Arts & Entertainment
‘The Handmaid’s Tale,’ ‘Dear White People’ are compelling new TV shows
‘The Handmaiden’s Tale,’ ‘Dear White People’ are compelling new TV shows
Logan Browning in ‘Dear White People,’ an uneven yet wortwhile new show that premieres this week. (Photo courtesy Netflix)
This week, the resistance comes to streaming TV. Even though these exciting series were in production long before last November’s election, they’ve gained relevance as the new administration reaches the 100-day mark.
The first series is the stunning new adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s revolutionary novel “The Handmaid’s Tale” which premiered on Hulu this week. The story is set in the all-too-near future. In a world where environmental calamities have caused the birthrate to plummet, extreme right-wing Christian fundamentalists have overthrown the U.S. government and established a totalitarian theocracy called Gilead in its place.
Gay men and other enemies of the regime are summarily executed. Women are not allowed to read and are strictly color coded by function. Wives of the elite are dressed in blue; “Marthas” (domestic servants) are dressed in green; and, “Handmaidens” are dressed in red. The Handmaidens, the only remaining fertile women, are forced into sexual slavery, serving as concubines for the ruling Commanders and the Wives.
“The Handmaid’s Tale” is narrated by Offred (Elisabeth Moss) who is the Handmaiden for the “Commander” (Joseph Fiennes) and his wife Serena Joy (Yvonne Strahovski). Moss (“Mad Men”) turns in a brilliant performance in a role of staggering physical and emotional demands. She not only turns in a wonderfully subtle turn as the seemingly composed and serene Handmaiden whose understated gestures convey a world of meaning, but also provides a vibrant voice-over narration and plays “June” in flashbacks of life before the establishment of Gilead.
The supporting cast, including Samira Wiley (“Orange is the New Black”) as June’s lesbian bff and Alexis Bledel (“Gilmore Girls”) as Offred’s companion. is uniformly excellent. Of special note is Ann Dowd who plays Aunt Lydia, one of the “Aunts” who indoctrinate the Handmaidens into their new lives. As a trainer, she is horrifically brutal, but as a midwife, she is surprisingly tender. The amazing ability of Atwood and series writer Bruce Miller to create such fascinating well-rounded characters is one of the great strengths and joys of the 10-episode series.
“Dear White People,” which premieres on Netflix on Friday, April 28, approaches contemporary politics from a more satiric angle. Based on the excellent 2014 movie of the same name by out writer/director Justin Simien, the 10-episode series wells the story of four black students at Winchester University, a predominantly white school. The movie covers freshman year; season one of the series covers sophomore year.
The same characters return (although most are played by different actors), but the continuity between the movie and the show is inconsistent. Troy (Brandon P. Bell) is the pot-smoking son of the dean, struggling to meet his father’s high expectations. Sam (Logan Browning) is the campus radical and host of the hard-hitting radio show that gives the series its name. Coco (Antoinette Robinson) is now an ambitious pre-law student. Lionel (DeRon Horton) is uneasily juggling his identities as a gay man, a journalist, an activist and a black man.
Unfortunately, the series suffers from sophomore slump. The first four episodes are mired in repetitive exposition, rehashing the grotesque blackface party that ends the movie. The series start to gain some traction in episode five, but it doesn’t really catch fire until the final episode (which was written and directed by Simien himself). The writing and directing of the other episodes (shared between several people) is uneven, often lacking the style and substance that made the movie such a delight.
Despite these flaws, the series is still worth watching. Simien and his creative team raise issues that need to be discussed. They are trenchant observers of our contemporary political climate and thoughtfully examine the messy intersections of race, class, gender and sexuality. The acting is strong and there are flashes of great writing.
Superstar Dolly Parton died on Tuesday at a Nashville hospital. She was 80.
The Human Rights Campaign and Lambda Legal are among the groups that mourned the long-time LGBTQ ally’s passing.
“We are heartbroken by Dolly’s passing,” said HRC President Kelley Robinson in a statement. “She showed the world what it looks like to lead with love and stood with our community long before others in entertainment, using her voice and platform to create a world where LGBTQ+ people feel seen and celebrated. Her music and her spirit touched millions; and her generosity, especially toward children, will be felt for generations. We will miss her dearly, and we will carry forward the light she shared with all of us.”
The Washington Blade will update this story.
Theater
New GALA show about WWII spy full of conflict, intrigue
‘GARBO: The Actor Who Saved the World’ an inspired true story
‘Garbo: The Actor Who Saved the World’
Sept. 3-27
GALA Hispanic Theatre
3333 14th St., NW
$25-$50
galatheatre.org
Conflict, intrigue, and abundant imagination – all the elements for an extraordinary story. Add real-life Spanish spy Juan Pujol García who worked as a double agent loyal to the United Kingdom against Nazi Germany during World War II to the mix and it’s truly inspired.
Code-named “Garbo” by the British (a nod to his acting prowess), the anti-fascist’s mission took him from Madrid to Lisbon and later a London suburb where he created fictitious reports while unassumingly blending in with middle-class commuters.
By inventing a phony spy network of 27 agents with intricate backstories and tales of espionage worthy of Balzac’s pen, Garbo convinced Hitler’s generals that the D-Day invasion would hit Calais instead of Normandy, saving thousands of lives along the way.
And now the tale unfolds on stage in “GARBO: The Actor Who Saved the World,” a premiere thriller at GALA Hispanic penned by GALA artistic director Gustavo Ott, staged by Cuban director Carlos Celdrán, and starring out actor Kevin Jorges in the title role.
When Jorges was tapped to play Garbo, he (like the rest of the cast) was utterly unfamiliar with the play’s cunning protagonist.
But that changed quickly. Jorges, 37, has immersed himself in the biography and become increasingly interested and somewhat enamored with the character.
Charismatic with an easy smile and rich, warm voice, Jorges says he had to put aside his sensibility as a gay man in order to portray Garbo, who was a straight, patriarchal figure. But he also embraced similarities with the spy, like their shared aversion to physical violence.
And Jorges cites what he finds a pivotal moment: Garbo says to his British MI5 case officer and handler Thomas Harris (played by gay GALA veteran Carlos Castillo) that after what they’ve been through, neither will be what they once wanted to be. They are changed. They’ll never be the same.
Performed at 90 minutes in Spanish with user friendly English surtitles, “Garbo” is about imagination as resistance. “It’s also about a theatrical vocation that went unfulfilled,” says Ott. “That is perhaps the greatest disappointment of modernity: the insurmountable obstacles a vocation faces.
“Through his imagination, Garbo attempts to reclaim his lost calling—that of being an artist—and in his new trade as a spy, he uses it as a lifeline.”
Ott adds, “Walt Whitman viewed imagination as a traveling companion. He could rely on it when he was alone, when he lost hope, and when life slammed every door shut.”
Jorges was was attracted to acting at an early age, but the murder of his father in Caracas in 1999, made it more than an interest, theater became a refuge that saved him from tragedy. Today, he believes that theater is a refuge for many Venezuelan artists, it’s a way for them to contribute to society despite difficult circumstances.
Despite enjoying a successful early career in Caracas with many roles and accolades, Jorges had no choice but to seek new horizons. Political turmoil and economic collapse prompted him to leave Caracas in 2019 for Spain where he worked outside of his profession for a few years.
The actor credits “migrant persistence” for his return to the stage. On New Year’s Eve in 2022, Jorges made a pilgrimage to the famous monument to Cervantes at Plaza de España in Madrid where he made a heartfelt wish to act again.
Soon after, Jorges was collaborating with playwright and director Elio Palencia on “Timón Of(f) Caracas,” a personal one-man adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Timon of Athens, reframing the universal themes of betrayal, excess, and misanthropy to mirror the sociopolitical realities of Venezuela. To much success and acclaim, the production toured important cities throughout Spain.
It was Palencia who suggested to GALA’s Ott that Jorges hop the pond to play Garbo in D.C.
While he once viewed each acting job as an opportunity, Jorges now sees them as gifts. And, he says, the part of Garbo is a gift filled with possibilities: “It’s wonderful performing in Spanish with English translation. I love the interaction of culture. I really enjoy seeing the way things are done at GALA. Maybe sometime I’ll be performing in English too.”
Books
Exploring Renée Richards’s life through lens of a trans author
Surprises await in new book about pioneering tennis star
‘Finding Renée Richards’
By Julie Kliegman
c.2026, HarperOne
$28.99/272 pages
Come on in, the water’s fine.
Wade into it up to your ankles, your calves, your waist, you’ll be OK. You’ll adjust to the waves that swirl around you so come on, dive in, it’s all good. As in the new book “Finding Renée Richards” by Julie Kliegman, that goes for swimming, and for controversy.
Assigned to do a story on books written by trans tennis great Renée Richards, Julie Kleigman read the books and became “transfixed by a woman who had fought so hard to simply live as who she had long known she was….”. Their editor had figured that, as a nonbinary and trans individual, Kleigman would have “something incisive to say…” in an article. Instead, once they met and began interviewing Richards, Kliegman was left frustrated.
Born in the late summer of 1934, Richard Henry Raskind seemed to have arrived with a tennis racket in his hand. His mother was a psychiatrist; his father was an orthopedic surgeon who hoped “Dick” would follow his footsteps but Raskind was drawn instead to ophthalmology and tennis. He was also irresistibly drawn to wearing women’s clothing.
His sister knew of this pull and Raskind eventually came out to both parents, but few others on the tennis circuit were aware. When Raskind visited his hometown of New York City, however, he enjoyed furtively going out in women’s clothing but he also tried to squash the desire; in the meantime, he fell in love, married, fathered a son, and eventually learned that it was possible to become the woman he knew he really was.
To continue playing tennis professionally was a bonus.
And right there were the disagreements Kleigman had with Richards.
Richards, “To this day… [makes] a point of describing herself as a woman, period,” says Kleigman, but she firmly acknowledged Richard, almost as a separate individual, insisting that Kleigman use “him/his” pronouns when describing her earlier life.
And as for tennis and trans women’s participation in the sport, Richards had something even more frustrating to say.
Take that as a fair warning: you might be equally surprised at what author Julie Kliegman uncovered in “Finding Renée Richards,” and you may be truly gobsmacked by reading opinions from other women about the topic of trans women in sports.
That’s the main, huge point of interest in this fascinating book; the other is Richards’s life as seen through the lens of a trans individual. Kleigman’s wrestling with the 90-year-old Richards’ firmly dug-in heels is, in itself, worth your time as a study of highly varying viewpoints. That Kleigman and Richards have both lived at least a part of trans history is somewhat of a key to understanding how this book unfolds, as Kleigman offers up Richards’s tale. Readers who are able to read between the lines will be riveted.
If you’re a sports fan and you have opinions, you must read this book – and that goes double if it’s tennis you love. Also check out “Finding Renée Richards” if you just want a raucously good and very fine read.
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Dolly Parton dies at 80
Monument to LGBTQ Canadians officially unveiled
The fight to save one of Baltimore’s last gay bars
When home becomes a journey: migration, memory, and the African diaspora
Gay-owned pizzeria in Dupont Circle burglarized
Trump-Vance administration’s LGBTQ brain drain: what you need to know
Not all trans people are the same
UPDATE: Impulse Group’s ‘PrEP Pool Party’ cancelled
Calendar: August 21-27
