|Manuel BetanurtManuel Betanurt on gay panic humor Somethg Rotten! on Broadway.
Contents:
EXPLORG GAY PANIC HUMOR BROADWAY’S SOMETHG ROTTEN!
* something rotten gay *
And yet, at the heart of the show is a troublg unrcurrent of gay panic that is both untered and amplified by the show’s own yet, at the heart of Somethg Rotten!
Is a troublg unrcurrent of gay panic that is both untered and amplified by the show’s own mil garners much of s lghs om wty wordplay matched wh a tic sense of humor about mils. The number, which visually echo Annie, A Chos Le, and Chigo among other inic mils, also jokgly pots out that all the “chos boys are kd of gay.
Four gay men experience art, sex and love durg one night. * something rotten gay *
” It’s then that the show’s over-reliance on gay humor beme evint, pecially when poed by characters wearg stum signed to accentuate their dpiec.
While the show has some remarkably tame femist tak on genr (Nick's wife cross-drs to get a job, a gag all but elevated by the hilar Heidi Blickenstaff), the number of cheap gay jok were hard for me to ignore, pecially as they harkened back to a time where nanci and nni and fags and fairi, were a punch le and of the character of Lord Clapham (Peter Bartlett), Nick and Nigel’s patron. This is a one-note joke that neverthels gets several enr, wh every sgle piece of dialogue fallg hard on gay double entendr. It mak ritur out of effemate gay men while amg them wh an anachronistic plot that pends on s very morny for the jok to work.
It utiliz the very form of mils to strike a barga wh s dience, allowg them to enjoy such a gay genre wh the safe distance afford by s irony.