Adapted from Claudia Allen’s award-winning play, Hannah Free is the story of a passionate but thwarted lifelong love affair between two women who have shared a lifetime of friendship and love.

Hannah, a fiercely independent septuagenarian butch lesbian and Rachel, a married homemaker who has never left Michigan, are both bed-bound in the same nursing home after decades “together”. So near, yet so, so far. Rachel’s daughter Marge doesn’t want Hannah upsetting her mother and has banned Hannah from the same room as her precious “moon-flower.” Greta, a young pretty student who mysteriously shows up at the nursing home, has a plan to circumvent Marge. Utilizing gorgeously constructed flashbacks to visually build the story of the past and the present, Director Wendy Jo Carlton lovingly details Hannah and Rachel’s passionate beginnings and the subsequent decisions both women made in an era when marriage was oftentimes the only choice and presents storylines about old age, loneliness, and same-sex visitation rights that are so rare. Iconic award-winning actor Sharon Gless (Cagney & Lacey, Queer As Folk), in real life an outspoken advocate of LGBT equality, plays Hannah with fervor and strength. We are delighted that Gless will be in attendance to accept the Philadelphia Qfest 09 Gay Icon Award -- Carol Coombes