Author: Joe

New York City is preparing to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots while hosting World Pride in June.  Currently running at La Mama is a piece which examines the state of gay rights in the Balkans.  The program notes that 55 Shades of Gay: Balkan Spring of Sexual Revolution is the first theater company from Kosovo invited to share their work with an American audience.  This play so enraged a member of their Ministry of Justice that he publicly called for the beheading of its cast.  The question asked by this production:  “Is sexual liberation possible in the Balkans?”

A cast member approaches the audience at the beginning of this show.  If you are homophobic, a Christian fundamentalist or a fascist, you are encouraged to leave the theater.  What follows is not easy to describe.  The play is a political burlesque meant to shock, push buttons, entertain, point out hypocrisy and maybe even open some minds to eliminating discrimination once and for all.

An Italian company has come to a very provincial town in order to build a condom factory which will provide 200 jobs.  One of these foreigners has fallen in love with a local man.  He applies for a marriage license, supposedly allowed by the country’s European Union approved Constitution.  A wall of outrage erupts from intellectuals, politicians, religious leaders and even “professional grenade launchers.”  They work hard to keep the wedding from happening.  Even Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel is vilified for her stance on same sex marriage.

The small town’s mayor looks to distract the public’s attention away from this thorny issue.  He devises a scheme to plant palm trees despite the fact that the climate is wrong.  Being called crazy for planting palm trees is preferable to being labeled “the town of the butt fuckers.”  Aggressively absurdist in style, this piece does not shy away from controversy.  “Kill the faggots!” is a frequently repeated mantra.  Perhaps it’s time for a new Catholic inquisition, they ponder.  The targets for ridicule are many and far-ranging.

Equal parts flamboyant exaggeration and furious indignation, 55 Shades of Gay is a jumble of styles, languages and music.  Some scenes are played for laughs while others are intentionally provocative.  A tree across the street from the municipal building occasionally comments on the action occurring in the registrar’s office.  Even the typewriter has thoughts.  Some songs and the color pink are thrown in to this quite energetic (and also frenetic) spectacle.

As a reminder of the continued evolution of equal rights, 55 Shades of Gay is an interesting piece of theatrical experimentation.  The five Kosovar actors, particularly the lovelorn Tristan Halilaj, manage to present nicely drawn characterizations (and cartoons) amidst the grotesquerie and satire.  Overall, the performance feels a bit long likely due to repetition in the storytelling.

Head downtown to La Mama if you want to see the Qendra Multimedia theater company challenge the status quo.  A friend recently commented that the struggle for gay rights is now over since the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage.  This show reminds us that the voices of oppression are alive and thriving.  One cast member says, “Their hatred is hysterical.  It makes me laugh.”  Here is an opportunity to laugh about no laughing matter.

www.lamama.org

www.qendra.org

“Some people go to therapy to work out their stuff,” Nicholas Linnehan informs at the start of his autobiographical play, Identity.  Not him.  Instead, “I write plays to fix myself.”  Before the first scene even starts, his character named Mike is laying bare his emotions for the audience to see.   A man with a mild case of cerebral palsy and disarthryic speech, he points out that he is different from us.  “And deep down inside, I guess I’m praying I’m really not.”

The play opens with Mike restrained on a hospital bed.  Why is he there?  What has happened?  In a series of flashback scenes, the audience is taken on a journey to comprehend, understand and empathize with life as a disabled person.  His particular road is made even more difficult as Mike is also a gay man.  Admittedly a terrible athlete despite Dad’s dreams for baseball glory, he instead found his home run in theater.  Thankfully he has shared his trials and tribulations in this original, heartfelt and engrossing confessional.

The fourth wall is broken repeatedly throughout Mr. Linnehan’s play.  His asides are wry and often hilarious.  As a straight “A” ten year old:  “by the way, I’m supposed to be much younger now.”  He stops and asks, “am I giving an Oscar worthy performance here?”  The jokes are frequent and effectively draw us in closer to his quirky and playful personality.  When he turns serious and peels back yet another layer for us to examine, the drama is vivid and quietly devastating.

Mike is living “in the crack” somewhere between abled an disabled.  As a result, he does not feel part of the normal world “if it exists.”  In a scene loaded with emotional transparency, he wishes for one more affectation of his disease “just to belong.”  Mike’s search for his identity is the basis for this play.  What makes this riveting theater is the performance itself.  He takes his audience by the hand and does not lecture.  He doesn’t demand empathy and is occasionally off-putting in his bitterness and self-deprecation.  The effect achieved allows us to see a real, imperfect and articulate human being sharing a complicated journey.  Identity certainly confronts the hard knocks of growing up but is ultimately a celebration of life and the dreams which give us hope.

At intermission, Mike confided “you are all part of this crazy thing I call a play.”  The story centers on three key figures from his past:  mom, dad and a doctor.  Dad (Tim Connell) is largely a one-dimensional tyrant but seems to have been written that way since these scenes are extracted from Mr. Linnehan’s memories.  Amy Liszka’s endearing, chain smoking Mom is the more sympathetic parent but even she struggles with unequivocal love and support.  It is no surprise that the Doctor (Matthew Tyler) is perhaps the most important character on this stage.  His eyes are our window into the clinical and distancing part of this expressively therapeutic play.

Christopher Scott directed Identity with a loosely informal style but with clearly defined scenes ranging from naturalistic to abstractly provocative.  In the small (and quite nice) basement theater at El Barrio Artspace, Mike’s parents try to grasp whether their son is happy.  His doctor also wonders the same thing.  At the end of this memorable tale Mr. Linnehan turns to the audience and asks, “Am I happy?”  It’s worth your time to find out the answer in this uniquely fascinating work.

www.artspaceps109.org

www.identitytheater.com

A very pregnant woman is helping her family cope with mother’s impending death from Stage 4 cancer.  Dad teaches Tai Chi.  Mom is a painter.  Her Aunt is an actress who has just arrived to offer support to her dying sister.  Jane is a Buddhist and wants a burial cremation involving a bonfire not hospice care.  The doorbell rings.  The simple pine box coffin has arrived.  Aunt Lydia is named Death Coordinator.  There is going to be Dying in Boulder.

The attractive set design by Yu-Hsuan Chen is dominated by a large Japanese-style rock garden.  The tranquility of the space suggests a place for meditation and calm.  Aunt Lydia is troubled by the family’s preparation for her sister Jane’s death only to hear “what she needs now is comfort, not hope.”  Linda Faigao-Hall’s play examines our fear of death using comedy to hold a mirror to western practices and beliefs.

Jane’s death bed wishes include a karmic cleansing.  She’d rather not take her issues into the afterlife.  Slow deaths are a blessing as there’s “time for atonement.”  She wants to have private heart-to-heart chats with everyone.  One family member never returned after their “talk.”  Dying in Boulder begins as a dark comedy which explores our reactions to end of life care.

Max arrives to offer support for her journey to the next phase of existence.  Jane attended his workshop “The Buddhist Way to Die, Part I.”  For every lighthearted joke, there are also deeper musings which emerge.  There is “no shame in growing old; it’s part of being human.”  The first act swings unevenly between humor and wisdom.  Flashbacks (often laced with jokes) are used to fill in backstories; some are silly, others are appalling which at least gives the play a jolt of adrenaline.

The second act veers uncomfortably from light and slightly edgy comedy to a much darker place.  Jane may be a dying Buddhist but she has some death bed cruelty to administer.  Sordid family secrets and baggage have to be aired out before the karmic cleansing will be complete.  The soap opera unfolds and comedy takes a back seat to a laundry list of familial slights and life regrets.  Although the death bed one-on-one conversations were foretold in the first act, nothing suggested the extent of the dramatic overload which came later.

As daughter Nikki, Mallory Ann Wu successfully navigated her character’s conflicts and emotions.  Resigned to her mother’s impending death, she becomes the moral center of the play.  Can the next generation learn from the mistakes of previous ones?  Is forgiveness possible or even necessary?  After questioning her own upbringing and now about to have a baby, can she make family her passion (rather than career)?

Ms. Faigao-Hall has written a play filled with the thoughts and absurdities of a life imperfectly lived.  The imperfection is in the eye of the beholder.  The regret may be in the mind of the dying.  The uneasy mix of sitcom laughs and stinging family dysfunction ultimately hinders the play’s focus.  The consideration of one’s own Dying in Boulder is an interesting notion worthy of exploration.  I hope mine is funnier with histrionics kept to a minimum.

www.lamama.org