Controversial Gay Plays

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 6:32pm

Hey folks, i need your help.
Could you be so kind to list plays no matter how big of small that were seen as controversial when they opened or still are seen that way.

Thanks so much

[rorschach37]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 6:36pm

The Normal Heart was very controversial at the time of its original opening.

[LYLS3637]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 6:48pm

The most controversial I can think of is "Corpus Christi" by Terrance McNally. Bomb threats were called in, death threats were made against the cast and playwright. Christians went apoplectic over this play (and still do whenever it pops up somewhere)

Updated On: 5/10/12 at 06:48 PM

[kdogg36]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 6:49pm

I was a bit young, but I've heard that there were protests outside the theatre during the original run of La Cage aux Folles. Can anyone confirm this?

[followspot]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 6:56pm

These all ruffled feathers in their time:

"The Children's Hour"
"Tea and Sympathy"
"Cat on a Hot Tin Roof"
"Game of Fools"
"A Taste of Honey"
"Now She Dances!"
"The Killing of Sister George"
"Entertaining Mr. Sloane"
"The Haunted Host"
"Fortune and Men's Eyes"
"The Madness of Lady Bright"
"The Boys in the Band"
"Staircase"
"Norman, Is That You?"
"Kennedy's Children"
"Short Eyes"
"Gemini"
"Bent"
"T-Shirts"
"Blue Is For Boys"
"Jerker"
"Execution of Justice"
"As Is"
"Safe Sex"
"Adam and the Experts"
"My Queer Body"

Updated On: 5/11/12 at 06:56 PM

[dramamama611]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 7:02pm

Laramie Project always seems to stir up some controversy.

[xxdrewboy85xx]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 7:03pm

Corpus Christie is by far the most controversial.

A production of Corpus Christie was done in my home town about 10 years ago and because of the protesting going on around the show and the negative publicity, the college auditorium where the play was being performed made the decision to not allow the theater company to perform their play on the school's property. So a "Liberal" Church stepped in and allowed the play to be performed in the Church.

[mc1227]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 7:41pm

Not sure if it was the first of it's kind, but "Torch Song Trilogy" was controversial when it opened in the early 80's. Made Harvey Fierstein a legend, deservedly so.

Updated On: 5/10/12 at 07:41 PM

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 7:46pm

Angels In America

[Gothampc]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 8:37pm

What was the name of that play in the 1980s about phone sex?

[Matt2]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 8:50pm

Just an observation, but aren't all plays with homosexual themes, dialogue and/or characters controversial because the subject of homosexuality was/is controversial. I don't think there is a "gay play" that is uncontroversial.

Updated On: 5/10/12 at 08:50 PM

[Playbilly]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 9:05pm

The Boys in the Band

Equus (presumed gay themes)

Bent

[Playbilly]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 9:08pm

The Ritz


Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (from those who claimed it was "really" about a gay couple)

The Night of the Iguana

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 9:09pm

I don't think there is a "gay play" that is uncontroversial.

I don't remember any controversy over Next Fall. And Take Me out had an intriguing plot and nudity, but again, I don't remember it being "controversial".

[Playbilly]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 9:13pm

You bring up a good point. Is the controversy over the text, production, or WHERE the production might be?

Could be any combination causes a stir.

[morosco]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 10:40pm

What was the name of that play in the 1980s about phone sex?

Jerker, or The Helping Hand: A Pornographic Elegy with Redeeming Social Value and a Hymn to the Queer Men of San Francisco in Twenty Telephone Calls, Many of Them Dirty by Robert Chesley.

[uncageg]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 11:45pm

1973..Find Your Way Home starring Michael Moriarty. Not sure how controversial it was but I remember my mother went to see it with a group who had no clue what it was about and the rest of the group was not happy. My mother loved it.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 11:48pm

I honestly remember nothing controversial around Angels in America or Torch Song Trilogy.

[Matt2]

Posted: 5/10/12 at 11:51pm

"I don't remember any controversy over Next Fall. And Take Me out had an intriguing plot and nudity, but again, I don't remember it being 'controversial'."

True, for many people the representation of homosexuality in media is no big deal anymore. You're gay, so what? However, in some parts of the country, and in certain circles, the subject is almost as taboo as it was 50 years ago. I was really going along the fact that some people find the subject matter itself controversial, regardless of how it is presented- pretty much along the lines of what Playbilly wrote.

The location of a production definitely has an impact on how it is received. There was a controversy when my high school did Les Mis (which only made all of us want to do the show even more) and even a relatively controversial-free show like Legally Blonde got some people here in an uproar. We did them anyway though, and loved every minute of it. However, I went to school in a small, mid-western town that prides itself on its "traditional" values. Hardly the bastion of culture or open-mindedness. It seems though that those people are becoming fewer in number.


Updated On: 5/10/12 at 11:51 PM

[wonderwaiter]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 1:09am

In the 1990s in Georgia, a community theater production of Lips Together, Teeth Apart was the final straw for a town already rocked by M. Butterfly. Cobb County officials issued a resolution saying that homosexuality was incompatible with their beliefs, and they lost a ton of revenue dollars from the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.

[Matt2]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 1:23am

^It's these kinds of towns that want Hello, Dolly! and High School Musical performed over and over again. Anything new or thought provoking is a bridge too far. They like their little world just so and don't want to see or hear something that might challenge their beliefs, or god-forbid, get them to think!

[AADA81]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 3:45am

Controversial based on location of a production is different than controversial based on the year a play was originally written. I recall many years ago the plays "The Killing of Sister George", "Fortune and Men's Eyes" and, especially, "The Boys in the Band" receiving a lot of press for being controversial simply for existing. Later generations of plays may have had controversial reactions in segments, but it evolved over time to where it's not in wide swaths like it once was.

Going farther back, the film adaptations of some plays with a gay theme or subtext would almost inveritably be whitewashed or removed, such as the original film adaptation of "The Children's Hour" called "We Three" (1936). As I recall, "Cat On a Hot Tin Roof" (195 really toned it down as well. I'm not saying these films are bad (they're actually quite good) but it is interesting to put them into the context of their times.



Updated On: 5/11/12 at 03:45 AM

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 9:00am

Sholem Asch's GOD OF VENGEANCE (1907)

When it premiered on Broadway the entire cast was arrested. A couple tries to shield its daughter from the brothel they operate. Unsuccessfully. The daughter falls in love with one of the prostitutes. Not your typical Jewish family drama.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 10:24am

Thanks morosco, that was the one.

[OtherDaryl2]

Posted: 5/11/12 at 10:53am

The phone sex play was Jerker or The Helping Hand . . . by Robert Chesley.

Oops - someone beat me to it.

Ummm - Also check out Hosannah by Michelle Tremblay. Or Untold Decades by Robert Patrick.

Updated On: 5/11/12 at 10:53 AM