Flashback Friday Halloween Edition: David Whale Remembered

If Mary Shelley was the "Mother of Frankenstein" as the author of the original novel, then James Whale was the "Father of Frankenstein" as the director of that classic 1931 Universal Pictures film. He was also unapologetically gay, and one can argue that his film, especially its equally superior sequel, Bride of Frankenstein, was chock full of queer coding. So let's take a brief look at this enigmatic film icon.

Born in 1889 in Dudley, Worcestershire, England, he would enlist as an officer in WW1 and be captured and become a POW. It was then that he became interested in theater. Hey, you can do the math of how a bunch of Englishmen in cramped quarters found solace in...theater! After the war he would find himself in London, both on and off stage. His 1928 direction of Journey's End brought him to Broadway's success, and then to Los Angeles, where he would live for the rest of his life.

While he found enduring fame in the horror genre with films like Frankenstein (1931), The Old Dark House (1932), The Invisible Man (1933), and Bride of Frankenstein (1935), among others, all considered classics, he was displeased that he would be pigeonholed into horror. He directed the first film version of the musical Show Boat in 1936. But it was his directorial style, set designs, lighting, and cinematography with horror that cemented fame, if not his happiness. He borrowed heavily from German expressionism to create his large, Gothic style in his films: the use of large cavernous spaces, deep, contrasting shadows, and the mix of horror and humor. He also pioneered the use of a mobile camera to capture 360° panning shots

Throughout this time of his earlier fame, Whale lived with his longtime partner of 23 years, producer David Lewis. While the two were not socially or politically flamboyant in regards to their sexuality or relationship, they were open and honest about who they were. Filmmaker and friend Curtis Harrington said Whale was out, "not in the sense of screaming it from the rooftops or coming out. But yes, he was openly homosexual. Any sophisticated person who knew him knew he was gay."

Years after Whale's death, when his sexuality was more openly talked about and discussed in relation to his work, a queer eye, if you will, was more closely trained on his films, especially his most famous. There is a lonely longing in the creature that you can see in the clip above. It's loneliness and confusion about who we are, and why we are, that would have been the experience of most gay men of that time, and still is for too many. A standing outside of mainstream society, an abomination of nature looking in, with a desire to be thought of as "normal." That loneliness, confusion, and eventual anger leading to horrific revenge is inherent in Shelley's novel, though as far as I'm concerned, no film version has fully brought the creature to life as it is written of in her story.

As celebrated gay film historian Vito Russo once said of The Monster and The Bride, they are "...antisocial figures in the same way that gay people were 'things' that should not have happened." Not to mention that his two leads in the film were both gay, and the blatant camp elements of his  Bride of Frankenstein, it's hard not to read "queer" into the films, even though his partner Lewis would later disclaim such notions. "Jimmy was first and foremost an artist; his films represent the work of an artist, not a gay artist, but an artist."

Whale and Lewis would end their relationship after Whale brought his chauffeur, Pierre Foegel, into their home. Lewis bought a small home nearby and remained close with Whale, while Foegel would stay with Whale until his death, caring for him after a series of increasingly debilitating strokes. James Whale died by drowning in his pool at his Pacific Palisades home in May 1957 at the age of 67. While initially regarded as an accident, it wasn't until shortly before his death in 1987, when his former partner Lewis released the contents of his suicide note, that the world learned the truth.

To "queer up" Whale's tale further, there is the excellent "based on true events" film Gods and Monsters from 1998, starring Sir Ian McKellan as Whale, and an incredibly hunky Brendan Frasier as a gardener he befriends. While not exactly true to history, it strives and succeeds in looking at themes in Whale's work and life in the last weeks of his life. McKellan was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal. I highly recommend this stunning film if you've never seen it.

With the recent release of a new version of the story by award-winning director Guillermo del Toro that just started streaming on Netflix, we'll see how far he takes the creature and whether he manages to remain faithful to Shelley's original novel in terms of its motivations, hell-bent on revenge against his creator, Victor Frankenstein. As they say, "only a monster plays god." But with a hottie like Jacob Elordi in the role of The Creature, this Frankenstein will certainly give us a bit of elusive sex appeal. You can see his good looks through even this makeup design!

And yes, in the novel, the monster speaks and reasons much more than has ever been put to film. Those scenes you see in a frozen wasteland and the ship? Yup, that's in the novel too. So I, for one, am very excited for this!

Of course, if you need more sex appeal, you can seek out any plethora of homoeroticised erotica that pushes the sexuality of the creature to its limits. You only have to let your fantasies run rampant!

Hello, Daddy Frankenstein Creature!

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