Sunday 11 April 2010

Yay, Panels!

Today's educational fieldtrip was to the Off-Broadway Alliance's "New Directions for Gay Theater" with Christopher Sieber, Michael Urie, Leslie Jordan, and a bunch of other people involved in productions with gay characters and themes this season. Fun!

The whole Hell's Kitchen crew ended up going - myself, David, Brady, Leah, and Lee - and we obviously arrived precisely at noon, because I was militant about getting there in time for bagels and coffee because grad students get a free pass when it comes to complimentary food and because I haven't done theater since high school that means I don't have to worry about embarrassing myself in front of these people.

It was surprisingly good, and there were a bunch of solid questions and thoughtful responses about the politics of representation, typecasting, labeling and marketing, and the usual stuff that comes along with queer media. The lesbian in the audience beat me to the question about lesbians, which was fine, as I'm pretty sure she asked it more convincingly than I would have. It was a nice change of pace - as we've all established, I'm a sucker for panels, but most of the ones I go to have to do with treaty bodies and grave violations of human rights, and do not involve me falling in love with Leslie Jordan.

I'm actually going to see The Kid at the end of the month with a couple of friends, so I can report back on that in approximately three weeks. Which is good, because the fact that my Sunday involved a panel, laundry, and writing two conference papers clearly suggests that I need to get out more.

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