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Fanlore:Featured Article Archives/2025: Week 24
"Great moments on the cutting room floor: THE KISS in the alley." -- art from S and H #21 (May 1981). It riffs on the musical group, Kiss, and portrays its four members as well as Starsky and Hutch. NOTE: the debate had nothing to do with rock music or Kiss!
The very popular 1975 Starsky & Hutch episode, "The Fix," is full of angsty moments that lend themselves to smarm, hurt/comfort, and various slashy interpretations. In 1984, one fan commented that "The Fix" was "another bit that makes the internal organs wobble about."
"The Kiss in the Alley Debate" began in October 1980 and was mostly over by May 1981. In it, Starsky & Hutch fans argued heatedly at great length about the fan theory of whether Starsky and Hutch kissed in the iconic alley scene during the episode "The Fix" when Hutch comes down off the wall and falls into Starsky's arms.
The debated scene was broken down into seven frames which fans referred to as "Magnificent 7." These frames, when shown slowly and advanced one at at time, made it look like, to some fans, that the guys were kissing. One fan even created a helpful diagram and many comments that refuted the fan theory.
Discussions about the seven frames began and mainly occurred in several issues of S and H, the main letterzine of the time. There were some comments in the UK letterzine, APB, as well.
The main proponent of the theory was Penny Warren, an outspoken BNF. While fans mostly disagreed with her theory about Starsky and Hutch's alley kissing, they were also likely pushing back against Warren's long history of stating abrasive opinions about other topics in S and H and in other print zines. Since the letterzine tended to be a hotbed of strongly heated and combative comments, that's saying a lot!
All these speculations and theorizing was fueled by the technology of that new machine called the VCR which allowed fans to stop the motion, to study the scene more carefully, and for some fans, to manipulate it make it appear that the two's embrace included a kiss.
The debate included speculation about the characters' sexuality, what could and couldn't be shown on the screen, and suggestions that fans corner the actors and ask them point blank.
It is important to keep in mind that many of the fans who did not see the kiss as described were fans who believed in the Starsky/Hutch premise and were supportive of a sexual relationship between them, they just didn't see it as portrayed as Hutch fell off the wall into Starsky's arms. Many fans went out of their way to point out they would have like to see the kiss, but could not. From a fan in "I would have welcomed it. As I said it's right, it works. And I wish it had been there."
In 1982, a year after the main debate, fans Kendra Hunter, Terry and Diana Barbour created a very early songvid based on these seven frames. It was called Kiss You All Over, and it was shown at the second ZebraCon.