#250706 ~ Political Plays, Gender Crossings, Enduring Legacies
Brian Eugenio Herrera's #TheatreClique Newsletter for July 6, 2025.
WELCOME to #TheatreClique — my emphatically intermittent newsletter dedicated to encouraging you to click out to some of the most interesting, intriguing & noteworthy writing about drama, theatre & performance (at least, so says me)…
This Week's #TheatreCliquery:
This installment of #TheatreClique links out to pieces that consider what makes a play a political play; the techniques and histories of gender crossing performance; and unexpectedly enduring legacies. And for this week’s opener, I lift a song that’s become one of my favorites of the year: Joy Oladokun’s “I’d Miss the Birds.” …and if clicking the image below routes to an error message, try clicking here.
EDITOR’S NOTE: whenever possible, whenever linking to paywalled pieces, I try to “gift” the article to #TheatreClique readers. In other words, clicking out to articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, Atlantic, and Wall Street Journal should neither present hassle nor burn through your current allotment of free views. Here’s hoping more outlets — hello LATimes! hi NewYorkMagazine! yo NewYorker!— adopt similar technologies for subscribers soon...
#NowClickThis…
Wherein I highlight a handful of the most click-worthy links I’ve encountered in the last few…
at The Arts Fuse, playwright/memoirist Dan O’Brien shares an excerpt from his latest pamphlet: “40 Questions About a Political Play”;
at Did You Sleep with the Models, writer/editor Sam Staggs recalls the work of Charles Ludlam — aka “the greatest male actress of all time” — and show how Ludlam’s work was documented in 1980s gay adult magazines;
actor/musician/comedian Douglas Goodhart offers his incisive, two-part tutorial on the essential “Musical Theatre Acting Moves" (Part 1, Part 2);
at Elle, John Proctor Is the Villain playwright Kimberly Belflower digs into why Lorde’s “Green Light” is the ultimate coming-of-age anthem;
WHYY’s Peter Crimmins reports on the ways Philly theater companies are exploring long-term collaborative producing models;
at SPACES, arts writer & memoirist Tanya Ward Goodman reflects on how the collaborative spirit of artistic practice can become an enduring legacy;
The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Rosa Cartagena profiles Philly Drag King Henlo Bullfrog.
Thoughts from That One “Critic” Who Likes Everything:
Wherein I offer capsule reviews of what I liked best — my HIGH-LIKES if you will — about the shows I’ve recently engaged...
#87: frikiNation
Book by Krystal Ortiz; Music & Lyrics by EsKoria • Directed by Rula A. Muñoz • NYC, Off-Off-Broadway : National Queer Theater @ HERE Arts • June 2025.
A potent bilingual rock musical that riffs on the extraordinary story of los frikis — the punk rock subculture that emerged in Cuba in the 1980s and, notoriously, included some who intentionally exposed themselves to HIV infection in order to be quarantined in state-run AIDS “sanatoriums” where they would receive food, shelter, and heath-care. Richly scaffolded by the propulsive songs of underground Cuban rock band EsKoria — translation “scum” or “dregs”; also “immoral person” — Krystal Ortiz’s frikiNation deftly queers the los frikis story by emphasizing their refusal to adhere to Fidel’s mandated heteropatriarchal modes of gender presentation, making los frikis not only social outcasts but also gender outlaws. (Notably, the 2024 movie Los Frikis — a gorgeously shot film, rich with powerful performances — opts to emphasize the perhaps “straighter” themes of rebellion, freedom, and masculine self-expression.) In Ortiz’s frikiNation, this expansive queerness activates a rich tangle of romance, resistance, and discovery for a compelling cluster of distinctive characters. Rula Muñoz’s smartly directed workshop production — fortified by impressive actor-musicianship from a charismatic cast (special highlikes to Jojo Fleites, Nico Raimont, and the incomparable Francés Ines Rodriguez as Yoli) — confirms the readiness of this piece for a fuller production. (Ideally including an in/appropriately punk projection/supertitle design to capture and convey the richness of both Ortiz’s bilingual script and EsKoria’s lyrics en español.) May it be so…
See also:
Community Spotlight Foundation’s Jamil Luna interviews playwright Krystal Ortiz on opening night;
For a richly nuanced scholarly history of los frikis, see Carmen Torre Pérez, “‘Los Frikis’: Resistance through Underground Cultures in 1980s Cuba,” Journal of Popular Music Studies 35.1 (2023) • pdf.
#88: Trophy Boys
Book by Emmanuelle Mattana • Directed by Danya Taymor • NYC, Off-Broadway : MCC Theater • June 2025.
An often compelling exploration of how teen boys take up (and are taken in by) the instructions offered by (elite) patriarchal culture. The scenario is simple: in a high-stakes high school debate tournament, the boys debate team must prove the affirmative case for the resolution “Feminism Has Failed Women” if they are to claim their hard-earned championship. Predictably, madcap chaos ensues. Perhaps less predictably, playwright/performer’s Emmanuelle Mattana’s strategy to assign actors who are not cis men to play these boys activates an immediate measure of delighted comedy even as it frustrates the mimetic impulse to collapse character and actor into one. By so underscoring the simple fact that these excellent actors are not the characters they play, Trophy Boys also challenges its audience to tune into how these characters are “trying on” their own respective performances of masculine identity, community, and authority. Danya Taymor directs with what is quickly becoming her signature capacity to highlight glimpses of adolescent interiority amidst this fast-past teen drama. Deftly staged and captivatingly performed, Trophy Boys will likely continue to stir — fittingly — debate about its premise and provocations in college/university classes and on such stages for some good while.
See also:
at Talkin’ Broadway, writer/scholar Kimberly Ramirez the many ways Trophy Boys’s animating conceit demonstrates how “cultures of entitlement, perpetuated by privileged men, continue to fail women and society as a whole”;
at The Brooklyn Rail, freelance writer Leah Abrams considers Trophy Boys’s characters for whom “knowledge isn’t transformative [but] defensive, a set of tools to guard against anyone who threatens their path”;
#89: Prince F*ggot
By Jordan Tannahill • Directed by Shayok Misha Chowdhury • NYC, Off-Broadway : Playwrights Horizons with Soho Rep • June 2025.
A startlingly theatrical meta-drama about queer and trans becoming told through a (perhaps fantastical, perhaps prescient) speculative future history of “what would happen if” young Prince George were to grow up to become Britain’s first avowedly gay royal. The romantic-dramedy at center of Prince F*ggot is aptly formulaic, hitting all the requisite beats of such tales, albeit with explicit digressions into the pleasures and perils of gay sex/uality. (There’s good reason for the production’s requirement that you put your phone in a Yondr pouch.) This not-uninteresting-but-also-not-remarkable royal gay romantasy is elevated, sometimes profoundly, by the interstitial autobiographical stories told by the ensemble of queer and trans actors. These stories — sometimes riffing off a real-life photograph, sometimes as comment on the play itself — open the potency (and beauty) of Prince F*ggot’s theatricalization of the socio-historical contingencies of queer/trans becoming. The challenges of Jordan Tannahill’s expansive script and Shayok Misha Chowdhury’s exuberantly maximalist direction — with exhilarating sets by David Zinn and breathtaking lighting by Isabella Byrd — are handily met by a cast of legends (K. Todd Freeman, David Greenspan, Rachel Crowl) and likely legends-to-be (Mihir Kumar, John McCrea, N'yomi Allure Stewart). Special highlikes include Kumar’s dreamy turn as leading man and David Greenspan’s bobbed twirl as a royal communications director named Jacqueline. Wild. Weird. Surprising. Profoundly captivating. Truly impressive.
See also:
with incisive elegance, The New Yorker’s Helen Shaw glosses the rich complexity of Prince F*ggot;
Exeunt’s Lane Williamson grapples with Prince F*ggot being the “intentionally messy, ragged play [it] needs to be”;
#90: Out of Order
By Carl Holder • Directed by Skylar Fox • NYC, Off-Off-Broadway : Most Unwanted Productions @ East Village Basement • June 2025.
In a literal East Village basement studio (door to the street on one side, bathroom at the other, maybe twenty chairs lining the walls between), playwright/actor Carl Holder deconstructs the “the autobiographical solo show” to be a collaborative exercise of theatrical trust. A pile of folded index cards, possibly color-coded, fill a plastic punchbowl in the center of the space. These cards — reminiscent of those one might pin to a board when plotting a screenplay — contain prompts. Some chart the workplace drama of the animals on FarmerFarmer’s farm, others cue vulnerable details about Holder’s artistic autobiography, while still others postulate more existential questions about life, mortality, and story structure. With captivating tracksuited verve (and with occasional logistical support from the seemingly affect-free bartender), Holder remixes the 90-minute show each time it is performed in whatever order the cards come out. (The evening I saw it, “Climax” was maybe the second card plucked.) Thanks to Holder’s theatrekid-approaches-middleage vulnerability, and to the actual literal magic of Skylar Fox’s deftly imperceptible directorial scaffolding, and to the unexpected intimacy forged between Holder and his audience-participants — somehow the whole thing works. Astonishingly well. (The presence of this notorious theatregoer took the obligatory audience participation right past “cringe” to new levels of “cringetastic,” which I actually totally appreciated.) A happy surprise, highly recommended.
See also:
at Theatrly, rising arts writer Emily Wyrwa talks to Out of Order actor/writer Carl Holder about the genesis and history of Out of Order;
TheaterMania’s Zachary Stewart praises Out of Order as “a bracing commentary on how the neatly plotted life rarely works out according to plan”;
#91: Lowcountry
By Abby Rosebrock • Directed by Jo Bonney • NYC: Off-Broadway @ Atlantic Theater Company • June 2025.
In Abby Rosebrock’s perverse spin on the Hallmarkian “meet cute” romance plot, David (Babak Tafti) is a registered sex offender, subsumed within the vortex of proving his regret and “powerlessness,” as his 12-step sponsor Paul (Keith Kupferer) reminds him several times daily. Keith’s also leaning on David — hard — to start dating. That’s why Tally’s coming over to David’s place. Tally (Jodi Balfour) is just visiting her tiny South Carolina hometown, to help with some family stuff, before returning to Los Angeles as soon as she f’n can. The play spools with the looping anxiety of a first date, as we watch David (and then Tally) calculate when to reveal what about themselves, what lies are worth telling, and what rules are worth breaking. It’s a drama of hairpin turns that culminate in a quick series of physical actions that promise life-changing consequences. Tafti’s vividly alive performance meticulously oscillates between a perceptibly scared person triple-checking every possible action for possibly unintended consequences and the sexy, confident, charismatic man he once was. For their part, Balfour and Kupferer are kinetic as two inadvertent adversaries — each more palpably predatory than the ostensibly convicted predator — grappling (at first abstractly, then finally face-to-face) for the prize of David’s not-quite-free will. (The opening cat-playing-with-mouse phone conversation between Tafti’s David and Kupferer’s Paul is an enthralling example of realist acting’s fascination with what scholar Christopher Grobe has analyzed as “the great telephone scene.”) At heart, Rosebrock’s drama is that of the escalating tensions felt when predator and prey come together, which director Jo Bonney calibrates with dexterity. And while the play’s briskly inconclusive concluding acts might initially feel like they come out of nowhere, it’s also just as immediately clear: there was nowhere these three characters could go together… except off a cliff. A fascinating, if not altogether satisfying, slice of life at its most uncertain.
See also:
at Observer, arts writer/critic David Cote highlights Abby Rosebrock’s “flair for writing women who are smart, funny, self-critical and pissed off”;
at TheaterMatters, critic/scholar Jonathan Kalb considers The Atlantic’s Lowcountry as “a buoyant and subtle production of a swift, fun and sensuous play.”