Boulevard Studio's artistic director Mark Bucher
For a Midwestern city of its size, Milwaukee’s theater scene is notably rich and robust. It spans the spectrum from professional houses to community ensembles and black box venues. Many have been around as long as anyone can remember, while others come and go. They produce everything from William Shakespeare, Broadway musicals and workhorse classics to contemporary one-act festivals.
In recent decades, there’s been an effort to bring a fair representation of diversity to Milwaukee audiences as well. The Hansberry-Sands Theatre Company focused on African American-relevant plays; Theatrical Tendencies and the Milwaukee Gay Arts Center presented LGBTQ works. Meanwhile, mainstay houses and especially smaller ones like the Boulevard and Off the Wall theatres have staged an ever-more inclusive range of socially sensitive dramas, comedies and musicals. Experiments with color-blind and gender-bending casting have generally worked with a good deal of success (although, half a decade ago, director Ray Bradford’s attempt to stage a drag version of gay playwright Robert Harlings’ Steel Magnolias was nipped in the bud when he was refused the rights because of the planned alternative casting).
A marketing effort underwritten by LGBTQ organizations developed affinity programming that, beginning with the 2015-’16 season, brought the first LGBTQ “Out” Nights at the Milwaukee Repertory Theater and the Skylight Music Theatre. They continue today with The Rep holding its second of the season on Tuesday, Dec. 4, for a fun Stackner Cabaret musical revue, The All Night Strut! A third is likely in the spring. Meanwhile, the Skylight is contemplating one for its holiday production of Hairspray.
The 2018-’19 season, however, has a noticeable dearth of LGBTQ plays. It could simply be a matter of priorities or an inadvertent omission. Or, more practically, it may be a matter of economics. In the past, LGBTQ philanthropists like Joseph R. Pabst, William Radler, the Cream City Foundation and others have underwritten a major part of production costs for professional house shows. But mainstream theaters are, after all, dependent on mainstream audiences. While our theatergoers may be a more progressive lot, they still can’t be expected to fill houses for a typical three-five week run of a professional production if the subject matter is too quirky or queerly demanding.
An example of that dilemma is Milwaukee’s women-focused Renaissance Theaterworks that, despite an ever-growing number of lesbian playwrights, has never mounted a lesbian play. The Skylight’s hit run of La Cage aux Folles two seasons back proved gay shtick and catchy tunes can bring the house down with a Milwaukee ovation to boot. It may not have had its success if it had delivered a genuine gay family values message rather than one camouflaged as a pull-out-all-the-gay-stops farce.
Meanwhile, this year is the 50th anniversary of the 20th century’s pre-Stonewall gay classic, Mart Crowley’s Boys in the Band. And, while a revival was successfully mounted in New York City, the likelihood the drama’s golden anniversary would be celebrated by a Milwaukee production was at best improbable. Aside from the lack of a local cast (the play requires nine male actors with very specific attributes), the apparent perception was that local audience appeal could not have made it financially viable. Ultimately, finding funding for even minimal productions has become increasingly difficult as has finding patrons to support them.
Besides, the problem with many LGBTQ repertoire pieces, for example those of Tennessee Williams, like the gay films of yore, is in the depiction of LGBTQ characters as victims, outcasts or criminals with little hope of redemption. The poor wretches inevitably suffered a sorry fate. Even Boys in the Band is hardly uplifting, but it is honest, and, as a historical document, worth producing.
Mark Bucher to the Rescue!
There is, however, a gay play in the offing opening on Thursday, Nov. 15. Mark Bucher’s Boulevard Theatre is producing Terrance McNally’s acclaimed masterpiece, Mothers and Sons, as a concert reading at the Plymouth Church on the city’s upper East Side. It is the latest in Bucher’s 33-season-long history of LGBTQ-relevant productions. Many are worth a mention.
In 2000, Bucher staged Theatre District by Richard Kramer, a charming piece presenting a powerful but normal same-sex relationship. Bucher even flew in the playwright for talkbacks discussing what it’s like to be a gay playwright. At the time, despite the importance of the writer, Bucher could not get an interview in the local press. The play later opened in New York City with great success.
About a decade later, Bucher’s all-male cast version of Moliere’s The Misanthrope ventured into the realm of 17th-century French theater but set in a 21st-century art gallery. Replacing the play’s romantic dynamics with same-sex relationships underscored the universality of human foibles. The cast, identified largely as gay and bisexual, included Dear Ruthie (Mark Hagen) in a rare “trouser role.” More recently, the Boulevard has addressed current themes like the transgender struggle with Small Things by established, out, LGBTQ playwright Daniel McIvor. The piece handled the issues of sexuality and gender identification. But, rather than focus on the trans character (a younger person who is never seen), it instead presented the issue through the eyes and emotions of the older and wiser grandmother who convinces her daughter to accept her trans child.
Other past Boulevard productions, many of which were regional premieres (as is Mothers and Sons), include Evan Smith’s Remedial English. Set in a high school, it explores a same-sex crush between students with age-appropriate actors, most of whom identified as gay. The provocative Gidion’s Knot by Johnna Adams, a play about bullying, suicide and hierarchical terrorism, again pushed audiences into facing the uncomfortable realities of 21st-century life in America. The list goes on. But, suffice it to say, Bucher’s mission continues to be to confront today’s issues through the lens of thoughtful and thought-provoking new theater.
In several recent conversations I had with Bucher, we discussed his rationale for producing the plays he does and, in particular, the upcoming Mothers and Sons. Obviously, there are a lot of contemporary works being written that deal with today’s LGBTQ life. So, I posed the question, why, apart from the finances, do major houses avoid them? Bucher’s answer was sobering: “Homophobia is as pernicious as it ever was but has grown stealthier. Even the upcoming Hairspray, written by a gay man, doesn’t include a gay scene,” he said, adding, “People are turned off by the demands of the underserved to be recognized as healthy. However, it’s important for LGBTQs, especially those who know the impact of AIDS and discrimination to see LGBTQ actors in LGBTQ pieces. Nowadays, it’s not enough to argue that a straight actor can play a gay role, because that’s what acting is all about. There has to be representation on stage of the community, ethnicities or orientations being played.”
And, having followed the evolution of the Mothers and Sons reading, his point is well taken. Casting is always a challenge. In this case, Bucher enlisted Joan End, Nathan Marinan and Mark Neufang for the lead roles and Pamela Stace as narrator. However, finding a child actor to play the son of the play’s gay couple was especially difficult. “Is the play ‘family friendly’?” asked one mother. In fact, the play’s title should be clear enough. It’s about family and family relationships, in particular of mothers and sons, and the fact that we, the LGBTQ community, are worthy of family. Critics have lauded it as “eloquent, powerful and funny.”
Eventually, Bucher succeeded in solving the casting problem. But, it’s not hard to imagine the reluctance of a mother to expose her child to potential bullying or other repercussions resulting from his or her participation in a “gay” play. Despite the play’s message of hope and change brought about by intelligence and reason, the society in which we live remains uneasy about things LGBTQ and may not embrace them as readily as we might hope. Bucher hopes for a good showing of community support throughout the run of this “rare and uncompromisingly gay story.”
The Boulevard Theatre is a true LGBTQ community asset. It needs our support. This season, with so little relevant entertainment available for us and about us, Mothers and Sons is a must see. Mothers and Sons runs Nov. 15 -25 at Plymouth Church. 2717 E. Hampshire Ave. For tickets ($15), visit https://www.brownpapertickets.com/user/eventreports.html?events=3819435.
