Arts & Entertainment
Theatrical highs
Many stellar gay-helmed productions infused D.C. stage scene


Delia Taylor as Winnie in WSC Avant Bard’s production of Samuel Beckett’s ‘Happy Days.’ (Photo by Dru Sefton; courtesy WSC)
It was a particularly good year for Washington theater. Included among the many solid offerings were numerous shows made by and about LGBT people.
Woolly Mammoth presented works by rising gay playwrights Robert O’Hara and Samuel D. Hunter. O’Hara’s autobiographical comedy “Bootycandy,” about growing up black and gay in America, follows the misadventures of young Sutter as he grapples with finding his place in the world and his own burgeoning sexuality. O’Hara — who also directed — led a terrific design team and got some great comedic performances from a talented five-person ensemble who portrayed a much larger number of characters ranging in age, portrayed many more characters ranging in age, sexual orientation and gender.
Hunter’s “A Bright New Boise” is a dark comedy set in the break room of a big box store in Idaho. Woolly’s production was staged by gay director John Vreeke and featured an finely drawn performance from gay actor Michael Russotto.
Leading dramatists were honored. In the spring, Arena Stage celebrated the work of Edward Albee with a festival featuring the gay playwright’s entire canon (mostly staged readings). The festival’s centerpiece were fully staged productions of Albee’s searing domestic drama “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” which starred Tracy Letts and Amy Morton as the boozy, battling spouses George and Martha; and Albee’s more recent work “At Home at the Zoo,” a riveting peek into the lives of three New Yorkers.
At the same time, the Georgetown University Theater and Performance Studies Program presented an equally ambitious celebration of another gay playwright’s stunning oeuvre: the Tennessee Williams Centennial Festival (Tenn Cent Fest for short). Included in the extensive, multidisciplinary program was a production of “The Glass Menagerie” featuring Sarah Marshall, who is gay, as the former Southern belle matriarch Amanda Wingfield, who’s based on the playwright’s overbearing mother.
In May, the Kennedy Center presented “Follies” (gay composer Stephen Sondheim’s paean to ex-chorines and messy relationships) starring Bernadette Peters. Staged by local gay director Eric Schaeffer, it was a little uneven but boasted a sublime second act. Since its run here, an improved version of the same production moved on to Broadway and is slated for a limited Los Angeles run in the spring.
At Synetic Theater, gay actor Philip Fletcher continued to do amazing things with his body during 2011. A longtime regular with the movement-based theater group, Fletcher played Edmund in a stunning, punk rock “King Lear” in April, and in October he reprised his role as the most maniacal third of a triadic Iago in “Othello.”
At WSC Avant Bard in Rosslyn, director Jose Carrasquillo directed Delia Taylor (both gay) in a splendid production of Samuel Beckett’s daunting “Happy Days.” Tony Cisek — also gay — designed the set. In fact, Cisek designed sets for many productions throughout the year including Ford’s “Parade,” Folger’s “Othello” and “After the Fall” at Theatre J.
Other news from 2011: The Shakespeare Theatre Company’s gay artistic director Michael Kahn celebrated 25 years at the troupe’s helm; legendary (and lanky) Broadway choreographer Tommy Tune came to town to accept the Helen Hayes Tribute for an exceptionally successful career in theater; award-winning local actor Holly Twyford (who is gay) made an impressive directing debut at No Rules Theater Company with “Stop Kiss.” On a sadder note,Ganymede Arts, Washington’s only gay-specific theater closed, citing straightened finances as the main reason. The company was known for successfully staging works of special interest in LGBT audiences and for four years, it held fun fall arts festival, which attracted cool notables like Karen Black, Charles Busch and Holly Woodlawn.
For Helen Hayes Award-winning actor and DC theater scene veteran Rick Hammerly, 2011 was an especially busy and professionally fulfilling year. In addition to acting in the Kennedy Center’s long-running “Shear Madness,” the Tenn Cent Festival’s “And Tell Sad Stories of the Deaths of Queens…,”and most recently as Mr. Fezziwig in “A Christmas Carol” at Ford’s Theatre, he also produced “Magnificent Waste” for Factory 449, a progressive theater company that he and a small group of other theater artists founded several years ago.
And in what Hammerly describes as the highlight of his year, he staged a timely production of “Dead Men Walking” at American University in the fall. The play was created for universities by Tim Robbins through his Dead Man Walking School Theatre Project. It closely follows Robbins’ 1995 award winning film adaptation of the book by Sister Helen Prejean, based on her time spent with Death Row inmates.
“The experience gave me the opportunity to introduce the students to the power of theater — what it can really accomplish if you’re tackling things that are current. We used the story of Troy Anthony Davis’ execution in the play to tie what’s taking place on stage to something that is actually happening in the world. It demonstrated the strength of art and theater.”
Theater
Trans performer, juggler premiering one-woman show

Circus of the Self
May 29-June 6
Spooky Action Theater
1810 16th St., N.W.
Pay-What-You-Can: May 2
All other performances: $35
Spookyaction.org
For Lucy Eden, tricks have proved a way into theater.
The Oakland, Calif.-based trans performer and juggler is premiering her one-woman show “Circus of the Self” at Spooky Action Theater in conjunction with WorldPride.
Directed by Spooky Action’s artistic director Elizabeth Dinkova, the autobiographical busking show is a unique blend of circus and serious storytelling.
Juggler first met director several years ago in Atlanta. Eden explains, “She was working at a theater down the street from the juggling club where I spent a lot of time. She needed people for a street fair. I agreed. Another collaboration soon followed.”
Previously, Eden had worked mostly as a roaming performer at Atlanta corporate events and street style pre-game shows for the Braves: “Those environments were a good way to work on material, to learn what tricks make people stop their talking and turn their attention to me,” she says.
Now based in Oakland, Calif., Eden, 40, has created a 77-minute-long one-woman show infused with burlesque, expert juggling, and a personal, sometimes difficult, story.
While she hesitates to say it’s the obligation of all trans people to tell their stories, she says, “In these times, if you get the opportunity, I believe you ought to take it.”
Recently, she took a break from preparations, to talk life and showbiz.
BLADE: How exactly did you learn circus tricks?
EDEN: I’m autodidactic. I taught myself to juggle in the last semester of college. Things had gone wrong and I was looking for distraction. So, when I found a “three ball learn to juggle” kit, I never looked back. That lead to advanced juggling, unicycling, and balancing objects on my face.
Things began to look up. Today, I try to resist everything in my life going back to circus tricks, it almost always does.
BLADE: It sounds almost preordained.
EDEN: For sure. It changed everything. Circus skills force you to face your own failure. When you drop a ball, you can’t convince yourself or the audience that it didn’t happen. Performing, like life, forces you to develop capacities to deal with internal and external failures.
It teaches us not take ourselves, societal rules, or the idea of what’s success too seriously.
BLADE: Juggling at a cocktail party to baring your past before a rapt audience must be quite a stretch.
EDEN: It is, but rather than making a dramatic leap, I leveraged the fun and draw of circus to engage people in a more difficult conversation.
BLADE: Spooky Action’s website warns about “frank discussions of transphobia and mental health.”
EDEN: Well yeah, I grew up in rural Georgia in the 1990s. You can only imagine. Trans is integral to my identity, and a hot button term right now. I think everyone sees and hears a lot of things about trans people that don’t in fact come from actual trans people.
A big part of why I wrote this show and brought it to D.C. is because I really want audiences to have as intimate and revealing look at me as a trans persona as I can give them. I think it’s only through knowing that we can get beyond all the noise, misinformation, and fear mongering.
BLADE: Lately I hear a lot of artists bandying about the term “queer joy.” Woolly’s website uses the term in describing aspects of your show. What does it mean to you?
EDEN: It’s an important thingfor us all to be focused on right now, but we’re in a place where joy is hard to access. So, to me, it’s complex; it’s an important yet nuanced pursuit.
BLADE: As a part of the vast and promising WorldPride (through June 8) entertainment lineup, what makes your show stand out?
EDEN: It’s fun. I wrote “Circus of the Self” with a queer audience in mind. I spend a lot of time and creative energy performing for a general audience. I want this to be different. As far as I know, there’s nothing quite like my show out there.
There are a lot of shows that are a combination of storytelling and circus parts but they tend to be surface level entertainment. I think of this as more standup with circus layered on; it’s modeled after queer comedians like Hannah Gadsby and Tig Notaro whose work is driven more by personality than jokes.
I have tried to write a show for a queer audience. It has all the things I need to see for myself but never have.
Movies
‘Things Like This’ embraces formula and plus-size visibility
Enjoyable queer romcom challenges conventions of the genre

There’s a strange feeling of irony about a spring movie season stacked with queer romcoms – a genre that has felt conspicuously absent on the big screen since the disappointing reception met by the much-hyped “Bros” in 2022 – at a time when pushback against LGBTQ visibility is stronger than it’s been for 40 years.
Sure, part of the reason is the extended timeline required for filmmaking, which tells us, logically, that the numerous queer love stories hitting theaters this year – including the latest, the Manhattan-set indie “Things Like This,” which opened in limited theaters last weekend – began production long before the rapid cultural shift that has taken place in America since a certain convicted fraudster’s return to the White House.
That does not, however, make them any less welcome; on the contrary, they’re a refreshing assertion of queer existence that serves to counter-balance the hateful, politicized rhetoric that continues to bombard our community every day. In fact, the word “refreshing” is an apt description of “Things Like This,” which not only celebrates the validity – and joy – of queer love but does so in a story that disregards “Hollywood” convention in favor of a more authentic form of inclusion than we’re ever likely to see in a mainstream film
Written, starring, and directed by Max Talisman and set against the vibrant backdrop of New York City, it’s the story of two gay men named Zack – Zack #1 (Talisman) is a plus-sized hopeful fantasy author with a plus-sized personality and a promising-but-unpublished first novel, and Zack #2 (Joey Pollari) an aspiring talent agent dead-ended as an assistant to his exploitative “queen-bee” boss (Cara Buono) – who meet at an event and are immediately attracted to each other. Though Zack #2 is resigned to his unsatisfying relationship with longtime partner Eric (Taylor Trensch), he impulsively agrees to a date the following night, beginning an on-again/off-again entanglement that causes both Zacks to re-examine the trajectories of their respective lives – and a lot of other heavy baggage – even as their tentative and unlikely romance feels more and more like the workings of fate.
Like most romcoms, it relies heavily on familiar tropes – adjusted for queerness, of course – and tends to balance its witty banter and starry-eyed sentiment with heart-tugging setbacks and crossed-wire conflicts, just to raise the stakes. The Zacks’ attempts at getting together are a series of “meet-cutes” that could almost be described as fractal, yet each of them seems to go painfully awry – mostly due to the very insecurities and self-doubts which make them perfect for each other. The main obstacle to their couplehood, however, doesn’t spring from these mishaps; it’s their own struggles with self-worth that stand in the way, somehow making theirs more of a quintessentially queer love story than the fact that both of them are men.
All that introspection – relatable as it may be – can be a downer without active energy to stir things up, but fortunately for “Things Like This,” there are the inevitable BFFs and extended circle of friends and family that can help to get the fun back on track. Each Zack has his own support team backing him up, from a feisty “work wife” (Jackie Cruz, “Orange is the New Black”) to a straight best friend (Charlie Tahan, “Ozark”) to a wise and loving grandma (veteran scene-stealer Barbara Barrie, “Breaking Away” and countless vintage TV shows) – that fuels the story throughout, providing the necessary catalysts to prod its two neurotic protagonists into taking action when they can’t quite get there themselves.
To be sure, Talisman’s movie – his feature film debut as a writer and director – doesn’t escape the usual pitfalls of the romcom genre. There’s an overall sense of “wish fulfillment fantasy” that makes some of its biggest moments seem a bit too good to be true, and there are probably two or three complications too many as it approaches its presumed happy ending; in addition, while it helps to drive the inner conflict for Zack #2’s character arc, throwing a homophobic and unsupportive dad (Eric Roberts) into the mix feels a bit tired, though it’s hard to deny that such family relationships continue to create dysfunction for queer people no matter how many times they’re called out in the movies – which means that it’s still necessary, regrettably, to include them in our stories.
And in truth, “calling out” toxic tropes – the ones that reflect society’s negative assumptions and perpetuate them through imitation – is part of Talisman’s agenda in “Things Like This,” which devotes its very first scene to shutting down any objections from “fat shamers” who might decry the movie’s “opposites attract” scenario as unbelievable. Indeed, he has revealed in interviews that he developed the movie for himself because of the scarcity of meaningful roles for plus-sized actors, and his desire to erase such conventional prejudices extends in every direction within his big-hearted final product.
Even so, there’s no chip-on-the-shoulder attitude to sour the movie’s spirit; what helps us get over its sometimes excessive flourishes of idealized positivity is that it’s genuinely funny. The dialogue is loaded with zingers that keep the mood light, and even the tensest scenes are laced with humor, none of which feels forced. For this, kudos go to Talisman’s screenplay, of course, but also to the acting – including his own. He’s eminently likable onscreen, with wisecracks that land every time and an underlying good cheer that makes his appeal even more visible; crucially, his chemistry with Pollari – who also manages to maintain a lightness of being at his core no matter how far his Zack descends into uncertainty – isn’t just convincing; it’s enviable.
Cruz is the movie’s “ace in the hole” MVP as Zack #2’s under-appreciated but fiercely loyal bestie, and Buono’s hilariously icy turn as his “boss from hell” makes for some of the film’s most memorable scenes. Likewise, Tahan, along with Margaret Berkowitz and Danny Chavarriaga, flesh out Zack #1’s friend group with a real sense of camaraderie that should be recognizable to anyone who’s ever been part of an eclectic crew of misfits. Trensch’s comedic “ickiness” as Zack #2’s soon-to-be-ex makes his scenes a standout; and besides bigger-name “ringers” Roberts and Barrie (whose single scene is the emotional climax of the movie), there’s also a spotlight-grabbing turn by Diane Salinger (iconic as Francophile dreamer Simone in “Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure”) as the owner of a queer bar where the Zacks go on one of their dates.
With all that enthusiasm and a momentum driven by a sense of DIY empowerment, it’s hard to be anything but appreciative of “Things Like This,” no matter how much some of us might cringe at its more unbelievable romcom devices. After all, it’s as much a “feel-good” movie as it is a love story, and the fact that we actually do feel good when the final credits role is more than enough to earn it our hearty recommendation.

Friday, May 23
“Center Aging Monthly Luncheon and Yoga” will be at 12 p.m. in person at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. For more details, email [email protected].
Trans Discussion Group will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This group is intended to provide an emotionally and physically safe space for trans people and those who may be questioning their gender identity and/or expression. For more details, email [email protected].
Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Happy Hour” at 7 p.m. at DIK Bar. This event is ideal for making new friends, professional networking, idea-sharing, and community building. This event is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Saturday, May 24
Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Brunch” at 11 a.m. at Freddie’s Beach Bar and Restaurant. This fun weekly event brings the DMV area LGBTQ community, including Allies, together for delicious food and conversation. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.
Black Lesbian Mixer will be at 11 a.m. on Zoom. This is a support group dedicated to the joys of being a Black lesbian. For more details, email [email protected].
Sunday, May 25
“The Queen’s Table: A Women’s Empowerment Brunch” will be at 11 a.m. at Zooz. This event will celebrate queer women’s strength. For more details visit Eventbrite.
Monday, May 26
“Center Aging Monday Coffee and Conversation” will be at 10 a.m. on Zoom. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ+ adults. Guests are encouraged to bring a beverage of choice. For more details, email [email protected].
Tuesday, May 27
Genderqueer DC will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is a support group for people who identify outside of the gender binary. Whether you’re bigender, agender, genderfluid, or just know you’re not 100 percent cis — this is your group. For more details, visit genderqueerdc.org or Facebook.
Coming Out Discussion Group will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This support group is a safe space to share experiences about coming out and discuss topics as it relates to doing so. For more details, visit the group’s Facebook.
Wednesday, May 28
Job Club will be at 6 p.m. on Zoom. This is a weekly job support program to help job entrants and seekers, including the long-term unemployed, improve self-confidence, motivation, resilience and productivity for effective job searches and networking — allowing participants to move away from being merely “applicants” toward being “candidates.” For more information, email [email protected] or visit thedccenter.org/careers.
Thursday, May 29
The DC Center’s Fresh Produce Program will be held all day at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. To be fairer with who is receiving boxes, the program is moving to a lottery system. People will be informed on Wednesday at 5 p.m. if they are picked to receive a produce box. No proof of residency or income is required. For more information, email [email protected] or call 202-682-2245.
Virtual Yoga with Charles M. will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is a free weekly class focusing on yoga, breathwork, and meditation. For more details, visit the DC Center for the LGBT Community’s website.
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