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The New Conservatory Theatre Center, San Francisco’s home for LGBT drama, is wading into the muck of the comments section for its current play.
From White Plains, Michael Perlman’s 90-minute one-act, looks at the dynamics of apology and remorse in the online age. When a victim of homophobic high school bullying (Dennis Sullivan) goes on to win an Oscar 15 years later, he calls out the name of his former tormentor (Ethan Rice) in his acceptance speech, blaming him for the suicide of an acquaintance who was also on the receiving end of Ethan’s cruelty.
Ethan’s subsequent, and half-sincere, mea culpa on Facebook only amplifies the controversy. As it plays out, tension grows between Dennis and his semicloseted boyfriend Gregory and between Ethan and his friend John, who pulls away in preparation for his wedding, having chosen his gay brother over Ethan to serve as best man.
From White Plains examines whether adults should be held to account for their teenage sins, and to what extent justice and injustice coexist in the court of public opinion. Ethan is a captivatingly unsympathetic character, a well-drawn cipher for the humiliation and abuse nearly every LGBT person endured growing up, and someone who remains a casually homophobic asshole well into adulthood. But Dennis comes off as increasingly bitter and dogmatic, eager to inflict pain in the name of healing it. Unlike Inigo Montoya in
The Princess Bride, who confronts and kills the Six-Fingered Man who murdered his father, Dennis toys with his quarry, making him squirm until his life is virtually destroyed.
Sal Mattos, who plays Dennis, told
SF Weekly that this play speaks not only to his personal experience as a writer confronted with whom to engage online, but also because he's been a part of NCTC's Youth Aware program, which works with schools to address cyber-bullying.
"The power that people feel they have when they’re online, the way they treat others, is something that we talk a lot about to young people in terms of cyber-bullying," Mattos said. "But it’s not something we talk about with adults, how we keep it alive. That’s something this play deals with firsthand.
"It isn’t until the climax of the play that they actually get to deal with it face-to-face," Mattos added. "The play explores the damage that does to someone, never actually having real conversations."
The production is as barebones as we might expect from a black box. Considering the subject matter and the fact that the only props of note are cell phones and laptops, a little more whiz-bang — something akin to the onscreen texts Frank Underwood exchanges in
House of Cards, maybe — could have brought it closer to home. Still, this is a theme that will resonate with any queer who came of age in an environment less progressive than that of
Glee. LGBT rights may be advancing, but it’s still a fitful march, and the survivors are scarred.
From White Plains,
through April 26, at New Conservatory Theater, 25 Van Ness, 861-8972.
