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> I writhe from the fact that it is a play, which does not make sense to me – I’ve never been tricked into attending the theater, the actors know that they are acting, there’s nothing inherently embarrassing about telling a story or pretending. And yet from that first boisterous ensemble trot onstage, I am seized with an urge to die and melt into the ground.
I definitely don't feel the same way about a lot of the things you wrote about here (probably at least partially due to my own over dramatic and intense nature making theatre acting and weird unnatural stage directions seem closer to the way I experience things. Also I'm catholic so I'm very at home watching people knowingly ignore the obvious) but that bit about gender swapped shakespeare really fucking hit me like a baseball bat. "The staging says: I love boyishness, but I hope you’re not thinking of going on T. I heard it turns you into a raging monster. Have you tried being Eileen Myles?" i feel like i've been unravelled but in a very good and necessary way.
As a transguy who regularly designs/builds/helps produce Shakespeare and other theatre with cross-gender casting and regendered roles (and has helped *many* actors with realistic male body movement): please don’t speak for me when you’re sharing your opinions about what sounds like some truly mediocre theatre.
Of course — I’m using “one” to refer to myself in the third person, and I don’t believe every single experience of cross-gendered casting is identical; I’m speaking about some of my responses to theater I have seen, not all of which I would characterize as mediocre.
This is the particular passage with which I took issue: “A Woman-Hero playing Macbeth or whomever strikes the transmasculine viewer as the cheerfully-condescending cis interlocutor...” I hope you can see how that lead me (and likely others), to believe you were attempting to speak broadly for transmasculine folks, especially in an essay where you primarily refer to yourself in first person.
I also hope you can at least understand why I would bristle at the suggestion that my primary work as a trans artist (usually with other trans folks, some who realized their trans-ness in part through playing cross-cast roles) is *inherently transphobic.* Especially coming from a prominent figure whom I - and again, many of those same trans artists - admire.
It’s impossible not to see mediocre theatre if you see theatre with any regularity - there’s just too much of it out there, at every budget tier. It just saddens me that it sounds like you’ve seen poorly done cross-casting and have condemned the entire practice based on those few productions.
I haven't condemned anything; I spent some time considering my own response that I bring to theater, which is neither inherently praiseworthy nor blameworthy, and I feel perfectly entitled to discuss bad theatrical moments without including the clause, "Of course, some theater is quite good"; I trust that my readers can also make that distinction. I can also understand your bristling on the idea of whether cross-casting is inherently transphobic, and can understand why two reasonable people might disagree on that subject.
> I writhe from the fact that it is a play, which does not make sense to me – I’ve never been tricked into attending the theater, the actors know that they are acting, there’s nothing inherently embarrassing about telling a story or pretending. And yet from that first boisterous ensemble trot onstage, I am seized with an urge to die and melt into the ground.
same! i thought i was the only one
I definitely don't feel the same way about a lot of the things you wrote about here (probably at least partially due to my own over dramatic and intense nature making theatre acting and weird unnatural stage directions seem closer to the way I experience things. Also I'm catholic so I'm very at home watching people knowingly ignore the obvious) but that bit about gender swapped shakespeare really fucking hit me like a baseball bat. "The staging says: I love boyishness, but I hope you’re not thinking of going on T. I heard it turns you into a raging monster. Have you tried being Eileen Myles?" i feel like i've been unravelled but in a very good and necessary way.
Got a subscription....been following your work and your story (and Grace’s) for awhile. I love the Didion/Wintour skits ....
As a transguy who regularly designs/builds/helps produce Shakespeare and other theatre with cross-gender casting and regendered roles (and has helped *many* actors with realistic male body movement): please don’t speak for me when you’re sharing your opinions about what sounds like some truly mediocre theatre.
*trans guy. Not a good place to miss a space.
Of course — I’m using “one” to refer to myself in the third person, and I don’t believe every single experience of cross-gendered casting is identical; I’m speaking about some of my responses to theater I have seen, not all of which I would characterize as mediocre.
This is the particular passage with which I took issue: “A Woman-Hero playing Macbeth or whomever strikes the transmasculine viewer as the cheerfully-condescending cis interlocutor...” I hope you can see how that lead me (and likely others), to believe you were attempting to speak broadly for transmasculine folks, especially in an essay where you primarily refer to yourself in first person.
I also hope you can at least understand why I would bristle at the suggestion that my primary work as a trans artist (usually with other trans folks, some who realized their trans-ness in part through playing cross-cast roles) is *inherently transphobic.* Especially coming from a prominent figure whom I - and again, many of those same trans artists - admire.
It’s impossible not to see mediocre theatre if you see theatre with any regularity - there’s just too much of it out there, at every budget tier. It just saddens me that it sounds like you’ve seen poorly done cross-casting and have condemned the entire practice based on those few productions.
I haven't condemned anything; I spent some time considering my own response that I bring to theater, which is neither inherently praiseworthy nor blameworthy, and I feel perfectly entitled to discuss bad theatrical moments without including the clause, "Of course, some theater is quite good"; I trust that my readers can also make that distinction. I can also understand your bristling on the idea of whether cross-casting is inherently transphobic, and can understand why two reasonable people might disagree on that subject.