While New York City recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with much hoopla and an enormous traffic-stopping Gay Pride parade that went on well into the night, New York’s Lincoln Center Theater chose to feature the other side of the coin by mounting the American premiere of playwright Chris Urch’s The Rolling Stone. Sensitively directed by Saheem Ali the play, an import from London, is scheduled to run through Sunday, August 25th. Though all seven characters in this harrowing political play are fictionalized, that in 2010 The Rolling Stone, a Ugandan newspaper, urged on by anti-gay Christian missionaries from the United States, started to publish the names, addresses, and photos of suspected gay men which in turn inspired Urch to write this play, is very real. Chillingly so! For shockers, the inflammatory newspaper headline “Hang Them” – reminiscent of the “Jail Hillary” chants – appeared at the top of each page in bold type. As you can well imagine violent attacks, even a murder followed, and the lives of many suspected homosexual men and their families were turned upside down. While the play is set in Uganda it is only the tip of the iceberg, as such happenings have been taking place, and still are, in countries all over the world for decades, if not centuries. Today, in Africa alone, over half of its 54 countries, including Uganda, have criminalized homosexuality, with many advocating prison for life, and even death. Saheem Ali, who grew up in East Africa and is queer himself, is the perfect choice to direct The Rolling Stone. As he told one interviewer during a rehearsal break, Urch’s play had particular resonance for him. “I understand the play’s particular brand of homophobia. I was homophobic when I was growing up. I did not know any openly pay people. It was only when I came to the United States for college – Northeastern University in Boston – that I met gay people.” As the lights go up on act one, after a rousing religious hymn that lets the audience know that religion is going to be a large part of this play, we see two young men in a boat. It is night and the sky is star-filled. From their light banter it is obvious that they are on their first date and on their way, tentatively so, to being more than just close friends. Dembe (a wonderful Ato Blankson-Wood) is an 18-year-old Ugandan. Sam (a cool, calm, and collected Robert Gilbert), with a Ugandan mother and an Irish father, is a mixed-race doctor from Ireland. In his late twenties (or is it early 30s?), he is the older of the two. Sam has come to Africa, as he tells Dembe, “to try to do good.” Throughout this short introductory scene it is obvious that love is in the air. It is also obvious that two men alone in a boat at night are playing in extremely dangerous waters. This is made explicitly clear when Dembe nervously questions whether or not they are being watched. Dropping another ominous clue of what’s to come, Sam takes several pictures of Dembe. Adding more fuel to the fire we learn that earlier in the day Dembe attended his father’s funeral. Later on it is revealed that a lot less money than expected was left for the family, which greatly lessons the chance of both Dembe and his sister Wummie (Latoya Edwards) to continue their education in London. Adding more subplots than a seven-layer cake, we also learn that Dembe’s father was a greatly loved pastor, the church is looking for his replacement, and that Dembe’s older brother Joe (a solid and fiery James Odom) is hell-bent, no matter what it takes, on filling that role.
Rounding out this fine cast is Mama, an excitingly explosive Myra Lucretia Taylor. A scheming, self-serving church congregant and family friend Mama also has a daughter Naome (the deliciously silent Adenike Thomas), who for some unknown reason has not spoken one word in the past six months. The secret-hiding Mama—only she knows why her daughter stopped speaking—having some power in the church manages to get Joe appointed as the new Pastor. Of course, strings are attached. The exposition-filled act one, though well acted and moderately enjoyable, is mostly surface. Act two does an about turn with a fusillade of deeply heartfelt scenes that pack a wallop, many totally unexpected. Secrets are revealed, photos come back to bite, Mama reveals her true colors, Naome shockingly utters a scream, Dembe and Sam come under public suspicion, Sam and Wummie have a confrontation, and Dembe reveals his true nature to both his family and to Naome, as she tellingly hangs on to every word as he unveils his heart. It is the most intimate, truthful, and beautifully written moment in the play. Fittingly, it takes place on a boat in the quiet calm of the water. Most shockingly, though not totally unexpected given Joe’s macho behavior as the newly head of the family, to keep his job as Pastor, protect his family, and please his congregation, he delivers a vitriolic anti-homosexual sermon. “I ask the Lord what shall be done and the Lord tells me for us to look to our children. Look to our boys and if we see a limp wrist, we crush it.” At the end of play, as their world appears to be falling apart, Dembe, Wummie, and Joe, have no other choice but to leave their fate in the hand of God. Whether this will be of any help at all is left up in the air.
