Topher Payne’s ‘Perfect Arrangement’ Takes on Govt’s Anti-Gay Witch-Hunt: INTERVIEW

Perfect Arrangement, which opens Off-Broadway October 15 at Primary Stages, gives a lesser-known — and totally terrifying — moment in gay history a clever sitcom treatment. Written by Atlanta-based scribe Topher Payne, the play is set during the “lavender scare” in the 1950s, when the U.S. state department fired hundreds of employees over allegations of homosexuality. The government’s internal witch-hunt, which rode the tide of McCarthyism, deemed gay men and women deviants and national security threats.

Payne’s story finds government higher-up Bob Martindale (Robert Eli) tasked with leading the hunt, along with his secretary, Norma Baxter (Julia Coffey). The thing is, Bob’s got a boyfriend, Jim Baxter (Christopher J. Hanke), and Norma’s got a girlfriend, Millie Martindale (Mikaela Feely-Lehmann) — they’re married to each other’s same-sex sweethearts. Not only that, but they live in adjoining townhouses — connected by a two-way closet (naturally).

The premise paves the way for plenty of revolving-door antics, and ultimately, the threat of serious consequences should the couples’ secret be discovered. Through what Payne calls “the farce of attempting to pass,” the play explores what it means to hide who you are, and why coming out is as political as it is personal. Nearly two decades before the Stonewall riots, the nascent beginnings of the gay rights movement began in reaction to the lavender scare.

I spoke to Payne about his inspiration for the play, the surprising history behind it, and why celebrating “straight-acting” gay people is a problem.

Naveen Kumar: Can you tell me a bit about where you got the idea for this play?

Topher Payne: I read [The Lavender Scare by David Johndon] and was so compelled by the story of what had gone down in the ‘50s and frustrated with the fact that this was not a piece of our history that all of us know.

Topher Payne

In 2009, I got married in Massachusetts and came back to Georgia, where my marriage license was purely decorative. My husband took my name when I got married… it was just smart if something happened to us… It was just easier if we had the same last name to prove that we were family, and then we could just be brothers or cousins or whatever the situation called for. There was such an absurdity to that, which was of course frustrating and soul-sucking, and also just really funny… At some point, the story that became the Martindales and the Baxters really grew out of that.

RELATED: ‘Lavender Scare’ Documents Government’s Gay ‘Witch Hunt’ Lasting Four Decades: VIDEOS

NK: What was the most surprising thing you discovered about gay and lesbian life in this period, when you dug into the history of the 1950s?

TP: The born-out-of-necessity collusion between the gay community and the lesbian community to protect each other. The first gay bar I ever called home was the one gay bar in Jackson, Mississippi, and because there was just the one, there were no divisions in the community. It was the black gay bar and the white gay bar and the lesbian bar and the trans bar, and everybody was in the pool together. Atlanta, of course, has a much more thriving and diverse queer community, so there’s enough of you to be able to form your own pockets within that community. Unfortunately, that can also result in a breakdown in communication between people who are having divergent life experiences.

So, reading The Lavender Scare, I felt that little piece of home, like, ‘Oh, I remember when we were all in this together.’ And they were in the trenches together, and there was this battlefield mentality of, despite any differences or disagreements, we have to keep each other safe. There’s something quite beautiful in that.

NK: Was there a history of people making the arrangement the couples do in the play, which is to enter a heterosexual marriage in order to have relationships on the side?

TP: Very much so, because it was the ultimate marriage of convenience. I don’t know that they were buying townhouses and connecting them by a closet (laughs). It was the ultimate marriage of convenience, everybody wins! There were many, many examples of that in the era.

NK: The people in the play are well to do, they’re white, they’re middle class. Why did you decide to look at this history from the perspective of people who are “hiding in plain sight” by following conventions rather than, say, more marginalized characters?

TP: I am well aware that this is my first play about a bunch of white people (laughs). That was certainly born out of the oral history that inspired the piece in the first place, which [was given by] government employees, who in 1950, would have been uniformly white and middle class to upper middle class… Of course, there were no people of color represented in popular culture at that time, and because the world of the play is so aspirational — they’re trying to live up to exactly what they see on television — creating this universe where everything is lily-white and exactly what’s on the cover of House Beautiful and TV Guide was really interesting to me.

There’s the moment in the show where Norma says, “You would never stand for this if they were doing this to Negros.” And he’s like, “Well, of course not, because that’s an immutable trait, that’s who they are.” And you see this interesting division in self-perception. Because we’re talking about a time when being queer was considered to be a mental illness at best.

NK: There’s a degree of self-loathing that comes along with being in the closet, whether from lacking the courage to come out or from thinking there’s something wrong with who you are. I thought these dynamics played out very interestingly in the play. Can you speak a bit about that?

TP: By the act of being closeted, you’re effectively colluding with the enemy. They’re telling you that there’s something shameful and wrong about the nature of your existence, and by choosing to fly under the radar, you’re acknowledging the veracity of that argument. They even say in the play, “This will never stop if we keep hiding.”

But I think it’s really interesting that something so clearly born out of necessity can end up making the problem so much harder to fight, because then you’re not standing together as a community. It wasn’t really until the government did this grand sweep of well-educated, well-spoken individuals who — now that they were marked with this brand and had nothing to lose — that you saw the first stirrings of the Mattachine Society. As in all things, the tactics of your oppressors can also be the very thing that presents an opportunity. And I find that encouraging.

NK: I hate to ask this question of writers, but considering how far we’ve come in the past year with the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage, what do you hope audiences will take away from revisiting a time when things were so vastly different?

TP: What I hope they would take away from it is kind of the farce that’s built around passing. The gains we’ve made in visibility and respectability in American culture in the past decade are really unfathomable when you think about it. But we, as a queer culture, still place a really high value on passing, on your ability to assimilate into the culture at large. We celebrate our very feminine lesbians, we celebrate our very masculine gay men, we celebrate trans individuals who look like they were born the gender that they are presenting as. And we consider those successes.

One of the things I feel Perfect Arrangement addresses, or certainly attempts to address, is the farce of attempting to pass, attempting to craft yourself in the image of someone that you simply are not, rather than exploring in broader terms the identity you feel genuinely compelled toward.

We have the benefit of history and being able to look back and knowing that, as the characters in the show are starting to experience a world outside of their own home, there’s a long way to go. We’re seven years before the first public demonstrations in D.C. We’re 19 years before Stonewall. I’m so intrigued by that moment before, the moment that people have the first stirrings of, I deserve more than this.

I think in a lot of ways, we’re living in one of those times. Despite the rights that we’ve gained, they’re certainly not unchallenged. It’s an uphill battle, but it’s still a battle, so we can win it. I would love for my play to be less relevant, but frankly there are a lot of things that were introduced into American culture 65 years ago that are still very present today.

Perfect Arrangement is in performances at The Duke on 42nd Street through November 6.

Recent theatre features…
Clive Owen Stars in ‘Old Times’ on Broadway and ‘Cloud Nine’ Comes to Atlantic Theatre Co.: REVIEW
‘Spring Awakening’ Couples Sign Language with Sexual Discovery on Broadway: REVIEW
16 Big Shows Coming to Broadway This Fall: A Cheat Sheet
‘The Legend of Georgia McBride’ Teaches Intro to Drag Off Broadway: REVIEW
Hip-Hop Juggernaut ‘Hamilton’ Opens on Broadway: REVIEW
‘The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey,’ By Trevor Project Co-founder James Lecesne Opens Off Broadway: REVIEW

Follow Naveen Kumar on Twitter: @Mr_NaveenKumar (photos: james leynse)

The post Topher Payne’s ‘Perfect Arrangement’ Takes on Govt’s Anti-Gay Witch-Hunt: INTERVIEW appeared first on Towleroad.

Naveen Kumar

Topher Payne’s ‘Perfect Arrangement’ Takes on Govt’s Anti-Gay Witch-Hunt: INTERVIEW

Open Question: Do you support the LGBT community?

answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20151014041409AACrzQJ

PHOTOS: Finding Beauty in Skid Row

Cleis Abeni

www.advocate.com/transgender/2015/10/14/photos-finding-beauty-skid-row

Anderson Cooper Earns High Marks As Democratic Debate Moderator

Depending on who you ask, the big winner in Tuesday night’s Democratic showdown was either Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, both or racial equality (for finally being discussed in a 2016 debate). One result was widely accepted though: CNN’s Anderson Cooper absolutely crushed it as a moderator.

“Anderson Cooper won the debate,” wrote Red State’s Erick Erickson.

“He asserted himself as the strongest figure of the presentation, candidates included,” wrote Mediaite’s Joe Concha. “In the end, Cooper showed why he’s one of the top journalists in the game: He was impeccably prepared, wasn’t hesitant to ask follow-up questions when warranted and didn’t offer up one question — not one — that could be considered frivolous or fluffy… A solid A.”

Cooper hammered each candidate with questions about their biggest weak spots. He asked former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former Rhode Island Sen. Lincoln Chafee about their wavering political stances. He grilled Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Virginia Sen. Jim Webb for their high marks with the NRA. He questioned former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley’s record as mayor of Baltimore, a city plagued by recent unrest. And he asked all of the candidates about their electability, putting the three Democrats who are polling in the single digits in a tough spot.

Cooper repeatedly refused to let candidates dodge questions or give non-answers:

“Senator Sanders, you have to give a response,” he said.

“Senator Sanders, you didn’t answer the question,” he said later.

“You agreed to these rules and you’re wasting time,” he told Webb. “So if you would finish your answer, we’ll move on.”

Cooper’s performance was well-received on Twitter:

 As Slate’s Justin Peters wrote, “I wish he could moderate all the debates.”

Related On HuffPost:

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

feeds.huffingtonpost.com/c/35496/f/677065/s/4aa8e9d5/sc/24/l/0L0Shuffingtonpost0N0C20A150C10A0C140Canderson0Ecooper0Edemocratic0Edebate0Emoderator0E20A160In0I8291670A0Bhtml0Dutm0Ihp0Iref0Fgay0Evoices0Gir0FGay0KVoices/story01.htm

Open Question: Why is incest frowned upon n the LGBT community,but not transgenderism?
I find people pretending to be the opposite sex weirder than two blood related adults consenting.

answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20151014022645AAdIn2m

The Library Is Open! Bette Midler Reads Justin Bieber’s Penis-Praising Pop

Justin Bieber’s father gave all of civilization the creepy-crawlies after he praised his son’s penis size, which was on full display when The Biebs was photographed taking a quick skinny dip while in Bora Bora.

But all is right in the universe once again, thanks to The Divine Miss M, Bette Midler, who reminds us of what is important in the world: slaying your enemies with just a passing comment.

Read her Tweet about Bieber’s father below:

Justin was raised by his mother, after his father (Jeremy) left them and married another woman. Reports say Bieber grew up poor, without much financial support from his father, but Justin has openly maintained a good relationship with his father and stepmother. Nevertheless, it is fun witnessing an icon giving Elder Bieber the beat-down.

Dan Renzi

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/NnlTE_kVsqE/the-library-is-open-bette-midler-reads-justin-biebers-penis-praising-pop-20151014

The Time the Boston Gay Men's Chorus Risked Their Lives in the Middle East

“They want to know if you are willing to perform as the Boston Men’s Chorus?”

I was surprised when I received this text, which was sent to me several hours into a tense negotiation between executives from the tour company organizing the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus trip to the Middle East and representatives of the Istanbul venue we were contracted to perform at in just six weeks’ time. In hindsight, of course, I should not have been.

Our plans to sing at the Zorlu Performance Center (ZPC) in Istanbul last June received major attention in media outlets across Turkey three months before our scheduled arrival. Conservative Islamist papers described us as “perverts,” and thousands of people signed a Change.org petition calling on ZPC’s owners to cancel our show because it would take place on the tenth day of Ramadan. ZPC responded by suspending ticket sales to our show.

My reply was short and to the point: “No.”

I didn’t know it at the time, but the refusal to take “gay” out of our name was the first of many forceful, though not always easy, decisions that resulted in the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus’ improbable―but historic―performance in Istanbul.

Last week, the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus published the final video from our June trip during which we performed six times over 10 days in Ein Gedi, Jersusalem, Tel Aviv, and Istanbul. This 11th and final video is the story of how and why our original Istanbul concert was cancelled, and what it took to put on the performance that ultimately took place before 5,000 people at Bosphorus University. With on-camera interviews featuring, among others, U.S. Consulate General to Istanbul Charles Hunter, whose intervention ensured our safety while in Turkey, the video is, as we like to say in the entertainment business, a “must see.”

The process of editing it nearly three months after the concert took place provided an opportunity for reflection on what we accomplished, and how we did it.

First lesson? Actions speak louder than words. In all of the media interviews that we did leading up to the showdown with ZPC executives, we were asked over and over again what the point was of identifying ourselves as gay. Implicit in the question was the assumption that we were putting sex before art, and being needlessly salacious. We patiently explained that in the United States, choral music performed by gay men was a 35-year-old tradition steeped in the civil rights movement. I don’t even want to think of the message we would have sent to Istanbul’s small, but passionate, LGBTI community if we had agreed to take the stage as the Boston Men’s Chorus, let alone the message we’d send to our members and supporters.

Second lesson? Hope for the best, but work like hell to make it happen. When ZPC executives abruptly cancelled our concert with less than five weeks to go, we had no idea where we would find another venue with a stage big enough to hold our 110 singers. We had no flexibility on our June 27 performance date, and thanks to the controversy, we were expecting large crowds, further exacerbating what was quickly turning into a security nightmare. With approval from university officials, the LGBTI student group at Bosphorus University offered us outdoor space. It wasn’t the best option for us acoustically, but they could accommodate the date―and large crowds.

Performing under less than ideal conditions is not new for the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus. During our tour of Eastern Europe in 2005, we sang in Poland in spite of vocal protests from extremists that drew headlines around the world. Even with this history, I can assure you that saying that you abide by a set of principles to create musical experiences that “inspire change” is one thing. Adhering to them in a foreign country where a majority of the population not only doesn’t believe you deserve basic rights, but has been served up several months’ worth of sensational stories detailing your pending arrival and describing you as “perverted,” is quite another. Even more so when Twitter is ablaze the 48 hours before your entry into the country with tweets by radicals promising you, among other things, an “Islamist welcome” illustrated with an emoticon of a bulls-eye.

We were committed to performing. But we weren’t going to be stupid about it. We hired private security for our time in Turkey. And before flying out of Israel, we spoke directly with Consulate General Hunter about the threats―which escalated online daily as our concert date approached. Hunter and his security director assured us that US authorities were aware of and monitoring the threats. He also told us that he had informed the national Turkish government and municipal authorities in Istanbul that he would be attending our concert and sitting in the front row.  The Consul also sent a formal notice to the Turkish Government on our behalf.

Last lesson? When you stand on principle it might be lonely at first. But you quickly meet amazing allies. Istanbul has a passionate community of LGBTI activists who protested on our behalf outside the Zorlu Performance Center―no small thing in a country which largely bans public political expressions.

As a result, we were able to perform in Istanbul. More than 5,000 people jammed into the performance space: students decked out in rainbow garb; families with children; hipster singles; middle-aged couples. They danced in the aisles, cheered, and reveled in what was, ultimately, a rare expression of LGBT culture in a Muslim country, proving once again that stories of love, pride, and acceptance―communicated through song―resonate despite cultural and language barriers.

CRAIG COOGAN is Executive Director of the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus.

Craig Coogan

www.advocate.com/commentary/2015/10/14/time-boston-gay-mens-chorus-risked-their-lives-middle-east

Dems Differ With Republicans, Not Much With Each Other

Tuesday night’s Democratic presidential debate highlighted the differences between the Democrats and the Republicans far more than differences among the Democratic contenders.

Unlike the Republican debates so far, the first Democratic debate had no bashing of LGBT people or talk about “persecution” of people of faith — as a matter of fact, some candidates touted their support for LGBT causes. It had no demonization of immigrants. It had no denunciation of abortion or call to defund Planned Parenthood.

Indeed, some of the candidates pointed out those contrasts in their closing statements. “On this stage, you didn’t hear anyone denigrate women, you didn’t hear anyone make racist comments about new American immigrants, you didn’t hear anyone speak ill of another American because of their religious belief,” said former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley. “What you heard instead on this stage tonight was an honest search for the answers that will move our country forward.”

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also commented on this, saying, “In this debate, we tried to deal with some of the very tough issues facing our country. That’s in stark contrast to the Republicans who are currently running for president.” 

There was little discussion of LGBT issues, but the few statements the candidates made had a positive tone. O’Malley praised the attitudes of young people. “Talk to our young people under 30, because you’ll never find among them people that want to bash immigrants or people that want to deny rights to gay couples,” he said, to much applause. “That tells me we are moving to a more connected, generous, and compassionate place, and we need to speak to the goodness within our country.” That was in his closing statement; in his opening statement he had touted passing the state’s marriage equality law as one of his accomplishments as governor.

Lincoln Chafee, who signed marriage equality into law when he was governor of Rhode Island, noted his support for that cause when answering moderator Anderson Cooper’s question about whether he was vulnerable for criticism for his switches in party affiliation, from Republican to independent to Democrat.

“I have not changed on the issues,” Chafee said. “I was a liberal Republican, then I was an independent, and now I’m a proud Democrat. But I have not changed on the issues. And I open my record to scrutiny. Whether it’s on the environment, a woman’s right to choose, gay marriage, fiscal responsibility, aversion to foreign entanglements, using the tools of government to help the less fortunate.” He switched affiliations, he said, because there was no longer a place for him in the Republican Party: “The party left me.”

Clinton, who in her opening statement said one of her goals as president would be addressing “the continuing discrimination against the LGBT community,” faced a question from Cooper about the fact that she has changed positions on marriage equality and other issues.

“You were against same-sex marriage,” the out CNN journalist said. “Now you’re for it. You defended President Obama’s immigration policies. Now you say they’re too harsh. You supported his trade deal dozen of times. You even called it the ‘gold standard.’ Now, suddenly, last week, you’re against it.”

Clinton replied that her principles had not changed, “but, like most human beings — including those of us who run for office — I do absorb new information.”

LGBT issues didn’t come up otherwise, and in general, the five participants largely were in consensus on major issues — with former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb slightly more conservative than the rest, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont generally somewhat more liberal.

The candidates agreed on the need to further regulate financial markets, reduce economic inequality, provide a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, reform the criminal justice system so fewer people go to jail for nonviolent crimes, address climate change, and limit military involvement around the world, with a few differences on just how to do this. For instance, Sanders and Clinton agree that making higher education more affordable would reduce the economic divide; Sanders wants free tuition at public colleges and universities, no strings attached, while Clinton would like to see students work in exchange for tuition waivers.

The candidates also highlighted some differences in their voting records. Sanders and Chafee, who is a former U.S. senator as well as a governor, both pointed out that they voted against U.S. military action in Iraq, which Clinton voted for as a senator from New York. Sanders called the Iraq war “the worst foreign policy blunder in the history of this country,” and he warned against U.S. intervention in the conflict in Syria, which he dubbed “a quagmire in a quagmire.” He suggested that Clinton would be more open to intervention than he would. Clinton, for her part, criticized Sanders’s votes against gun control measures.

Sanders also touted the differences in funding between himself and other candidates, saying he’s the only one without a super PAC, which can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money, and that most of his supporters are small donors. The senator identifies as a small-D “democratic socialist,” and Cooper said a Republican attack ad on his positions would “write itself.”

Sanders replied that there’s a need to educate people about what democratic socialism is, that it embraces such policies as universal health care and paid family leave. As to whether Americans will vote for him, Sanders said, Republicans win when there is a low voter turnout. … Sixty-three percent of the American people didn’t vote, Anderson. Eighty percent of young people didn’t vote. We are bringing out huge turnouts, and creating excitement all over this country.”

All in all, there was little in the debate that appeared likely to change the status of Clinton and Sanders as the top contenders. Vice President Joe Biden could shake up the race if he decides to run, but he has not announced a decision.

The biggest applause of the night came in a discussion of the congressional inquiry into Clinton’s use of a private email server when she headed the State Department. “Tonight I want to talk not about my emails, but about what the American people want from the next president of the United States,” she said to much applause

Sanders interjected, “Let me say something that may not be great politics. But I think the secretary is right, and that is that the American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails.” The crowd erupted even further, and did so again shortly thereafter, when Cooper asked Clinton if she wanted to comment on Chafee’s remarks about the email matter raising questions of credibility. She said simply, “No.”

If you missed the debate and want to see a full transcript, The Washington Post has one here, annotated with commentary.

Trudy Ring

www.advocate.com/election/2015/10/13/dems-differ-republicans-not-much-east-other

Open Question: Why do homophobic people use facebook?
Facebook, as i’m sure you know, highly supports the lgbt community and donates a lot of money to LGBT charities. But then there are people who say how they hate the community and go on pages to say all their hateful crap. I ask them why there on a sight that so strongly supports something they hate and never get a answer. I thought they boycott this kind of stuff. (Which I honestly think corporations do this to make homophobes starve to death) What do you think? I’m actually curious about this

answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20151013203846AA16Rcr