Connect with us

Arts & Entertainment

Janis returns

Actress Davies stars again in Joplin-themed concert/theater mashup

Published

on

Janis Joplin, One Night with Janis Joplin, Arena, Mary Bridget Davies, Gay News, Washington Blade

‘One Night With Janis Joplin’
By Randy Johnson
Arena Stage
Mead Center for American Theater
Runs through Aug. 11
$40-$99 for various performances
Sundays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m.
Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m.
Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m.
arenastage.org

Few music lovers — relatively speaking — had a chance to see Janis Joplin live considering she died in 1970. It’s tempting to say that “One Night With Janis Joplin,” the gay-penned (by Randy Johnson) tribute show playing now at Arena Stage, is the next best thing to the now-impossible notion of going to a Joplin performance.

And while the show is that, it’s also not just a cheesy rock tribute show of the type we see given in honor of classic rock acts all the time. It’s its own musical/theatrical experience with singer/actress Mary Bridget Davies in the title role earning raves for her uncanny ability at not just channeling but recreating Joplin’s trademark gutbucket vocals.

The show was a hit at Arena last fall when nearly 20,000 people saw it in Washington. It’s had successful engagements in Portland, Cleveland and Pasadena, Calif., and will open on Broadway at the Lyceum Theatre in October.

Janis Joplin, One Night with Janis Joplin, Arena, Mary Bridget Davies, Gay News, Washington Blade

Mary Bridget Davies as Janis Joplin in ‘One Night With Janis Joplin.’ (Photo by Jim Cox; courtesy Arena)

Davies (34, straight and Helen Hayes Award-nominated for the role) whom we interviewed last year as well, took a few minutes with us by phone last week from her home in Cleveland to riff on everything from how the show has varied in different cities to why the Joplin allure remains undiminished decades after her untimely death. Her comments have been slightly edited for length.

 

WASHINGTON BLADE: How was the run at Arena versus other places you’ve played the show?

MARY BRIDGET DAVIES: Arena Stage runs like such a well-run ship. Nothing was ever a problem there. It was like summer camp for theater and we just had a really good time. I’m completely excited to come back.

 

BLADE: Some critics have said it seems like you were born to do this. Do you feel some cosmic destiny with Janis?

DAVIES: It’s weird, yeah, sometimes I do feel like she’s around. There are some accidental parallels too — frustrated attempts at college … she was just so free and I get to enjoy some of that. I mean, yes, I’m up there saying lines, I’m not just winging it, but she just had that wild abandon and I get to do that every night.

 

BLADE: Has the show changed since last fall?

DAVIES: Yes, it’s been evolving and getting tighter. We’re not like this tired old circus chorus walking in circles. We’ve had several little breaks so each time we come back excited to do it again. And I think we’ll enjoy it even more this time because the terrain is more familiar now.

 

BLADE: Have the crowd reactions varied much from city to city?

DAVIES: I was very, very nervous in Pasadena because it’s L.A., so anyone who was anyone came to the show. I mean, like, Cher was there one night. There was a lot of industry vibe there that gave it kind of a scary urgency. At Arena before, I would say we had the most forward people. People would try to get on the stage and dance. I kinda looked at the crew like, “Uh, what am I supposed to do here?” They would wrangle them off like in the Van Halen video. It’s kind of flattering that they were so moved they wanted to get up and jam but it does blur the lines a little. Secretly I was kinda OK with it as long as you don’t try to rip the mic out of my hand and say, “It’s my friend’s birthday.”

 

BLADE: Is it ever hard to find the balance between crowd interplay and performing it as a straight-up dramatic piece?

DAVIES: Yes. Like in Milwaukee we had this much smaller space with a modified thrust stage. It was almost more fun on one hand but also more intimidating too. If you had a bruise or something, they could see it, it was that close. As a performer you really shouldn’t let the crowd dictate the proceedings but there is something of that fourth wall break because this isn’t a straight-up dramatic piece or a musical. People don’t always realize that. They’ll be on their phone or act like they’re home watching TV. One dude went to sleep. I’m like, “Are you kidding me? This is really hard!” Another guy held a tablet on his lap and taped the entire show.

 

BLADE: I know technically that’s a no-no, but still, from a historical perspective, think how awful it would be if nobody had bootlegged any of Janis’s shows. We’d have so much less to go on. As long as somebody isn’t trying to profit off of it, isn’t there some value in stealth recording?

DAVIES: Oh yeah, in terms of my research and as a fan, I get that. The rock and roll part of me thinks that’s cool but then on the other hand with the copyright issues, you have to respect that too. You don’t want some 30-second barrage out of someone’s purse showing up on YouTube.

 

BLADE: As great a run as you’re having with this, is there some part of you that’s concerned about your entire persona and identity getting swallowed up by the myth of Janis?

DAVIES: I have people come up to me and say, “Aren’t you that Janis girl?” I wear it as a badge of honor. I think I’ve been able to maintain a balance. I just released my own album — which Arena has been very kind to let me sell at the shows — and I was nominated for a blues music award. And I take my down time to try to stay current within the industry. But you’re right, it can be a double-edged sword. … There may come a time when my heart’s not in it but for now I’m proud to be “the Janis girl.” If they were saying, “Hey, aren’t you the Ashley Simpson girl?” I’d be a lot more worried.

 

BLADE: Is part of the reason the show’s been such a hit is that people simply crave hearing Janis sing and this is as close as it gets at least for a live experience?

DAVIES: Yeah, I think there is some of that. It can be pretty overwhelming at times. People still go see Big Brother (Joplin’s old band) in droves, especially in Europe. People are crying. She died 43 years ago and people are still throwing themselves at my feet. Sometimes I’m like, “Whoah, I don’t know how to handle that.” I think people just miss her so much, they’ll take her any way they can get her. Other people come in rather skeptical but I always say, that’s fine. Go ahead and come in skeptical because then the end up leaving very happy.

Advertisement
FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM
SIGN UP FOR E-BLAST

Photos

PHOTOS: Pride on the Pier

Blade’s WorldPride celebration ends with fireworks show

Published

on

The Washington Blade's Pride on the Pier. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

The Washington Blade’s second day of Pride on the Pier at The Wharf DC ended with a fireworks show on Saturday, June 7. The fireworks show was presented by the Leonard-Litz LGBTQ Foundation.

(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)

The Washington Blade’s Pride on the Pier (Photo by Cedric Craig for Wild Side Media)
Continue Reading

Out & About

‘Lou’s Legacy’ to make TV debut next week

New documentary features Blade news reporter

Published

on

Lou Chibbaro, Jr. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

The new documentary “Lou’s Legacy: A Reporter’s Life at the ‘Washington Blade’” will make its broadcast TV premiere next week. 

WETA will broadcast Lou’s Legacy on Saturday, June 21 at 8 p.m. and Monday, June 23 at 9:30 p.m. Maryland Public Television will feature it on June 28 at 10 p.m. People anywhere in the U.S. can livestream the film at WETA.org, PBS.org, the PBS App, and on YouTube TV, Hulu + Live, and Amazon Prime. After the June 21 broadcast, viewers can stream the documentary on-demand on the PBS App, PBS.org, or WETA.org.

The documentary from Emmy-nominated D.C. filmmaker Patrick Sammon tells the story of the legendary Blade news reporter, Lou Chibbaro Jr., as he works on an article about the return of drag icon Donnell Robinson – also known as Ella Fitzgerald — to the Capital Pride stage. Donnell and Chibbaro reflect on their careers and discuss the ongoing backlash against the LGBTQ community, including laws targeting drag performers. 

Continue Reading

Movies

20 years later, we still can’t quit ‘Brokeback Mountain’

Iconic love story returns to theaters and it’s better than you remember

Published

on

Jake Gyllenhall and Heath Ledger in ‘Brokeback Mountain.’ (Photo courtesy of Focus Features)

When “Brokeback Mountain” was released in 2005, the world was a very different place.

Now, as it returns to the big screen (beginning June 20) in celebration of its 20th anniversary, it’s impossible not to look at it with a different pair of eyes. Since its release, marriage equality has become the law of the land; queer visibility has gained enough ground in our popular culture to allow for diverse queer stories to be told; openly queer actors are cast in blockbuster movies and ‘must-see’ TV, sometimes even playing queer characters. Yet, at the same time, the world in which the movie’s two “star-crossed” lovers live – a rural, unflinchingly conservative America that has neither place nor tolerance for any kind of love outside the conventional norm – once felt like a place that most of us wanted to believe was long gone; now, in a cultural atmosphere of resurgent, Trump-amplified stigma around all things diverse, it feels uncomfortably like a vision of things to come.

For those who have not yet seen it (and yes, there are many, but we’re not judging), it’s the epic-but-intimate tale of two down-on-their-luck cowboys – Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhall) – who, in 1963 Wyoming, take a job herding sheep on the titular mountain. There’s an unmistakable spark between them, and during their months-long shared isolation in the beautiful-but-harsh wilderness, they become lovers. They part ways when the job ends and go on about their lives; Ennis resolutely settles into a hardscrabble life with a wife (Michelle Williams) and kids, while Jack struggles to make ends meet as a rodeo rider until eventually marrying the daughter (Anne Hathaway) of a wealthy Texas businessman. Yet even as they struggle to maintain their separate lives, they reconnect, escaping together for “fishing trips” to continue their forbidden affair across two decades, even as the inevitable pressures and consequences of living a double life begin to take their toll.

Adapted from a novella by Annie Proulx, (in an Oscar-winning screenplay by co-producer Diana Ossana and acclaimed novelist Larry McMurtry), and helmed by gifted Taiwanese filmmaker Ang Lee (also an Oscar winner), the acclaim it earned two decades ago seems as well-deserved as ever, if not more so. With Lee bringing an “outsider’s eye” to both its neo-western setting and its distinctly American story of stolen romance and cultural repression, “Brokeback” maintains an observational distance, uninfluenced by cultural assumptions, political narratives, or traditional biases. We experience Ennis and Jack’s relationship on their terms, with the purely visceral urgency of instinct; there are no labels, neither of them identifies as “queer” – in fact, they both deny it, though we know it’s likely a feint – nor do they ever mention words like “acceptance, “equality,” or “pride.” Indeed, they have no real vocabulary to describe what they are to each other, only a feeling they dare not name but cannot deny.

In the sweeping, pastoral, elegiac lens of Lee’s perceptive vision, that feeling becomes palpable. It informs everything that happens between them, and extends beyond them to impact the lives they are forced to maintain apart from each other. It’s a feeling that’s frequently tormented, sometimes violent, and always passionate; and while they never speak the word to each other, the movie’s famous advertising tagline defines it well enough: “Love is a force of nature.”

Yet to call “Brokeback” a love story is to ignore its shadow side, which is essential to its lasting power. Just as we see love flowing through the events and relationships we observe, we also witness the resistant force that opposes it, working in the shadows to twisting love against itself, compelling these men to hide themselves in fear and shame behind the safety of heterosexual marriage, wreaking emotional devastation on their wives, and eventually driving a wedge between them that will bring their story to a (spoiler alert, if one is required for a 20-year-old film) heartbreaking conclusion. That force, of course, is homophobia, and it’s the hidden – though far from invisible – villain of the story. Just as with Romeo and Juliet, it’s not love that creates the problem; it’s hate.

As for that ending, it’s undeniably a downer, and there are many gay men who have resisted watching the movie precisely because they fear its famously tragic outcome will hit a little too close to home. We can’t say we blame them. 

For those who can take it, however, it’s a film of incandescent beauty, rendered not just through the breathtaking visual splendor of Rodrigo Prieto’s cinematography, but through the synthesis of all its elements – especially the deceptively terse screenplay, which reveals vast chasms of feeling in the gaps between its homespun words, and the effectiveness of its cast in delivering it to performance. Doubtless the closeness between most of its principal players was a factor in their chemistry – Ledger and Gyllenhall were already friends, and Ledger and Williams began a romantic relationship during filming which would lead to the birth of their daughter. Both Williams and Hathaway bring out the truth of their characters, each of them earning our empathy and driving home the point that they are victims of homophobia, too. 

As for the two stars, their chemistry is deservedly legendary. Ledger’s tightly strung, near-inarticulate Ennis is a masterclass in method acting on the screen, with Gyllenhall’s brighter, more open-hearted Jack serving in perfectly balanced contrast. They are yin and yang to each other, and when they finally consummate their desires in that infamous and visceral tent scene, what we remember is the intensity of their passion, not the prurient details of their coupling – which are, in truth, more suggested than shown. Later, when growing comfort allows them to be tender with each other, it feels just as authentic. Though neither Ledger nor Gyllenhall identified as gay or bisexual, their comfort and openness to the emotional truth of the love story they were cast to play is evident in every moment they spend on the screen, and it’s impossible to think of the movie being more perfect with anyone else but them.

What made “Brokeback” a milestone, apart from the integrity and commitment of its artistry, was that it emerged as a challenge to accepted Hollywood norms, simply by telling a sympathetic story about same-sex love without judgment, stereotype, identity politics, or any agenda beyond simple humanistic compassion. It was the most critically acclaimed film of the year, and one of the most financially successful; though it lost the Oscar for Best Picture (to “Crash,” widely regarded as one of the Academy’s most egregious errors), it hardly mattered. The precedent had been set, and the gates had been opened, and the history of queer cinema in mainstream Hollywood was forevermore divided into two eras – before and after “Brokeback Mountain.”

Still, its “importance” is not really the reason to revisit it all these years later. The reason is that, two decades later, it’s still a beautiful, deeply felt and emotionally authentic piece of cinema, and no matter how good you thought it was the first time, it’s even better than you remember it.

It’s just that kind of movie.

Continue Reading

Popular