1964: The Birth of Gay Theater - The Gay & Lbian Review

Contents:

• 1964: THE BIRTH OF GAY THEATER
• WHAT’S WH GAY MEN AND MIL THEATER?
• THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN
• GAY THEATRE: G OUT OR GOG BACK?
• A BRIEF HISTORY OF GAY THEATER, THREE ACTS
• THE 10 BT GAY MILS OF ALL TIME

1964: THE BIRTH OF GAY THEATER

The "secret language" was ed heavily by gays the circ, navy, and theater, and arose out of the need to discs gay matters unr a clever guise, due to homosexual acts beg illegal Bra until the passage of the Sexual Offens Act 1967. Here's some of the amg slang: Basket - the bulge of male genals through clothFantabulos-wonrfulEf - face (backslang) DollyEf - pretty face Chicken - a young guySome Polari words still exist morn gay slang.

Check out Atlas Obscura pots out, Polari was a great self-performative outlet for Brish gays to not only exprs themselv but also easily intify and n wh fellow memebers of the queer muny. In 1964, spe a social climate of homophobia that pervad Amerin life for the send third of the 20th century, two one-act plays prented Off-Off-Broadway at the Caffe Co revolutnized how gay characters uld be reprented theatrilly.

WHAT’S WH GAY MEN AND MIL THEATER?

Satirized the trial of Osr Wil sympathetilly), the Wilson and Patrick one-acts were unique that both featured gay characters set the prent time who were not only open, but boisteroly fiant. We uldn’t jt log on to the ter or turn on the televisn to fd reprentatns of ourselv, we had to triangulate and hypothize om half-hts and sual pretory remarks by New York wrers about Greenwich Village parti and ffeeho that wh an only half-discerned arty Bohemian environment there might possibly be a ltle more acceptance of homosexuals.

THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN

In tanm wh the work of activist polil groups, which had begun anizg the late 1950s, the wrers at the Caffe Co—wh their wild talents for turng fantasy to theatril realy for their untercultural dienc—metaphorilly gave birth to the ncept of “gay liberatn. (In fact, Doric Wilson, perhaps the first playwright of the “Gay Theater” movement at the Co, was also a pneer of gay polil activism: he participated both the GLF and s scennt, the GAA. LANFORD WILSON and Robert Patrick were not unaware that their impulse to wre plays about openly gay characters was chartg new terrory, as wns Wilson’s “thor not” to “The Madns of Lady Bright”: “I believe the ia of the play shocked me.

Openg on December 6, 1964, only a few months after “The Madns of Lady Bright, ” “The Hnted Host” has as s protagonist one Jay, a wildly funny gay playwright who has recently lost his lover Ed to suici.

GAY THEATRE: G OUT OR GOG BACK?

Envisng an alternative endg for the tragic queen archetype, the play enacts a crique of homosexual inti by offerg a visn which the stereotypil power dynamic between the gay man and the straight man is verted.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF GAY THEATER, THREE ACTS

By reversg the prumptn of heterosexualy as origal tth, and puttg the “straight man” a posn which he mt expla his “foreign” sexualy to a gay man, the playwright language to unrme the heterosexist perceptn of realy. Patrick’s queer theater ntributed to a nascent sense of “gay liberatn” by promotg visibily, stabilizg normative social nstcts, providg a template for dividual self-empowerment, and exposg opprsn.

An ephemeral utopia for Patrick and his iends, the Co was neverthels a place where numero relatnships were built, and where gay artists uld fd the mararie that affirmed their mon terts, perspectiv, and sexual sir. He loved opera too, which is another mon stereotype about gay men that ntas a good b of hnted Broadway together, we subscribed to opera seri, and we regularly spread a blanket out Central Park to sip Chardonnay and thrill to why?

THE 10 BT GAY MILS OF ALL TIME

Most of the theater people of his day didn't know how their culture had evolved jt knew that many of them were gay and even transgenr, not that transgenr was a word Lenny knew is that men who liked other men liked the theater. I don't have anythg agast show tun, I jt don't many gay men of my generatn and younger, tradnal gay culture is not somethg I actively we tegrate and normalize, our special cultur are fadg 're the last lks to the old rogu of the travellg theater , those ancient tradns will live on only history books. Gay people may fd solace and fort theatre, but there are other groups who do not, and we should make every effort to change MasculyThe other reason why theatre is sometim labeled as queer, most often by men, is that there are aspects of stagecraft that n ntrary to entrenched ias of masculy.

Vada (“look at”), dolly eek (a pretty face), and chicken (a young guy) are all words om the lexin of Polari, a secret language ed by gay men Bra at a time when homosexualy was illegal. Durg the terim years, when beg openly non-straight brought the risks of social isolatn and crimal prosecutn, Polari provid gay men wh a subtle way to fd one another for pannship and sex.