Australian scripted drama The Box made history with a tender kiss. Widely credited with featuring the first ever lesbian kiss on Australian television, this moment between bisexual journalist Vicki Stafford (Judy Nunn) and model Felicity Baker (Helen Hemingway) aired in the series’ pilot episode on 11 February 1974.

The immediate build-up plays quietly and romantically, with a close-up of Vicki comforting the uncertain young Felicity. The camera lingers on the women's expressions and casual intimacy with little fanfare, resulting in a stark and groundbreaking portrayal of sexuality.

But in the context of the pilot, the kiss was designed to provoke: the sweet make-out happens after a salacious series of events, where Vicki’s careerist scheming leads to Felicity, who claims to be a teen schoolgirl, posing for a nude centrefold. Workplace chaos, double crosses and identity reveals follow.

Dramatising the high-stakes world of 1970s television stations, this clip shows how The Box courted scandal and used tropes about queer women as scheming, morally transgressive and hyper-sexual. Though certainly outmoded, the kiss remains bold and iconic – and Judy Nunn strikes a memorable figure as a devil-may-care career woman with a fantastic mullet.