422: Killjoy Was Here 1: Terry Scott On . . . Homosexuality?

“Scott on . . .“
The Sex War”, 9 October 1972
written by John Kane

The creature above appears in a screengrab from a documentary about changing attitudes to women in British sitcoms. When the credits mentioned that this brief scene was from the “Sex War” episode of "Scott on . . ", suddenly the nature of the bizarre creature in that middle class lounge amidst all those nice middle class ladies and giving Terry Scott a stern glare was revealed to me . A couple of notes in gay magazines of the times explains all. That oddity is Colin Jeavons playing a poof. It’s 1972 and flamboyantly (even bizarrely as in this instance) dressed camp homosexuals with feminine bouffant hairdos are the order of the day, in other words: “A POOF”. This is one of the reasons why Gay Lib members of that time were so irate, because this is how gay men were being portrayed on television. Writers for the few gay magazines, journals and newsletters of the time, “Jeremy”, “Lunch” and “Gay News” would mutter enviously over the fact that in America public campaigns by gay men seemed to have least some minimal effect. In the UK – nothing doing. But this episode appeared and then in the 28 October 1972 edition of “The Radio Times” a letter was printed written by actual, real homosexual men expressing their disapproval of this caricature fantasy. Oh, oh, the rejoicing!