When John Schlesinger brought Midnight Cowboy to preview audiences in 1969, the reaction was visceral and polarising in a way that epitomised the cultural fault lines of the era. Dustin Hoffman later recalled that, after a scene showing a male student performing oral sex on the film's central character in a Times Square grindhouse, “people walked out in droves.” That immediate, public repudiation left the filmmakers convinced they had pushed too far — so far, in fact, that some on the production believed the backlash might “end everybody's career.” For Schlesinger, an openly gay director who had come out during the making of the film, the preview hysteria underscored both the personal and professional risks of putting explicitly homosexual material into a mainstream American feature in 1969.
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AI concept artworkArchive Record · 1960s
Midnight Cowboy's Infamous Preview: Walkouts, Fear and a Groundbreaking Oscar Win
Midnight Cowboy / 1960s
When John Schlesinger brought Midnight Cowboy to preview audiences in 1969, the reaction was visceral and polarising in a way that epitomised the cultural fault lines of the era. Dustin Hoffman later recalled that, after a scene showing a male student performing oral sex on the film's central character in a Times Square grindhouse, “people walked out in droves.” That immediate, public repudiation left the filmmakers convinced they had pushed too far — so far, in fact, that some on the production believed the backlash might “end everybody's career.” For Schlesinger, an openly gay director who had come out during the making of the film, the preview hysteria underscored both the personal and professional risks of putting explicitly homosexual material into a mainstream American feature in 1969.
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