just about a year ago i met people like me i thought i was only one and it's a little easier now how did you meet these other people who were like you at parties at uh bowls dragon balls sailors in those early days would you try to dress up as a woman i'm talking about when you were 14 and 15. yes i would put on my mother's clothes run around the house on her heels did you ever catch you no when was your first homosexual experience when i was 15. and how did that happen in a movie somebody some fella kept on staring at me and staring at me i seen the picture once i seen it twice and i just did it most of the night and he was still there moving slowly but surely next to me and then the knee starts rubbing his knee at someone and i just was a young or old no he was young and where did you go with him well actually i i got panicked then i he had told me to come into the men's room and i told him all right all right and when he went into the men's room i looked up at the clock and i said eh i got to get out of here and i just left i left them so that ended that scene well what was the next time near the rides where i was they have an amusement park some felt like i could just feel the eyes piercing through me and i turned around he told me uh if i like to go on some rides i told him right i don't mind we went on a few rides and then he told me if we'd like to go into the broad walk so i said to myself well i'm gonna see what happens being that i ran out less time out of the movies i'm gonna see the next few steps what happens with another man what did happen a few things that i guess a girl would do with a fella did he kiss you yes did he touch you yes did you touch him yes not right away did he ask you to do things which went against your principles and feelings yes did you do them no when did you finally go all out with a man about two weeks later was the same man yes i met him and he told me to meet him in new york was he homosexual yes was he an overt homosexual or was he married and with children well he had a wife and a daughter but uh he was separated from them did you feel happy after having had an experience with him not really because i felt dirty i felt like i was trapped in between something that i didn't know what to do about either go all the way and try to change i felt different i didn't like him after that i despised him as a matter of fact i lived with him for about nine months and i despised him every day but i just did it because i was getting deeper involved and i just had nothing else to do so i just let it go did you feel that he was responsible in measure for your turning into a complete homosexual well yes but he didn't like me uh to be very obvious were you passive or active in the relationship well it was sort of a funny deal it was a mutual yes and now vicki would you tell us about a normal day in your life a day during which you conform to society actually i'm living in two worlds the female and the male world as much as i favor the female world because of a narrow-minded society i have to conform to conventions so on my working days i get dressed as a man because that's what society likes to see and i do need the money for my operation so i play the part of a meal but believe me i don't like it one bit because i feel like an imposter it's a good thing for me i live within walking distance for my job so every morning when i walk to work i stop and i see girls and i envy them not because i like them physically but i admire them for certain things that they free to do what they like me i have to hide and i don't feel very right it's not a normal thing to feel but that's the way i am i love to look at windows especially lingerie windows i love to see the pretty silks and satins things i'll be wearing once i get my sex changed and i just like the other girls beautiful and sexy then i think i hope i'll get a chance in life to get the things i really want instead of hide from society and men's clothes and just to see these things make me tingle and i know what would make men tingle too and to see them on me especially if i was a woman well it's getting late i better get to work and get this out of my head now [Music] oh brother i have a customer waiting for me that's what i get so looking in the windows dreams that's all they are who knows oh well maybe this job will help me get this money for this operation then i'll be sitting in a chair and someone will be waiting on me and my hair thank you ladies and gentlemen during our six-month research project we interviewed literally thousands of homosexuals who ran the gamut from those who betrayed up the slightest trace of the feminist qualities to those like vicky who but for a quirk of faith had been born a woman we know that homosexuality is a psychological aberration to be treated by a competent psychiatrist but one of those like vicky who don't want to be treated who want to be women are we to judge you