THE MAKE A SCENE FILM CLUB DEEP DIVE - THE BIRDCAGE AND QUEER REMAKES
Ahead of our Make A Scene Film Club screening of The Birdcage at CULTPLEX on Wed 7th May 2025 we’re doing a deep dive primer on the film, the many versions of La Cage Aux Folles and that rare thing…a queer remake!
MANY VERSIONS OF THE BIRDCAGE
The Birdcage is the 1990s remake of the 1978 seminal, French queer film La Cage Aux Folles that was made back when overtly gay films were not being made let alone being hits. As of 2020, La Cage aux Folles has remained the no. 11 foreign-language film released in the United States of America. The film was the second highest-grossing film of the year in France in 1978 with 5,406,614 admissions. In Germany, it received 2.65 million admissions, making it the 11th highest-grossing film of the year. The film was based on a popular 1973 stage play of the same name.
Here’s a bit of context on the original film and why it was an outlier at the time
For a full run on the history of from the stage play to the 1996 remake check out this comprehensive video essay…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozTjoeHy7mI
When you think of La Cage Aux Folles/The Birdcage you may think of the song I Am What I Am which came from the stage musical remake of the film/stage play. Spend an ecstatic five minutes throthing yourself into oblivion watching a few versions of the song that became a queer anthem here…
Walter Charles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuqMUO7qno0&list=RDvuqMUO7qno0&start_radio=1
Harvey Fierstien
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPk7iH1ON8s
The Gloria Gaynor disco hit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zreTvtpTeoU
Here’s a bit of a dip into the 1983 broadway mounting of the musical
https://www.westendbestfriend.co.uk/news/tony-tuesday-la-cage-aux-folles
The 1996 version with Robin Williams has an interesting history as one of the few gay films produced by a major studio. Whilst LGBTQ films had been made between the original La Cage Aux Folles and the remake they were largely made by and distributed by independent production and distribution house, with the rare exceptions of films like William Freidkin’s The Boys In The Band (1970) (another queer film that had proved itself as a hit play) but none that were funded and put out by a company as big or iconic as United Artists/MGM and Universal who went to bat for The Birdcage.
There are very few gay comedies that have major studio backing, Billy Eichner’s Bros even used this as part of their marketing when it was released by Universal in 2022.
None of the films in the 70s, 80s, 90s or since have had the talent behind the camera of The Birdcage. Director Mike Nichols you’ll know from directing The Graduate and also Working Girl and the TV version of AIDS stage play Angels in America is rumoured to be bisexual but was not out and most notably was married to journalist Dianne Sawyer but apparently had a life long male photographer lover. The film is written by his comedy partner Elaine May who was a director herself notably the underseen but hugely revered A New Leaf and The Heartbreak Kid.
They’re seen as the parents of modern American comedy and specialized in improv, with most of their work together happening in the 1960s so it was a treat to see them come back to work together for The Birdcage in 1996
For a bit of a deep dive into iconic comedy duo Nichols and May check out these articles…
https://www.vulture.com/2011/08/nichols-and-may-the-cool-parents-of-modern-comedy.html
https://www.filmcomment.com/article/elaine-may-in-conversation-with-mike-nichols/
For more of May and her work this Sight And Sound article celebrates her perfectly:
https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/elaine-may-laughing-matters
And of course The Birdcage has Robin Williams lending his star power to this LGBT film as one of the biggest comedy stars of the 1990s and Nathan Lane - the gay stage actor getting his big film break - who went on to be the voice of Timon in gay coded meerkat and warthog couple Timon and Pumba in Disney’s The Lion King. (Interestingly Billy Eichner played Timon in the Lion King “live action remake”. More on queer remakes next…)
Here’s Nathan recently talking about The Birdcage with People magazine and Conan O Brien after the recent death of Gene Hackman who stars with Diane Weist as their straight oppostie numbers in the film.
https://people.com/nathan-lane-reflects-on-why-the-birdcage-was-so-subversive-exclusive-11704455
Here’s Nathan talking about Gene…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDpR5-jHijY
Here’s Nathan chatting about getting the part in the film…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-dkpLt1e5g
And I recommend cheering yourself up with this clip of Robin Williams supporting a drunk Jack Nicholson to pick up an award he and Daniel Day Lewis beat him to winning in 2003 which really shows Robin’s much missed warmth, quick wit and fast improv skills…
QUEER REMAKES
So in this deep dive beyond exploring The Birdcage we wanted to look at queer films that get remakes. It’s hard enough to get an LGBTQ+ film made let alone for it to live on in different versions
I mentioned The Boys In The Band which has both a 1970 version and a Ryan Murphy 2020s remake…
https://www.vox.com/21494168/boys-in-the-band-netflix-review
The Wedding Banquet was Ang Lee’s 90s queer comedy and has recently been remade by Fire Island filmmaker Andrew Ahn which adds a lesbina couple played by Kelly Marie Tran and Lily Glanstone into the mix
It’s even more rare for a trans or lesbian story to live beyond the first iteration if it even gets made at all so there is a trend of suggesting lesbian “remakes” of films that were so close to being lesbian in the first place…
Queer remakes of straight projects are rare but do happen. Who knew we needed a lesbian version of David Cronenberg’s Dead Ringers with Rachel Weisz in the Jeremy Irons twin role but we got it as a TV series a few years back on Amazon
Rachel-weisz-is-starring-in-a-lesbian-remake-of-a-david-cronenberg-dead-ringers
This might be a little bit of society progressing, often series or movies when brought back for a sequel or remake series or film to continue the series brings in much lacking queer representations missing in the original. Velma used to be coded as queer and in the new Scooby Doo series she’s a out proud lesbian! Subtext becomes text. Here’s some other examples…
https://www.out.com/gay-tv-shows/rebooted-shows-with-lgbtq-representation#rebelltitem12
But when it comes to queer remakes what we need right now is Charlize Theron’s lesbian version of Die Hard! It’s what we deserve!
https://ew.com/movies/charlize-theron-lesbian-die-hard-remake/