![]() The second time it happened, it was not as-what’s the word?-noble, I guess. It was a good moment too, because the second time it happened-well, the first guy was making a bold acknowledgement, in a very sincere way, of his own shortcomings as, like, a white man in America. Like, racist was on the wall-that’s another one where I’m like, I don’t know who would ever in a million years choose this…but hey, let’s see. But then there are other words that are sort of meant to be provocative. Like, Sondheim came to the show and he chose beekeeper. It was instinctive, but I like the ones where I wondered if anyone would ever choose them. ![]() ![]() And so when I decided to have all of those nouns up on a board, it became sort of obvious to use the same iconography. They literally had to carry a sign that said, “I am a man.” That was in the back of my head-this idea that there are people fighting to be seen, to be recognized for who and what they clearly are. And so in that journey, I came across the “I am a man” signs from the Memphis Sanitation Strike in 1968, and I learned about what they meant: These men were tired of being called boys. And that exploration kept pointing me back to all the same sources, which were people who have been marginalized and oppressed, and generally African American writers like James Baldwin and Frantz Fanon and Toni Morrison. To create this show, I was reading extensively about identity and what it means to be and be seen in this world. Audience members arrive to find themselves confronted by a vast board covered with dozens of small tags: “I am a teacher.” “I am a mother.” “I am a mechanic.” “I am an accountant.” Each is asked to choose the label that best describes who they think they are before taking their seat. It’d be unforgivable to divulge exactly what DelGaudio says or does during In & Of Itself-but it’s no spoiler to reveal that the performance actually begins in the lobby of the theater, before he even shows up. Next month, DelGaudio will publish his first book, Amoralman: A True Story and Other Lies, which fills in a few more of the blanks about his past. Stephen Colbert, another expert in the blurriness of identity, was so captivated by In & Of Itself that he coproduced the film version directed by Frank Oz, which debuts on Hulu on Friday. In and of itself.īy the time DelGaudio wrapped up his indefinable stage show’s 560-performance theatrical run, first in Los Angeles, then in New York, he’d amassed a collection of bold-faced blown minds. Here is a list of ways to describe Derek DelGaudio’s In & Of Itself: Magic.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |