Fails the Bechdel test
Happy Birthday, Wanda June
1971. Directed by Mark Robson, written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr..
The Bechdel test
Bechdel score
2 / 3
Fails
-
Yes
1. At least two women
3 women characters. 3 of them speak. -
Yes
2. Who talk to each other
Women do talk to each other. -
No
3. About something besides a man
Every conversation between women that our parser found mentions a man.
Second opinion
Not rated bechdeltest.com readers haven't rated this film.
The film
A family reacts to the return of the patriarch who abandoned them seven years prior.
- Released
- 09 Dec 1971
- Genres
- Comedy, Drama
- Rated
- R
- IMDb
- 5.9 / 10
- Elsewhere
- View on IMDb
Starring, by lines spoken
- Women
- Men
- Not in the cast list
- Bigger name, more lines
- Harold 441 lines, man
- Penelope 255 lines, woman
- Woodly 164 lines, man
- Paul 142 lines, man
- Looseleaf 102 lines, man
- Shuttle 101 lines, man
- Von Konigswald 15 lines, man
- Mildred 11 lines, woman
- Wanda June 11 lines, woman
- Woody Woodpecker Voice 2 lines
Full cast, 11 people
- Rod Steiger as Harold Ryan
- Susannah York as Penelope Ryan
- George Grizzard as Dr. Norbert Woodley
- Don Murray as Herb Shuttle
- William Hickey as Looseleaf Harper
- Steven Paul as Paul Ryan
- Pamelyn Ferdin as Wanda June
- Pamela Saunders as Mildred Ryan
- Louis Turenne as Major von Koningswald
- C.C. Whitney as Mrs. Kestenbaum
- Lester Goldsmith as Mr. Kestenbaum
Who talks, scene by scene
We couldn't read who says what in this film's script, so there's no dialogue chart for it yet.
The evidence
- Straight from the script
- Counted from the script and the credits
Tap an exhibit to open it.
Exhibit A: every 100 lines
Out of every 100 lines with a known speaker, 22 are women's.
277 lines from women, 966 from men.
- Women
- Men
Exhibit B: who's in it
3 women and 6 men in the cast. 3 women and 6 men from it get lines.
Characters
With lines
- Women
- Men
Exhibit C: who gets heard
The first woman speaks at line 2 of 1,247.
The longest stretch with no woman speaking runs 118 lines.
Every line of dialogue, first to last
- First line by a woman
- Longest stretch with no woman speaking
Words spoken
Women speak 22% of the words (3,219), men 78% (11,607).
Exhibit D: the test the other way
Two named men talk to each other about something besides a woman. It passes the reverse test.
Conversations between two named characters
Two women
1
Two men
63
Exhibit E: behind the camera
1 of the 10 people in these jobs is a woman.
Across the whole crew, 19% of the people whose gender is listed are women.
- Directed by
- Mark Robson (man)
- Written by
- Kurt Vonnegut (man)
- Produced by
- Lester Goldsmith (gender not listed), Bernard Donnenfeld (gender not listed), Robert Wise (man)
- Shot by
- Fred J. Koenekamp (man)
- Edited by
- Dorothy Spencer (woman)
- Production design by
- Boris Leven (man)
- Costumes by
- Michael Woulfe (man)
- Cast by
- Billy Gordon (gender not listed)
The crew, department by department
-
Production
0 women, 3 men, 3 not listed
-
Costume & Make-Up
1 women, 3 men
-
Directing
0 women, 2 men, 1 not listed
-
Art
1 women, 1 men
-
Camera
0 women, 2 men
-
Writing
0 women, 2 men
-
Editing
1 women, 0 men
- Women
- Men
- Gender not listed on TMDB
Exhibit F: how old the stars were
Women: 17 on average. Men: 38 on average.
The top-billed cast, at the film's release.
Women
Pamela Saunders 8, Pamelyn Ferdin 12, Susannah York 32
Men
Steven Paul 12, Louis Turenne 38, Don Murray 42, George Grizzard 43, William Hickey 44, Rod Steiger 46
About this analysis
Our parser read the script: 1 scenes and 1,247 lines of dialogue. How the test works
