While Melville's Starbuck roamed the Atlantic Ocean aboard a whaler, Bill Starbuck first appeared on the stage of the Cort Theatre as a character in 1954's The Rainmaker. The original Broadway cast of N. Richard Nash's drama featured Geraldine Page as Lizzie and Darren McGavin as Starbuck. Within two years, a film adaptation had been released starring Katharine Hepburn and Burt Lancaster.
On October 24, 1963, a musical adaptation of The Rainmaker crafted by Nash (book), Tom Jones (lyrics) and Harvey Schmidt (music), opened at the Broadhurst Theatre with Inga Swenson as Lizzie, Robert Horton as Starbuck, and Stephen Douglass as Sheriff File. As in the original play, the plot of 110 in the Shade focuses on Lizzie Curry, a love-starved spinster living on a drought-stricken farm in the American Southwest with her father and two brothers during the Great Depression, who fears that she is doomed to spend the rest of her life as an old maid.
One fine day, a slick and fast-talking grifter (Starbuck) arrives on the scene, promising the local residents that he can make it rain. While it takes awhile for water to fall from the sky, the cynical Lizzie eventually falls for Starbuck's masculine charms.
After years of withering on the vine, Lizzie suddenly finds herself having to choose between two men who have fallen in love with her. When she turns to her father and asks him what to do, he replies "Whatever you do, just remember you’ve been asked. You don’t ever have to go through life a woman who ain’t been asked!"
For those of us who came out in the 1960s (before and after the Stonewall riots), watching a younger generation of LGBT people yearn for and embrace same-sex marriage has been a constant source of political pride and wonderment. In the early days of the sexual revolution, those of us who refused to be classified as criminals purely on the basis of our sexual orientation proudly thought of ourselves as sexual outlaws, rejecting the concept of gay marriage as the ultimate embrace of heteronormative behavior. I can still remember my mother telling me (through gritted teeth) that she had read all about my "lifestyle" and how my friends and I liked to go out "dancing." I calmly reminded her that she and my father went square dancing twice a week and didn't seem to think there was anything particularly deviant about their own behavior. "That's different," she scoffed.
The AIDS epidemic forced more and more LGBT people to rely on their chosen (as opposed to their biological) families for emotional support. Whether living alone, with roommates, or with their lovers, many gays accepted the fact that same-sex marriage was out of the question and would probably not become a reality in our lifetimes.
Nonetheless, during the 1980s, plays like Harvey Fierstein's Torch Song Trilogy (1982), Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart (1985), and Bill Hoffman's As Is (1985) pointed to the importance of same-sex marriage (not only for the protection two spouses and their assets, but also for the sake of their children). While some people yearned for that kind of legal acknowledgment and societal acceptance, others had been doing without it for so long that they refused to consider marriage as a defining factor in their lives.
In the course of my adult life, I've experienced three different forms of coming out. The first involved telling friends and family that I was gay. The second was the discovery that, even though I was not built like a gym bunny, there was a subculture of chubby chasers out there looking for love. The most recent (and perhaps most sobering) form of coming out was learning that the reason I didn't fit the accepted norms of what a gay man should be was because I was an introvert (an INTJ on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator). So when an extremely handsome and passionate boyfriend whispered "Honey, why you no want to marry me?" it was difficult to explain that although I was extremely fond of him, I'm the kind of person who needs lots of time alone. I like being single and have no desire to marry anyone.
Was that my Lizzie Curry moment? Did it mean I never had to go through life carrying the stigma of someone "who ain’t been asked"? The hard truth is that, just because gay men and lesbians can now marry each other doesn't mean everyone wants to do so. It's a curious thought, made curiouser and curiouser (as Alice said during her Adventures in Wonderland) by the fact that I just saw a play which depicts a similar situation.
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The New Conservatory Theatre Center is currently presenting the regional premiere of a contemporary gay love story. As playwright Philip Dawkins explains:“My interest in writing Le Switch was mostly in how do we, as queer people, maintain our oppositional identity when our most recent human rights gains have been mainstream, capitalist acceptance? I’m not anti-marriage (some of my best friends are married), but when I list all that I find beautiful and strong about our big, sexy rainbow community, marriage doesn’t even make the top 50.”
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| Playwright Philip Dawkins |
Set in New York and Montreal, the play begins as David (Steve Rhyne), a Professor of Library Sciences, addresses his students at the beginning of the semester. Now in his mid-thirties, David grew up in an extremely dysfunctional family. What saved him from committing suicide was his close friendship with two older gay men: Frank (Donald Currie) and his lover, Danny (who eventually succumbed to AIDS). These men took David in and (as gay stepparents, mentors, or fairy godfathers) guided Danny down the path to living an openly gay lifestyle.
Despite being severely fashion challenged and (like many librarians) finding joy in sorting out and categorizing things, David fancies himself as queer, rather than gay. His fear of commitment recently caused his relationship with a man he had been dating for several months to crash and burn as soon as the boyfriend expressed a desire to move in together.
Thankfully, David can always rely on his roommate (the chronically depressed Frank) and his twin sister Sarah (Nancy French) for emotional support. Sarah, who spends most of her time living in a fantasy world as a continuity editor for comic books and video games, married David's college roommate, who needed a green card in order to remain in the United States. Now, after several years in which Jamel's work has frequently kept him on the road, Sarah is stunned to discover that she has fallen in love with her husband.
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| Steve Rhyne (David) and Nancy French (Sarah) in a scene from Le Switch (Photo by: Lois Tema) |
Meanwhile, David's best friend from childhood, Zachary (Brian J. Patterson), is about to marry his boyfriend. Although David loathes weddings, he has agreed to be Zachary's best man out of a sense of duty that rivals young Frederick's in The Pirates of Penzance; or, The Slave of Duty. However, the last thing David anticipated was that the impulsive, trend-conscious Zachary would insist on having his meticulously planned bachelor party spread over a costly weekend in Montreal!
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| Brian J. Patterson (Zachary) and Steve Rhyne (David) in a scene from Le Switch (Photo by: Lois Tema) |
After arriving in Canada, David stops at a local flower shop to purchase a bouquet for Zachary and locks eyes with a handsome florist. At 25, Benoit (Ryan Vasquez) belongs to a younger generation for whom same-sex marriage and parental acceptance of a gay child are completely normal. Impressed by the ease with which Benoit switches back and forth between French and English during conversations, David also learns that Benoit still lives with his parents.
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| Ryan Vasquez (Benoit) and Steve Rhyne (David) in a scene from Le Switch (Photo by: Lois Tema) |
While there is an obvious romantic attraction between the two men, there are also plenty of challenges for them to overcome.
- In order to develop any kind of relationship, David and Benoit will have to commute between New York and Montreal. Benoit is passionate about his love for Montreal (although he would love for David to show him around New York).
- As a hard-core New Yorker, David finds it difficult to accept that such an attractive young man prefers to forego such commonplace electronic necessities as a smartphone and computer.
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| Steve Rhyne (David) and Ryan Vasquez (Benoit) in a scene from Le Switch (Photo by: Lois Tema) |
As much as he hates to admit being torn between the politics of his mentors (who would have regarded same-sex marriage as pathetically bourgeois) and the openness of a younger generation of gay men, David is an emotionally constipated librarian caught in a mid-life crisis. Not only is he woefully unprepared to handle a multilingual and multigenerational relationship, he has always thought of himself as a gay rebel. His sarcastic sister is more than willing to break David's bubble by explaining how he's the most normal person she knows.
After two years of visiting each other in their respective cities, Benoit feels fully accepted into David's family of choice. But when he proposes to David on the night before he is to fly home to Montreal, David freezes him out, unable to deal with the fact that someone genuinely loves him and wants to spend the rest of his life with him.
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| Ryan Vasquez (Benoit) and Donald Currie (Frank) in a scene from Le Switch (Photo by: Lois Tema) |
Tom Bruett has directed Le Switch with a knowing ear for gay vernacular ("New York can be a real lippy bitch!") and a solid understanding of gay men who find it hard to let down their emotional armor. Sarah Phykitt's fluid unit set works extremely well with the film and projections that showcase each city in tandem with Sophia Craven's lighting and Sara Witsch's sound design. Wes Crain has a lot of fun with his costume designs (especially some of David's nerdier outfits).
Steve Rhyne's emotionally conflicted David (who prefers to focus his love on the books he collects rather than people) offers a sharp contrast to Brian J. Patterson's ebulliently superficial Zachary and Ryan Vasquez's tender but honest Benoit. Donald Currie scores strongly as Frank, with Nancy French enjoying some choice moments as David's sister, Sarah.
Performances of Le Switch continue through December 3 at New Conservatory Theatre Center (click here for tickets). Here's the trailer:
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