ABSTRACT
MOST PEOPLE KNOW TWO THINGS ABOUT the Hays Code. One is that the bedrooms of all married couples could contain only twin beds, which had to be at least 27 inches apart. The other is that although the Code was written in 1930, it was not enforced until 1934, and that as a result, the ‘pre-Code cinema’ of the early 1930s violated its rules with impunity in a series of ‘wildly unconventional films’ that were ‘more unbridled, salacious, subversive, and just plain bizarre’ than in any other period of Hollywood’s history. 1
