Adam’s Rib (1949) Queer Film (A).

DIRECTOR: George Cukor

Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn—Adam and Amanda Bonner—play married lawyers who find themselves on opposite sides of a sensational case. Doris Attinger (Judy Holliday) has shot her unfaithful husband (Tom Ewell) after catching him with his mistress. What follows is a courtroom duel that becomes a referendum on gender, marriage, and equality. One of the film’s most memorable moments comes when Amanda calls a female weightlifter (Hope Emerson) to the stand and has her hoist Adam into the air, a literal demonstration of female strength. By the end, the Bonners reconcile, acknowledging that equality in law and love is far more complicated than either wanted to admit.

Screenwriters Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin populate their comedy with a gallery of unforgettable supporting players—Holliday, Emerson, Ewell, Jean Hagen—and, as Amanda’s best friend, David Wayne as Kip Lurie, the Bonners’ next‑door neighbor and a Broadway composer.

Kip is one of the great queer‑coded characters of the Hays Code era. With his closely cropped hair (so fashionable today) and flamboyant manner, he is the constant target of Adam’s barbed put‑downs, such as Adam’s statement that it would not be hard to turn Kip into a woman since he is halfway there already. Yet Kip pursues Amanda with dogged determination, even composing a song for her—“Farewell, Amanda,” written by Cole Porter, no less. Thanks to Wayne’s inspired performance, Kip stands as one of Hollywood’s most memorable gay characters of the period, coded but unmistakable.

The screenplay earned an Oscar nomination for Gordon and Kanin.

There’s also a wonderful bit of Hollywood lore woven into the film’s production. Hepburn, Cukor, Gordon, and Kanin deliberately shaped Judy Holliday’s scenes to showcase her comedic brilliance—essentially turning Adam’s Rib into an audition reel for Harry Cohn, the powerful head of Columbia Pictures. Their gambit worked. Cohn relented and cast Holliday as Billie Dawn in Born Yesterday, the role she originated on Broadway. Two years later, under Cukor’s direction, she won the Academy Award for Best Actress.

CINEMATOGRAPHY

George Folsey

MGM

STREAMING: Amazon Prime, YouTube and Apple TV+

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