Queer people have always been around, but for a long time their stories were untold. There is a lot of pain in much of the history, but there is also a lot of joy. Sébastien Lifshitz’s Casa Susanna highlights a safe haven of queer joy in the mid-20th century but doesn’t shy away from the fear and even shame prevalent in the community at the time.
The documentary features a lot of talking head interviews. Elucidated within one of these interviews is a reason why this is probably the case. Many of the people that went to Casa Susanna and its ilk at the time did not want to have their picture taken by others for fear of it being used as blackmail later.
Casa Susanna was basically a resort/getaway in the Catskills where a community of crossdressers (some of who would later become trans-women) would go to be amongst community and be able to be themselves in safety.
What stood out to me is the language used in the documentary about identity, how it evolved for people, and how societal views/pressures come into play, even within safe spaces. Some people went to Casa Susanna at the time that staunchly said they were heterosexuals (they were all married) and crossdressing was just a part of them, and they had no desire to transition, turning their nose down at the practice. McCarthyism was rampant and to be queer was to risk being blacklisted from regular employment. There is a great clip in the film where a trans-woman testifies about her desire for legitimate employment. But since she’s denied that, she won’t turn her nose down to getting a meal where she can (the implication being sex work). Casa Susanna was frequented by people that were at the top of their fields, who had a lot to lose if discovered, so, understandably, some would hide their true desires even from each other until it felt safer. One of the adamant eventually did transition when the world became a little safer to do so. Or perhaps, since safe is a relative term, when she was no longer able to deny her true self.
Gregory, was a highlight as he talked about the loving relationship of his grandmother Maria with Susanna. The way he spoke about their loving relationship, and effortless transitioned between speaking about Tito and Susanna, switching pronouns with ease. While most of the central Casa Susanna “heterosexual” relationships focused on this documentary did not survive as people embraced their more authentic selves, Maria and Susanna’s grew deeper. To which Gregory concluded, “I guess they were lesbians.”
When they went through old photos, they reached one and spoke about how at their funeral the attendance was split between people that knew them as a man and people that knew them as a woman. It was a humorous anecdote about how it forced the officiant to stumble and use gender-natural pronouns. But I also felt it incredibly sad and indicative of something at the root of the people that went to Casa Susanna. At the core of a lot of this film, were people who tried to stay in society’s boxes of what is “normal” until they couldn’t anymore. We heard stories of playing football players in high school, and most of them spent most of their daily lives going about as men. They were married to women, and many of them were fathers. Only later in life, once Casa Susanna was gone, did Susanna live as Susanna full-time, no longer shuffling between the worlds of Tito and Susanna.
The queer community will always find and make safe spaces, but it shouldn’t have to. We should all be fighting for a world where there don’t need to be Casa Susannas and where every Susanna, Diana and Katherine (both also in the doc), etc., can just be herself.
Casa Susanna (France) premiered at premiered at Venice in the autonomous section Giornate Degli Autori and will also screen at TIFF.
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