Audiences can be grateful to Workhouse Theatre Co. for its rare production of Harvey Fierstein's landmark gay play, "Torch Song Trilogy." Premiered between 1979 and 1981, these three one-act plays present one of the first unapologetically positive portraits of contemporary gay life.
Workhouse's current production is masterful. Together, the plays run for 3 1/2 hours, but there is never a sense of time lagging.
Director Richard Jackson celebrates Fierstein's gift for wisecracking one-liners, but recognizes that for all the camp and comedy, the emotional heart of the play is the relationship of Arnold and Ed. That family drama remains front and center.
The plays include the two-person "The International Stud," delineating the start of drag queen Arnold's relationship with closeted schoolteacher Ed. In "Fugue in a Nursery," the most experimental, Ed and his new girlfriend, Laurel, host Arnold and his new boyfriend, Alan, for a weekend, staged on two giant beds. In "Widows and Children First," the most powerful of the three, Arnold, his foster son, David, and Ed (sleeping on the sofa) are visited by Arnold's mother.
Fierstein delivered an iconic performance as Arnold, the autobiographical role that he wrote for himself. Max Wojtonowicz gets out from under that shadow to create a unique characterization. There is a wide-eyed exuberance to his over-the-top camp, and he brings an extravagant emotional vulnerability to his portrayal.
Ed is not nearly as flashy or even as sympathetic a character, but Joseph Botten makes the emotionally repressed, often-insensitive dolt always endearing.
As Mrs. Beckoff, Miriam Monasch believably encompasses the full range of the role, from quintessentially comic Jewish mother, to hateful homophobe, to loving and hurting parent, without ever losing sympathy.
Laurel can often come across as a doormat, but Shannon Jankowski makes even the character's neuroses engaging. Steven Lee Johnson is a smartass as David, but his confrontation with Arnold is one of the evening's more powerful moments. Rory Taylor Gilbert gives a nicely contrasting hard edge to Alan.
