Done backwards

I went to The Ringwald, a small theater in Ferndale, to see the play The Homosexuals. The story is about an almost-20 gay young man from Iowa arriving in Chicago (I figured it was New York, and the program doesn't say) in the year 2000 and being invited to a party of gay friends. Over the next ten years we see the effect this young man has on the group. It was both touching and funny (though not necessarily at the same times).

There is a fascinating aspect to this play. A five minute scene appears at the very beginning and end of the play. This turns out to be the end of that party. However, the scenes that make up the rest of the play run backwards. After the intro we have a scene between Evan (the young man) and Peter set in 2010. Then comes a scene with British Mark (yup, the character's name -- to distinguish him from Mark) set in 2008 and one with Michael in 2006, etc. The last of the six scenes is the whole party, ending with the vignette that opened the play.

I've been pondering: Why do it this way? Would the play work with the scenes in chronological order? I do understand that during the party scene as Evan meets each character we already know what entanglements Evan will have with that character. Whether that is better storytelling I haven't yet worked out.

Evan is in every scene, quite a daunting task for the actor, who handled it well. Most of the other characters are in only two scenes and one is seen only at the party. The cast includes one woman, a character who likes to hang out with her gay pals.

The theater has perhaps 100 seats. As expected, nearly all the audience was male, and they got all the gay jokes. The stage is small and close and there is no curtain. During scene changes a not very bright work light came on and most of the characters reset the stage for the next scene. One character was responsible for helping Evan change costume which was done in full view, even if Evan began the next scene offstage. The one time Evan had to strip completely, his changer held up a sheet to block our view -- which brought a laugh from the crowd.

The show runs one more weekend, Friday through Monday. You can find a review about halfway down this page of a review site.