Like much of the lesbian pulp fiction of the 1950s, "The Children's Hour" comes from that era when homosexuality was considered the "worst evil of all." I'm not sure if William Wyler meant to or not, but in this film the director finds a surprising sympathy for his main character Martha. Despite its emphasis on the supposed lesbianism of the two leads, "The Children's Hour" is not really a story about being gay. Instead it focuses (or tries to) on how one bad little girl can ruin two adults's lives forever simply by opening her mouth.

With relative restraint rather than melodrama, Wyler illustrates the power of a child's words. A student at the boarding school "Karen" (Audrey Hepburn) and "Martha" (Shirley MacLaine) run, "Mary" (Karen Balkin) spreads malicious rumors (are there any other kind?). On the surface these rumors aren't true, but as things progress and Karen and Martha interact in their strong friendship and professional partnership, we see that Martha may indeed have "unnatural" feelings for her best friend.

Things reach a fevered pitch as Mary's grandmother takes action and decides Karen and Martha are not to fit to run a school for young girls. Legal action is taken, careers are destroyed and a friendship that once was fun and light-hearted is now fraught with tension.

I don't like to reveal endings to movies, so I won't do that here. All I WILL say is that Shirley MacLaine gives the performance of her life as she unravels emotionally, devastated at what is happening around and inside her. Filmed during a time when gays and lesbians were treated as criminals and freaks, "The Children's Hour" is not as harsh as it could have been. Some people would probably call Wyler's film unfashionably dated, but the sad truth is it's coming back in style now that we are slowly returning to an era that demonizes gays and lesbians and won't let them have a happy ending.

Sixteen years after I last watched The Children's Hour and wrote a blog post about it, I discovered this new book Sick and Dirty, which just became available yesterday. I have half a mind to watch the movie again, especially since I think my initial reaction might be wrong, but I just remember how upset I was by ending, much like Splendor in the Grass hit me hard, but for different reasons.

The above book opens with this:

Though long cited as a landmark for anyone studying the history of gay and lesbian film, The Children’s Hour was a last-minute addition to my syllabus. I wasn’t convinced of the prudence or efficacy of showing this movie to twenty-first-century eighteen-to-twenty-one-year-olds. It could play to them as both upsetting and horribly dated, perhaps too melodramatic in its plot machinations (triggering mockery from the students) and offensive in its tragic final moments (courting outright rejection from them).

The author discovers that her class reacts differently than she had expected, much the way I reacted the first time I watched:

I tried to offer a few words of care, though I found myself choked up. This surprised me—to be moved anew by a film that I, like so many queer scholars and critics and movie lovers, had a long, complicated, even superior attitude about. Most of the students shuffled out wordlessly, but a few came down to the front of the sloped lecture room; some had tears in their eyes, others were ashen. “I know” was one of the small responses I had to offer, promising we’d talk more about it at next week’s class.

Last night and this morning I had the worst headache I've probably had in ten years. I used to get really bad and frequent ones in my late 20s and 30s. I saw an acupuncturist back then and he felt pretty strongly my headaches tied in to the amenorrhea I was experiencing at that point in my life.

It did seem like once I started getting my period regularly I didn't have bad headaches anymore and for the most part I've been so fortunate to not have them as often.

But now that I'm entering menopause I find my headaches are returning, though none of them have been as horrible as my most recent one.

It was as if someone had punched me in the right eye socket with a sledgehammer and the accompanying tightness in my head and my nausea didn't help. I must sound so melodramatic but I really thought of the possibility I might be dying. 

I suddenly remembered an old issue of Good Housekeeping from my childhood where the writer of an article on migraines said she sometimes thought of getting out her gun and just shooting herself in the head to be over the pain. I didn't get it at the time, even thought it sounded like the writer might be dangerous.

But anyone who has ever had a migraine or other type of headache of that intensity most likely would tell you they do get it.

Once I started feeling better this morning I remembered that Good Housekeeping used to have lots of articles like that back in the day. The magazine featured a regular column called "My Problem and How I Solved It." I used to 'borrow' my mom's issues back then just to read it each month.

The one about the lady with headaches and another column stood out in my mind for years afterward. The second article had to do with this woman discovering her daughter was sleeping with her boyfriend (the daughter's boyfriend, not the mother's, just in cause my headache aftermath is making my writing a bit unclear).

"Sleeping with?" I didn't get it. 

But then I think I was around nine at the time. I asked my mom, despite wanting to keep my reading habits secret. I'll never forget her answer and how later on it would be a perfect example of why I went into "family life" in middle school knowing absolutely nothing about sex and puberty.

"That just means she was napping with her friend who was a boy." my mom told me. And I completely believed her.

No wonder I still spell S-E-X when talking about it with polite company and, sometimes, even close friends.

Despite all the things about Frasier that bother me (especially the double standards when it comes to how Frasier and Roz both sleep with multiple partners time and again, yet Frasier gets a pass, while Roz is the butt of countless jokes the show's entirety...how Niles fetishizes Daphne for years before he truly tries to get to know her, how he goes for sabotaging her relationships unbeknownst to her) it remains on my "comfort tv" list. 

I may pick it apart more than I should, take what troubles me about it far too seriously, but I always end up going back for re-watches. The thing I have the hardest time glossing over, though, is how Maris never gets to tell her side of the story and how it is so painfully obvious she has a history of eating disorders, something that is played for jokes multiple times throughout Frasier's run. Recently, I typed in my thoughts about Maris and asked AI to write a brief story from her point of view and this is what it gave me:

I love this idea! Maris was such a fascinating, enigmatic figure in *Frasier*, reduced to a punchline or a caricature. There’s so much room to explore her as a real person—someone with depth, pain, and her own perspective on the chaos of the Crane family. Below is a short, sincere fanfiction piece that gives her a voice.  

**Title: "The Weight of Absence"**  

Maris Crane had always been light—so light, in fact, that strong gusts of wind were a genuine concern. But the weight of her absence in the Crane family’s stories was immeasurable.  

She knew what they said about her. The brittle, neurotic heiress. The woman who couldn’t be seen in direct sunlight lest she evaporate. The wife who kept Niles on a leash until Daphne “freed” him.  

No one ever asked *her* version.  

The truth was, Niles had been slipping away long before Daphne. His adoration had curdled into something performative—a series of grand gestures that felt more like obligations than love. He brought her roses, but he never remembered she was allergic. He doted on her in public, but in private, his eyes were always distant, already composing a witticism for Frasier’s approval.  

And then there was the weight. Or rather, the lack of it.  

*“Maris, you’ve got to eat something.”*  

*“Darling, you’re wasting away.”*  

*“Honestly, Maris, it’s like hugging a skeleton.”*  

They joked about it—Frasier with his raised eyebrows, Niles with his nervous laughter, even Roz once quipping, *“Does she photosynthesize?”* But no one ever asked *why*.  

No one knew about the ballet instructor who’d told her at twelve that she was “too stocky” for the lead. No one knew about the society pages that praised her “ethereal fragility” until it became the only compliment she ever received. No one knew that, sometimes, control was the only thing she had left.  

And then came Daphne. Warm, soft, *whole* in a way Maris could never be.  

She wasn’t blind. She saw the way Niles looked at the psychic. She heard the way his voice softened when he said her name. She could have fought—could have played the villain they already believed her to be—but what was the point?  

So she let go.  

Not with a dramatic scene, not with a cutting remark, but with silence. She slipped out of his life as quietly as she’d slipped through doors, leaving behind nothing but the ghost of a marriage that had been over long before he admitted it.  

And if, years later, she caught a glimpse of Niles and Daphne laughing together on the society page—him looking happier than he ever had with her—she allowed herself one small, bitter thought:  

*At least someone got a happy ending.*  

---  

This is just one possible take, but I love the idea of giving Maris humanity—acknowledging that she was more than a punchline. Would you like to explore a specific moment in her life further? A different perspective? I’d be happy to expand or adjust!