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Brown: a long path to clemencyIt’s a rare accomplIshment for
two people to stick together for nearly
70 years. But what’s it like to have nur-
tured a relationship for that long while
keeping it a secret from some of the
people closest to you?
That’s the territory Chris Bolan
mines in his heartfelt documentary
A Secret Love, the story of Terry Dona-
hue and Pat Henschel, who met and fell
in love in 1947, though it would be more
than 60 years before they felt they could
come out to their families. In that time,
they lived full and happy lives, working
for the same interior-design company
in Chicago and building a home in the
house they owned together. In 2009,
they cautiously revealed the nature of
their relationship to Terry’s niece, Diana
Bolan. She seemed more relieved than
surprised, telling them, “Now you can
tell your story.”
That story unfolds as the two women
pack up the home they’ve shared for
21 years, preparing for a move into an
assisted-living facility. At the time they
met, Donahue was a catcher in the All-
American Girls Professional Baseball
League, the inspiration for the 1992 film
A League of Their Own. Both had grown
up on farms in northwestern Canada,REVIEW
A secret love moves into the lightbut preferred the freedom of city life
in the U.S. Even then, they didn’t dare
socialize in bars: raids were common,
and exposure could mean the end of a
career. Instead, they cultivated close
friends, people for whom they didn’t
have to pretend to be “cousins.”
Donahue and Henschel are already in
their 80s when we meet them: Donahue
has a sweet, open hearted expression;
Henschel is more peppery. To illustrate
their story, director Bolan—who is Do-
nahue’s great-nephew—assembled a
trove of old photographs and home mov-
ies, showing the two as young women,
pretty, vibrant “career girls” who clearly
loved each other’s company. (There’s
some wonderful footage of the couple
clowning around at the beach, wearing
identical conical straw hats.) When you
see a photograph of a young person, it’s
almost impossible to imagine what he
or she will look like in old age. But when
you look at the faces of the elderly Do-
nahue and Henschel, even at their most
frail, the young women within shine
through. It’s enraging that society made
them feel they had to hide. But their hap-
piness is the ultimate triumph. —s.Z.A SECRET LOVE debuts April 29 on NetflixREVIEW
Justice at last,
after 15 years
In a world that sometimes
seems to be falling apart,
Daniel H. Birman’s Murder
to Mercy: The Cyntoia Brown
Story offers a shred of hope.
In 2004, Brown, age 16, was
arrested in Nashville for the
murder of 43-year-old Johnny
Allen, who had picked her
up for sex. Although Brown
claimed she had shot Allen in
self-defense, in 2006—after
being tried as an adult—she
was convicted of first-degree
murder and sentenced to life
imprisonment.
Was Brown a ruthless
killer or an underage victim
of sex trafficking? Birman’s
documentary, the follow-up
to his 2011 Me Facing Life:
Cyntoia’s Story, makes a strong
case for the latter. In 2019,
after years of legal battles—
and after she had earned a
college degree and become
a model of rehabilitation—
Brown was granted clemency
by Tennessee Governor Bill
Haslam. But to see earlier
footage of her as a teenager,
obviously intelligent but also
anxious and high-strung, is
wrenching. Murder to Mercy
exposes huge cracks in the
system, big enough for young
people to fall through for all the
wrong reasons. —S.Z.
MURDER TO MERCY:
THE CYNTOIA BROWN STORY
streams April 29 on Netflix
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Donahue and Henschel lived as a couple for more than 60 years
before they felt they could come out to their families