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| Show | Did He Like It?* |
Synopsis | |
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The GLAAD Award-winning Fringe favorite "gay rap opera" returns to NYC, this time Off-Broadway. Jack and Dillon are two star-crossed lovers who must cope with the reality of hatred when one is brutally beaten. Their story is told entirely through rap, spoken word and poetry, turning the often-homophobic musical genre on its ear. Click here for tickets. |
Two Romeos in a Modern Tragedy
*By ANDY WEBSTER
Published: June 25, 2008
Those familiar with Manhattan gay culture may not find a lot of new ground in “Bash’d!,” billed as a “gay rap opera,” other than the novelty of a story recited entirely in verse and set to electronic rhythms and samples. Certainly not in the sexual explicitness of its lyrics, its nightclub argot or its star-crossed “Romeo and Romeo” narrative. But such an audience should be impressed by the passion of its convictions.
The players in “Bash’d!,” dressed in white and pink, are two affable Canadians, Nathan Cuckow, as Feminem, a dandy in a fedora, and Chris Craddock as T-Bag, a stout homeboy in track duds and a baseball cap. The two, who wrote the lyrics as well, bring impressive stamina to these roles and many others, and to Aaron Macri’s somewhat repetitious music. (The production, clocking in at an hour and change at the Zipper Factory Theater, is deftly directed by Ron Jenkins.)
Feminem and T-Bag narrate the story of Dillon (Mr. Cuckow), a young man from a small town who comes to the big city and meets Jack (Mr. Craddock), a streetwise veteran of the scene. The two court and manage to coax their reluctant parents into attending their nuptials, a situation from which “Bash’d!,” despite its title, draws much of its mileage. Later, when Jack heads out one evening for a taste of night life, a street encounter with bigots has fatal results.
The production confers a kind of sainthood on Dillon and Jack — taking a supernatural turn at one point, it appropriates the heavenly wings of “Angels in America” — but then “Bash’d!” isn’t drama; it’s fabulist agitprop. Yet it comes down to earth at the right times, and is blunt where it needs to be, in its vigorous defense of gay marriage and in a haunting recitation of names of people murdered in homophobic hysteria, beginning with Matthew Shepard and Brandon Teena. And going on. And on. And on. In such moments “Bash’d!” shows its rage, its grief and its driven, heartfelt determination.
“Bash’d!” continues in an open-ended run at the Zipper Factory Theater, 336 West 37th Street, Manhattan; (212) 352-3101, www.thezipperfactory.com.
Click here to buy tickets to Bash'd Off-Broadway.
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