STRAIGHT: THE PLAY

[@z5]

Posted: 2/23/16 at 1:03am

Anyone seen it/heard anything?

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 2/23/16 at 1:06am

Why does everything always have to be straight with you?

[After Eight]

Posted: 2/23/16 at 7:09am

A twenty-six year old resists moving in with his girlfriend, who wants to know why. Because he's attracted to men, that's why, and is having a fling with a college student. Will he tell her or not? Basically, that's the entire play, which keeps repeating the situation again and again without any resolution. It's a big tease, and an exasperating one. Meanwhile, to fill up the time, there's a lot of yakking about banking, genetics, and what not --- all of it padding, and none of it interesting.

 

Finally it all ends, abruptly, and unsatisfyingly.

 

The actors are good, and the set is attractive.

 

90 minutes, no intermission.

 

[jbird5]

Posted: 2/23/16 at 7:43am

If you enjoy watching good looking young men spooning, this is your show.

[haterobics]

Posted: 2/23/16 at 7:58am

Almost caught this the other night, when I was grabbing advance tickets to see Bobby Steggert in Boy at the same box office right about when 20at20 would have started. But didn't know anything about it, so i figured I'd wait. The audience coming to see it were decidedly not Straight.

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/8/16 at 5:50pm

I caught this last night and think it could have been a really edgy play in like 1992. It covered well-trodden ground that we've seen better tackled in other plays, TV shows and films. At this very moment you can see a much better bi-sexual storyline on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend with Darryl (I'm both-sexual!) and White Josh's budding romance. The gay members of the threesome of sorts in Straight are 20 and 26 years old. The 20 year old makes a big deal about the 26 year old being so old, but it would have made the play much more interesting if he actually were old. Part of what makes Darryl's story work so well is that he's an older divorced man with a daughter who is realizing that while he still is attracted to women, he has been suppressing his interest in men these years. 

 

Straight's two couples are on very unequal footing. Ben and Emily have been dating for five years and are contemplating moving in together. Ben and Chris are a craigslist/grindr hook-up that turns somewhat serious, but Emily knows nothing about. Unfortunately this forces Emily to be played as the most unobservant and dense person ever (she literally finds them passed out on the couch together IN THEIR UNDERWEAR and assumes they were just out for wild night of drinking). 

 

The actors fair better when the dialogue is serious rather than comedic. There are some laughs to be found, but more of the groaning variety than genuine ha ha funny. 

 

Unlike After Eight, I did like the ending and think it led to a realistic conclusion, but it wasn't enough to completely salvage the play. The runtime is 90 minutes and it does go by quickly. 

[@z5]

Posted: 3/8/16 at 9:04pm

The ending was very realistic, which is why it was so shocking and wow for me. if that makes sense.

[After Eight]

Posted: 3/8/16 at 9:27pm

"The ending was very realistic, which is why it was so shocking and wow for me. if that makes sense."

 

It doesn't. If it's so realistic, then it wouldn't be shocking at all.

 

The fact is, the audience gasped, and in some cases, jeered, in disbelief at an unrealistic, and wholly unacceptable ending, in both real-life, and theatrical terms.

[Fantod]

Posted: 3/8/16 at 9:40pm

Anyone care to spoil the ending?

[GreasedLightning]

Posted: 3/8/16 at 9:42pm

If anyone cares to do so, please spoiler tag it or PM it to Fantod. I am seeing it tomorrow and don't really want the ending spoiled.