Eight Forty-Eight - 'Sweet Tea' Shares Stories of Gay Men in the South

Check out this wonderful interview w/ E. Patrick Johnson from WBEZ Chicago Public Radio’s “Eight Forty-Eight” program.

1 year ago
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Sound Designer Miles Polaski discusses the ways in which he worked with the entire SWEET TEA team to compose his sound design.

Part of the challenge when doing any kind of design for a play is discovering and setting up the rules of the play.  In other words, what kind of conventions will we use, why, and how do they help support the arc of the play?

Sweet Tea has been a collaborative and organic process between the designers, director and our actor/playwright to find answers to these questions.  The world of this play and its structure give a sound designer freedom to have some fun.  So figuring out where to start wasn’t clear right away.  Once we knew what the sonic pallet of the play was we needed to understand how we could implement our choices.  After seeing a run through of the play for the designers it was clear to me that this play contains 3 forms: E. Patrick Johnson speaks in first person; the characters monologues; and Countess Vivian.  The structure of the text as well as the staging of each of these sections made it clear that these sections needed to have different sonic support.  For example, when EPJ speaks as himself we can embrace a more stylized world where underscoring helps support the text.  And when we are in character monologues a more natural atmospheric sound scape helps support these moments.

Of course, we have now finished our technical rehearsals (where we compose and set all of the sound into the play) and some of the rules have changed.  Which is to be expected in a highly stylized show such as Sweet Tea.  We began to discover what worked and what did not and we shifted our tactics accordingly.  But I won’t talk about those changes here - I’ll let you hear for yourself when you go see Sweet Tea.

1 year ago
Jane M. Saks (Co-Producer), Executive Director, Ellen Stone Belic Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media writes about her connection to SWEET TEA.   In Sweet Tea, the play, what E. Patrick Johnson and Daniel Alexander Jones do is bring oxygen and audiences to stories we really cannot live without knowing. It is a privilege and an honor to have collaborated over several years with E. Patrick as an Institute Fellow, and more recently with Daniel to help introduce the lives and stories of the men of Sweet Tea into the theatrical canon. Oral history, upon which E. Patrick’s scholarship for Sweet Tea, the book, is based, is often how we learn of the existence and life experiences of people that have otherwise been invisible to a wider public and, sometimes to themselves. There have always been great voids and reverberating silences in history and being gay, black and southern fits into that category. Sweet Tea fills part of that large void, adding the cadence and tempo of lives that are often ignored. It is a rare opportunity to accompany and be led through the terrain of these men’s lives. Performance, like oral history, is an encounter at a particular moment between human beings. We must recognize these as contested locations of power and voice and pay attention to what is absent, heard, eliminated, seen, offered and spoken. Who deems it valuable and worthy of historic record, creative gesture or close attention? We must. In creating Sweet Tea, E. Patrick and Daniel understand it as an act of memory shaped as much by the moment of telling as by the lives being told. Sweet Tea, the play, is a long, deeply-held and layered conversation that resides in the body, the spirit and the mind as the lives overlap and intersect through their solitudes and interdependencies. We are not merely witnesses nor passive vessels heavy with other people’s experiences and testimonies. We actively participate in the human constellation. I believe words, like people, are defined by the company they keep. The men of Sweet Tea, the play, keep and make glorious company. Messy, challenging, exquisite, beautiful companions, they are.  Whispering with words well chosen, screaming with the movement of the earth, singing with the rhythms that water and music carry, and preaching with a grace-filled calling — they help to define us as well as themselves. They create company that is full of pain and loss, tender necessity, fury, haunting honesty, style, humor, bawdy self-possession, sarcastic longing and joy and love. They are defined between and among themselves and each other, sometimes standing alone and, yet, inextricably linked.  They tint the air, move the dirt, cry the seasons, and drink the tea. Through and with E. Patrick, they offer it all to us. You will not want to resist the temptation to love them; it is strong and unyielding.  The soil of the play is fertile with a long growing season, but sometimes hard and acidic. It is deep and abiding. I believe our differences and our similarities have essential power – a force we cannot do without. If denied, we are far less than our myriad definitions, like words, which are endless. The men of Sweet Tea as well as E. Patrick himself bring depth, poignancy and poetry, as well as great power and impact to the narrative landscape of queer black men of the South. They create and change that landscape forever. Since its founding in 2005, the Institute has been a place for the creation of new innovative work.  We believe that creative work can always be a catalyst to challenge assumptions and expand human experience and possibilities. Sweet Tea is a perfect example of this deeply held conviction. E. Patrick and Daniel are visionary artists who courageously mine for the most authentic creative gesture. What is central to their creative practices is a temporal understanding of the value of the moment within their artistic vision and within history. It is a gift to collaborate with them and the men of Sweet Tea: C.C.  Chaz/Chastity, D.C., Duncan Teague, George “The Countess” Eagerson, Ed, Freddie, Gerome, Harold, Larry J., Michael, R. Dioneaux, and Stephen. The Institute Staff would like to thank them and our co-producers at About Face Theatre for the World Premiere of Sweet Tea, the play. Photo from Windy City Media Group.

Jane M. Saks (Co-Producer), Executive Director, Ellen Stone Belic Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media writes about her connection to SWEET TEA.

 

In Sweet Tea, the play, what E. Patrick Johnson and Daniel Alexander Jones do is bring oxygen and audiences to stories we really cannot live without knowing. It is a privilege and an honor to have collaborated over several years with E. Patrick as an Institute Fellow, and more recently with Daniel to help introduce the lives and stories of the men of Sweet Tea into the theatrical canon.

Oral history, upon which E. Patrick’s scholarship for Sweet Tea, the book, is based, is often how we learn of the existence and life experiences of people that have otherwise been invisible to a wider public and, sometimes to themselves. There have always been great voids and reverberating silences in history and being gay, black and southern fits into that category. Sweet Tea fills part of that large void, adding the cadence and tempo of lives that are often ignored. It is a rare opportunity to accompany and be led through the terrain of these men’s lives. Performance, like oral history, is an encounter at a particular moment between human beings. We must recognize these as contested locations of power and voice and pay attention to what is absent, heard, eliminated, seen, offered and spoken. Who deems it valuable and worthy of historic record, creative gesture or close attention? We must.

In creating Sweet Tea, E. Patrick and Daniel understand it as an act of memory shaped as much by the moment of telling as by the lives being told. Sweet Tea, the play, is a long, deeply-held and layered conversation that resides in the body, the spirit and the mind as the lives overlap and intersect through their solitudes and interdependencies.

We are not merely witnesses nor passive vessels heavy with other people’s experiences and testimonies. We actively participate in the human constellation. I believe words, like people, are defined by the company they keep. The men of Sweet Tea, the play, keep and make glorious company. Messy, challenging, exquisite, beautiful companions, they are.  Whispering with words well chosen, screaming with the movement of the earth, singing with the rhythms that water and music carry, and preaching with a grace-filled calling — they help to define us as well as themselves. They create company that is full of pain and loss, tender necessity, fury, haunting honesty, style, humor, bawdy self-possession, sarcastic longing and joy and love. They are defined between and among themselves and each other, sometimes standing alone and, yet, inextricably linked.  They tint the air, move the dirt, cry the seasons, and drink the tea.

Through and with E. Patrick, they offer it all to us. You will not want to resist the temptation to love them; it is strong and unyielding.  The soil of the play is fertile with a long growing season, but sometimes hard and acidic. It is deep and abiding. I believe our differences and our similarities have essential power – a force we cannot do without. If denied, we are far less than our myriad definitions, like words, which are endless.

The men of Sweet Tea as well as E. Patrick himself bring depth, poignancy and poetry, as well as great power and impact to the narrative landscape of queer black men of the South. They create and change that landscape forever.

Since its founding in 2005, the Institute has been a place for the creation of new innovative work.  We believe that creative work can always be a catalyst to challenge assumptions and expand human experience and possibilities. Sweet Tea is a perfect example of this deeply held conviction. E. Patrick and Daniel are visionary artists who courageously mine for the most authentic creative gesture. What is central to their creative practices is a temporal understanding of the value of the moment within their artistic vision and within history. It is a gift to collaborate with them and the men of Sweet Tea: C.C.  Chaz/Chastity, D.C., Duncan Teague, George “The Countess” Eagerson, Ed, Freddie, Gerome, Harold, Larry J., Michael, R. Dioneaux, and Stephen. The Institute Staff would like to thank them and our co-producers at About Face Theatre for the World Premiere of Sweet Tea, the play.

Photo from Windy City Media Group.

1 year ago
Dramaturg Chloe Johnston interviews E. Patrick Johnson on all things SWEET TEA. Chloe:  How did you know/find the men interviewed in SWEET TEA?     E. Patrick:  The first men that I interviewed were actually people that I knew – friends that I either grew up with or knew from college who live in North Carolina, particularly in Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill and also men that I knew who lived in Atlanta.  And then, from there, it was a snowball effect.  They told other people who put me in touch with other people and then they told people who told people who told people.  So I was never more than one person – sometimes two people – removed from the person I was interviewing.    C:  Why do this piece now in Chicago?  How is it different to perform it outside of the south?    P:  There are certainly sometimes some advantages to performing the show in the south and those advantages are sometimes an instant recognition of some of the mannerisms, the colorful language, or recognition of somebody like the person I am performing.  But, you know, I have found that no matter where I perform that there’s always a possibility of people connecting.  For instance, when I performed in Philadelphia it was one of the most moving and powerful and intense performances that I’ve ever had because there were all these black, gay men in the audience, who weren’t necessarily from the south.  I just felt like we were levitating, I really did.  And so I think that I stopped anticipating what the response would be from any audience based on whether they were in the north or south or east or west because there’s always the potential for people to connect in their own way to what they’re seeing and witnessing.  But Chicago is, to me, up south and many of the African Americans who live on the south side of Chicago are from Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and have these rich, familial connections to the south.  Sometimes it’s just the first generation away.  So I think it’s important to perform the show here in the southern Diaspora, as it were, because I think that a lot of the themes will also resonate with folks who live here in Chicago.  And not just the black, gay men but white, gay men or white lesbians or Latino lesbians…because, ultimately, the particularity of these stories also make them universal.  Not in the “Kumbaya” universal way but in ways that speak to the experiences that we have when we deal with another human being.  You know, family dramas, partnership dramas, all these kinds of things.  I’m looking forward to performing the show here in Chicago.   C:  How do you feel that your race, sexuality and geographical upbringing have each shaped you and is it possible to say if one shaped you more than the others or do you see them as always intertwined?  P:  I see my southern upbringing, my race, gender, sexuality, class, all of that being intertwined.  I will say, however, that my consciousness around how they’re intertwined has evolved.  You know, for instance, when I was a kid I wasn’t conscious of my sexuality and even when I became conscious of it I wasn’t ready necessarily to deal with it.  Ironically, when I moved further south from North Carolina to Louisiana and was really experiencing racism in more explicit ways than I had in North Carolina, it became a fertile ground for me to come into my sexuality.  It was where I came out.  And that’s interesting to me that, while I was really experiencing blatant racism, I was really at a place where I could deal with my sexuality.  And that was in the deep, deep south in Louisiana.  But my relationship to all of those identities has evolved as I’ve gotten older and lived a little bit longer…but I always see them sort of pivoting around each other.  C:  What made you leave the south and what do you think of Chicago?  P:  I left the south but the south didn’t leave me, that’s for sure.  It was a job opportunity.  I left the south because I was offered a job at Norhtwestern and it was the place to, it was a dream job because of its history in performance studies.  So that’s why I left.  I didn’t want to leave.  I wanted to stay in North Carolina.  I wanted a job at the University of North Carolina, my alma mater, but it didn’t work out.  But I’m not sad about it anymore because I think of Chicago now as home.  A lot of my friends in Chicago are southerners who were, you know, transplanted here for some reason or the other.  I really have a sense of community here and not just academic community but you know, just everyday folk.  Because Chicago is a small enough city to not feel overwhelming, I feel good about it.  I love Chicago and plan to stay here for a while.   C:  That’s good news for us!  Well, thank you very much.  Photo from Gay Pride Rockland.

Dramaturg Chloe Johnston interviews E. Patrick Johnson on all things SWEET TEA.

Chloe:  How did you know/find the men interviewed in SWEET TEA?    

E. Patrick:  The first men that I interviewed were actually people that I knew – friends that I either grew up with or knew from college who live in North Carolina, particularly in Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill and also men that I knew who lived in Atlanta.  And then, from there, it was a snowball effect.  They told other people who put me in touch with other people and then they told people who told people who told people.  So I was never more than one person – sometimes two people – removed from the person I was interviewing.   

C:  Why do this piece now in Chicago?  How is it different to perform it outside of the south?   

P:  There are certainly sometimes some advantages to performing the show in the south and those advantages are sometimes an instant recognition of some of the mannerisms, the colorful language, or recognition of somebody like the person I am performing.  But, you know, I have found that no matter where I perform that there’s always a possibility of people connecting.  For instance, when I performed in Philadelphia it was one of the most moving and powerful and intense performances that I’ve ever had because there were all these black, gay men in the audience, who weren’t necessarily from the south.  I just felt like we were levitating, I really did.  And so I think that I stopped anticipating what the response would be from any audience based on whether they were in the north or south or east or west because there’s always the potential for people to connect in their own way to what they’re seeing and witnessing. 

But Chicago is, to me, up south and many of the African Americans who live on the south side of Chicago are from Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and have these rich, familial connections to the south.  Sometimes it’s just the first generation away.  So I think it’s important to perform the show here in the southern Diaspora, as it were, because I think that a lot of the themes will also resonate with folks who live here in Chicago.  And not just the black, gay men but white, gay men or white lesbians or Latino lesbians…because, ultimately, the particularity of these stories also make them universal.  Not in the “Kumbaya” universal way but in ways that speak to the experiences that we have when we deal with another human being.  You know, family dramas, partnership dramas, all these kinds of things.  I’m looking forward to performing the show here in Chicago.  

C:  How do you feel that your race, sexuality and geographical upbringing have each shaped you and is it possible to say if one shaped you more than the others or do you see them as always intertwined? 

P:  I see my southern upbringing, my race, gender, sexuality, class, all of that being intertwined.  I will say, however, that my consciousness around how they’re intertwined has evolved.  You know, for instance, when I was a kid I wasn’t conscious of my sexuality and even when I became conscious of it I wasn’t ready necessarily to deal with it.  Ironically, when I moved further south from North Carolina to Louisiana and was really experiencing racism in more explicit ways than I had in North Carolina, it became a fertile ground for me to come into my sexuality.  It was where I came out.  And that’s interesting to me that, while I was really experiencing blatant racism, I was really at a place where I could deal with my sexuality.  And that was in the deep, deep south in Louisiana.  But my relationship to all of those identities has evolved as I’ve gotten older and lived a little bit longer…but I always see them sort of pivoting around each other. 

C:  What made you leave the south and what do you think of Chicago? 

P:  I left the south but the south didn’t leave me, that’s for sure.  It was a job opportunity.  I left the south because I was offered a job at Norhtwestern and it was the place to, it was a dream job because of its history in performance studies.  So that’s why I left.  I didn’t want to leave.  I wanted to stay in North Carolina.  I wanted a job at the University of North Carolina, my alma mater, but it didn’t work out.  But I’m not sad about it anymore because I think of Chicago now as home.  A lot of my friends in Chicago are southerners who were, you know, transplanted here for some reason or the other.  I really have a sense of community here and not just academic community but you know, just everyday folk.  Because Chicago is a small enough city to not feel overwhelming, I feel good about it.  I love Chicago and plan to stay here for a while.  

C:  That’s good news for us!  Well, thank you very much. 

Photo from Gay Pride Rockland.

1 year ago

PART ONE

George Eagerson, AKA Countess Vivian, is the oldest man Patrick interviewed for his book “Sweet Tea: Gay Black Men of The South, An Oral History”. At the age of 97, he has quite the story to tell, among them, surviving Hurricane Katrina by staying in his house! Patrick interviewed him before the storm and lost contact him following the storm. However, as you will see a friend of Countess’ found “Sweet Tea” by chance, recognized Countess’ picture on the cover and helped put Patrick back in touch with Countess. This is the reunion (in two parts).


Created by Stephen J. Lewis.

1 year ago

PART TWO

George Eagerson, AKA Countess Vivian, is the oldest man Patrick interviewed for his book “Sweet Tea: Gay Black Men of The South, An Oral History”. At the age of 97, he has quite the story to tell, among them, surviving Hurricane Katrina by staying in his house! Patrick interviewed him before the storm and lost contact him following the storm. However, as you will see a friend of Countess’ found “Sweet Tea” by chance, recognized Countess’ picture on the cover and helped put Patrick back in touch with Countess. This is the reunion (in two parts).

Created by Stephen J. Lewis.

1 year ago

Check out this extremely interesting video of Daniel and E. Patrick in New York City a few weeks ago.  Filmed and created by Stephen J. Lewis. 

1 year ago
Emma Stanton shares her thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works. For me, The XYZ Festival is an opportunity to speak to and connect with our theater community in a way that is both big and small.   What initially drew me to About Face Theatre was a reading of The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later in the Fall of 2009. While the piece itself was speaking to me on a very personal and intimate level, I knew that that it was also speaking to something much bigger than me. And knowing that this small story was being communicated around the world at the same time was profound for me. Because the theater gave this small story an incredible, resonating voice. This is the kind of theater experience I want to be a part of, the kind of theater I want ot make.  Since the XYZ Festival this year was opened up to the playwriting community on a national level, I was interested in developing a selection process that mirrored the submission process. Therefore, as submissions rolled into the office of About Face Theater, we worked on getting readers that were not only from Chicago but from across the country to participate in the reading of these plays.   This interest in reaching out on a personal and larger level does not end in the submission and selection process of the XYZ Festival. It is what I am looking for, as well, as I am reading possible contenders for the festival. I am asking myself: How does this play speak to me on an individual level? What is it about this play that makes the telling of the story specific and therefore new to me? and How does this play speak to the larger issues of our mission? Honestly, I imagine a string going between a small stone and a huge cloud. It is the tension in that string, the relationship between the big and small, that I am interested in. Photo Credit:  http://www.law.columbia.edu/ipimages/Information_technology/images/CheckMarkX.jpg

Emma Stanton shares her thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works.

For me, The XYZ Festival is an opportunity to speak to and connect with our theater community in a way that is both big and small.   What initially drew me to About Face Theatre was a reading of The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later in the Fall of 2009. While the piece itself was speaking to me on a very personal and intimate level, I knew that that it was also speaking to something much bigger than me. And knowing that this small story was being communicated around the world at the same time was profound for me. Because the theater gave this small story an incredible, resonating voice. This is the kind of theater experience I want to be a part of, the kind of theater I want ot make. 

Since the XYZ Festival this year was opened up to the playwriting community on a national level, I was interested in developing a selection process that mirrored the submission process. Therefore, as submissions rolled into the office of About Face Theater, we worked on getting readers that were not only from Chicago but from across the country to participate in the reading of these plays.  

This interest in reaching out on a personal and larger level does not end in the submission and selection process of the XYZ Festival. It is what I am looking for, as well, as I am reading possible contenders for the festival. I am asking myself: How does this play speak to me on an individual level? What is it about this play that makes the telling of the story specific and therefore new to me? and How does this play speak to the larger issues of our mission? Honestly, I imagine a string going between a small stone and a huge cloud. It is the tension in that string, the relationship between the big and small, that I am interested in.

Photo Credit:  http://www.law.columbia.edu/ipimages/Information_technology/images/CheckMarkX.jpg

1 year ago
Kendra Miller, newest AFT Artistic Intern, shares her thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works. For me the XYZ Festival is the chance to create a dialogue between the community and the theatre and to reinvent their relationship. I’m fascinated with the “firsts” that are happening in the creation of this festival. I believe that it is only through continual experimentation and rebirth that theatre as an art form can succeed. In a world linked by super fast connections and impressions that often don’t depend on any physical presence or significant time spent, an hour or two spent in the dark with complete strangers becomes a highly unusual experience. I’m interested in the creation of a festival that reaches beyond it’s own physical space and immediate audience to create an experience in many different ways for many different people. The rings of involvement spread outwards from the people who wrote these plays all across the globe, to readers across the country, to the roots of our theatre here in Chicago. Everyone has their own idea of what the XYZ Festival should look like, and a synthesis of these ideas and inputs is slowly emerging in a very organic and exciting way.Queer theatre, new theatre. Reinvention is survival for both. One of our plays brought up an interesting question: “Why would it be important if this person were gay?”. Why wouldn’t it be? Shouldn’t it be? Does it matter? The process that we have created for the selection of these plays doesn’t let us have easy answers, and helps us find the plays that ask the hard questions. I love the focus being put on the creation of the process itself because as we muddle along and experiment and discard, we’re always learning new information and constantly breaking down preconceived notions of what we think the process should be, what queer theatre and new theatre should say. Photo Credit:  http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3184/2753543046_292514dc6c.jpg

Kendra Miller, newest AFT Artistic Intern, shares her thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works.


For me the XYZ Festival is the chance to create a dialogue between the community and the theatre and to reinvent their relationship. I’m fascinated with the “firsts” that are happening in the creation of this festival. I believe that it is only through continual experimentation and rebirth that theatre as an art form can succeed. In a world linked by super fast connections and impressions that often don’t depend on any physical presence or significant time spent, an hour or two spent in the dark with complete strangers becomes a highly unusual experience.

I’m interested in the creation of a festival that reaches beyond it’s own physical space and immediate audience to create an experience in many different ways for many different people. The rings of involvement spread outwards from the people who wrote these plays all across the globe, to readers across the country, to the roots of our theatre here in Chicago. Everyone has their own idea of what the XYZ Festival should look like, and a synthesis of these ideas and inputs is slowly emerging in a very organic and exciting way.

Queer theatre, new theatre. Reinvention is survival for both. One of our plays brought up an interesting question: “Why would it be important if this person were gay?”. Why wouldn’t it be? Shouldn’t it be? Does it matter? The process that we have created for the selection of these plays doesn’t let us have easy answers, and helps us find the plays that ask the hard questions.

I love the focus being put on the creation of the process itself because as we muddle along and experiment and discard, we’re always learning new information and constantly breaking down preconceived notions of what we think the process should be, what queer theatre and new theatre should say.

Photo Credit:  http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3184/2753543046_292514dc6c.jpg

1 year ago
Dav Yendler shares his thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works. For me, the XYZ Festival is an exploration what new queer work can offer a community.  When we were working in collaboration with Colloaboraction on our Sketchbook show, we always batted around the concept that “queer youth are ambassadors of the new.”  By saying this we inexorably linked together the concepts of the queer and the new and that pairing has stuck with me ever since.   Last year’s festival tried to express our theater and our mission with Out’n’About/maps; the thesis of the festival was that the queer community was in every community and so our events were spread around the city.  While the last year’s thesis is still absolutely valid, I’m interested in exploring this relationship between queerness and newness.  There’s a lot that’s new with this festival- new process, new panel, new plays.  Here’s a thought experiment- take our 20 semi-finalist plays and either A) remove all the “queer elements” and/or B) turn them into “straight elements.”  Can you do this?  Are these 20 plays suddenly quotidian?  Are they even plays?   These are by no means the chief questions I’m asking when I read these semi-finalists.  I’m also interested in how we as a theater interact with our audience as a cross section between the theater and queer communities (especially in regards to last year’s attempt and especially with our purposeful inclusion and acknowledgment of local playwrights).  Additionally, when we make a concerted effort to have our close friends and family have a strong hand in shaping the festival, how are we expressing our theater’s identity?  These are questions that interest me as a theater practitioner, as a straight dude working in a queer joint, and as an artist.  Photo Credit:  http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Q1ecy7eA7BA/SxA7JhGSQ5I/AAAAAAAABBI/LqdEpvgsBmQ/s400/z.jpg

Dav Yendler shares his thoughts on the XYZ Festival of New Works.


For me, the XYZ Festival is an exploration what new queer work can offer a community.  When we were working in collaboration with Colloaboraction on our Sketchbook show, we always batted around the concept that “queer youth are ambassadors of the new.”  By saying this we inexorably linked together the concepts of the queer and the new and that pairing has stuck with me ever since.  


Last year’s festival tried to express our theater and our mission with Out’n’About/maps; the thesis of the festival was that the queer community was in every community and so our events were spread around the city.  While the last year’s thesis is still absolutely valid, I’m interested in exploring this relationship between queerness and newness.  There’s a lot that’s new with this festival- new process, new panel, new plays.  Here’s a thought experiment- take our 20 semi-finalist plays and either A) remove all the “queer elements” and/or B) turn them into “straight elements.”  Can you do this?  Are these 20 plays suddenly quotidian?  Are they even plays?  


These are by no means the chief questions I’m asking when I read these semi-finalists.  I’m also interested in how we as a theater interact with our audience as a cross section between the theater and queer communities (especially in regards to last year’s attempt and especially with our purposeful inclusion and acknowledgment of local playwrights).  Additionally, when we make a concerted effort to have our close friends and family have a strong hand in shaping the festival, how are we expressing our theater’s identity?  These are questions that interest me as a theater practitioner, as a straight dude working in a queer joint, and as an artist. 

Photo Credit:  http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Q1ecy7eA7BA/SxA7JhGSQ5I/AAAAAAAABBI/LqdEpvgsBmQ/s400/z.jpg

1 year ago
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