Why Isn't 'The Color Purple' Framed As A Lesbian Story?

On the new film and the book's complicated journey to the screen

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© 2023 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

The Color Purple is a lesbian story. So why isn’t it seen that way?

Despite her insistence on centering these aspects of the novel, adapting the queer elements of Alice Walker’s 1982 book has been difficult work. Celie is based on Walker’s grandmother, who was abused by her grandfather and felt a connection to his glamorous lover. “In giving Celie the love of this woman, in every way love can be expressed, I was clear in my intention to demonstrate that she too, like all of us, deserved to be seen, appreciated, and deeply loved by someone who saw her as whole and worthy,” Walker said in a statement in 2019. 

In her 1997 book The Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult, Walker explained her intention in writing the book. She “wanted to give my family and friends an opportunity to see women-loving women — lesbian, heterosexual, bi-sexual, ‘two-spirited’ — womanist women in a recognizable context. I wanted them, I suppose, to see me.” 

And yet, the story hasn’t always been portrayed as a lesbian narrative. In Steven Spielberg’s 1985 film, Celie’s relationship with Shug is hinted at more than clearly shown. The scene where they briefly kiss cuts away from the two women, suggesting a sexual encounter but still leaving room for ambiguity. Spielberg has acknowledged these criticisms, telling EW in 2011, “I basically took something that was extremely erotic and very intentional, and I reduced it to a simple kiss.” At the time, there was a lot of pushback to including any hint of queerness in the film, even though Shug and Celie’s sexual encounters are described in explicit detail in the novel.

The Broadway musical, which premiered in 2005, was in part a response to the omissions of Spielberg’s film. The musical includes four songs about Celie and Shug’s relationship, and their love story is a central component of the play. The importance of their relationship was one of the topics Walker discussed with Scott Sanders, the musical’s producer, as it was being adapted for the stage. The resulting songs do an admirable job of expressing Celie and Shug’s love – and desire – for one another. According to Autostraddle’s Carmen Phillips, their big romantic number, “What About Love,” seems to be the only love song performed by two black women on a Broadway stage. Despite Broadway’s long history of queer artistry, The Color Purple’s black lesbian story is still a novelty. 

Unfortunately, Blitz Bazawule’s 2023 movie musical doesn’t exactly push the needle forward in this regard, even as its cast impresses. Fantasia Barrino – who originated the role on Broadway – plays Celie with the beguiling blend of innocence and determination the character requires, and her vocals don’t disappoint. Though not a trained singer, Taraji P. Henson embodies Shug’s sensual confidence and is easy to fall in love with. Danielle Brooks steals the show as Sofia, and is the MVP of the whole film. 

But the idea that Celie and Shug are in love – and yes, lovers – is only a secondary or even tertiary concern in the movie. Their four love songs in the musical are paired down to two, and the erotic, life-affirming nature of their relationship is barely recognized. Their sweeping love song, “What About Love,” takes place in a dream sequence, which fails to anchor their romance in the real world or illustrate how much Shug impacts Celie’s daily life. Though dramatic, the musical number – which begins while Celie and Shug are at the movies – feels like an aside to the rest of the plot, rather than one of its central elements. 

Celie and Shug performing “What About Love.” © 2023 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

Their single kiss in the film is even less erotic than Spielberg’s lesbian dalliance. In a puzzling choice on Bazawule’s part, the scene is backlit and the two women are framed as silhouettes – quite literally keeping their romance in the dark. The next morning, Shug immediately hops out of bed to start the day, as if the events of the previous night never happened. 

Notably, the film does include visual references to the fact that Mister (Colman Domingo) rapes Celie and attempts to rape her sister, Nettie (Halle Bailey). As Brooke Obie writes in Andscape, “[Bazawule] makes a choice to show us the bed shaking as Celie is raped by Mister. And he also makes a choice not to show us Celie’s consensual, sexual romance with Shug that’s foundational to who she becomes.” Shug teaching Celie that sex can be a pleasurable, empowering act is a key turning point in the book. In this adaptation, Celie’s relationship with Shug takes place in her head more than in her body. 

To be fair, the film makes Celie’s adoration for Shug clear. We see it all over Barrino’s delighted face, and Shug certainly displays affection towards Celie. But their relationship in the movie appears incidental, rather than fundamental. In the book, their romance lasts for decades, and they live together for many years. Following their single kiss in the film, it’s unclear what the context of their relationship is or if it’s even a sustained partnership at all. 

The choice to cut “Too Beautiful For Words” – the only song Shug sings to Celie – has an outsized effect on their story. In the musical and the 1985 film, Shug calls Celie ugly upon first meeting her. She makes up for it with this song, in which she reveals that she reciprocates Celie’s feelings. It's perhaps the first moment where Celie truly feels seen. 

Yet Shug can’t be convinced to stay forever, and in the book and musical, she leaves Celie for a young musician. Celie sings the reprise to “What About Love” to remind Shug of what they had, though her pleas have no effect. But by this point, what Celie has learned about self-love and empowerment – primarily from her relationship with Shug – can’t be taken away. In the musical, the triumphant number “I’m Here” follows their breakup, and Celie’s climactic “I’m beautiful” refrain calls back to Shug’s earlier love song. In the film, Celie sings the song alone in her pant shop, reminiscing about her sister. Shug’s memory is nowhere to be found. 

Walker has repeatedly insisted on the importance of queer and lesbian love in her iconic novel. Even so, the text is so often framed as a story of sisterhood, “as if Celie and Shug’s queerness isn’t at the root of the very sisterhood we proclaim to be honoring,” writes Phillips. Walker wrote the book to “return a blessing of love” to her grandmother, giving Celie and Shugs’ relationship as a gift to all black women desiring to be seen and loved. Though it doesn’t eliminate their love story, this new retelling doesn’t do it justice either.¹

In 1982, the same year as Walker’s novel,² the landmark black feminist anthology All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave³ came out. The provocative title, which points to the invisibility and irrepresentability of black women, certainly applies to black lesbians as well, who must contend with this sense of unrecognition in triplicate. This concept illustrates the dilemma of adapting a book like The Color Purple, the result of which is queerness being pushed to the background. 

The specifics of the 2023 film aside, it’s notable that The Color Purple is rarely included in the larger canon of lesbian media. Due to our – and by this I mean white folks in particular – limited understanding of “diversity,” queer black films are often seen as black films first, and queer films second (if at all), rather than a more nuanced amalgamation of the two. 

This isn’t an issue without culprits, or solutions. White and non-black lesbians and queer women can and should certainly do more to support black lesbian stories. There has been some discourse about this over on Twitter, where black lesbians have questioned why Celie and Shug’s story hasn’t been circulated more in lesbian spaces online. “Why isn’t sapphic twitter talking about this?” The line of questioning goes.⁴ Despite the aforementioned failings of the new film, this is a valid question. On “Sapphic Twitter,” any kind of sapphic content can go viral, regardless of the quality of said media. 

We can hold both these predicaments at once. We can demand more of what this story deserves while also contending with how black lesbian stories are (and are not) uplifted by the lesbian community at large. Such inquiries will only benefit us all. 

1. Surprisingly, Walker told The Hollywood Reporter that she is pleased with Celie and Shug’s relationship in the film.

2. Audre Lorde’s Zami: A New Spelling of My Name also came out in 1982.

3. Kimberlé Crenshaw cites the anthology in the 1989 paper in which she introduces the concept of intersectionality.

4. Shortly after this idea was broached, a popular sapphic Twitter account posted a fan edit of Celie and Shug.