March 22, 1984 –
Queen filmed the video for I Want To Break Free at Limehouse Studio in London, England, on this date. Directed by David Mallet, it was a parody of the northern British soap opera Coronation Street with the band members dressed in drag.
The video for this song parodies a popular British television soap, Coronation Street. The opening sequence features all the band members in drag (Mercury as a housewife, Deacon as grandmother, Taylor as a schoolgirl, and May as a housewife). This confused many people who didn’t catch the reference. Brian May was asked in an interview with Q magazine March 2011 whether each band member’s character in the video was an accurate reflection of their personalities? He replied: “Of Course! Everybody thinks that was Freddie’s idea because it looks like something that he would love to do but it actually came from Roger’s girlfriend at the time, strangely enough. It was her idea to pastiche the Coronation Street women.”
The Haus of Dcaligari 