'Take Me Out' Review: Jse Williams Is Powerful As Gay Baseball Star

Contents:

• JSE WILLIAMS WEIGHS ON BEG A STRAIGHT MAN PLAYG A GAY CHARACTER BROADWAY'S TAKE ME OUT
• 'GREY'S ANATOMY' STAR JSE WILLIAMS MAK A SE FOR WHY STRAIGHT ACTORS N PLAY GAY ROL HIS BROADWAY BUT, 'TAKE ME OUT'
• STT ELLIS TALKS ABOUT THE BROADWAY GAY-THEMED BASEBALL PLAY 'TAKE ME OUT'
• TAKE ME OUT REVIEW. A GAY LOVE LETTER TO BASEBALL

JSE WILLIAMS WEIGHS ON BEG A STRAIGHT MAN PLAYG A GAY CHARACTER BROADWAY'S TAKE ME OUT

His cisn to open up about his sexualy sparks a firtorm of homophobia and racism the sport, particularly his own locker room. But Williams is also engagg wh another proment topic of discsn — whether straight actors should play gay characters.

He don't nsir himself part of the gay muny, and he's stgglg wh his own inty and sense of awarens there. You were talkg about the inty issu that the play wrtl wh, and your character, Darren, has two big thgs that he's alg wh terms as a biracial baseball player who out as gay.

Dealg wh tolerance and and the racism and homophobia that e up the play, do you have to parse the nuanc between those two thgs or is all one big meltg pot of horrible people? But Jse Williams is well st as the gay baseball superstar Darren Lemmg.

'GREY'S ANATOMY' STAR JSE WILLIAMS MAK A SE FOR WHY STRAIGHT ACTORS N PLAY GAY ROL HIS BROADWAY BUT, 'TAKE ME OUT'

"Dpe the monali, the media, cludg the New York Tim, has wonred whether Williams, a straight actor, should play a gay character.

Bee straight men playg gay, everybody wants to give them an award, " Billy Porter, who is a member of the LGBTQ muny, told The Hollywood Reporter Neil Patrick Harris, who married his hband David Burtka 2014, told The Tim 2021 that he "would fely want to hire the bt actor" for any role. "Take Me Out, " which opened April 4, centers Darren, a stellar profsnal baseball player, and what happens to him and his team — the fictnal Empir — after he out as script, viewed by Insir, lls Darren "a Black man who you uld image had never suffered" and Williams told Entertament Weekly that the character "don't nsir himself part of the gay muny" and has been "straight prentg" before he mak the somewhat impulsive cisn to share his sexual orientatn wh the world at a prs 's is a versn of a g-out story, there is no nyg that. Unfortunately, tryg to do so, he grossly unrtimat the power of racism and homophobia.

We also see the shock Darren feels when 's clear the team manager Skip (Ken Marks) isn't gog to fight to keep Shane Mungt (Michael Oberholtzer) — the player who ed explic homophobic and racial slurs agast Darren — om beg restated on the team. Williams has a lot to prove his Broadway but as Darren, and part of the reason he's succsful bee of his platonic chemistry wh stage veteran and "Morn Fay" star Jse Tyler Fergon as Darren's bs manager Mason "Marz" role, more than Williams', benefs om beg played by an openly gay actor who knows the stggle that many young people face bee of their sexualy. Marz knows why 's important that Darren don't n away om baseball, bee he's facg the btal reali of racism and homophobia.

STT ELLIS TALKS ABOUT THE BROADWAY GAY-THEMED BASEBALL PLAY 'TAKE ME OUT'

Gay people need Darren to keep playg so they n keep dreamg. Marz has the right to ll the gay jock out for not botherg to notice a lot of the homophobia that moners the queer muny face.

For all the bety of a well-executed h and n and the ceremony of a home n, there is also the off-the-field snipg, a hateful Twter rant and an ocsnal work one hand, Take Me Out is the story of Mason Marzac (aka Marz, played by Jse Tyler Fergon), a gay fancial adviser whose volvement the re cint has led him, to fall love wh the game. Avery on Grey's Anatomy, who makg his Broadway but), the gay superstar and a person of lor who out the closet and the mayhem that rults. Homophobia is ont and center.

He's a homophobe. You're tght to be a racist; you're tght to be homophobic. Stori on tribalism, homophobia, hate speech hate crim lead the daily news feed, not to mentn the Twtersphere.

TAKE ME OUT REVIEW. A GAY LOVE LETTER TO BASEBALL

Blatant homophobia and transphobia is rampant thanks to the lik of Republin policians like Ron DeSantis, Greg Abbott, Ken Paxton, Lren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and many others propagatg anti-LGBTQ hate Fierste on Love, Broadway, Secrets, Addictn, and Fightg Anti-LGBTQ BigotryLast year, almost 20 years after Take Me Out was first performed, Bryan Ruby ma history as the first out gay profsnal baseball player, tellg USA Today that he wanted “to help create a world where future generatns of baseball players don’t have to sacrifice thenticy or who they really are to play the game they love. The gay baseball player is not alone, isolated, bullied, rejected. The tle of the play tak on many meangs—light and dark—as the play is easy to sell Take Me Out as “the gay baseball play.

But Darren is adamant that he wants normal service to ntue as much as possible; he don’t need any helpg hand, whatever the homophobia of the locker room which we see mor eptns st of 'Take Me Out. ' Jeremy DanielUsually, we are programmed to support the gay hero this ntext; appld their bravery, and be ennobled by the lson they may teach .

Tyler Fergon plays Mason Marzac, Darren’s agent, a gay man who is more stay-at-home than partier, and— his stuffy shirt and troers—far om the ttosterone-filled, sexy client. He tak great pri takg Darren’s lls his apartment block’s rridor when his hot gay neighbors are wh listeng Tyler Fergon 'Take Me Out. Mason don’t re about sports, ed has been alienated om them—until there is Michael Oberholtzer’s Shane Mungt, a fantastic pcher and awful human, whose sual homophobia and racism be a sendary cultural prism the play.