The Killing of Sister George is a 1968 American film directed by Robert Aldrich and filmed at his Aldrich Studios in Los Angeles. It is based on the 1964 play by British playwright Frank Marcus. In the film, an ageing lesbian television actress, June "George" Buckridge (Beryl Reid, reprising her role from the stage play), simultaneously faces the loss of her popular television role and the breakdown of her long-term relationship with a younger woman (Susannah York). Although Marcus's play was a black comedy, the film version was marketed as a "shocking drama"; it added explicit lesbian content that was not in the original play, and was presented as a serious treatment of lesbianism.
Along with the more campy films What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? and Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte, The Killing of Sister George cemented Robert Aldrich's status as a cult-favorite director with queer audiences.
Plot
Middle-aged actress June Buckridge (Beryl Reid) plays "Sister George", a lovable motor scooter-riding district nurse and local sage, in a fictional long-running BBC television soap opera, Applehurst. She has been with the show for four years and is so identified with her character that she is nicknamed "George". Off-screen, June is outspoken, ribald, cigar-smoking and frequently inebriated, unlike her kindly on-screen persona. Although June has been popular with viewers in the past, several Applehurst characters have recently been killed off causing June to worry that Sister George may be next. Her worry affects her already volatile relationship with her live-in lover, a younger, beautiful woman named Alice (Susannah York), whom June calls "Childie". Childlike Alice plays with dolls, writes poetry, and has a minor fashion industry job, but relies on June for most of her financial and emotional support. Domineering June is alternately affectionate toward Alice and abusive to her, and reacts jealously when Alice spends time with other women or men. Alice rebels by talking back to June and refusing to play along with a "contrition" game in which June makes her kneel and eat a cigar butt.
After an Applehurst colleague jokes about Sister George possibly dying on the show, June walks out on a script reading, gets drunk, and forces herself into a taxi alongside two young Catholic nuns, whom she sexually assaults, resulting in the taxi having an accident in a busy intersection. The nuns' Mother Superior and the Archbishop complain to the BBC, causing powerful network producer Mrs Croft (Coral Browne) to visit June at home and lecture her about her behaviour and her attitude at work. When June balks at apologising for the incident, Mrs Croft makes clear that her future at the network depends on her apologising and changing her ways. Mrs Croft further infuriates June by taking an interest in Alice, complimenting her cooking and encouraging her poetic aspirations. At the next script reading, June finds that Sister George has been temporarily written out of the show with an illness, seemingly as punishment for June, and raising the possibility that her character will not recover.
June's spirits improve when she receives the next script, showing that Sister George has recovered and returned to riding her scooter. June and Alice go to a party at Gateways lesbian nightclub, to which she jokingly invites Mrs Croft. Halfway through the party, when June is already annoyed by Alice dancing with another woman, Mrs Croft arrives to tell June in person that Sister George will die by being hit by a ten-ton truck. After June storms off, Mrs Croft invites Alice to meet with her to further discuss Alice's poetry. On June's last day of filming for Applehurst, Alice untruthfully says she cannot meet June for lunch because she is busy at work. June, upset, tries to sabotage her fellow actors' performances and to drag out the filming as long as possible; afterward, she finds out that Alice lied to her in order to meet with Mrs Croft.