Originally published in ThreeWeeks.
I expected controversy from this re-imagined New Testament tale - something cynical and cutting edge. What I didn't expect, or expect to enjoy, was sincerity. The company loves this story, they tell us so straight away - and by the end, you will love it too. In this version, our saviour (Joshua) is born to rotten parents in modern-day Texas. The other twist - that Joshua, and some of his apostles, are gay - is just a background to the familiar story of love, forgiveness and betrayal, which is exceptionally well-acted and unexpectedly funny. When the setting moves from Texas to ancient Israel and back, the time travel is left unexplained, but the audience is too charmed to care. This play will make a believer out of you.
Corpus Christi is playing at Bedlam until 25 August, every night at 10pm. Buy tickets here.
Showing posts with label queer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label queer. Show all posts
13 August 2007
11 August 2007
On reading homophobic writers
I'm covering the Edinburgh International Book Festival now, which is pretty exciting - that tent in Charlotte Square Gardens is like an alternate universe based entirely on books. :)
My first reading was a discussion with Tariq Ramadan. He's a Muslim scholar currently at Oxford, one of the best-known in Europe. It was a fantastic session - I'll post more about it once I've written my ThreeWeeks review.
There is much that we agree on, but I know, from reading elsewhere, that he believes that homosexuality is "wrong". I would like to read some of his work, but I will probably feel strange about it. It's a feeling Ramadan probably knows better than me - his Ph.D. was in Western philosophy, and I'm sure he has studied people he knows are racist. We pick and choose valuable points from work that we cannot be fully reconciled with.
I will never read a book by someone I agree with on everything. But there's something more fundamentally offputting about reading an author who would probably prefer that I didn't exist. All in all, it left me feeling a bit sad.
My first reading was a discussion with Tariq Ramadan. He's a Muslim scholar currently at Oxford, one of the best-known in Europe. It was a fantastic session - I'll post more about it once I've written my ThreeWeeks review.
There is much that we agree on, but I know, from reading elsewhere, that he believes that homosexuality is "wrong". I would like to read some of his work, but I will probably feel strange about it. It's a feeling Ramadan probably knows better than me - his Ph.D. was in Western philosophy, and I'm sure he has studied people he knows are racist. We pick and choose valuable points from work that we cannot be fully reconciled with.
I will never read a book by someone I agree with on everything. But there's something more fundamentally offputting about reading an author who would probably prefer that I didn't exist. All in all, it left me feeling a bit sad.
09 August 2007
Stonewall
Originally published in ThreeWeeks.
This glitter-drenched production recalls the events that led to a 1969 raid on the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York; a raid which turned into a riot, then days of riots, and then the first Pride parade. It's no Andrew Lloyd Webber - the sixties girl group soundtrack is lip synched, and the dance sequences wouldn't hold up on Broadway. But the punchlines hit home, the costumes are fabulous, and all the queens (especially Rikki Beadle-Blair, also writer and director) just ooze charisma. Blair's script juxtaposes the integrationist gay rights groups of the time with the gutsy street kids and sex workers who actually pulled off Stonewall. But best of all, this sophistication in the script didn't keep the audience from smiling, laughing, and, by the end, standing to cheer.
Seeing Rikki Beadle-Blair reminded me of his short-lived Channel 4 series, Metrosexuality, which I love love love. We like to show this series on special occasions at the anti-homophobia peer education program I used to work with in Toronto. It wish it was as well-known as Queer as Folk, because it does everything better.
Also check out Cate's post about going to see Stonewall - we went together, and it was a bit weirder than I had room to say in the review. Several groups walked out in apparent disgust...
Stonewall is playing at the Pleasance Courtyard every night at 5:50 until 17 August. Buy tickets here.
This glitter-drenched production recalls the events that led to a 1969 raid on the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York; a raid which turned into a riot, then days of riots, and then the first Pride parade. It's no Andrew Lloyd Webber - the sixties girl group soundtrack is lip synched, and the dance sequences wouldn't hold up on Broadway. But the punchlines hit home, the costumes are fabulous, and all the queens (especially Rikki Beadle-Blair, also writer and director) just ooze charisma. Blair's script juxtaposes the integrationist gay rights groups of the time with the gutsy street kids and sex workers who actually pulled off Stonewall. But best of all, this sophistication in the script didn't keep the audience from smiling, laughing, and, by the end, standing to cheer.
Seeing Rikki Beadle-Blair reminded me of his short-lived Channel 4 series, Metrosexuality, which I love love love. We like to show this series on special occasions at the anti-homophobia peer education program I used to work with in Toronto. It wish it was as well-known as Queer as Folk, because it does everything better.
Also check out Cate's post about going to see Stonewall - we went together, and it was a bit weirder than I had room to say in the review. Several groups walked out in apparent disgust...
Stonewall is playing at the Pleasance Courtyard every night at 5:50 until 17 August. Buy tickets here.
29 July 2007
LesbianDad
I've added LesbianDad to the link list on the right, mostly because of this post about the open nature of queer families. It got me thinking; you should read it.
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