Arts & Entertainment

Mistakes of memory

Tight ‘Old Times’ production explores longing and frustration

Published

13 years ago

June 2, 2011

Both Kate’s husband and her closest female friend want to possess her and her past.

Obsessed with memories, the rivals have shaped recollections stressing their respective importance in Kate’s life. Whether their stories are even a little bit true is unclear, but in Harold Pinter’s enigmatic “Old Times,” now in production at Shakespeare Theatre Company, veracity takes a back seat to the power of relationships and the mistiness of memory.

Seated in the starkly white living room of their quiet seaside home, Deeley (Steven Culp), a successful filmmaker, and his beautiful wife Kate (Tracy Lynn Middendorf) discuss the imminent visit of Anna (Holly Twyford), an old friend whom Kate hasn’t seen in 20 years and her husband has never met. In fact, Deeley knows precious little about Anna, and the tidbits his wife has offered — that Anna is not only her oldest but also her only friend; that they were once flat mates in London; that she used to steal Kate’s underpants – have done nothing to endear her to him.

Anna arrives. Over drinks (and cigarettes), she and Deeley genteelly set to battle while Kate curled up on the couch like a cat looks on rather amusedly. Initially Anna – witty and sociable — recounts the fun times she and Kate shared as single young women in London. In reply, Deeley relays how he first met Kate at a grungy cinema where they’d both gone to see the aptly titled “Odd Man Out.” Anna remembers things differently. She says she saw the film with Kate but Deeley wasn’t there. Eventually, the conversation escalates into a heated contest of who knows Kate best. They even compete in singing the half-forgotten lyrics of Kate’s favorite old songs.

When Kate leaves the room to bathe, Deeley says he remembers Anna from their London days. He claims they drank at the same pub, and one night he even peeked up her skirt at a party. Initially Anna says it can’t be true, but then changes her tune, admitting she was at the party wearing Kate’s underwear. What to believe? At one point Anna says, “There are some things one remembers even though they may never have happened.”

While Deeley’s stories about Kate are tinged with sex (he tends to objectify her), Anna’s intimate moments/memories are more gentle — she strokes Kate’s arm while asking if she might draw her bath or read aloud to her. Anna now lives as expat with her husband in Sicily, or so she says. Here, very little is for certain. But clearly she was at one time — or still is — in love with Kate and Kate seems to respond positively to her expressions of tenderness. Feeling relegated to third wheel status, Deeley grows increasingly angry and is ultimately reduced to heaving sobs.

Impeccably staged by Shakepeare’s gay artistic director Michael Kahn, the production is taut and very funny. The three-person cast is first rate. Making her debut at Shakespeare, Twyford (who is also gay) handles the brief, precise Pinter dialogue beautifully, and rather hilariously fills the playwright’s well-known pauses with expectant frozen smiles.

Jane Greenwood’s costumes nicely illustrate Anna and Kate’s differences: In addition to a slick chignon, the former wears a rather severe dress with a bow at her throat while the latter’s casual peach clothes and loose-fitting pink robe describe a softer, less dramatic person. Deeley is appropriately tweedy as the accomplished documentarian relaxing away from town.

Walt Spangler’s bright white set makes a perfect blank slate on which to scribble and erase memories, real and imagined.

Nightlife

Ed Bailey brings Secret Garden to Project GLOW festival

An LGBTQ-inclusive dance space at RFK this weekend

Published

1 hour ago

April 26, 2024

Evan Caplan

Ed Bailey's set at last year's Project Glow. (Photo courtesy Bailey)

When does a garden GLOW? When it’s run by famed local gay DJ Ed Bailey.

This weekend, music festival Project GLOW at RFK Festival Grounds will feature Bailey’s brainchild the Secret Garden, a unique space just for the LGBTQ community that he launched in 2023.

While Project GLOW, running April 27-28, is a stage for massive electronic DJ sets in a large outdoor space, Secret Garden is more intimate, though no less adrenaline-forward. He’s bringing the nightclub to the festival. The garden is a dance area that complements the larger stages, but also stands on its own as a draw for festival-goers. Its focus is on DJs that have a presence and following in the LGBTQ audience world.

“The Secret Garden is a showcase for what LGBTQ nightlife, and nightclubs in general, are all about,” he says. “True club DJs playing club music for people that want to dance in a fun environment that is high energy and low stress. It’s the cool party inside the bigger party.”

Project GLOW launched in 2022. Bailey connected with the operators after the first event, and they discussed Bailey curating his own space for 2023. “They were very clear that they wanted me to lean into the vibrant LGBTQ nightlife of D.C. and allow that community to be very visibly a part of this area.”

Last year, club icon Kevin Aviance headlined the Secret Garden. The GLOW festival organizers loved the its energy from last year, and so asked Bailey to bring it back again, with an entire year to plan.

This year, Bailey says, he is “bringing in more D.C. nightlife legends.” Among those are DJ Sedrick, “a DJ and entertainer legend. He was a pivotal part of Tracks nightclub and is such a dynamic force of entertainment,” says Bailey. “I am excited for a whole new audience to be able to experience his very special brand of DJing!”

Also, this year brings in Illustrious Blacks, a worldwide DJ duo with roots in D.C.; and “house music legends” DJs Derrick Carter and DJ Spen.

Bailey is focusing on D.C.’s local talent, with a lineup including Diyanna Monet, Strikestone!, Dvonne, Baronhawk Poitier, THABLACKGOD, Get Face, Franxx, Baby Weight, and Flower Factory DJs KS, Joann Fabrixx, and PWRPUFF.

Secret Garden also brings in performers who meld music with dance, theater, and audience interactions for a multi-sensory experience.

Bailey is an owner of Trade and Number Nine, and was previously an owner of Town Danceboutique. Over the last 35 years, Bailey owned and operated more than 10 bars and clubs in D.C. He has an impressive resume, too. Since starting in 1987, he’s DJ’d across the world for parties and nightclubs large and intimate. He says that he opened “in concert for Kylie Minogue, DJed with Junior Vasquez, played giant 10,000-person events, and small underground parties.” He’s also held residencies at clubs in Atlanta, Miami, and here in D.C. at Tracks, Nation, and Town.

With Secret Garden, Bailey and GLOW aim to bring queer performers into the space not just for LGBTQ audiences, but for the entire music community to meet, learn about, and enjoy. While they might enjoy fandom among queer nightlife, this Garden is a platform for them to meet the entirety of GLOW festival goers.

Weekend-long Project GLOW brings in headliners and artists from EDM and electronic music, with big names like ILLENIUM, Zedd, and Rezz. In all, more than 50 artists will take the three stages at the third edition of Project GLOW, presented by Insomniac (Electric Daisy Carnival) and Club Glow (Echostage, Soundcheck).

Out & About

Washington Improv Theatre hosts ‘The Queeries’

Event to celebrate queer DMV talent and pop culture camp

Published

2 hours ago

April 26, 2024

Tinashe Chingarande

The Washington Improv Theatre, along with the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs and the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington DC, will team up to host “The Queeries!” on Friday, April 26 at 9:30 p.m. at Studio Theatre.

The event will celebrate Queer DMV talent and pop culture camp. With a mixture of audience-submitted nominations and blatantly undemocratically declared winners, “The Queeries!” mimics LGBTQ life itself: unfair, but far more fun than the alternative.

The event will be co-hosted by Birdie and Butchie, who have invited some of their favorite bent winos, D.C. “D-listers,” former Senate staffers, and other stars to sashay down the lavender carpet for the selfie-strewn party of the year.

Tickets are just $15 and can be purchased on WITV’s website.