Chapters in the history of gay rights
Terrence McNally’s “Some Men,” at the Second Stage Theatre, is less a play than a dramatized social history, a series of vignettes that chart the changes in gay men’s lives over the past 80 years.
McNally inevitably hits familiar touchstones – the married, closeted gay man who nervously engages a hustler, parents emotionally unable to acknowledge their sons’ homosexuality, cruising at the baths, an AIDS patient’s friends gathered in a hospital waiting room, gay couples as proud parents.
There are several things, though, that enable the evening to surmount the obvious and become a thoughtful, amusing and often touching celebration.
One is McNally’s double focus. There’s the predictable pleasure in increased openness and acceptance, the look-how-far-we’ve-come feeling. But the 67-year-old playwright also wants to make clear that it’s wrong to see the journey as going from complete darkness to light.
Beginning at the wedding of two men – McNally suggests marriage is the ultimate affirmation – he then zooms in on the stories of the guest couples, and their ancestors and heirs. Most interestingly, he looks at the ambivalence of the past.
In the most dramatically effective scene, a small group of show queens has gathered at a gay bar in Greenwich Village in the late 1960s, to swap trivia, talk about Judy Garland’s recent death and sing. Several of them, gathered around the piano, do a rousing “On the Street Where You Live,” and their joy warms the theater.
Outside, there are the sounds of the Stonewall demonstrations, but most of the men relaxing in the bar don’t have much interest in gay liberation.
Their attention is taken by a man in drag (David Greenspan) who’s come in for a drink, drawing the disapproval of the bartender. (”You want to drink here? Dress like a man.”)
The assertive drag queen gets a drink and sings a particularly affecting “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” before leaving to see what all the commotion outside is about. Some of the other men, sensing that change is in the air, decide they perhaps should check it out, too.
In the evening’s most amusing scene, a middle-aged couple (Greenspan and Don Amendolia) is being interviewed about the old days by two rigid, jargon-spouting gender-studies majors.
The older men had disappointments – one was preparing for a career in the diplomatic service but, realizing his gayness would limit his advancement, decided to open a landscaping business instead. However, they try to explain to the uncomprehending college students that their lives together have basically been happy and fulfilling. The advances have been great, and necessary, but don’t dismiss what preceded them.
(”There was our New York, and then there was everybody else’s,” says one in fond remembrance, while the other notes wryly, “We’re a couple of non-threatening, assimilated homosexuals. We’re out, we’re proud, and nobody notices. It [bugs] me.”)
The evening is helped greatly by the sharp performances of the nine-man cast, under the direction of Trip Cullman. Even in the shorter scenes, the actors quickly stamp the characters as individuals, largely avoiding the trap of stereotyping. In addition to the amusing Amendolia and Greenspan, Frederick Weller and Kelly AuCoin stand out, with Randy Redd contributing significantly on the piano.
Finally, there’s McNally’s writing. He’s gone over some of this territory before, in “Love! Valour! Compassion!,” but he presents his characters and ideas with grace and humor. And while a few scenes have a rote quality, most of them are lively and very immediate.
“Some Men” also comes with a message, simple but potent: People have the right not to be judged. They’re entitled to their lives and their histories.
Source: northjersey.com