Compound and ambiguous meanings in Danish cross-dressing comedies.

The article analyzes two Danish cross-dressing comedies, *Min Kone er Husar!* ("My Wife is a Hussar!") (1935) and *Solstik* ("Sunstroke") (1953), focusing on how they use cross-dressing to explore and complicate sexual identity and gender through diverse aesthetic and performative strategies. Both films depict temporary female-to-male cross-dressing that ultimately returns to traditional gender and marital norms, yet they highlight gender ambiguity via star personas, supporting characters, and settings that encourage identity play and transgression. The comedies also engage with broader themes of sexuality beyond the cross-dressers themselves, illustrating that gender and sexual norm-challenging behaviors are pervasive within the narrative worlds. This study emphasizes the complexity and layered meanings of cross-dressing comedies, challenging simplistic ideological readings by revealing their compound and ambiguous nature within Danish cultural and historical contexts.