by
Kate Dobbs Ariail
Chapel Hill, NC, January 7, 2009: As
part of The Gender Project, the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill’s campus-wide conversation this year, which focuses
on gender and identity, Playmakers
Repertory Company (PRC2 series)
is presenting the playwright/performer
Taylor
Mac
in his The
Young Ladies Of… The show is staged
in the Elizabeth Price Kenan Theatre in the UNC Center for Dramatic
Art, which is an excellent size and configuration for a one-person
show. As directed by Tracy Trevett and designed by David Evans
Morris and Juliet Chia, the show maximizes the spatial and technical
potential of the small theater for this story of a search for identity,
connection and self-definition.
The Young Ladies of… is a sometimes-trying,
sometimes touching, pastiche. Pastiche is the artist’s word; perhaps,
he has co-opted it, the way the pink triangle was co-opted, to
cleanse it of its derogatory connotation and claim it as a positive
symbol of queer pride. However, pastiche still retains its meaning
of “hodgepodge” and carries with it the idea of
snippets combined from earlier source materials and arranged
by the artist as fresh creative work. Occasionally, the ideas
and metaphors and references in this play do exceed the artist’s
control in arranging them, and devolve into hodgepodge. But mostly
what Mac does is too original to be correctly called pastiche:
Connecting ideas and patterns, he makes a rich texture of thought
and feeling; a pieced and layered performance imbued with the
sensibilities of the collagist and the filmmaker as well as those
of the musical-theater lover, and the nonconformist drag queen.
The show is supposed to be outrageous and provocative. Maybe I
see too much art theater, but it didn’t seem that way to
me. What’s another guy in a dress, playing the ukulele atop
a ladder? (He sings better than Tiny Tim, thank goodness.) The
play is sweet, and it becomes beautiful in the way it gets around
to acknowledging the universal human yearning to be known and
loved for oneself. But its thrashing over of assumptions, expectations
and rules about gender behavior seems very 1970s, even while its “Look
at me!” autobiographical qualities clearly derive from the
current Age of Memoir. I opted out of the culture of conformity
and practice of homogeneity so long ago that I have a hard time
maintaining interest in this decade’s self-referential fantasia
on a conflict I’ve left behind. However, my 20-something
companion assures me that the gender wars are still raging — the
same narrow paths are laid out; the same torments prepared for
those who go a different way.
Although I found the gender diatribes to be sometimes boring,
and the ditzy style (sudden verbal reversals, manic repetitions,
tangential excursions and circumlocutions, abetted by much pointless
movement) exasperating and reductive of empathy for the character,
I was entranced by the visual experience of the play. The stage
design, with its slide-show visuals, and the physical props are
very good, especially the thousands of letters (from the Young
Ladies) dropped from above and hurled by the actor from trunk and
box into an eroding mound on the stage. Taylor Mac has some fine-looking
legs, and they are well-displayed in his ragged tulle fairy gown/christening
gown/goddess tunic/ball dress. Mac’s make-up is gorgeous,
coruscating with crystals around the eyes. Above the dress, a Pagliacci
visage gleams under a tousled mop of blonde curls, and the lighting
plays off the sad clown’s face with a wide palette of expressive
effects.
Throughout the play, a song from Carousel recurs: “Is
it worth wondering?” Sometimes referring to Mac’s quest
for knowledge of his missing father, sometimes a broader philosophical
query, that question can only be answered with “yes.” We
breathe, we wonder. An artist like Mac makes up the answers the
universe forgot to provide. If you don’t like them, you can
make up your own.
The Young Ladies of… continues at PRC2 through
Sunday, January 11th. See our calendar for details.
