lgbtq

KCT ‘Slingbacks’ about more than perils of being gay in high school

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By John Lyle Belden

I had the good fortune to not only see the new comedy, “Another Man’s Slingbacks,” presented by Khaos Company Theatre through June 24, but also to see it with playwright Andrew Black.

In this play – set in fictional Lincoln High School, Anderson County, U.S.A. – the very masculine star quarterback Killer Kerrigan (Donovan Whitney) leads fellow jocks Romeo (David Alfonzo) and Meatwad (Josh Weaver) as they hit on the girls, Barbra (Sabrina Lang) and Lana (Gorgi Parks Fulper); pick on the New Kid, Devon (Kyle Dorsch); and torture gay classmate Ricky Malone (Andre Guimaraes).

Fed up with the abuse, Ricky wishes that Killer could be made to feel what it’s like to be homosexual. This brings the attention of a Fairy Godmother (David Malloy), complete with fabulous wings, glitter and a smoker’s voice, who presents Ricky a lengthy contract for a Standard Transformation Spell. Disregarding all the small print, the desperate boy signs.

Suddenly, Killer understands fashion and Broadway, and feels aroused by his teammates. Will he still be Big Man on Campus?

Gay playwright Black, who had been working on this play since 2010 (some references were updated to set it in this year), didn’t settle for just indulging in queer stereotypes. The resulting story explores the fact that to come of age, all teens need to “come out” of the expectations and roles set for them by the social constraints of high school.

“What could a straight person learn?” from being gay, Black said he asked himself. “When you discover you are attracted to your own gender, you have to rewrite the rules for yourself. You have to make strong choices.”

Killer is forced to adapt to a new mindset, but he’s not the only person who needs to change and grow, as Ricky finds when simply wishing revenge on his tormentor doesn’t make his own life better.

Whitney bravely takes on all aspects of Killer’s character. Lang is also excellent, as Barbra tries to adjust to Killer’s changes making him more attractive, yet more distant. Weaver as “the Meat Man” turns his simpleton into a scene-stealer. Molloy solidly commits to his no-nonsense magical persona, yet it is Dorsch who looks natural in high heels. Guimaraes, having just graduated high school in real life, is familiar with its uncertainties. Alfonzo ably embodies a go-along-to-get-along character. Fulper surprises with her devious role. And kudos to James Mannan for playing various grown-ups.

Direction was provided by KCT artistic director Kaylee Spivey Good, in one of her last jobs before going overseas later this summer to earn her Masters in theatre.

There are two more performances scheduled, 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, at KCT’s new stage 1775 N. Sherman Drive on Indy’s east side. Get info and tickets at www.kctindy.com.

There’s a lot going on with ‘Hir’ at Phoenix Theatre

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By John Lyle Belden

Talk about having issues with the “binary” – if one feels overwhelmed while viewing “Hir,” on stage through June 18 at the Phoenix Theatre, it’s because we are slammed with two dramatic themes simultaneously.

First, we are hit with the affects of trauma and abuse: After years of dominating his family and using them as punching bags, Arnold (Brad Griffith) suffered a stroke, making him barely able to talk or even think. We meet him a year later, during which his long-suffering wife, Paige (Jen Johansen), has gone the opposite way in every aspect of life. What was clean is left dirty; what was ordered is in disarray; what was put away is tossed to the floor or stuffed in an odd place. And, once forbidden to work outside the home, she has taken a job with a non-profit. What she makes there doesn’t matter, as paying bills on time was the old life. As for Arnold, he is kept in a medicated stupor and deprived of all dignity.

Into this situation comes their son, Isaac (Ben Schuetz), a discharged Marine who had the duty of picking up combatants’ body parts from the battlefield. Returning from his recent traumatic environment to his old one, all he wants is a world that makes sense.

The second theme – from which comes the play’s title – is that among the family’s changes is that the younger sibling has changed from daughter to son. Max (Ariel Laukins) has taken hormones and insists on being referred to by the pronouns “ze” and “hir” (rather than he/she or her/him). Paige is overjoyed to have something so different and new – “the future!” she declares – that she homeschools Max so that they can learn together.

The aspect of gender roles and identity takes on irony in that while Max is free to be hir-self, part of Arnold’s humiliation is being made to always wear a dress. What’s more, in the mixed-up world of this drama, Max is the most stable and certain person on the stage.

Johansen once again comes through in chewing through a meaty role. Griffith ably compensates for his role’s limited speech with his physicality. Schuetz has Isaac deal with the swirling insanity in a convincing manner, without going over the top. And Laukins makes an excellent debut.

The world of “Hir” is exaggerated and mildly bizarre, providing a lot of laughs, but this is no comedy. Trans playwright Taylor Mac’s script uses the funhouse mirror to magnify these issues, allowing us to confront what is wrong about these people’s lives without distraction by the underlying tragedy – but one way or another, it has to be dealt with.

Find the Phoenix at 749 N. Park Ave. (corner of Park and St. Clair downtown, near Mass. Ave.); call 317-635-7529 or visit http://www.phoenixtheatre.org.

Doesn’t seem so “Dirty” these days, does it?

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NOTE: As the Word/Eagle is in flux with the renaming and corresponding change in official website, John is putting his reviews here — for now.

By John Lyle Belden

It seems few people give a thought towards Mae West these days. After all, she was a star of the black-and-white film era, a Vaudeville player. She was curvy when ample curves were cool, but sexy when the mere hint of sex – let alone making “Sex” the name of your play – could get you in trouble.

But she deserves a closer look, not only for how she confronted those troubles and withstood them, but for how she was an advocate not only for sexual freedom but for LGBT rights.

This life is explored in the play “Dirty Blonde,” which has one more weekend (today through Sunday) at Buck Creek Players just southeast of Indy.

We meet not only West (played by Sonja Distefano) and the men in her life (portrayed by Jay Hemphill and Michael Patrick Smiley), but also Jo and Charlie (Distefano and Hemphill), two West fans who meet in the years following West’s 1980 death at her tomb. Charlie had actually met the siren in her later years, an encounter that deeply affected him.

We see the progression of West’s career: from Vaudeville struggles; to controversy with Broadway plays “Sex,” its follow-up “The Drag” – centered on homosexuality – and her hit “Diamond Lil;” to success in film; and finally her stubbornness in insisting on staying in the spotlight and doing things her way to the very end. The scenes are interspersed with the growing relationship of Jo and Charlie, as the line between wanting to know Mae and wanting to be her blurs.

Distefano has the voice and gestures down, but struggles with the charisma of her larger-than-life role; she is far more appealing as Jo. Hemphill and Smiley do great work, but the pacing and overall feel of the show gave a sense that something was lacking. Still, it is a good effort and an enlightening look at an American icon.

Find the Buck Creek Playhouse at 11150 Southeastern Ave. (Acton Road exit off I-74). Get info and tickets at 317-862-2270 or www.buckcreekplayers.com.

John L. Belden is Associate Editor at The Eagle (formerly The Word), the central-Indiana based Midwest LGBTQ news source.

Review: Buck Creek’s ‘Garland’ charms

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By John Lyle Belden

NOTE: Review also appears online with The Word (www.theygayword.com).

“Hi, I’m Judy Garland, Liza Minnelli’s mother.”

BCP Garland
Georgeanna Teipen as Judy Garland in “The Property Known as Garland” at Buck Creek Players through Sunday (BCP photo)

This is how the star, occupying the body of Georgeanna Teipen at Indy’s Buck Creek Playhouse, introduces herself to Ed (Steve Jerk) in the dressing room of Copenhagen’s Falconer Centre as they await what would be her final public concert, March 25, 1969. She then sends Ed on a fool’s errand so that she can be alone for the next hour to talk to us – across space, time and the fourth wall – about her life.

“The Property Known as Garland” was crafted by Billy Van Zandt from Garland’s actual words in interviews and dictations for a never-published memoir. Director D. Scott Robinson said a minimum of dramatic license was employed in the script. While he can’t say Judy’s stories were all true, because “she was a story-teller,” he said. “What you hear is what she actually said.” Robinson added that most aspects of her narrative, including her scandalous first pregnancy, are independently verifiable.

Robinson also said that while he was thrilled to get the rights to this show, he wouldn’t do it without Teipen as Garland. Fortunately, she was quick to say yes, he said. And indeed, from the short dark wig to the sassy attitude that sways from playful and wistful to maudlin and angry, she does – for 90 minutes, no intermission – become Judy Garland.

I must note that for those who are either eager for or cringing at the thought of her belting out full renditions of “Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart” or “Over the Rainbow,” it won’t happen. Teipen is spared inevitable comparisons to the legendary voice, as Judy saves it for her Danish audience.

Still, to hear her story, from little Frances Gumm and her sisters in vaudeville, through her time with MGM and Oz (including backlot Munchkin tales), up through her more recent triumphs (Oscar-nominated for “A Star is Born”) and trials (getting booed off the stage in Australia), is fascinating enough without song breaks. And in Teipen’s performance, we feel those highs and lows with her.

She touches on her appeal to LGBT audiences, including encounters with drag impersonators.

There is also a touch of irony, as she remarks on how each of her peers and rivals are “drunks” while waving her ever-refilling glass of Blue Nun dismissively. She has no problem with it, she says, except for having to switch from wine after being told, after liver surgery, that she could no longer consume hard liquor. And she laments how Marilyn Monroe was careless enough to overdose on pills, just months before she would die from a day of constant consumption of barbiturates.

There is just one weekend of performances left before the Garland glamour leaves us again. Find Buck Creek Players at 11150 Southeastern Ave., Acton Road exit off I-74; call 317-862-2270 or see www.buckcreekplayers.com.