When I was an intern at a professional theatre in Cincinnati, Ohio, back in the 1990’s, I was cast in a four-woman play as a bi-curious woman named Renee. Opposite me – my theatre co-star – was a woman playing the role of a gay private detective with whom I end up having an affair.
I had never before (nor have I since) acted the part of a gay woman in a play, so this was going to be an adventure. I thought it would be easy, but I was wrong, at least at first.
Our director held a talk-fest with us to help us ease our way through our first kiss; a kind of getting-to-love-you conversation, as it were. It didn’t help for spit.
The top of Act Two begins with a wordless scene with just us two, on the floor of the stage in a soft spotlight. We kiss. And I run my hand down her body. Our getting-to-love-you conversation was all about that scene. That approximately 30-second scene! We talked for hours, and still we were awkward as hell when we first kissed.
Now, take into account the fact that my co-star actually was gay. You would think that that would help the situation, but no. She was awkward as I was. So much for easing into things.
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Fast forward a few weeks. The play has gone up (meaning, for the newbies, that the play has opened and is running). We’re standing behind a part of the set, waiting to enter in the dark between scenes and get under the covers of an onstage bed where we will hide until our scene is lit, at which point we will be sitting there in the bed as though we have been there all night.
Standing behind me in the dark is my co-star. We have done the play now about three times – stood behind this flat waiting for our entrance now about three times. And suddenly, to my instant alarm, in my ear my onstage lesbian lover whispers, “I love how you smell when you sweat.”
???
Uh…first of all: what am I supposed to say???, is what I’m thinking. And then I’m thinking, holy God, we’re about to go on stage, you idiot! Why are you talking to me about personal stuff???
I was so glad to get that light cue that got me out on that stage! Christ Almighty!
Nowhere else in my life have I found stories to equal the ones that I gather in live theatre.
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Well, here I go again. I’m off to San Francisco on Tuesday afternoon to audition for another lesbian role as well as a straight one! They want me to audition for both roles because they see me as possible in either one. Well, in that long-ago play, all of the women but me were gay. And I spent weeks listening to these women put straight women down – an interesting upside-down kind of bigotry, if you will.
The roles I’m reading for are (1) the straight woman who plays with the affections of the gay lead, or, (2) the gay writer who reads like Bette Davis as a lesbian.
So, if I get cast, and if the cast is all gay, and if I have to spend all of my time in a heterosexual closet, I think this is what I’ll do: If I get cast as the Bette Davis-ish lesbian, I’ll just stay in character and kick ass if someone puts me down for not declaring myself gay. Or maybe I’ll just walk up behind someone in the dark, just before the lights come up, and whisper, “I love how you smell when you sweat.”
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