Sally Ride became the first American woman in space on June 18, 1983. The soft-spoken physicist became an icon and was thrust into the spotlight even before she landed back on Earth. However, beneath her unflappable composure in public, she carried a secret. The new documentary SALLY reveals her romance with and sacrifices of her partner Tam O’Shaughnessy, who tells the full story of the complicated and iconic astronaut.
O’Shaughnessy is one of the main subjects and the executive producer of SALLY, which is directed by Milwaukee native and Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Christina Constantini — who has long been obsessed with Ride and her story.
"I think like many girls I thought, 'If a girl can do that maybe I can do big things, too,'" recalls Costantini. "... I loved her so much I was given the assignment in third grade to paint on the side of my elementary school, Golda Meir, a mural of my hero. So [Sally is] next to Brett Favre and Michael Jordan ... and she's still there now."
O'Shaughnessy knew Ride long before she became an astronaut. They first met and became friends playing tennis together, seeing each other throughout their teenage years up until they went their separate ways to college. "When Sally was selected to be the first American woman in space, every astronaut was allowed to send out 50 invitations to friends and family, and she called and and sent me an invitation, and I hadn't talked to her in a couple of years... and I was thrilled to get an invitation. And it was spectacular," recalls O'Shaughnessy.
After Ride landed back on Earth she started giving talks around the country, picking cities where her friends lived so that she could spend time visiting them according to O'Shaughnessy. "So when she started coming to Atlanta to give talks, she'd call me and we would get together and, you know, take a walk, go out to eat or whatever," she says. "And that started happening fairly frequently for various things that she was doing and we basically reestablished our friendship, and then it became romantic one early evening."
O'Shaughnessy and Ride "had an amazing life together" for 27-years, but their relationship was never made public outside of select friends and family until it was disclosed in Ride's obituary after passing away 17 months after a pancreatic cancer diagnosis in 2012.
"I think her experiences becoming this celebrity, kind of an overnight famous person, it was very hard on her because she was kind of a quiet introvert," says O'Shaughnessy. "So I think that's the primary reason that she just didn't really think it was anybody else's business. But I do think if we had stayed in academia, if we're both professors at universities it just would have been easier, simpler to be more open with more people...
And once we [started Sally Ride Science in 2001], we knew that the viability of the company depended on corporate sponsorships and there was ... just no way that we would get sponsorships if they knew that two women who were involved as a couple ran the company. So it was kind of a combination of things for Sally and she had a lot more to lose, I think, than than I did at the time."
"I wanted to tell a story that paid homage to this love story that was unfolding as this American history was also unfolding."Cristina Costantini
Costantini notes she found out about the relationship along with the rest of the world in Ride's 2012 obituary. "I thought, 'Oh my God, you know, if NASA was barely ready for women, I doubt they were ready for this. I wonder what that was like at the time.' And so I thought about this movie for a long time and I finally got up the courage to e-mail National Geographic," she explains.
Turns out, O'Shaughnessy was already working with National Geographic on a Sally Ride film and the two women were brought together to work on the documentary. Costantini admits she wasn't sure if the film would work until the moment she met O'Shaughnessy.
"[Sally Ride] was so great in public, but a perfect hero story is only so interesting to me," she notes. "So you know, Tam is like a godsend to a documentary filmmaker. She is brilliant, she's really well spoken, she has a great sense of humor and an incredible memory. And most importantly, she has the desire to tell us about who Sally really was ... I wanted to tell a story that paid homage to this love story that was unfolding as this American history was also unfolding."
O'Shaughnessy notes that she had been wanting to share Ride's story for a long time, but was hesitant to make it a TV movie "because they're going to take too many liberties on the truth." Once she signed up to make the documentary O'Shaughnessy says she was committed to being honest, which was an easy and comfortable process with Costantini.
"One of the reasons I wanted the film made was that most people think of Sally as the famous astronaut, first American woman to fly in space, but she was so much more than that. She was an athlete, she was a science writer, she was an entrepreneur, she advised presidents on space policy and science education policy. So I kind of wanted the full picture of Sally told to the world so that people could see how interesting and fun and funny and all sorts of things [that she was]," explains O'Shaughnessy.
For Costantini, SALLY is for anyone who has ever had to hide a part of themselves to get where they want to go. "Sadly in 2025, [it's] more relevant than it's ever been. And so, you know, I hope that this film will give people hope that that progress is possible, but I also hope that it serves as a reminder that these rights are not guaranteed. They were hard fought — women earned the right to go to space, and people didn't give it to them," she says.
O'Shaughnessy hopes audiences take away not only how fierce Sally was, but also how kind and gentle she was beyond the public figure she had to be.
"Yes, it's true — she wasn't open with the public about, you know, being a gay woman, being queer. But on the other hand, she lived her life exactly the way she wanted to live it," notes O'Shaughnessy. "I hope the message to people is don't let anyone ever tell you how to live your life or who you should love. You know, it's sort of following Sally's brave — and mine, too — example."
You can see SALLY on April 24 for the opening night of the Milwaukee Film Festival. Both director Cristina Constantini and subject/EP Tam O'Shaughnessy will be in attendance and you can find more information and additional showtimes here.
Milwaukee Film is a financial supporter of WUWM.
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