John Schlesinger

John Schlesinger was a British filmmaker who directed some of the most significant films of the 1960s and 1970s, including Midnight Cowboy (1969, Academy Award for Best Director -- the only X-rated film to win Best Picture), Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971, which featured one of the first same-sex kisses in mainstream British cinema), Marathon Man (1976), and Darling (1965). He was gay and met photographer Michael Childers on a blind date in Los Angeles in 1967; the two remained partners for 36 years, until Schlesinger's death in 2003. His willingness to direct Sunday Bloody Sunday -- a film about a bisexual man's relationships with both a man and a woman -- was an act of considerable courage in 1971.