This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Hey queers, welcome to season three episode nine.

[0:02] Meghan: We're talking shows today with me, Harrow, and Meghan.

[0:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Woo.

[0:13] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Thesis on Joan is a podcast dedicated to amplifying voices from the LGBTQ community in the New York performing arts scene and examining the industry from a queer perspective. Join us as we sit down with groundbreaking theater folks, both on stage and behind the curtain.

[0:29] Harrow Sansom Thesis: For many queers, theater has been an escape, and this podcast looks to have open conversations on where we've come from and where we're headed as a community while queering the canon along the way.

[0:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Hey Meghan, we're here.

[0:42] Meghan: It's just us today.

[0:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yay.

[0:44] Meghan: Just us.

[0:46] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I feel like we've had such a fantastic run of amazing interviews.

[0:51] Meghan: So yeah, it's actually been a while since it's been just us recording.

[0:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I like it.

[0:56] Meghan: We get to check in more.

[0:58] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, exactly. Um, how's it going?

[1:02] Meghan: It's good. I feel I'm excited. We're into fall. I feel like I'm doing more things already because the weather's so much nicer.

[1:10] Meghan: I like sat out in the park yesterday with my dog and ate and drank apple cider.

[1:16] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Fantastic.

[1:16] Meghan: Yeah. I'm like, this is the best. I love this.

[1:20] Harrow Sansom Thesis: How about you?

[1:21] Meghan: Yeah, I agree. Like I feel like that temperature drop last week, and I'm like, now I'm my fully realized self again. You know, I'm not saying I'm not still sweating through my clothes every time I go on the train and such, but um, you know, it's just like a little more refreshing when you get off the train.

[1:39] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I'm wearing layers now. It's great.

[1:41] Meghan: Yeah. No, it's true. It's my favorite, like fashion time of year.

[1:46] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. Definitely. I used fashion in a strong way right there.

[1:49] Meghan: I mean, I get to wear my flannels again and jeans.

[1:52] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Or fashion.

[1:54] Meghan: Yeah. It works. Great. I'm happy.

[1:56] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Mm-hmm. I've been thinking a lot about like transparency with my day job at work and how that applies to us. And I was just wondering if we could tell our listeners anything we want them to know about how this podcast, Thesis on Joan, is created. Like what would you want them to know?

[2:17] Meghan: Hmm that's a really good question. Um I would want them to know how much that we have like taught ourselves how to do this. You know, I feel like we came in with like I was thinking this the other day when I was editing an episode. I'm like, you know, two and two years ago, two and a half years ago I had no idea how to do this.

[2:42] Meghan: So um I feel like that's part of it is like how much um you know we just had this idea and we really wanted to make it a reality so we just figured out the tools that we needed to do it and did it. Um not saying like yay us but saying like it's easy for other people to do the same thing. It wasn't the challenges for creating the podcast weren't as daunting as I thought they were before we got into it I guess.

[3:07] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah I definitely agree. And I love the editing part now too.

[3:11] Meghan: It's yeah.

[3:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. It was probably what I was most scared for at the beginning and then like after the first year I feel like it's you know it's that math brain space.

[3:23] Meghan: Definitely. Yeah I think for me it's uh when you first asked me to do the podcast I had all this a rush of fear because I'm like, oh god, people will listen to what I think about things and judge me for it.

[3:38] Meghan: Um and I've had to like try and let that go and try and let my like imposter syndrome go. Um and talk to myself like okay we're just like two queer people talking about our experiences with theater. We've both seen a lot of theater and we love theater and yeah hopefully people will find that interesting and I don't have to be like the most educated person about it or you know have the most brilliant take on something to be interesting.

[4:05] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[4:06] Meghan: Even though you usually do so.

[4:08] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Thank you. But I just I it's nice to not have that pressure on myself I would say.

[4:14] Meghan: Totally and like you know we named our podcast Thesis, right? So we're we're both like huge nerds. So I feel like doing homework coming prepared to interviews like we've creepily revealed to some of our interviewees like how much we look into their lives.

[4:30] Meghan: Like yeah I think we often try to do the most but we don't necessarily have to point so and I appreciate our systems for how we like create the podcast. Like we kind of each take turns uh like producing an episode.

[4:46] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So um yeah I don't know I think it's it's fun to do it that way and it helps like space out the work evenly.

[4:53] Meghan: Yeah. And I I have to say too like I appreciate you know the grace that you grant me and hopefully vice versa when we have something busy going on in our lives, you know and I I feel like that's something that is not present at most people's real jobs, you know, where you're like, oh you have a big trip coming up or you have this coming up how can we make sure that this is actually gonna work for you so you're not just getting things dumped on you at a really busy time.

[5:17] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So thank you for I feel like you create that space at work for other people.

[5:22] Meghan: So thanks for creating it our podcast.

[5:25] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I hope so. And thank you.

[5:26] Meghan: Yeah. I really appreciate our flexibility and like I think since we're friends too, that we understand that like we have other things in our lives that are very important to us, and um we want to support each other being able to do those things too.

[5:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, it's I mean, like do creative things with your friends, but also like you know, have a good system in place.

[5:47] Meghan: It continues to go well.

[5:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I I don't want to get into that too much, but I think it is hard to create things with your friends and and remain friends, yeah.

[5:57] Meghan: Yeah, creating things with friends, living with friends, like anytime you get into any type of long term you know, you're together in something, it has a potential to get tricky.

[6:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So I'm I feel like we're doing well.

[6:12] Meghan: Yeah, thank you. I appreciate I remember when we first met and talked about this. He said, like, I have a mission to be the best roommate ever or something like that.

[6:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I'm like, great, this is gonna work so well.

[6:25] Meghan: Yeah, you can be you can have good friends who are bad roommates.

[6:28] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Definitely, yes.

[6:29] Meghan: Absolutely.

[6:31] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Well, thanks for checking in with me about that. Um we can jump into our show discussion, which is our main event today.

[6:38] Meghan: Yeah, and we actually have a lot to discuss, which is very exciting.

[6:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I love the first one. The the I forgot we even went to you put it on there, the uh Taylor Mac's Songs From Bark of Millions concert, which back in last week of June, right?

[6:56] Meghan: Yeah, it was for pride. It was like five days before I got COVID again.

[7:01] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh no.

[7:04] Meghan: Um, but I'm glad we went. That was kind of like my pride celebration. I didn't know that was gonna be it.

[7:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh great. I was so sad you couldn't come out for pride.

[7:12] Meghan: It was uh, you know, it happens. It's fine. I gotta keep everyone safe.

[7:17] Harrow Sansom Thesis: But it was wow. What a great experience that was though. I wanted to go back and see like every night yeah shows. What an incredible queer event and I'm so glad it's just like in process and we haven't even seen like a full version yet.

[7:32] Meghan: Yeah. You know it was like really fun because each song was about a different queer icon or person in history and um that week at school I was doing like Pride lessons and we had just did like a whole thing on um Stormy DeLarverie the bouncer who used to work at Cubbyhole and Stonewall and um this like butch icon and one of the songs was like a lovely little like jazzy standard about Stormy and I was just like crying.

[8:04] Meghan: I was like oh this is amazing like most people who even like have a tangential knowledge of like queer history don't know who this person is and it's like a whole song about this person and it just yeah probably so much joy.

[8:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah I felt like a bad queer because I I'll admit that like a lot of the songs came and went and there wasn't like a program or explanation of what the songs are called or who they were about so you just had to like guess or not guess and I I probably didn't know who most of the songs were referring to and but I still had such an amazing time and all the songs are incredible.

[8:40] Meghan: They're so fun to listen to and beautiful.

[8:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So great. And even if you don't know who they're about it it's just such a journey. Um and I think anything Taylor Mac does is wildly entertaining.

[8:50] Meghan: Totally.

[8:51] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. I think I only knew like three of the people the songs were about.

[8:55] Meghan: But did make it less entertaining. And like I feel like I've seen Taylor Mac do this before, but this was the first time that Judy like really stepped back for a lot of it, which I loved too, and like had this wonderful queer cast and like do you remember that one part where Judy actually like went in the audience and watched part of the show?

[9:17] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[9:17] Meghan: And then we got to watch uh Judy like climb back onto the stage and like giant heels and this like gigantic uh optimal headdress.

[9:27] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was amazing.

[9:28] Meghan: It was so wonderful.

[9:30] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, the costumes, even though it's in this tiny like Joe's pub space, right? It was like we're not gonna tone down any costuming for that.

[9:37] Meghan: It was and I bet the look every night was different too.

[9:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh I'm sure.

[9:41] Meghan: Yeah.

[9:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I cannot wait until I hope that it is staged in like the 24 hour concert format because I will I'll do it. I love my sleep, but I will ruin it for that.

[9:53] Meghan: I'm still so sad I didn't get to go to that, but yeah. Just I I can't wait to see more of Taylor Mac stuff. Like it's always so incredible.

[10:01] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. I feel like I'm just on the couch sometimes on a weekend night, like watching TV and just like, what's Taylor Mac up to? Sadly usually not a new show.

[10:10] Meghan: So keep an eye out for Songs From Bark of Millions. Hopefully it will get, you know, a full production in the coming years and we can all go queer the fuck out at this production.

[10:22] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It's gonna be amazing. Something I saw over the summer, we're we're going back because uh I think I saw this time travel a couple of months ago, but I saw previous guest Nina Ki's play, Gumiho down at uh DR2, and I saw this a virtual reading of this like last year and was really moved by it, and it was so amazing to get to see it in person.

[10:44] Meghan: It follows this uh the story of a queer Korean adoptee who's like struggling with finding out that their birth mother doesn't want to meet them, and uh they're in the LA scene and they're basically just like sleeping around with all the queer Asians of the LA scene.

[11:00] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um I took a friend who felt like personally attacked by the show, but I think in a good way.

[11:10] Meghan: Um, but yeah, it was really incredible. Just like I've never seen that kind of representation before of like parts of my identity and just like this kind of identity on stage. That was really amazing.

[11:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And Nina Ki is such a wonderful writer.

[11:24] Meghan: Um, I remember in the when I saw the virtual version, I gasped at many of the reveals, and it still happened in person, even though I knew it was coming, it was great.

[11:33] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um, so if you can check out another production of Nina Ki's, I would highly recommend that.

[11:38] Meghan: Was um, and we have another show we're gonna talk about similar to this.

[11:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um, but having watched a digital version and then seeing it in person. Were there things that were like extremely different than what you imagined they would be?

[11:52] Meghan: I think this happened also for the other show we're gonna talk about where this was kind of a high, highly dramatic show.

[11:59] Meghan: And on Zoom, I think sometimes that can come across as like too melodramatic. And when you see it in person, it's like just right. It's like, yes, these are very high stake events, and like these are the emotions someone would have in this event.

[12:14] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um and it doesn't feel like a lot. And I still really enjoyed the virtual version, but uh yeah, it's just so different seeing it on stage.

[12:21] Meghan: Um, seeing the actors, it is like kind of double cast with similar actors and in different characters, and just being able to see like costume changes and like physical body changes uh in the way they're playing the roles was really amazing too.

[12:36] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh so it was really great to see how each each of them embodied the characters more.

[12:41] Meghan: Uh and it was a totally different cast too. So it was I'm it was incredible to see just so many Asian people and it looked like from reading the playbill or the program that they were all queer too and just a cast of queer Asians is a dream.

[12:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah yeah fantastic yeah and we love Nina I'm so sad I missed that one.

[13:01] Meghan: That's that's awesome.

[13:02] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah hopefully there'll be more soon.

[13:04] Meghan: Yes fingers crossed another show I got to see was The Nosebleed by Aya Ogawa who was the writer, director, and a performer in the show so wow uh so talented.

[13:17] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And then the rest of the ensemble cast kind played versions of Aya that all represented kind of different identities of her uh or different aspects of her identity so like her queer self uh herself as an Asian person.

[13:31] Meghan: But yeah they all played her in different scenes um and it was just a beautiful kind of like ritualistic meditation on relationships to fathers and how hers was not great.

[13:43] Meghan: There was a lot of talking to the audience, uh, and interacting. We, uh, wrote down a list of questions we would like to ask our fathers, and then they collected them.

[13:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh my gosh.

[13:54] Meghan: Yeah, it was very intense.

[13:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That's heavy, yeah, and there was this whole ritual they did with the questions that was really beautiful.

[14:01] Meghan: Um, so there was like audience participation, but not in a terribly scary way.

[14:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um, that felt, you felt really like honored to be a part of it, I think. Also when Aya played her father, like all of a sudden their body just like transformed into like a 70-year-old man.

[14:18] Meghan: It was incredible. Um, but yeah, such a fun show. There was a whole running joke about The Bachelor that was great.

[14:26] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And it felt very queer and loving too. Um, so I'm so glad I got to see that as well.

[14:31] Meghan: Oh, that's awesome.

[14:33] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[14:34] Meghan: That's great. What was the show that you had seen that they were in previously or they directed? Uh, Haruna Lee's Suicide Forest.

[14:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That's it. Um, that was one of the last shows I saw before everything shut down.

[14:47] Meghan: Yeah.

[14:47] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That was such a wacky weird show.

[14:51] Meghan: Another one I'm sad I missed.

[14:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I feel like I can never have a conversation about it.

[14:55] Meghan: Yeah, having not experienced it.

[14:57] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It's, yeah, it felt very like, I think it was very based on like Bouteau theater, and I don't know a lot about that, but it had, yeah, definitely had a lot of influence from that.

[15:07] Meghan: Um, yeah, it was fun. How cool to see all the different dimensions of her artistry though.

[15:13] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[15:14] Meghan: And it just felt very human and very vulnerable, um, like revealing of where she was, and yeah, really appreciated it.

[15:22] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Nice. Um, I didn't do a ton of theater going this summer because I was doing a lot of traveling, but um, I did want to shout out the Shakespeare in the Park production of As You Like It that was actually a revival or restaging, I'm not really sure how they're phrasing it, of the 2017 version of it.

[15:43] Meghan: Did you see the 2017 version?

[15:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: No, I got rained out I think twice.

[15:47] Meghan: Oh no.

[15:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And that's why I brought it up to make you feel bad.

[15:52] Meghan: Right, I didn't even try the summer.

[15:56] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I was like, it's just, I don't think it's meant to be.

[15:58] Meghan: Oh man.

[15:59] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I played the lottery and that's how we ended up going. Um, but it was just like so joyous and fun, and I did not realize that they had, um, written in two queer plots.

[16:15] Meghan: So there's like, you know, Shakespeare comedy, it's three weddings at the end, and like the main one is still a straight presenting couple, but the other two were queer couples.

[16:26] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And so it was just so fun to like have that be a surprise. You know, I'm just going 'cause I'm like, oh, free Shakespeare in the park, great. And then it was like incredibly queer and, um, very like emotionally manipulative, but in the way that you don't mind a Shakespeare in the Park show being.

[16:41] Meghan: You're like, we're outside, it's beautiful, I'll cry at this intergenerational story, you know. Um, but it was fun and it was interesting to see another Shaina Taub joint, another Shaina Taub production after seeing Stuffs, and this felt like very whimsical, you know, and very like, I don't know.

[17:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I feel like Stuffs was such a huge shift for her creative work. Um, so I kind of enjoyed going back to the more fun whimsy of her songwriting. Uh, but yeah, it's great. Who knows? Maybe they'll bring it back. We've already done it twice.

[17:21] Meghan: Yeah, I think I was confused. I was like, I feel like this is the one I didn't get to see, but I almost saw, but I just know my luck with Shaina Taub and Shakespeare in the Park is not good.

[17:31] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[17:32] Meghan: Yeah, that makes sense. Well, the cast recording, I believe from the 2017 version is available for streaming, so you can check out some of the queer love songs in there that are very fun.

[17:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Okay.

[17:44] Meghan: Yeah, I haven't listened to it.

[17:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I should.

[17:45] Meghan: Yeah, I think I saw one song before it started pouring again, and they're like, no, I'm sorry.

[17:51] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So you even like got into the theater.

[17:54] Meghan: Oh yeah. Both times I've been rained out, I've sat in the theater in the pouring rain for like 45 minutes before they finally were like, yeah, we're not gonna go on.

[18:05] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I've, yeah, I would say I've been to Shakespeare in the Park twice in the rain, but only once it got called, and honestly, I was kinda glad it did. Like, um, I'm, uh, I'm kinda done with this, King Lear.

[18:18] Meghan: Um, but once was during The Tempest, which was very fun actually. Because it was like scenically appropriate, but, um, yeah, the risky run.

[18:30] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, yeah. I don't know. Uh, give me air conditioning and indoors, away from the bugs.

[18:36] Meghan: Yeah, this was like, uh, we got really lucky with lottery and weather. It's, it was a once in a lifetime that's never gonna happen again.

[18:44] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Nice.

[18:44] Meghan: Might as well stop playing the lottery.

[18:46] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. Uh, and we both got to see Roger Q. Mason's Lavender Men.

[18:50] Meghan: Mm-hmm.

[18:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: A recording they streamed, uh, of the in-person production.

[18:58] Meghan: Yeah. It was so fun to see Roger's work. We previously watched another, uh, play that Roger wrote, The Do Out, and this was so different.

[19:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Mm-hmm.

[19:10] Meghan: It was incredibly different, and also I was thrilled. I knew Roger was in it from the marketing materials, but I was thrilled at like the full presence of Roger in it.

[19:20] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was so, it was a lot of fun. But yeah, um, I don't know, what were your first reactions to the show?

[19:27] Meghan: Uh, I was expecting something more like The Do Out, I think, and which is like a one-man show, uh, is very dark, very serious, beautiful. Uh, and this was very fun, uh, kind of like a tongue-in-cheek comedy about Abraham Lincoln in a reality where he was queer and was in love with this other soldier that he worked with who was an attorney.

[19:51] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh, and then Roger played like different characters, but mostly like Abraham Lincoln's like maid.

[19:58] Meghan: Yeah. Also Mary Todd Lincoln for a bit, yeah, right before this is before he was elected as president and like the sacrifice that Abe had to give up this man that he loved to be president basically.

[20:13] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I'm like, this is such a weird perspective for Roger to focus on.

[20:17] Meghan: Yeah. Um, but by the end, uh, I think like it came full circle for me where I'm like, oh, okay, they are like very empowered, they're telling this person, uh, 'cause they make a deal with the Abraham character at the beginning that it's like if you tell the story, I will change the ending.

[20:36] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And then when they get to the ending, the spoilers, they don't.

[20:40] Meghan: They're like, no, sorry, this is my show.

[20:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, yeah, and I, it's like commentary on how cis, like gay men never want someone who looks like Roger, right? Who's, who's black, who's fat, who's, uh, you know, biracial, um, and how we look, I think with more sympathy and, uh, empathy with love stories and characters like Abraham Lincoln and his lover, um, because there's this white gay men.

[21:11] Meghan: Mm-hmm.

[21:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, and I like how, um, you know, we are watching it digitally, but I like how like complicit Roger makes the audience in it because of all the like fourth wall breaks, like right, like the audience is really brought into the story by the humor, and like, you know, the storytelling itself is very compelling, and then it kind of like throws it on its head, right?

[21:34] Meghan: It's like, well, y'all are cheering this on too.

[21:37] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And to that point too, I just like the idea of, you know, so many people are doing revisionist histories for a variety of reasons, many reasons, like hateful, terrible ones to write people out of revisionist history.

[21:51] Meghan: It's like I love seeing revisionist history where, you know, queer folks, black folks, fat folks are put into the story. You know, like it doesn't matter. I think Roger even says that the character says that it's like this is a fantasia, this is a story I'm telling.

[22:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like you're asking, why am I doing this? How could I do this to your history?

[22:11] Meghan: And the character's like, well, were you there? You don't know.

[22:14] Harrow Sansom Thesis: You know, and I love that call out, and then it's done a few times in the play to really remind the audience like stop being precious about this, you know.

[22:23] Meghan: Yeah, definitely. There's a really beautiful, when the two men finally like hook up for the first time, it turns into this like beautiful ballet.

[22:33] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was really awesome to watch it, but it was, yeah, then it gets broken of like, okay, but you would never want to see someone like me do that, right?

[22:41] Meghan: No.

[22:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, and I, it was weird because I'm like, oh, I don't, you see Roger as like a very big presence who's very like confident in themselves, it seems, and like to see them in this, in this character who's like very insecure and, uh, you know, feeling unwanted.

[22:59] Meghan: Um, glad that like by the end we're like, okay, here you see Roger like, or not Roger, I guess the character, and like owning themselves.

[23:07] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, stepping back into that power and like taking it over.

[23:11] Meghan: Yeah. I will continue to see everything that Roger Q. Mason writes or is in as long as I can.

[23:20] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um, excited to check out their work at Breaking the Binary.

[23:24] Meghan: Yeah. And then, uh, I know there are two shows we want to talk about that we got to see in person together recently. Um, the first is Once Upon a (Korean) Time by Daniel K. Isaac, who we moved aside to take a picture of the poster.

[23:41] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Sorry, Daniel K. Isaac, if you're listening. We, we knew it was you, we just really wanted a picture of the poster together.

[23:47] Meghan: So, and we're too, uh, embarrassed and shy to say hi.

[23:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Would love to talk to Daniel K. Isaac, but very intimidated by the beauty of Daniel K. Isaac.

[24:03] Meghan: Anyway, um, that's embarrassing. Just saying that on a podcast. Um, but yes, this is, as uh mentioned earlier, this was the other show that we saw digitally, and, uh, now we finally got to see a in real life production of it.

[24:20] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And such a beautiful production. Um, the projections were amazing, the set, the costume, puppetry, oh the puppetry, right?

[24:31] Meghan: Yeah, all those aspects are gorgeous. I, I, it was one of those things where I felt like I really remembered what was gonna be in the show, and even the things that were the same, I was like totally, it was completely new with the staging of it.

[24:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was, it was wonderful.

[24:46] Meghan: Absolutely. I think my favorite part of the virtual production was like the, the M scene where it's the, uh, queer Korean adoptee support group.

[24:57] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Right.

[24:58] Meghan: Which you forgot about somehow.

[24:59] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I forgot, like I knew that was my favorite part, and then when we got there to the in-person, uh, part and they got to that scene and they said that, I like gasped and clapped my hands.

[25:11] Meghan: Yep.

[25:14] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I was like, oh, they're excited, their favorite part's here.

[25:16] Meghan: And then after the show you're like, I forgot about that.

[25:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I love it.

[25:23] Meghan: I remember mostly that there I knew there was like the adoptee storyline, um, with the LA riots was the one I was remembering the most. And the space was great. La Mama was a wonderful theater for the, like, I just, it felt big in that space.

[25:39] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like it took up the whole space in a really beautiful way.

[25:43] Meghan: Yeah, and it's dealing with such huge themes of like war and depicting war and, uh, these like epic timelines that I think, yeah, it was a really great fit for that.

[25:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Mm-hmm.

[25:57] Meghan: Yeah, I think seeing it, um, on stage, because I mean, I have to admit, I have a very bad memory. We were just talking about book club, like I can't read things too far in advance.

[26:07] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So it was like watching it mostly for the first time for me.

[26:10] Meghan: And I think this time through, like the, um, the way the storyline weaved together was a lot easier for me to follow seeing like the actual staging and interaction of the characters.

[26:22] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Not that it was more difficult before, but this time it felt very, um, I don't know, it felt very cohesive in a really great way.

[26:30] Meghan: Yeah. I felt happy that I was starting to remember the folk stories. Um, because, you know, I didn't grow up knowing any of Korean history or folk stories and just hearing things like repeated helps me so much.

[26:44] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like I'm not a big, you know, ironically a big oral, uh, partaker and taker of knowledge.

[26:51] Meghan: Um, I do, I understand things much better by reading them.

[26:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh, so just being able to like hear these folk stories told to me multiple times is really helpful for me to like ingrain them into my brain in a way that like Little Red Riding Hood is or, you know, any of the stories that are in Into the Woods basically.

[26:55] Meghan: The part that was, I mean, it's hard to pick of like this is my favorite part, but I think the part that was always the most effective for me both digitally and in person was the scene with the, um, the women who are essentially enslaved and are, you know, forced to um, I don't know what's what would be the best way to say this.

[27:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: They're basically raped by Japanese soldiers. That's what's happening to them. And as this horrific thing is happening, they're comforting each other through these folk tales, and it's just the juxtaposition. You get so taken into the world of the folk tale, both through their attachment to the story and the way that it's staged, so it actually separates you from the horror for a while, and then it throws you back into it. It was just so effective and haunting, and yeah, I was really impressed with both the direction and the playwriting in that scene.

[28:18] Meghan: Yeah, such a heavy, difficult scene, and comfort women are a big part of Korean history that, you know, they mentioned this in the show that the Japanese denied that this happened.

[28:31] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[28:32] Meghan: And yeah, it felt horrible to know what was being portrayed off stage was happening at the same time you're listening to the story, but it did feel like this story is the lifeline to get you through the situation because, you know, you have to get through, and there's no other way really, but it's rough.

[28:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It is really hard to watch.

[28:55] Meghan: Yeah, yeah. And it was, you know, so jarring. Like, it's like, oh, now we're undersea with this magical queer sea person and bubbles, and it's like, and now we're back, and it's still horrible, you know? And it's, yeah, I'm not doing a good job explaining it, but it was really moving.

[29:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Mm-hmm. I love a good connection of generations through, you know, following how people's children, you know, and the intergenerational trauma that happens. And also learning about the history of Korea and the Korean people was really intricate and well woven together by Daniel, I thought, in a way that probably a lot of people don't know about Korean history, and they learn from the show, which is amazing.

[29:41] Meghan: Yeah, I certainly did. And all of these folk tales were completely new to me. So it was, and I love the self-awareness too. Sometimes, you know, it's like, well, this isn't, you know, with the adoptees at the end, they're like, well, this isn't like Western Cinderella. Like, listen how fucked up this, you know, like how different this version is, and yeah, I appreciated that a lot.

[30:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I also appreciated, much like the next show we're gonna talk about, I feel like we were in a very good audience with this in terms of reactions. Like, people were so like with it, gasping and like applauding, and it was, you know, just feeling that energy really helped make the experience too.

[30:22] Meghan: Yeah. I wanted to bring in an article that the New York Times put out recently about, it was called "Some Like It Not: Are Men in Dresses Still Funny?" And it's talking to all these folks about, you know, is the joke of a man in a dress still funny? Is it transphobic? Why are we still doing that? And a lot of shows that we have seen together recently have featured like, yeah, a drag moment. And it's all like femme drag. It almost seems like you can't have a show today without it. Like, I don't remember the last show I saw that didn't have a drag moment, which is very different than my earlier theater-going experiences, you know.

[31:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I mean, you know, there's, you know, Taylor Mac is always dressed.

[31:09] Meghan: Mm-hmm.

[31:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: There's definitely a moment in "Once Upon a Korean Time." There's a moment in the show we're gonna talk about, "American (Tele)visions," which way to the stage. There is a moment in "As You Like It" that was like a drag moment.

[31:22] Meghan: Ah.

[31:23] Harrow Sansom Thesis: "Fat Ham."

[31:25] Meghan: Oh yeah, "Fat Ham."

[31:26] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. And it's, you know, it's bad to say that like when it's not bad to say. An observation is in "Once Upon a Korean Time," when it happened, I was like, oh yeah, it's the thing that happens, you know.

[31:41] Meghan: Yeah.

[31:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I think when we were watching, we saw "American (Tele)visions" yesterday, and when the drag moment is revealed before it happened, I'm like, oh, it's gonna be a drag moment.

[31:53] Meghan: Like, yeah.

[31:56] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, you feel even like the lighting change. It's like, you know, almost bisexual lighting. It's like drag lighting. You can tell it's coming. There's usually some sort of curtain-y thing that people have to go through. And it's all used very to very different effectiveness, right? Like the "Fat Ham" one, which we haven't really talked about "Fat Ham," was like so incredible to me. Like that one was earned, it was needed, it was like the relief that you had been traumatically working towards that whole play.

[32:33] Meghan: And other times it feels a little arbitrary, and it just feels like a cheap way to add some relief into a show. I'm not gonna really pinpoint anything specific right now, but I don't feel like it's always used in a mindful way.

[32:50] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I don't know, what do you think?

[32:50] Meghan: Yeah, and I think, well, the article I feel like focused on the difference between like "Mrs. Doubtfire" and "Tootsie" versus like "Strange Loop." And I didn't even think about "Strange Loop" as a drag moment, but I guess it is.

[33:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I was almost shocked that that got grouped in with it because it is, but I don't think of that. And it's also the way that that actor is performing the mother, it's not, it's more an exaggeration of being that type of mother than it is an exaggeration of being like a feminine presenting person.

[33:29] Meghan: I don't know.

[33:29] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And there's people, there's cis men portraying women, you know, through the whole show too, so I'm not sure why like that moment. Is the actor in a dress at that point?

[33:39] Meghan: I think he is. And then it mentioned in the article that he off on Playwrights Horizons wore a wig, and I do distinctly remember that. And then the moment when he didn't realize that.

[33:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[33:50] Meghan: Yeah. And he's not in a wig for the Broadway production. But yeah, that feels very different to me than like these production number moments in some of these other shows.

[34:02] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[34:03] Meghan: It's just like an actor portraying it feels like an actor portraying a character. And then I feel like "Tootsie" and "Mrs. Doubtfire" are in like a whole separate other league. And it's like the intention behind it, right? And to me, it's always who's creating the thing, right? And we know that Michael R. Jackson is creating this, and it's being created for, you know, mostly black queers. It is created for black queers, and like "Tootsie" is not.

[34:30] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[34:31] Meghan: So there was like a line in that article Charles Bush was saying like, you know, people used to, it was like gay panic horror, right? And he literally says audiences are beyond that now, and I strongly disagree.

[34:46] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[34:47] Meghan: And then even like Taylor Mac came in and said like, well, it's like interesting when it's men performing women as men, but I think Taylor's giving the audience too much credit. Like I don't think that most folks are gonna be able to make that distinction, and I think most people are gonna see, I don't know. I see what they're trying to say as artists, but I don't think that the audience is actually reading it the way that they hope they are.

[35:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[35:20] Meghan: And I really appreciated what El Morgan's contributions in the article and, you know, her saying, you know, it can be really harmful and dangerous because if people, you know, see a man in a dress as a joke, if, you know, they find a trans woman, it can lead to violence against them because they think it's a joke, and that's really dangerous. And she's like, you know, my show has that moment in it, and my show doesn't get a pass either.

[35:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, that was super interesting. I'm glad she called that out. And just like saying, like, why do we even need to be doing this, right? Like that's the question, and no one seems to have a good answer for it or even a good reason to include it.

[36:04] Meghan: It's interesting the playwright of "Which Way to the Stage" talks about how, oh, it's always femme drag. We never see like women in masculine drag. And I'm like, that's so funny because that's what Megan and I were saying about her show, that character in mask drag. We're like, listen up.

[36:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[36:24] Meghan: That would have, and that's the problem, right? Is that everyone has like this fixed, and that when you go to a show, if there's a drag moment, you could pretty much say exactly what that moment's gonna look like. I think that's why "Strange Loop" feels so different because the actor is not putting on these like over-the-top outfits, like the actor's just putting on like a skirt and coming out and singing a song. It doesn't feel like, it's not meeting the audience expectations.

[36:57] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, and I think there's such a huge difference between shows like "Tootsie" and "Mrs. Doubtfire" where it's like the joke is a man in a dress versus like we are commenting on gender and having a fabulous moment and celebrating drag.

[37:13] Meghan: Right.

[37:13] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Versus like, which is like "Fat Ham."

[37:16] Meghan: Yes.

[37:17] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Versus like, isn't it ridiculous that a man could ever pass as a woman in a dress, which is what the other two shows are, I think. I'm like, sorry if you're making commercial theater for a mass audience, that's probably the joke you're doing, even if you're not trying to. You know, that's probably how it's being read, even if there's no intention of that whatsoever.

[37:37] Meghan: Mm-hmm.

[37:38] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I have not seen either of those shows either, so you know.

[37:38] Meghan: Well, for very good reason.

[37:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. I did see "Tootsie." I got a free ticket, and it was, yeah, it was, you know, exactly what we all feared. So it was like El Morgan said, like this is irresponsible. You know, why is this even happening? We've moved beyond it. We're better than this as a theater community. And if we keep producing shows like that and perpetuating this idea, like that danger, that harm is still just gonna keep being out there.

[38:12] Meghan: Mm-hmm.

[38:13] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And it cheapens like those really well-deserved wonderful moments like in "Fat Ham," you know, because then it's like if you see drag in every show, then the effectiveness of it when it's actually used in a way that serves the story is gonna go away.

[38:31] Meghan: Yeah.

[38:32] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, that article needed to come out like five years ago. And I don't know why. I guess there's a lot, there's a drag or a lot of drag in "Some Like It Hot," and I have not seen that yet.

[38:43] Meghan: Which I had no idea.

[38:44] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I don't know anything about that show.

[38:47] Meghan: Yeah.

[38:47] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And you wouldn't know from the advertising that there's drag in it.

[38:51] Meghan: So who knows.

[38:53] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Back to "Once Upon a Korean Time."

[38:55] Meghan: Yeah, sorry. But it is really interesting that the article came out, and I was, and now as we've been seeing more shows, I'm like, God, this is in every single show we've seen lately.

[39:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It's interesting.

[39:04] Meghan: And it's all femme drag.

[39:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Drag in the multiverse.

[39:07] Meghan: Oh, except "Stuffs."

[39:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: "Stuffs" had mask drag.

[39:11] Meghan: Oh, it did.

[39:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: But you know what? Mask drag, there's so few and far between that it's, I feel like it's never used in a way that's like a throwaway because it's so uncommon.

[39:25] Meghan: But I'm sure it is, I just haven't seen it.

[39:27] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And that was like one of my favorite parts of the show, so it was my favorite part, yeah.

[39:33] Meghan: So very fresh. Our last episode was with the playwright Victor I. Cazares, who is the writer of "American (Tele)visions," but this is super fresh. We just saw the show yesterday. They saw the matinee, and yeah, so we can check in on what we were thinking. But I hadn't been to the workshop since way before the pandemic. I know you've seen a couple shows there since, but it was just so great to be back in that space, and I feel like anytime I walk into a show there, I'm always like, whoa, what's gonna be different? And this did not disappoint.

[39:47] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, it looked completely different the minute we walked into the room.

[40:12] Meghan: Yeah, it looked huge, right? The way like the whole design and tech aspect of the show was mind-blowing. So impressive. But there were so many, it's huge on multimedia. There's screens, like the whole set are different screens. There's different projections everywhere. There's so many amazing surprises in the set, like the reveals of what there are these big metal box crates on stage, and you get to see inside all of them.

[40:42] Meghan: Uh this is gonna be a very spoiler-filled uh discussion.

[40:45] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um Yes.

[40:46] Meghan: And I thought yeah, each reveal I thought was so fun.

[40:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I know as soon as we I couldn't tell, you know, like those big boxes.

[40:53] Meghan: I thought, oh, maybe they're just like um a surface area for projection, and then as soon as the first one opened, I'm like, oh yes, this is gonna be it's so funny.

[41:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like it the the show has so many elements of like childlike whimsy, whether it's with actual toys or with video games, and then the set itself almost has like a polypocket vibe of like how a little kid would like structure their world if they were telling a story about their life.

[41:21] Meghan: It's like over here's uh Barbie Allen over here is our living room, you know.

[41:25] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So I I thought like thematically the set worked really well too.

[41:29] Meghan: Yeah, it was so great.

[41:31] Harrow Sansom Thesis: The cast was incredible, every single one of them so strong.

[41:35] Meghan: Yeah, the cast was amazing, and it was besides Ryan, I hadn't seen any of these performers before.

[41:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And the way that they jump between like the different timelines and the different roles, it's like acting masterclass up there, and many of them the the performer who plays the lead, well I guess I don't even know if you can say it's a lead, but the character who's on stage the most.

[41:59] Meghan: I was like, You're on stage this entire hundred minute show.

[42:02] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[42:03] Meghan: This is incredible.

[42:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And then they start doing like backflips and cart one-handed cartwheels and ugh.

[42:09] Meghan: It was so cool.

[42:10] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I've seen Raoul Castillo who plays the father in Looking.

[42:15] Meghan: Oh, okay.

[42:16] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That's I'm like, how do I know this person?

[42:18] Meghan: That's it.

[42:18] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Okay.

[42:19] Meghan: That was fun to see.

[42:20] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And he's in Vita.

[42:21] Meghan: That's oh.

[42:22] Harrow Sansom Thesis: He's very hot.

[42:24] Meghan: Yeah, he's he's great.

[42:26] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Into that.

[42:27] Meghan: And he plays this really kind of abusive father figure, but you also feel for him so much.

[42:34] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like what a complicated person.

[42:36] Meghan: Uh I think that's a feat to really like give humanity to someone who's uh abusive like that.

[42:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[42:44] Meghan: It reminds me of um some of our conversations around How I Learned to Drive.

[42:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I'm like, why do I feel anything for this character?

[42:51] Meghan: And I think it's because you live in their like sadness so long before the like their abusive nature comes out.

[42:59] Harrow Sansom Thesis: But yeah, maybe it's also because I recognize him from Vita, so I just felt bad for him.

[43:06] Meghan: Unclear.

[43:08] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[43:08] Meghan: Uh there were some amazing costume moments as well.

[43:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh Victor had mentioned that they you you brought this up because I had forgotten the the Project Runway designer.

[43:20] Meghan: Uh did two of the like the looks, the special costumes, I think is what they call it.

[43:24] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And they are incredible.

[43:26] Meghan: That last I mean they were both great, but that last one is like a whole performance art piece on its own.

[43:32] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[43:32] Meghan: It's very incredible.

[43:36] Harrow Sansom Thesis: The show focuses on uh an illegal Mexican family in the neighborhood where the very first Walmart was built.

[43:44] Meghan: Uh and the end and there's whole like running theme of uh like a old Nintendo game, like kind of Mario Brothers esque game, and in the end they get to like the final boss fight, and it's the mother character in this full Walmart receipt gown that's Walmartina.

[44:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yes, well Martina covered in like barcodes and prices.

[44:09] Meghan: Ugh.

[44:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was it's so good though.

[44:11] Meghan: Yeah.

[44:11] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And we were saying as we were leaving the theater and and talking with um the folks that we went with how like we fell right in the age gap for the show with some of the references between like the video games and the just like Walmart visuals and pricing.

[44:28] Meghan: But Harrow, you were saying you're a recent video game person.

[44:32] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[44:33] Meghan: I I did have a Nintendo like the one they had in the show when I was younger, but the only games I really played was Tetris and I had Mario, but I was not good at it at all.

[44:43] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So I hadn't really played video games like my whole adult life, and then when the pandemic hit I got a switch and now I play it every day, I think.

[44:50] Meghan: Um so I'm like, oh no, I I like recognize video game like mechanics that are in a lot of different games and uh just appreciating the like yeah, like the secret code thing of trying to be like hard fights and you press the keys in a certain order to you know unlock special abilities, that was all great.

[45:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was so good.

[45:13] Meghan: Yeah, when Ryan just yells up up down Bhat a great line.

[45:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um yeah, I loved how much of it because I had like the Game Boy when I was a kid, and uh so much of the Legend of Zelda iconography was used in the show, which brought me so much joy and you know, it it makes you the way that the story is nonlinear, but also like non-reality focused a lot of the times.

[45:40] Meghan: So like if you were a little kid and all of this stuff was going on around you, you would kind of put it in uh terms you could understand.

[45:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Like maybe this is just a quest I have to defeat and I can gather these items and there's there's always a solution, right?

[45:55] Meghan: You can always win the game.

[45:57] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And um I thought that was really interesting how Victor was able to like make it make sense in the mind of a I'm I'm assuming that character was like somewhere between like ten and fifteen.

[46:10] Meghan: But yeah.

[46:11] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I re-listened to uh Victor's our episode with Victor this morning and them just saying you are what you watch I think still just hits me in such a a weird way and um it's interesting to think about like video games and is that what it is watching but it's also participating in a way that is kind of like life where you're making choices and making moves but in this very controlled environment.

[46:39] Meghan: And yeah I think you're exactly right like the the main character Erica is trying to do that with all this like trauma she's experiencing but it does it can end as like cleanly as she wants it to.

[46:50] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I I mean I just have to talk about Ryan a little bit more as well.

[46:55] Meghan: Because it was this is my first time seeing Ryan like perform live just having seen yeah okay.

[47:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I was like only having seen digital shows.

[47:06] Meghan: Um but like wow just so wonderful I I feel like this role too is so fun because it is like the comic relief like character role which this show like desperately needs.

[47:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Definitely.

[47:20] Meghan: But yeah, it was I I just felt like he was very much in his element and the audience was like losing it for Oh yeah.

[47:27] Harrow Sansom Thesis: He was so wonderful.

[47:28] Meghan: And had some great moments of like gravitas and dramatic moments too I thought.

[47:33] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[47:33] Meghan: The detectives part was my favorite.

[47:37] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And they had such a great friendship.

[47:39] Meghan: The two um the younger people had such a great friendship.

[47:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It's interesting 'cause Victor was saying how, you know, they wrote this show a long time ago.

[47:48] Meghan: I think it was like early twenty thirteen or something.

[47:52] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh I think they said it's they've been working on it for at least fifteen years now.

[47:57] Meghan: So even earlier than that.

[47:59] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[47:59] Meghan: And they were like, you know, Walmart was a huge thing back then and we thought it was gonna be like, you know, the he the biggest boss of capitalism and you know, I I feel like yeah, we aren't talking about Walmart as much these days, but like it was so easily like supplant that with like Amazon or whatever, you know, and it totally felt completely relevant.

[48:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh yeah.

[48:20] Meghan: A hundred percent.

[48:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[48:21] Meghan: Probably even more relevant now than it was then.

[48:24] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I would say.

[48:25] Meghan: And even I feel like uh in areas outside of New York, I would say places like Walmart still have like such a huge hold on economies.

[48:34] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[48:35] Meghan: Well like we were saying when we were leaving the theater we're like our dads love Walmart.

[48:39] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[48:41] Meghan: But it's kind of like you know there's a lot of other stores in town but the way it's positioned it is the cheapest, easiest, most efficient place for my family to get a lot of their stuff.

[48:51] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So y you see how it easily takes over a community.

[48:55] Meghan: Definitely.

[48:56] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And to think about like the very first Walmart and just you know, the dawning of this new time.

[49:03] Meghan: Wild.

[49:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[49:04] Meghan: And the fact that like there's this all this about how the night that never ended, or I forget the exact phrase, but like basically the lights from the Walmart, I guess parking lot were so bright that like it just made it feel like day all the time and it like disrupted this family's sleep and they had weird work they had like really atrocious work schedules anyway where they're like working in the night shift and sleeping in the day.

[49:29] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So yeah, just the the tiny like local impacts of a Walmart on this family too is was really poignant.

[49:38] Meghan: Yeah and had huge consequences for their life.

[49:41] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[49:42] Meghan: And it was way more gay than we thought it was gonna be.

[49:44] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Not that we didn't think it was gonna be gay, but it was it was very queer.

[49:48] Meghan: Yes, definitely.

[49:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um with themselves.

[49:51] Meghan: What do you think what do you think was the um the thought behind like having the same actor play uh like these two young guys who were in in love with each other.

[50:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah I I don't know honestly I I was trying to think about that this morning too and I don't know if it's a comment on like people see like young people who are not identifying they w way they want them to as like interchangeable or not like as a whole person.

[50:23] Meghan: Um or maybe it was there was a line saying that they were like they were each other like towards the end was saying like well I I am him and he is me and like he's still here so maybe it was that um but yeah that was not easy to untangle.

[50:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: What do you think?

[50:40] Meghan: Well part of me was like is this just like a producing choice because it was less expensive to have one actor.

[50:47] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Especially one that's not on stage for most of the show.

[50:50] Meghan: Yeah, yeah.

[50:52] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I don't know.

[50:53] Meghan: And it it was interesting to me because it was so race specific too.

[50:58] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uh and the family is Mexican and then it was the actor who played Jesse and Alejandro.

[51:03] Meghan: Uh I think they said was Vietnamese.

[51:05] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um so I wondered like why that choice was made too.

[51:09] Meghan: Yeah.

[51:09] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I don't I don't know about the acting choice, but I feel like the story choice was really interesting when they get to the end and they're like don't tell dad that you're a legal immigrant.

[51:19] Meghan: So that was like I feel like the reason that that character I don't know.

[51:25] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It was it was a a huge surprise for some people in the audience who did not re did not realize they were the same person.

[51:37] Meghan: Yeah.

[51:38] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Not calling anyone out.

[51:40] Meghan: It was just like interesting Well it's a 'cause Alejandro you don't you never see like his full he's only appears for most of the show in on screen in like a video and most of it he's like pixelated or like distorted in some way so you don't get like a super clear image of his face.

[51:59] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um so you know maybe there's confusion about that.

[52:03] Meghan: It's giving them a lot of benefit of the out there.

[52:07] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um yeah.

[52:09] Meghan: It did like it took me a minute though when the actor came back out to be like are you Alejandro now?

[52:16] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[52:16] Meghan: Keena was a little confused on that.

[52:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um yeah I will say that even though we talked to Victor and they had warned us about this and told us like, you know, don't don't fall into the trap of linear storytelling as I was watching it I was still actively doing that and having oh yeah a hard time probably the first like little less than first half of the show, like trying to make it fit into something that like my linear focused mind is used to eventually when I gave up on that I I feel like I was able to like experience the show in a much fuller way but the the beginning I was like why am I doing this?

[52:55] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I know I'm not supposed to be doing this and I'm still trying to make it make sense you know.

[52:55] Meghan: Yeah I think I was still like the moment I was confused about I was like oh wait is the mom actually and and the dad I felt clear that the dad wasn't dead at the end right and then the mom I wasn't sure because I'm like wait did she really run away with Stanley or was that just like something Erica made up in her mind.

[53:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I don't know.

[53:22] Meghan: Because it could be real in like one reality and not real in another and maybe it's real in Erica's video game.

[53:29] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah it's it's really hard to understand.

[53:32] Meghan: But you know I'm fine not knowing either way I think.

[53:32] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah there were so many lines where I was like oh that's beautiful.

[53:39] Meghan: Yeah I know I would love to read the script of it for sure.

[53:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I'm not gonna say like good on them because they should be doing this anyway but like I'm glad that I'm glad that the show exists at this scale at New York Theater Works.

[53:51] Meghan: So it's it should be what they're always putting their money towards but it was I I can imagine Victor's frustration which they shared with us of like you know getting this on its feet and like how do you how do you do this at music stands and understand what it is.

[54:06] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah you know you you need the full effects of the of the production.

[54:11] Meghan: And they were pretty seamless like I was so impressed how how epic it was in the tech and just how smooth everything went.

[54:20] Meghan: Yeah, release the tapes of the stage manager. We want to hear them call the show; it was great. Yeah, sadly it will be over by the time this episode comes out, but hopefully folks listen to our Victor interview and are going to see it. Yeah, also playing on Broadway this fall is 1776, the musical, a production that I've never seen, Harrow's never seen. It's at the American Airlines Theatre; it's a Roundabout production. It is an all non-cis male cast. I'm not sure exactly how they're phrasing it, and it is led interestingly by two directors, one of them being Diane Paulus. So I'm, I don't know, I'm very intrigued to see what this is, and I love that I'm probably gonna go in having never seen anything about this show before, just experience this version only of 1776.

[55:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: It's not a show I've ever been excited to see, but now I kinda, I'm intrigued. I want to see it.

[55:25] Meghan: Yeah, I think this is the only way I would ever go, and it's playing through January 8th. Another show coming to Broadway this fall, previews begin October 28th, is Anne Juliet. It's not the word "and," it's the ampersand "and Juliet," the new musical. So I'm curious about this because, like you said, Harrow, I also have heard this is queer, but I don't know how or why or what. I will say I got the mailer for this recently and was, this is clearly not a unbiased presentation of these shows. I got the mailer of this and was like confused to see that it's mostly pop songs in the style of Moulin Rouge. So curious to see.

[56:12] Harrow Sansom Thesis: I wasn't a huge fan of how that worked in Moulin Rouge, but Moulin Rouge was not really that gay. So if this can be gay and also hit me with some Britney Spears, I might be more into it.

[56:28] Meghan: I'm excited for Betsy Wolf. I love some Betsy Wolf.

[56:31] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh, I didn't know. Okay. Wait, that ups my excitement a lot. Like I really like Betsy Wolf.

[56:36] Meghan: Yeah, she's great. Some off-Broadway shows that we're gonna try and check out. There's a show called I Wanna F*ck Like Romeo and Juliet. I don't know if that's how they're pronouncing it. There's an asterisk in the U of the F word. A lot of choices this fall with details. This is, I'm gonna read the blurb. Snow in July, comets falling from the sky, the world is thrown into chaos as Cupid rips off her wings and gives up on love. But her old flame, St. Valentine, has a plan to bring her spirit back up, and it involves reigniting the flame between two humans, another Alejandro and Benny. Moving from the heavens to Hackensack, I Wanna F*ck Like Romeo and Juliet is a love story of epic proportions that investigates gods and mortals, realism and fantasy, and the shame and joy within queer love of color. This is presented as part of the New Light Theater Project 2022 New Light New Voices Fall Festival and begins previews October 20th and runs through November 5th at 59E59 Theaters.

[57:42] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So another show that is coming from Parody Productions is Turning Krasniqi. This is the story of Hannah Krasniqi, a high school senior in a small conservative Kentucky town who transitions to become a Bernisha, a gender in his ancestral homeland of Albania. There are several problems with this, of course. Hannah has never been to Albania. Almost no one has transitioned to become a Bernisha in decades, leaving only a fairly antiquated ritual that requires taking an oath in front of 12 village elders as guidance. Hannah has no elders, but he's determined not to let that stop him. Can Hannah get the support he needs in order to overcome his transphobic principal and transition according to the ancient rules of the Bernic Transition? And that is playing November 3rd through 6th at AMT Theater.

[58:30] Meghan: Another show that I'm excited about is called The Patient Gloria, and this is going to be at St. Anne's Warehouse. I'm a fan of most things that happen at St. Anne's Warehouse. I feel like I've never had a bad artistic experience there. But it's written by the playwright Gina Moxley, an Irish playwright, and this is the blurb: a gloriously ballsy meditation on therapy, misogyny, and female desire based on the 1965 films Three Approaches of Psychotherapy, or the Gloria films. It's a punky mashup, a reenactment, actual footage, and lived experience. So the playwright is also playing The Therapist, which unsure, I have not been able to confirm. I believe is like playing it in male drag. So that is interesting to me.

Well, the playwright is also a director and directed a show I saw a few years ago at Irish Arts Center called How to Keep an Alien that was about this Irish lesbian woman trying to figure out how to get citizenship for her partner at the time who was an alien and was also, this partner was also the stage manager of the show. So it worked out. They were together; they had a great queer romance, but just based on that directing style, I feel like I'm going to enjoy this piece by Gina Moxley. So going to check it out. $49 tickets. There's a bunch of shows y'all can see. And please tell us what we've missed. We want to shout it out on social media if we can.

[1:00:03] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So jumping over to our action of the app, we want to shout out for folks to support the Fair Chance for Housing campaign. And this is a coalition of advocates, legal services, human service providers, and people who have experienced housing discrimination. So these folks believe that housing is a human right, and allowing justice-involved people equal access to safe and stable housing strengthens our communities and makes us all safer. Their goal is to pass the Fair Chance for Housing Act in New York City Council to protect people with conviction records from housing discrimination. Conviction has an end date; shouldn't the punishment? Our mass policing, arrests, and incarceration policies have disproportionately targeted communities of color.

These structural inequalities have disproportionate effects on black communities. As a result, 80% of New York City residents with a conviction are black or Latinx. Criminal background checks have been used far too long to perpetuate racial bias and exclude people from housing. Their site says we cannot end racial discrimination in housing if we don't end conviction record discrimination. So you can visit their website.

[1:01:23] Meghan: So we had a dizzy summer of TV watching. Oh, I finally watched Vida.

[1:01:29] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yay!

[1:01:31] Meghan: But not the most recent season because I can't find out how to find it. But we both started watching and finished watching A League of Their Own.

[1:01:39] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yes, and some of us have watched it twice already.

[1:01:44] Meghan: I know I gotta circle back and do a rewatch. Like I let it simmer for a few weeks. I'm ready.

[1:01:50] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I think the first time it was just me losing my mind a lot. So I needed to go back and like take in some more subtle moments I might have missed the first time.

[1:02:00] Meghan: Yeah, well, it was like shockingly queer, right? Like I expected it to be queer because I was like, okay, Abby Jacobson, it's also now 2022. Great. But like I had no idea the extent of queerness.

[1:02:18] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Were you surprised?

[1:02:19] Meghan: Oh, I was shocked. And I had even heard that it's super queer, and I'm just like, oh, everyone, oh, the main thing is queer. Ah, both of the main things are queer.

[1:02:30] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh, it's so wild.

[1:02:32] Meghan: I know. I was like, we couldn't possibly have both, could we?

[1:02:35] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yes. Everything is queer.

[1:02:37] Meghan: Yes. Did I tell you what my dad said? My mom and dad watched it over the course of like three days, and like the last episode, my dad looked at my mom and he was like, that was kind of more about being gay than baseball, huh?

[1:02:51] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So good.

[1:02:52] Meghan: But he still loved it. His favorite character is, um, I don't remember the character's name, but it's kind of the other like hard tomboy type that's from Canada.

[1:03:02] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh, favorite character.

[1:03:03] Meghan: Yeah.

[1:03:04] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Jess is my dad's favorite.

[1:03:05] Meghan: Amazing. Ugh. So many good queer moments. I think my favorite is, spoilers for A League of Their Own, but my favorite moment is when they finally go to the gay bar together.

[1:03:16] Harrow Sansom Thesis: So great.

[1:03:17] Meghan: And Jess and, um, Roberta's character are just like, yeah, we're gay.

[1:03:23] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, we sleep with a bunch of women. Obviously.

[1:03:28] Meghan: It was so great because it was like, you know, you're, I feel like it almost played on like the emotions of queer viewers never getting the payout they want, right? Because I'm watching it, I'm like, God, those two have to be gay. Like, there's no way those characters aren't gay. And then you get to that scene and they're like, obviously. I'm like, oh, okay, good, good, good, good. That was satisfying.

[1:03:49] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[1:03:52] Meghan: Yeah. It was that episode was so emotional and it's just like beautiful too. That show. I cried several times through the series.

[1:04:01] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Oh, yeah, same.

[1:04:03] Meghan: Do you have a favorite character?

[1:04:05] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Well, okay. I didn't know that I would be so into Janet from The Good Place, but dear lord.

[1:04:12] Meghan: It's the problem.

[1:04:14] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Um, I don't think it's a problem.

[1:04:17] Meghan: Well, the problem, she's not queer.

[1:04:19] Harrow Sansom Thesis: She's not out as queer.

[1:04:21] Meghan: I don't know. It's shocking that she's not, but yeah.

[1:04:24] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[1:04:25] Meghan: I mean, me and every queer that has seen the series now, I think.

[1:04:28] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah.

[1:04:29] Meghan: Yeah. Uh, but our original Joan, also, you know, she's great.

[1:04:33] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Ugh.

[1:04:34] Meghan: Roberta Kalandra's boy. I mean, don't talk to me about Roberta, like a wonderful.

[1:04:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Exactly. Well, we were saying too, like, it's kind of fun to see Roberta be like a different character than just like the heartthrobby type. You know, it's like kind of a more complex, almost like antagonistic role for a little bit, which is fun.

[1:04:56] Meghan: And I'm like obsessed with Uncle Bertie.

[1:05:01] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Uncle Bertie is my favorite.

[1:05:04] Meghan: Um, that was when the show really broke me. I'm like, you're gonna give us like a trans like male elder too? Like this is happening.

[1:05:14] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That was so wonderful.

[1:05:16] Meghan: And it makes the suit, uh, yeah. All the feelings.

[1:05:21] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. It's also just like nice, again, like knowing the manipulation queer audiences have been through to have so many like happy things handed to you. You know, like there are some, it's the times, like of course things are gonna have to not all work out for these characters and the world that they're in. But there's also, there's so many wins and so many great like love romantic moments and it's friendships and yeah, yeah, it's nice to have some joy, some this is the queer joy we always ask for.

[1:05:53] Meghan: Yeah. Well, if you can't tell, we highly recommend this series.

[1:05:58] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah, I'm sure we'll bring it up like way more. It's on Amazon Prime. Go enjoy it. You probably already have.

[1:06:06] Meghan: Yeah.

[1:06:08] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yeah. But I'm glad we got to talk about it more on the podcast.

[1:06:11] Meghan: Yeah. Well, thanks for joining us on this adventure through the past shows of the last six months, I think.

[1:06:18] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Yes.

[1:06:20] Meghan: And all of the things we're excited about for the fall season. We're excited to hear what you're looking forward to as well.

[1:06:27] Harrow Sansom Thesis: Thanks for listening. If you like, please follow, rate, and review us and share us with your friends. You can find us on Instagram and Twitter at Thesis on Joan. We'd love to hear your queer culture vects and ideas for queering the canon. Send us an email at thesisonjoan@gmail.com or leave us a voicemail at 845-445-9251. Come back for more interviews, fun, queer content, recommendations, and discussions on current theater. Until next time, keep it queer.

[1:06:55] Meghan: Not that it'd be that hard for y'all to do.

[1:07:15] Harrow Sansom Thesis: And I was talking to my mom, and I was like, I just feel like I've always had good roommate situations, but like Kate has had such terrible roommate situations, and I'm just worried I'm gonna be a bad roommate. And she's like, who was your roommate for 18 years? I was like, Kate. She's like, there it is. She's like, you've had to be a good roommate. Like, because she's a bad roommate, but we cut that out.

[1:07:38] Meghan: Cut that out.

[1:07:40] Harrow Sansom Thesis: That's our believer.

[1:07:41] Meghan: Yeah.

[1:07:44] Harrow Sansom Thesis: But yeah, Kate was a bad roommate.