Smart. Funny. Moving. Celebrated playwrights Jordan Harrison, Jeffrey Hatcher, Moises Kaufman, Joe Keenan, Neil LaBute, Wendy McLeod, Jose Rivera, Paul Rudnick and Doug Wright take on the red-hot subject of marriage equality, creating nine short plays for a theatrical event as magically entertaining and personally transforming as it is politically potent. Conceived and directed by Brian Shnipperand presented by Joan Stein and Stuart Ross in association with the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center, Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays opens for a five-week run of Monday night performances at The Renberg Theatre, in the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center’s Village at Ed Gould Plaza, on May 9. One preview performance takes place on April 25.
First presented as a one-time benefit performance at L.A.’s El Portal in 2009, Standing On Ceremony has since taken on a life of its own. Brian Shnipper and associate producer Allain
Rochel initially contacted a few playwrights to request contributions of short plays for an evening to raise funds and awareness in the fight for marriage equality. By the time a second benefit was organized at the N.Y. Theatre Workshop last June, the artistic world was galvanized: award-winning writers like Moises Kaufman and Neil LaBute were coming to them.
“So many people wanted to be involved that the New York benefit was 3 hours long and featured 35 actors,” explains Shnipper. “Since Joan and Stuart have come on board as producers, we’ve trimmed the number of plays to nine and are working with an ensemble of six actors to create a truly dynamic and cohesive 90-minute juggernaut that is ready to open as a full production. Just as the celebrity casts rotate at each performance, we hope to rotate in new plays as they come to us. It’s an ongoing process because we know that writers will continue to be moved to write on the subject.”
A different celebrity ensemble will be announced for each of the six Monday night performances at The Renberg Theatre. Celebrity casts were a key component of both the benefit performances and the workshop performances that followed at Largo at the Coronet last winter. Past performers have included Jason Alexander, Eve Best, Matthew Broderick, Jonathan Cake, Peri Gilpin, Judd Hirsch,Richard Kind, Hamish Linklater, Wendie Malick, Jefferson Mays, Deborah Messing, Debra Monk, Kathy Najimy, Zach Quinto, Jean Smart, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Alfre Woodard.
“When I saw it at Largo, I was blown away,” says Jon Imparato, Director of Cultural Arts at the L.A. Gay and Lesbian Center’s Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center. “It was obvious that the evening hit a raw nerve with the audience; we’ve never been able to laugh about gay marriage before because the wound was too open. I told Joan we wanted to have this on our stage.”
The nine plays that make up Standing On Ceremony include The Revision by Jordan Harrison, an amusing look at how two men might rewrite their vows to more accurately reflect the limited options available to a gay couple; White Marriage by Jeffery Hatcher, in which a wife and husband discuss his “gay” sense of humor; Moises Kaufman’s poignant London Mosquitoes, in which a widower tries to make sense of the loss of his long-time lover; This Marriage Is Saved by Joe Keenan, a satiric vignette about a disgraced evangelist and his wife who insist that his fling with a male prostitute has only strengthened their marriage; Strange Fruit by Neil LaBute, the story of two men in love whose plans to get married “the old-fashioned way” are stymied when reality rears its ugly head; Wendy MacLeod’s playful This Flight Tonight, which asks, “Is there any hope for happiness when a lesbian marriage begins in IOWA?”; Jose Rivera’s moving Pablo and Andrew at the Altar of Words, about two men who use their marriage vows to “say the things we never really say”; The Gay Agenda by Paul Rudnick, a sadly hilarious plea for understanding by an Ohio homemaker and member of Focus on the Family; and the clever On Facebook by Doug Wright, adapted from an actual Facebook thread chronicling one long fight among friends on the subject of gay marriage.
“About two years ago, I got involved in a Facebook thread about the issue,” explains Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wright. “I was stunned by the powerful emotions the topic engendered, and how over-the-top the argument became. It seemed innately theatrical.”
Wright, who married partner David Clement in California prior to the passage of Proposition 8, lives in New York, a state that recognizes same-sex marriage but won’t grant licenses. Ironically, Wright is a “marriage officiant,” ordained by the state of New York to marry other (heterosexual) couples. “The hypocrisy is mind-boggling,” he says. Wright is the recipient of the Pulitzer Prize as well as Tony, Drama Desk, GLAAD Media, and Outer Critics Circle awards for I am My Own Wife. His other plays include Grey Gardens (Tony nomination), Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Quills (Obie Award), The Stonewater Rapture, Interrogating the Nude, Watbanaland, Buzzsox Berkeley and Unwrap Your Candy. Film/TV: Quills and Tony Bennett: An American Classic.
Jordan Harrison is best know for his plays Doris to Darlene, Amazons and Their Men, Act a Lady, Finn in the Underworld, Kid-Simple, The Museum Play and Futura.
Jeffrey Hatcher’s plays include Never Gonna Dance, Three Viewings, A Picasso, Scotland Road, The Turn of the Screw, Tuesdays with Morrie (with Mitch Albom), Murder by Poe, The Spy, Neddy, Fellow Travelers, Compleat Female Stage Beauty, Mrs. Mannerly, Murderers, Ella, Mercy of a Storm, Smash, Armadale, Carczak’s Children, To Fool the Eye, The Falls, A Piece of Rope, All the Way with LBJ, The Government Inspector, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Cousin Bette, which was a big hit in Los Angeles last season. Film/TV: Stage Beauty, Cassanova, The Duchess, and episodes of Columbo.
Moises Kaufman has written and directed 33 Variations (5 Tony nominations), The Laramie Project (with Tectonic Theater Company), and Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellow in Playwrighting.
Joe Keenan wrote for Frasier for seven seasons, winning five Emmys and two Writers Guild Awards. His novels include Blue Heaven, Putting on the Ritz and My Lucky Star, which won a Lambda Award and the Thurber Prize for American Humor. His musical The Times (Kleban Award for lyrics) was seen at the Long Wharf in New Haven and the York Theater in N.Y.
Neil LaBute’s plays include bash: latter-day plays; The Shape of Things; The Mercy Seat; The Distance From Here; Autobahn; Fat Pig; Some Girls; This Is How It Goes; Wrecks; Filthy Talk for Troubled Times; In a Dark Dark House; reasons to be pretty; The Break of Noon; In a Forest, Dark and Deep. Fiction: Seconds of Pleasure. Film: In the Company of Men, Your Friends and Neighbors, Nurse Betty, Possesion, The Shape of Things, The Wicker Man, Lakeview Terrace and Death at a Funeral.
Wendy MacLeod has written Schoolgirl Figure, Sin, The Water Children, Juvenalia, Things Being What They Are, and The House of Yes, for which she also wrote the Sundance award-winning film.
Jose Rivera’s plays include Marisol, The House of Ramon Iglesia, Giants Have Us in Their Books, Each Day Dies with Sleep, Sonnets for an Old Century, Sueno, Cloud Tectonics, Maricela de la Luz Lights the World, The Promise, The Street of the Sun, Adoration of the Old Woman, School of the Americas, Brainpeople, Boleros for the Disenchanted, Massacre (Sing to Your Children), References to Salvador Dali Make Me Hot.
Paul Rudnick is the author of I Hate Hamlet, Jeffrey, The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, Valhalla, The Naked Eye, Regrets Only, The New Century. Films: Addams Family Values, Jeffrey, In & Out, Isn’t She Great, The Stepford Wives. Books: Social Disease, I’ll Take It, I Shudder. Articles and essays: for Vogue, Esquire, Vanity Fair, The New York Times, The New Yorker. Awards: Obie, Outer Critics Circle, and the John Gassner Playwrighting Award.
Conceiver/Director Brian Shnipper directed the world premieres of Wendy MacLeod’s Undescended, Say You Love Satan and All the Rage (Attic Theatre); world premieres of Joyce Carol Oates’ Separated and Nagle Jackson’s Barney Downsized; Bluff, Private Eyes, All the Rage, Three Viewings, The Notebook of Trigorin, A Hotel on Marvin Gardens, The Water Children, The Misanthrope, The Complete History of America (abridged) and Brutality of Fact (12 Miles West Theatre); and Voice of Good Hope (Luna Stage).
Joan Stein is a multiple award-winning producer whose Broadway credits include Sideman (Tony Award/Best New Play), The Lonesome West (4 Tony nominations including Best Play), Elephant Man (4 Tony nominations), 9 to 5 (4 Tony nominations, 15 Drama Desk nominations), and The Nerd. Off-Broadway, she produced Picasso at the Lapin Agile (Outer Critics Circle Award), The Miss Firecracker Contest, Table Settings (George Oppenheimer-Newsday Award for Best New Play) and The Middle Ages. In London: Sideman and Forbidden Broadway. In Los Angeles: Back to Bacharach & David, Baby It’s You! (Coast Playhouse and Pasadena Playhouse),Hedwig & The Angry Inch and Promises, Promises (Reprise). As executive director of the Canon Theatre 1990-2000: Love Letters; Forever Plaid; Ruthless!; bash (Showtime/Banf Film Festival Award); Nude, Nude, Totally Nude; The Last Night of Ballyhoo. Film/TV: My Brother’s Wife/ABC (starring John Ritter), Crazy in Love/TNT (Martin/Stein Co. with partner/Steve Martin). She is a co- founder of the N.Y. Theatre Workshop and co-conceiver/producer of In Mother Words (Geffen Playhouse).
Stuart Ross created Forever Plaid and directed the original New York, Los Angeles and West End productions. In L.A., Stuart has worked for Pasadena Playhouse, Reprise, Falcon Theatre, HBO Writer’s Workshop and The Blank Theatre Company. In New York he directed Enter Laughing: The Musical and wrote the book for Radiant Baby at the Public Theater and Fun with Dick and Jane: The Musical at Playwrights Horizions. Regionally, Mr. Ross has worked at the Old Globe, Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center, Royal George, Goodspeed Opera House, Cleveland Playhouse, Ford’s Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse. TV credits as director include Frasier, Veronica’s Closet, PBS Great Performances. Film: writer/director, Forever Plaid and Of Greater or Lesser Value.
Associate producer/co-conceiver Allain Rochel served as producing director and literary manager for Celebration Theater (2006-08), where he produced two seasons, including two all-male adaptations of Greek classics which he also wrote: Sissystrata, and The Bacchae, which recently enjoyed a sold-out run at the 2010 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. He will return to Edinburgh with Silken Veils, by Leila Ghaznavi, which will be presented at Highways Performance Space in April.
The L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center provides a broad array of services for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community, welcoming nearly a quarter-million client visits from ethnically diverse youth and adults each year. Through its Jeffrey Goodman Special Care Clinic and on-site pharmacy, the Center offers free and low-cost health, mental health, HIV/AIDS medical care and HIV/STD testing and prevention. The Center also offers legal, social, cultural and educational services, with unique programs for seniors, families and youth, including a 24-bed transitional living program for homeless youth. Information about the Gay & Lesbian Center is available on the Web at www.lagaycenter.org.
Standing On Ceremony takes place on six Mondays @ 8 pm: April 25 (preview); May 9 (Press Opening); May 23, June 6; June 20; and June 27. Audience members are invited to a “wedding reception” following every performance. Come for the show but stay for the cake! A portion of all proceeds from Standing On Ceremony will be earmarked to support the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center’s Vote for Equality program.
The Renberg Theatre is located at the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center’s Village at Ed Gould Plaza, 1125 N. McCadden Place, one block east of Highland and just north of Santa Monica Blvd. There is ample free street parking after 6 pm. For reservations and information, call 323-860-7300 or visit online at www.StandingOnCeremony.net. Join us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/StandingOnCeremony; follow us on Twitter @gaymarriageplay.
