Author: admin

Twelfth Night at the National Theatre
First off let me say how amazing it is to see these productions from our home at such a time as this. It’s a gift to all of us. That being said, it shouldn’t shut down our ability to voice our opinion on the work, and stretch our ability to look at the work with a critical eye.

The latest in the broadcast series is Twelfth Night directed by Simon Godwin featuring Tasmin Greig as Malvolia. Godwin’s is a mixed gendered cast that works very well. There are no difficulties in believing the characters in that regard. The design, set in a late 70’s motif, is impeccabile. In almost all of Shakespeare’s work we have a delineation of status, e.g. royals versus servants or mechanicals. So we usually get two forms of humor, one more sophisticated and one more broad. In some works the grand behave as badly as the servants through some device or other. Godwin clearly has pitched the work very broadly, almost everything is a joke. Here lies the problem, in doing so, we lose any real tension or stakes in the work. Olivia, in act one, has practically no status. Certain conventions to show this with some form of retinue, or how others defer to her, is lost. Her behavior towards Cesario/Viola becomes slapstick almost from the start. However, she gains her status back in act two.

The biggest problem I have is the sexual/romantic tension in the work, especially as it crosses gender lines. No one bats an eye when Malvolia is smitten with Olivia. I’m fine with that. On the other hand, Orsino and Cesario/Viola are constantly played for laughs. One of the biggest tensions in the work is between Cesario and Orsino. Orsino is clearly falling in love with what appears to him is a boy, a device Shakespeare often uses. Yes there is humor in it for us who are in on the secret but there is also a true longing and something more there: a pathos, and the tension of what is perceived as a transgression, something possibly forbidden.

The one whose intentions are the clearest in this production is Antonio, the sea captain, who is clearly and unabashedly in love with Sebastian. When he follows Sebastian to Illyria and tells him to meet him at the Elephant, an inn ( a location we never see in the text) it is a gay bar complete with a drag act wich is bewilldering. It makes no sense and is incongruous with the sexuality in the rest of the play. Sebastian’s intentions towards Antonio are never really clear in this production.

Godwin, the director, has cut the relationship between Maria and Sir Toby in an interesting way. All the early references to Maria being in love with Toby have been cut so in the end when she agrees to marry him it’s out of the blue. Specifically her scene with Feste the fool where the fool calls her out on her feelings. We have seen no special affection on Maria’s part throughout the work. Both performances are exceptional but again we lack longing here on Maria’s part and thus we have missed an opportunity to pull us closer to this character and her choices.

Malvolia, played remarkably and flawlessly by Tasmin Greig, gave us what we were missing from the rest of the work: humor and pathos. Clearly the director was seduced by the character, and the actor. Malvolia is a key to the story but not the central plot line. This production was the Malvolia show including her mounting the stairs into the rain as the last image we see which, although beautiful, made no real sense to the rest of the work.

As the play concludes and Viola and Sebastian are reunited, we see Olivia is not as smitten with Sebastian or her part of the bargain, the fervor in which she pursued Cesario/Viola seems to have evaporated. Directorially it is a strong choice. Orsino on his last line passionately kisses Sebastian. We assume it is because he thinks it is Viola, again a strong choice, and if we hadn’t played everything for a laugh this would have given us all a little pause.

Overall I enjoyed the production, and if you haven’t seen it I recommend you take it in. I didn’t agree with many of the director’s choices; they seemed at odds with themselves and the script at times but for the most part a beautiful work.

—

Frankenstien at the National Theatre
Adapted by Nick Dear, Directed by Danny Boyle, design by Mark Tildesley.
The production features Benedict Cumberbatch, and Jonny Lee Miller splitting the role of Creature and Frankenstien in rep.
When you see the production you will understand why they don’t play the role of the creature nightly the physical demands are huge.
The visuals of the production are as always from the National Theatre impeccable with a canopy of bulbs and lamps that reaches out into the audience as well as the warm glow of the cottage of De Lancy the blind scholar . The idea of light and transparency is used throughout the work very well as a theme that builds the world the characters inhabit.

When adapting a work of literature to the stage certain allowances are made, how a length of time is represented, which subplots to keep, which to let go of and so forth. Nick Dear has given us a superficial swipe at a very rich novel. The play itself stands as engaging and entertaining but not compelling.It is a wild ride that misses the mark of the text. The rape of Elizabeth is no where in the book and has no place in the play. The question of who is the real monster, humanity, and longing are touched on but not flushed out.
The play tells the story through the creature’s experience,we do not get the growth of his intellect and the deeper longing within him. We see Frankestien for a nano second in the beginning and then not till much later. I understand that this is from the creature’s perspective but the first encounter with his maker could have and should have been flushed out a little.

The physicality of the work, Cumbebatch as the creature gives us an amazing athletic performance, consistent but lacking any moment of real stillness to allow us into the character to empathise it’s all on one level, here I think Boyle should have stepped in. The opening sequences of the creature experiencing the world verges very closely on self indulgence, and the random dream sequence took us nowhere.
Frankestien was missing some larger passions that encompass his loss, the death of his little brother devastates him in the book, and he is passionately in love with Elizabeth. Neither read in this interpretation.
The play is a masterful physical experience, and a good first attempt at mining what is a brilliant work of literature. A work that is nuanced and full of passion and longing. The play is a step closer to telling us this story that has been widely and weirdly misrepresented in film.
This was my second viewing of the work and I was less seduced by it than the first encounter. I think it is a smooth production, well crafted and acted, certainly worth watching, but lacks an emotional arc that would have drawn me in and connected me to the story.

That book you meant to read is still on your shelf.

E.M. Forester is considered to be a quintessential author of his time, who captured the struggle and the character of the Edwardian period of England. His life span was long, from 1879 to 1970. His books and short stories continue to inspire and engage.
His circle of friends and colleagues included Christopher Isherwood, the poets, Auden and Seigfried Sassoon, Irish author Forrest Reid, and the composer Benjamin Britten to name a few.

Some little known facts: he was a conscientious objector during WWI, declined a knighthood, wrote a couple of short stories that would be considered Science Fiction, and was nominated 16 times for the Nobel prize in literature. What Forester is best at is the conflict within his characters striving to fulfill their hopes and coming up against Edwadian hypocrisy.

This week I’m recommending two of his works. The first is Howards End.
So much of what Forester writes about, especially in this book, resonates with today’s views on nature, industrialism, greed, and the devouring machine of a capitalistic society. The book pits three specific groups against each other: the materialistic vs the bohemian artist, vs the working poor. No matter how modern we claim to be we still have the vestiges of a ridiculous social order distorting our lives.

The second book is Maurice. Published posthumously, this was written directly following Howards End around 1914. The book circulated amongst his closest friends but did not see the public eye until after his passing, along with a collection of short stories titled The Life to Come. Here are Forester’s own words on the novel:
“Happiness is the keynote. I tried to create a character who was completely unlike myself or what I supposed myself to be: Someone handsome, healthy, bodily attractive, mentaly torpid, not a bad businessman, and rather a snob. Into this mixture I dropped an ingredient that puzzles him, wakes him up, torments him and finally saves him.”

For those unaware, Forester was a homosexual all his life. Having a queer perspective allowed him to see the pathos and longing of his generation with a different and perhaps clearer eye. If you’re looking for a film version to go along with his works, none have matched the team of Merchant and Ivory for their understanding of the spectacle, and the humanity of his work.

—

For those of us dancers and choreographers starting out in the 80s, Mark Morris was a breath of fresh air. He showed us a new way of looking at movement. He was, and remains, openly queer at a time when it was risky to do so. Mr. Morris changed the face of contemporary dance in the U.S. He brought back musicality, humor, story, and beauty to what had become a disconnected, unemotional dance form. His dancers were of all shapes, colors, and size, challenging conventional ideas of what dancers bodies should look like. I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Mark Morris, and his dancers perform, always with an emotional life on stage, drinking the air before them.

In his memoir we learn about what influenced his choreography, his love of music, and how his exposure to so many different styles continues to influence his work. Those of you who have seen or heard him at talks, or in interviews, will not be disappointed. He is frank, and honest with little self edit. He gives us a clear picture of how he defines himself as an artist, without numbing academic posturing. The tone is conversational, easy to follow, and often quite funny. If you are passionate about music, dance, and performing, this is a great read.

My take on the oscars
Bohemian Rhapsody a misrepresentation of Freddie Mercury and queer erasure has no place in the awards, nor does Green Book a story his family states is a clear misrepresentation of the relationship as well as it being all about the white guy. So both of these films I see as Hollywood still unable to get it right.
The good news Black Panther, a breath of fresh air in the super hero genre. Designed, directed and built by a black creative team is well deserved. The film was more than a film socially touching a nerve.
Roma, Black Klansmen, If Beale Street Could Talk and the Favourite films with a clear voice a clear perspective complete. Not over run by a team of writers, or producers interfering.
And as many of my costumers will agree Mary Queen Of Scotts for costume design? I think not a clear misstep for this designer unlike the Favourite which had a clear idea behind the stylization this was unfocused and just a mess.
Where are the women in the nominations? Once again over looked and ignored.
I use to be excited by the awards we use to have big parties surrounding them. Now older and with a stronger idea of representation and what that does to the industry I find them to be what they have always been a boys club, a white boys club. When Selma was nominated for best picture and not director because apparently the film directed itself I was done. Wont be watching this year, didn’t watch last year like so many things happening in todays world the oscars and Hollywood seem unable to join the 21st century . I seldom got to mainstream films anymore because I don’t always want to see some one shot or blown up. I love a good adventure and all of that but not all the time. And I am way past your 1950 ideas about queerness and gender.
Sadly they still get to decide what gets done and what should be told and how.

Where do I start? Freddie Mercury was an innovator, a musical wonderment. He was a force of nature. He changed the shape and sound of his time and is still played, loved and idolized today. Unfortunately, Brian May, lead guitar for Queen, holds the rights to the biography of Freddie so we see it through a very limited viewpoint.

Let’s start with the things that almost got me leaving the theatre.
Lucy Boynton plays Mary Austin adequately. For the record, according to the real Mary herself, Mary and Freddie slept together once—twice at most. They lived together for a time but Freddie was queer. Trying to make him somehow hetero or bi-sexual is inaccurate and a form of negating his sexuality.

In the film Freddie and Mary have a physical long-term relationship with him proposing marriage. I have no idea whether or not that actually happened. It is possible for two people to be incredibly in sync, close, support and love each other without it being sexual. Film vocabulary for relationships has evolved so that we could have seen a nuanced relationship between them that was not physical but still intense and loving. What we got instead was a trite version of what their bond really was. He loved and trusted her and bought her a house right next door. Not because he was a lonely unfulfilled man as the film depicts but because he could financially take care of someone he trusted implicitly and considered his family.

Jim Hutton, Freddie’s partner of 7 years who Freddie referred to as his husband, who stayed by him till Freddie’s death, who wore his ring, feels like an afterthought in the film.

Allan Leech plays Paul Prenter, the man who became Freddie’s personal manager. Here is where we see the world through the eyes of Brian May. What could have been a nuanced depiction of quite possibly a manipulative person working on his own agenda became Snidely Whiplash a one-dimensional character, the bad guy who leads Freddie down the dark and sordid path of the queer world. Here is where I almost shouted at the screen. I am so incredibly tired of straight people gaysplaining the 70s and 80s. News flash. You haven’t got a clue. You have no idea what it is to be criminalized for whom you choose to love. Any queer man or woman from 1963 to 73 would have been very aware of the changes that happened in the Queer community in that time. In 1967 the Sexual Offences Act amended the law of England and Wales decriminalizing homosexuality. The public face of the queer community exploded. But apparently all straight folks seem to focus on is the seedy backroom world of the evil Leather scene. In this film the bar scenes looked like outtakes from Pacino’s Cruising. Yes, they were that bad. If we are to believe Brian May Freddie’s fall into the queer scene was all Paul Prenter’s fault.

The script gives Alan Leech nothing to work with. Alan, who plays Paul Prenter, is a lovely actor but he was given a poorly written sad stereotype to play. Again no realistic take on what their relationship was. Again we don’t see any kind of development of their relationship and they were lovers for a time.

In the film Freddie goes off to record his solo albums leaving the band, leaving what is referred to again and again as his family. What we see in the film is Freddie unable to make something. That’s a little hard to swallow. His two solo albums did well: Mr. Bad Guy and Barcelona. There is absolutely no mention or reference to them in the film. We know that his solo work brought him together with the Italian Opera star Montserrat Caballé. Their single did well and was the anthem for the 1992 Olympics. Also not mentioned was his work on the remastered soundtrack to Metropolis, along with many other collaborations.

The idea that Freddie was incapable of creating new work without Queen is disingenuous. It was shameful to see a depiction of Freddie as someone who could not be musically fulfilled without Queen. Instead we see Freddie as a drugged out, coked up mess, who is redeemed by getting back together with the band. His queerness is played like a self-loathing attribute and that he was really a sad figure in his private life. Really?

Queen is nothing without Freddie—end of story. Would Freddie have been as big without Queen? Hard to say, I think he would have found a way.
What I hoped for was an accurate depiction of an incredible talented and important figure in music. What I got was the same old story from a straight Hollywood viewpoint. Because he was queer, he couldn’t possibly have been happy, the den of iniquity that was the 70’s queer scene was to blame for his sexuality and ultimate death.

Yawn.

Where the film does work is in the concert scenes. Here is where they get it right.
So if you want to see some good reenactments of Queen in concert go see this, if not, give it a miss. It would do Mercury’s fans well to remember that Freddie was queer. He wasn’t sad about it or hated himself because of it. His queerness is a huge part of who he was as a music maker. Embrace it. Don’t be embarrassed by it. Grow up.

When we look at the original A Doll’s House we see a classic work, one that changed the shape and style of theatre and one that brought a different viewpoint of women to the stage. It is a work full of emotion and with a clear arc. As an audience we are engaged, we connect and feel the desperation, the struggle, and the emotions of Nora and all the characters.

To write a sequel to this work is a big ask and begs the question, why? What is it you feel needs to be said? As pointed out by the playwright Lucas Hnath in the program,

“ All of the things we debate and negotiate in A Doll’s House are still topics that are debated and negotiated now. So one of the first ideas that I had about A Doll’s House part 2 is it’s a play about how much we’ve changed and how much we haven’t in terms of equality between men and women.”

Some things have changed and many have not. A Doll’s House is about the transformation of Nora. This is the premise of the original work. Where do you go with that 15 years on? Apparently it’s to have a tired old soap box litany of things that we all know and have heard again and again with no real fresh take on it. We are passionlessly lectured to by Nora. If the work had been done 20 years ago maybe, but now in 2018 we need something stronger.

The dialogue is contemporary as are the attitudes and physicality that makes it difficult to grasp why they are in period dress. Is this meant to be a farce? You are writing a sequel to what is considered to be an expertly crafted work that stands up to many forms of translation. The dialogue for this work is predictable and forgettable, and frankly uninspired.

Les Waters, the director in the program notes,
“I just found the writing very exciting and rather ferocious. Lucas sometimes talks to me about things he is thinking about writing, but they always surprise me. That’s terrific because most things aren’t surprising. With Lucas, I never know what’s coming next.”

I am bewildered—because not only was there nothing ferocious about the dialog I could tell what was coming next at every turn, so much so, that I left halfway through. The actors were all very accomplished, the set, costumes and the lighting beautiful. There was absolutely no emotional engagement within the text, no arc, and no raised stakes. If A Doll’s House is a symphony this was elevator music. Trope after trope is lectured to us from an older sophisticated Nora, and Torval, still in love with her gives us a tired viewpoint that still exists today but leaves us flat.

We will never clearly know what Ibsen intended but the work has surpassed what that may have been. A Doll’s House still resonates. ‘Why’ is the big question not being asked of the playwright and the director. This is a polite work sprinkled with humor. The audience can nod and say to themselves “oh yes, things then and things now…”
In today’s climate with a head of state talking about grabbing women by the pussy, the Weinstein affair, the imprisonment and disappearance of Pussy Riot and the vilification of the women coming forward, this hollow work simply doesn’t do anything to engage in the debate.

What would this work look like if a woman had written it?
What would this work look like if a woman had directed it?
Does the playwright think we are less passionate, as we get older?

What are you saying that hasn’t already been said in the original? Where is the fire and desperation of the original? Where are the traces of her transformation? Where is the arc of the work? What are you bringing forward in the work that makes us see it with new eyes?

None of these questions are answered or even addressed. Who has Nora become and what has brought her back? The premise of the work is something I would expect in a drawing room comedy not something that brings us Nora after 15 years of being independent. Her passion and fire are gone, as is the point of the sequel.

First I want to say I’m a major fan of same-gender casting. I think it’s a great tool to explore how we view and perform gender. It’s a framework I continue to explore and want to see more of. In many ways it can be a gift to the performer, a challenge to explore a role they may never have had the chance to play before. The audience gets to see gender performed and hopefully thinks about what that actually means.

Men playing women onstage can be more than drag and the traditional images of dames in Pantos. Too often the idea turns into a joke but more and more live theatre is challenging tradition. Ashland Oregon Shakespeare Festival is producing Oklahoma with same-gender romantic leads, they are presenting as same-sex love interests. Here we see a classic American musical through a lens of inclusion and queerness. The RSC production and new adaptation of Salome cast Salome as a young man whose gender expression is fluid.

As to the arguments concerning traditional casting in all male Shakespeare productions, not even the Globe in the UK is doing traditional casting. If they were, we would have 13 to 14 year old boys playing the women of Shakespeare, so the traditional argument is moot. I think modern audiences seeing a 12 year-old Kate in Taming of the Shrew would be very uncomfortable and maybe that would be a good thing. You have to be clear about what you are trying to say and how you are saying it. We are an art form that is built on communication and expression of ideas.

The Globe in the UK has given us some amazing performances some all same-gender some reversed gender, and everything in-between. The Pop-up Globe in Auckland gave us an amazing season last year: an all male cast, an all female cast for Julius Caesar, and also incorporated Te Reo Maori into its production of Midsummer.

So what in the hell happened to the season this year? Miles Gregory is an intelligent man. I cannot believe he is that obtuse. To not see hitching your cart to the #MeToo movement without any real substance would make him the pariah of the New Zealand theatre world, and put the future of the Pop-up Globe in jeopardy.

Let’s break down the basics. You are producing Taming of the Shrew, an already tricky work for the 21st century audience. You make a statement that it’s going to reflect the current culture of the #MeToo movement and the abuses exposed by the Weinstein case, but no women are involved in this project not the cast or the director. So basically you will have a group of men telling/explaining male oppression of women to women.
So what we will get is a production that will be a massive exercise in mansplaining.

And then the shit hit the fan, and justly so with threatened boycotts and calls for backers to pull out of the Globe.

I don’t disagree that the idea of looking at Taming of the Shrew from this point of reference is a good one, if thought through. An all female cast doing Shrew through this lens would be an amazing production. There are several directors in New Zealand now who could tackle this: Jo Randerson, Nina Nawalowalo, and Robin Payne are three women off the top of my head who have the directorial chops to tackle such a project.

What does this entire exercise demonstrate to all of us in the theatre?
We have a great deal of work to do. I am still hard pressed to understand such a misstep by Gregory. The idea that none of this was part of his thinking is deeply disturbing. Was last season just a fluke? I can’t think so. I have no working knowledge of the man only his work and his choices. To not build on the momentum created last season and continue to expand the possibilities of how we perform the cannon is shortsighted. Look to your mother ship in the UK see how they continue to broaden the discussion.
It’s 2018. Theatre cannot be a men’s club. New Zealand has some brilliant women actors and directors. Use them.

Below are a series of links to articles written a few years ago and as recently as last year addressing the issue of gender inequality.

#MeToo-themed, but all-male? NZ Pop-up Globe’s Shakespeare play …
https://www.newshub.co.nz/…/metoo-themed-but-all-male-nz-pop-up-globe-s-shakesp…

Theatres must act now about gender inequality | Stage | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/…/theatreblog/…/theatres-must-act-now-about-gender-in…

Gender in Theatre – Purple Seven
purpleseven.com/media.ashx/gender-thought-leadership.pdf

Women Continue Being Underrepresented In Theater Despite Being …
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/…/league-of-professional-theater-women-study_us_5…

The Sexism in our Non-Sexist Industry | Bitter Gertrude
The Sexism in our Non-Sexist Industry

There have been a great many voices raised about the current trailer for Bohemian Rhapsody, which is in reality a biopic of Freddie Mercury. Without him there would be no band called Queen. Here is the official description from 20th Century Fox:

“‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ is a foot-stomping celebration of Queen, their music and their extraordinary lead singer Freddie Mercury. Freddie defied stereotypes and shattered convention to become one of the most beloved entertainers on the planet . The film traces the meteoric rise of the band through their iconic songs and revolutionary sound. They reach unparalleled success, but in an unexpected turn Freddie, surrounded by darker influences, shuns Queen in pursuit of his solo career. Having suffered greatly without the collaboration of Queen, Freddie manages to reunite with his bandmates just in time for Live Aid.”

Already we see some misinformation concerning his solo career. Freddie’s album Barcelona recorded with Montserrat Cabellé was used as the theme song for the Summer Olympics in 1992 and did very well commercially. He didn’t ‘suffer greatly’ without his band he was exploring other musical forms. This whole take on his departure sounds like a PR stunt to keep the current iteration of Queen relevant.

What do they mean by “darker influences”? Do they mean AIDS? Well, the press relentlessly hounded him when he was clearly ill. I would consider that “dark forces”, and he certainly didn’t get AIDS from Mary Austin his life long best mate. He did however get it from his sexual partners who were predominately male. Any biographic portrayal of Freddie Mercury that doesn’t address his sexuality is a fraud and an erasure of queerness to placate a heterosexual audience. Not to mention his death from AIDS shook the music industry and the popular culture of the time. His passing is considered a landmark in the history of the epidemic.

Queer erasure unfortunately has been the standard operating procedure for the American film industry for a very, very, long time. Lets look at a brief list.

Brad Pitt as Achilles in Troy was not only alarmingly off with story line and plot involving some of the major Greek characters from the cannon of Greek theatre, but Patroclus wasn’t Achilles’ bestie, cousin, or comrade, he was his lover.

Shakespeare’s sexuality has always been a sticking point for many historians. The first half of the cannon of Sonnets are to a boy or youth and the first Juliet was in fact a boy. A fact Stoppard who penned Shakespeare in Love knows full well.

Richard the Lion Heart slept with both men and women and his marriage was childless. Never do we see this reflected in any film iteration of him, although we do see it in the play Lion in Winter.

The famous film Lawrence of Arabia with Peter O’Toole has him raped but doesn’t deal with his own sexuality. David Gerrold’s rendition of himself as a queer man adopting a kid in The Martian Child was transformed into a straight widower to appease the Mormon financier backing the film. The character Don Bernam in Lost Weekend is drinking because he is queer, in the movie it’s writers block.

Corporal Fife -Thin Red Line Jones the author of the work wrote that Fife has a sexual relationship with another soldier and the film took it out much to the protest of Jones and his family.

In Henry Fitzroy’s Blood Ties fiction-to-screen conversion we loose his bisexuality.

John Constantine the depiction of the character in Comic Book form is Bi and in the TV series straight.

This is just a sampling of past and present straight washing of queer, bi, and fluid people both of fiction and history in film. Representation matters both in fiction and in fact. Historical accuracy actually does matter because unfortunately people see it on the screen and believe that’s how it must have been.

This also occurs when representing trans, especially trans women, from Jarred Leto in the Dallas Buyers Club to Walter Goggins in Son’s of Anarchy Hollywood continually casts men to play what is essentially a woman’s role. Films want you to believe the authenticity of the characters. This has nothing to do with attraction or desire this has to do with the innermost concept of what you identify as. In the end it comes down to a major miss step by the casting agents, directors, and producers when they view Trans women, they see them as men.

This just doesn’t happen with queer characters and storyline but also with race as we have seen time and time again.

Why does it matter?

First off, as a queer man I am constantly having to read between the lines of anthropologists work who bring their own Christian, binary view that queer is other to their work in turn majorly misrepresenting the cultures they are studying. Important relationships that shift how people think and feel are swept to a byline or not reported at all. This has been used as a tool to say Queerness is an import of the evil west by certain Arab countries denying their own rich history of same sex relations. Chechnya’s round up, torture and disappearing of queer people is still happening with little to no outcry from any major country.
Even on our own soil we are constantly under attack from the right wing religious zealots who think the Handmaid’s Tale is an operating manual. Ignorance and denial, that’s what you support when you support straight whitewashing, when you support racial and sexual stereotypes you make it easier to make us other, and then it becomes easier to remove us.

Stage work and fiction are different from film. Theatre is very rarely about realism, even when it is, there is a separation that is always present. We have cross gender casting, racially blind casting and so on. This doesn’t mean that theatre is getting an A+ in this corner. There are works that simply need to be retired for their outdated two-dimensional portrayal of race and in some cases sexuality.

“Oh stop over reacting” or “You are ruining everything” or “That’s not that important” is what we hear when we bring this up and demand change. Here is where I get to use that word that is flying around a great deal at present, privilege. Dismissal can only come with privilege and status. It doesn’t affect you so why should you care?

Queer folk are not looking for special treatment. We are looking for accurate casting and storylines that reflect the entire story not just the bits that fit the hetero narrative.

So coming back to Freddie Mercury and why his sexuality is important. Thousands of little straight boys thought he was the bomb but they need to remember and acknowledge that one of their icons was bent. Mercury, along with David Bowie, Annie Lenox, and Grace Jones were the vanguard of pushing boundaries and challenging everything. It would do Mercury’s fans well to remember that Freddie was queer and they should perhaps think about that before they put on their Trump hat, use FAG as a slur, or queer bash. When you tell the full story you widen the definition of what we are and are aloud to be.

The announcement of the revival of Boys in the Band featuring Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, and Andrew Rannells. Co-stars will include Robin de Jesus, Brian Hutchison, Michael Benjamin Washington and Tuc Watkins. Joe Mantello at the Booth Theatre will direct the 50th anniversary production.
In the YouTube video promo bellow they speak of the work as “ground breaking” and still important.

Zach Quinto talks about an “explosion of backward thinking today” At which point I had to ask have you read the play?

The work is nothing but a tired parade of self-loathing characters fulfilling every stereotype that was prominent in the 70s and in some cases lingers today. They fulfill the straight worlds concept of the time, that queer men were sad, sex starved, self- hating alcoholics.
Matt Crowley the playwright reinforces every fear that was heaped on the community at the time, no queer man would ever find real love, happiness, or acceptance.
There is a very good reason it is almost never done, its terrible. It has become a relic of the past and should remain there.
Quinto is right there is a backward movement so why do a work that adds fuel to that fire. This is 2018 we have had some amazing works produced both film and stage that far outshine this work, and look at the queer world with open eyes.

Here is where I am fed up with the machine of Broadway and the hype that will be piled on this undeserving play.
Use your bloody imagination! Stop with the endless revivals of mediocre works.
Take a real risk, and stop being creatively lazy.
Here we have a group of queer men ready to go on stage and work, give them something to actually work with.
So much is being done elsewhere in the field of queer theatre and gender casting, look to the work of Propeller Theatre, the RSC, and the National Theatre and follow their lead.
The RSC recent production of Oscar Wilde’s Salome with a predominately male cast, there is also a re-interpretation from the National of the same work. If you must do a revival pick something that has withstood the test of time, something that is malleable to change but still holds a clear message and is well written. There are heaps of queer stories, literature, and art that has contributed to the world and how we view it, look to Williams, Cocteau, Genet, Lorca, Orton, and Kushner to name a few.

The amount of talent gathered for this project will be left out in the cold by a work that in no way matches the artists involved. Nor does this work deserve a re-mount we have all move way beyond the views expressed and portrayed within Boys in the Band. We no longer should promote such blatant stereotypes. Just as we see Step and Fetch it as reprehensible so should we see this play as equally reprehensible. I can think of no real reason to mount this work again, not everything deserves to be preserved. There is no part of this work that reflects on where we have been and where we are, the real experiences of queer men and women from this time found much stronger voices.

Here is a link to an article in the Guardian concerning where Queer theatre has come from and where it could go.

Q is for queer theatre | Stage | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2012/apr/03/q-queer-theatre-modern-drama