Rent. Angels in America. It used to be that if a major theater production dealt with The Gays, it would also be dealing with AIDS, discrimination, and blazing activism. Today’s productions, however, have gotten over all those dramatics; not because they’re no longer important, but because we’ve got bigger problems. Like: finding a date! Surviving WWII! No more worrying about AZT in these scripts.
Times theater critic Patrick Healy has waded through the handful of gay productions currently showing or en route and finds them “subtler, more nuanced: they place the everyday concerns of Americans in a gay context, thereby pressing the case that gay love and gay marriage, gay parenthood and gay adoption are no different from their straight variations. While persecution remains a reality for most of these gay characters, just as it does in many movies and television shows featuring gay love stories, the widening acceptance of AIDS as a pandemic rather than a gay disease — and the broadening debate on gay marriage and gay soldiers — have led, and have to some extent freed, writers and producers to use a wider lens to explore a broader landscape.”
Like characters sparring over religious differences. Because that is new to the stage, yah?
(Pictured: A scene from Yank, now playing Off Broadway.)
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Dirty Ole Man
Well it’s about time.
The message has always been “AIDS is NOT just a Gay Epidemic”,
it’s a “Human Epidemic”. I’m glad writers are now letting go of
the notion that all Gays are somehow affected by the virus thru
themselves or a love one. Thankfully, I don’t have AIDS nor do I know of anyone who has died from AIDS.
The stereotype is finally loosening it’s grip.
bobito
@Dirty Ole Man: Lucky you, DOM.
jason
I also got sick of AIDS being associated with gay and bisexual men. It worked against us. It demonized us. It was designed to do this. Homophobes loved the fact that it was being associated with us, and that we complied with this notion.
We are just as much to blame. We used AIDS as part of our political tool kit to win sympathy, but it backfired on us.
ggreen
Fortunately AIDS and HIV are no longer a problem for gay men in the US. The biggest problem for gay men is how to better emulate Paris Hilton, one of the super skank Kardashians or becoming a “Real Housewife of (name of Lame City here)”. Spray tans, bleached teeth and laser hair removal issues are always more spiritually satisfying than those messy end of life issues. Trying to find inner peace and fulfillment is such a huge worthless effort when getting drunk or high everyday and having sex with anything with a pulse is so much faster.
james p. p.
I’m happy at this progress although i have two things to say. (1) some of the settings take place before AIDS was known, so not mentioning it would be like not mentioning cell phones.
(2) Rent and Angels in America were written after a time of confused crisis and lack of knowledge – at a time when condom use among gay men was unheard of. it wasn’t to garner sympathy. it was to unite and educate. people like me who do not think AIDS and HIV are no longer a problem… namely because my best friend of 10 years died from it two years ago. in fact, over my out 10 years i’ve known at least 6 people who have died from the disease which is nothing compared to the generation before me. on occasion, i like to watch something that helps me relate – that other people have/are/are going to go through this same pain.
i am glad that we have moved away from the AIDS panic playwright, but there is no need to disrespect it – no more than we should disrespect a play written about surviving 9/11 by dismissing it as some left propaganda piece.
AIDS may not be killing your friends, but one day it will. I know it’s killed some of mine. so is it possible to back off the bitching just a bit and give a little respect for the gay shoulders on which we now stand?
and yes… i’m VERY happy for this new progression! 🙂
merkin
“Thankfully, I don’t have AIDS nor do I know of anyone who has died from AIDS.”
God its too early in the morning for such ignorance. I dont know any women with breast cancer, so breast cancer isnt a threat to women anymore
AIDS IS a gay disease, at least in America. If we didnt claim it, and talk about it and fight for government funding, even more gay men would be dead. If anything, the lie we spread was that AIDS was “everyone’s” disease–that prom queens in Mississippi and housewives in Buffalo were just at risk as gay men in New York and San Francisco. It was a necesessary deception–otherwise straight America wouldnt have given two shits about the fairies dying.
As for this current crop of gay theater, Ive seen most of the shows. Yes, they cover other territory besides AIDS, but they still feel steeped in stereotypes or well-trod issues–self loathing, DADT, gay marriage. How about a play with characters that happen to be gay? A murder mystery? A comedy of errors? An all-male “Paint Your Wagon”?
Robert
I can’t decide if the title of this article is meant to be sarcastic or serious. HIV/AIDS ISN’T a Gay Issue; it’s a Human Issue – good for them for realizing this and widening the scope.
Constantly associating Homosexuality and HIV/AIDS just makes it easier for the ‘phobes to consider it Gay Cancer; and who wants to go down that road again?
David Ehrenstein
Typically stupid NYT piece designed to alert breeders that it’s “safe” to go to gay plays now because they’re not about AIDS anymore.
I’m 63 — HIV-negative — and throughtout the 80’s and 90’s witnessed the deaths of untold nubers of those nearest and dearest to me.
But that’s “just so five minutes ago” now — right kids?
David Ehrenstein
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBQp5eNSTl8
Robert
@David Ehrenstein:
Good for you on being old and Negative. I’m almost 30 and living with my HIV+ partner; yet I still feel it’s appropriate for ‘Gay’ media to move away from the stereotype HIV/AIDS is a gay-centric disease.
It’s not a matter of HIV/AIDS being ‘so five minutes ago’; it’s a matter of it not being the exclusive worry of gay men and women. As I said above; it’s a human issue – why should every gay media piece cover it?
There is more to being gay than HIV/AIDS, or dressing like a woman, or going to bath houses.
conrad
@ everyone who thinks HIV/AIDS is not a gay disease. please check the epi data available from the CDC at http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/us.htm.
unfortunately %56 of new infections are between men who have sex with men. gay men do not make up half the population in the US but somehow we account for more than half of new infections.
gay men need to own these stats and acknowledge that are sexually liberated selves are at greater risk than hets.
not that HIV/AIDS needs to be addressed in every broadway play. im just saying, it’s important not to be a denialist about the risk we live with everyday…
Cam
No. 3 · jason said…
We are just as much to blame. We used AIDS as part of our political tool kit to win sympathy, but it backfired on us.
____________________
I seriously doubt that those men back int he 80’s were sitting there thinking…”I know, hey! I can use my dying boyfriend and all my dying friends to get political sympathy” I would bet they were doing whatever they could to survive the epidemic. If you read history, their main focus at the time was to get drugs approved faster…if they wanted sympathy that wouldn’t have been the route to go.
Robert
@conrad:
You make a valid point that gay men are of a high risk; though to me that still does not make this a ‘gay disease’. You have to keep in mind that when HIV/AIDS was first diagnosed it was considered Gay Cancer; something that ONLY harmed gay people – any association you make of HIV/AIDS as predominately gay is going to hit on that stigma and raise some pretty strong arguments.
That being said; look at the sample size the CDC used. When you consider the number of HIV+ people in the US alone, their sampling size is very small. The smaller the sampling size, the less reliable the data.
Joe K
I have HIV/AIDS.
Anyone who is gay and says they don’t know anyone with it is either lying, clueless, or has a lot of freinds that are afraid to say anything about it (especially living in a big city). When I first got my diagnoses, I was shocked to find out so many of my freinds had it (and never said anything about it). We wont even mention all those who have it and do not know it or care to know it.
I am so happy that we are getting away from any gay production mentioning HIV. It has its time and place, but almost any entertainment production that mentions HIV will usually have that actor with it die at the end of the production. HIV is not an automatic death scentence anymore. Maybe that is why they are getting away from it, as it has lost its “dramatic” value.
bobito
@Joe K: A lot of gay people back in the 80s & 90s immediately disassociated themselves from anybody who was HIV-infected, in order to maintain their bubble of “not knowing anybody who was infected.” Others immediately ceased contact with their “long-term survivor” friends the instant they became ill. It broke my heart when I visited sick friends and was told I was one of the only people who still acted as if they existed. Once would have been bad enough, but I heard it more than once. It was a really crappy time.
I’m sorry for your infection, but fortunately the prognosis is not nearly so bad anymore – hang in there, brother. And check out “Angels in America” (the HBO production was great, it’s on DVD) – not only does Prior Walter NOT “die at the end”, but he will bless you with “more life”.
@Cam: you are right. We weren’t really thinking about political sympathy at all. We were just tired of so many people dying. I was way too young to be dealing with all that shit back then, but ignoring or rejecting my friends and colleagues just never occurred to me.
Joe K
@bobito:
Yes I dont have a single freind left from the 80’s, and i am not that old.
I dont live my HIV, its just my Jetson’s brekfeast (sometimes it turns against me). It is nice to see media (even news media is getting away from it) normalize HIV into just another disease. Sadly i know this is a double edged sword (people thinking take a pill I wil be allright).
I love to see Gay themed entertainment that doesn’t make me squirm.
jason
Gay males are NOT at a high risk. There is nothing about being “gay” or “male” that makes you a high risk.
It is “promiscuity” that makes you a high risk. Keep that in mind.
dontblamemeivotedforhillary
@Jason – What if your lover cheats only once and transmitted the HIV virus to you? Does that make you promiscuous?
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” George Santayana
Latino
@Jason – What makes high risk for HIV in gay men is unprotected anal sex, not promiscuity (and that goes for any gender or orientation).
Andrew
Question.
If AIDS and HIV is a Gay epidemic, why are 80% of cases in North Africa, which largely outlaws homosexuality at all?
Robert
@Andrew: So wow… are you really suggesting that homosexuality only exists where it is not outlawed? I respect the argument that HIV/AIDS is by far not a ‘gay disease’ but your logic for why simply isn’t.