By Nick Baker for Compass
15 Mar 2021
When the cameras started rolling on Phyllis Papps and Francesca Curtis in October 1970, both their lives and Australia would never be the same.
Fifty-one years ago, the pair made history by being the first lesbian couple to come out on national television, in an interview with the ABC's This Day Tonight.
"The early 1970s were very, very conservative ... Gay women were invisible, because people didn't think lesbians existed," Ms Papps says.
Ms Papps and Ms Curtis, who are still together and live on Victoria's Phillip Island, have once again shared their story.
In the documentary, Why Did She Have To Tell The World?, which premiered on Compass on Sunday, the pioneering women look back at their journey.
'Nobody talked about it'
When Ms Papps and Ms Curtis were growing up, male homosexuality was illegal across Australia.
Legislation did not include lesbians, because, as Ms Papps reiterates, "they were invisible".
In this environment, both Ms Papps and Ms Curtis struggled immensely with their sexuality.
A black and white photo of Phyllis Papps and Francesca Curtis from the early 1970s.
Phyllis Papps and Francesca Curtis embrace in the early 1970s.(Supplied: The Australian Queer Archives)
"I didn't know anything about homosexuality or lesbianism. Nobody talked about it in those days," Ms Curtis tells the documentary. Ms Papps came from a very traditional Greek family and was briefly engaged to a man.
"I knew I was different, but I was forced to live a heterosexual life because my mother expected it of me and society did," she says.
A montage of images of the two lesbians who came out on national TV in 1970.
When Ms Papps confided to a colleague at work about her sexuality, the result did far more harm than good.
"[The colleague] gave me the names of three psychiatrists, and I went to one of them," she says.
"[I was given the drug] sodium pentothal, injected with it, and then had to talk."
Ms Papps and Ms Curtis met through activist circles and became prominent members of Australia's first homosexual political rights group, the Daughters of Bilitis, which later renamed itself the Australasian Lesbian Movement.
The pair exchanged wedding rings in July 1970 and in a matter of months, were known around the country.
Ms Papps and Ms Curtis agreed to take part in a story about lesbianism with the ABC's This Day Tonight to push for wider acceptance and visibility of the LGBTQIA+ community.
"No-one wanted to go on [the show], they were all in the closet, so Phyllis and I volunteered," Ms Curtis says.
Stand-in host Peter Couchman introduced the pair by saying, "most people find it hard to understand the kind of love that Phyllis and Francesca feel for each other".
"The law condones it, but many other women are revolted by the very thought of it and a lot of the churches regard it as perverted and unnatural," he told viewers.
Mr Couchman went on to ask Ms Curtis if she ever felt guilty about her sexuality.
She responded: "I think I had three months approximately of guilt. And then it went to a stage where I wanted to get up and I wanted to tell the world and I wanted the world to accept it."
Phyllis Papps and Francesca Curtis in a black and white photo taken during This Day Tonight in October 1970. The couple say the interview was a turning point — but came with a high personal cost.(ABC)
The impact of the national spotlight on Ms Papps and Ms Curtis was immediate.
"My mother took legal action against Francesca and myself to prevent us from making a claim on her inheritance," Ms Papps recalls.
"And my mother said, 'I'm happy to see you again, but I won't see both of you together' ... In our personal and professional lives, [This Day Tonight] was quite devastating."
But their TV appearance was heralded as ground-breaking and a key moment in Australia's long and unfinished road towards LGBTQIA+ equality.
"I believe This Day Tonight was absolutely major in creating a force," Ms Papps says.
Broader LGBTQIA+ progress happened slowly in the years following the interview.
South Australia became the first state to decriminalise male acts of homosexuality in 1975, but it was not until 1997 that Tasmania became the final Australian jurisdiction to do so.
And marriage equality would not pass federal parliament until 2017.
"It has been a life of struggle ... Not because we couldn't cope with being ourselves, [but because] we couldn't get people to accept us," Ms Papps says.
But throughout the difficulties, Ms Papps and Ms Curtis always had each other.
"You do have some highs and you do have some lows, and you stay together because you love each other, you care for each other ... you're great friends," Ms Papps says.
A changing AustraliaThe documentary's writer and director Abbie Pobjoy says they set out to "hold up a mirror to Phyllis and Francesca's national coming out 50 years ago".
"[I wanted] to showcase their hardships, triumphs and activism," they say.
"Now in the completion of the project, I realised that this story has also held up a mirror to myself, my fellow storytellers and the next generation of LGBTQIA+ young people and where we have to go next to secure our acceptance and livelihoods."
In recognition of their advocacy work, Ms Papps and Ms Curtis received a lifetime achievement award at the 2019 Australian LGBTI Awards, where they urged young people to continue the fight.
A group photo of the winners at the 2019 Australian LGBTI Awards, including Phyllis Papps and Francesca Curtis.
Phyllis and Francesca want the next generation to continue to build on their activism.(Supplied: Australian LGBTI Awards)
Looking back, Ms Papps says she has seen many examples of changing attitudes towards the LGBTQIA+ community, but one stands out.
It was during the marriage equality postal survey of 2017, when Australians were asked if they supported legalising same-sex marriage.
"My mum was in the nursing home, aged 98," she recalls.
"In a very gentle way I said, 'Mum, how did you vote?' And proudly she said, 'I voted yes' ... They were almost her last words.
"It took a whole lifetime to get to that."
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