To Be Straight With You
To Be Straight With You - DV8, Dunstan Playhouse, March 13-16, www.adelaidefestival.com.au
In the program for Lloyd Newson's latest work, To Be Straight With You, Rob Berkeley chair of the UK's Black Gay Men's Advisory Group writes: "Those who are homophobic are not compelled by history or poverty to be anti-gay."
This reasonable observation could be applied to most apologia for unpleasant behaviour, whether it's simply blaming your mother for your shortcomings or holding everyone else but yourself responsible for your (choose any or all) drinking, drug use, wife beating, child abuse, failure to get out of bed in the morning, or - as illustrated so vividly in To Be Straight With You - for your moronic hatred of others.
Australian-born, UK-based Lloyd Newson is a phenomenon in the world of dance. Whatever he does is always much anticipated, usually controversial, highly original and breaks ground where other choreographers and theatre-makers rarely dare or think to tread. In this work, which is a loosely linked series of solo and ensemble turns by a polyglot mob of talents, Newson fashions a thrilling entertainment around the obliquely suggested idea that taking personal responsibility for one's own attitudes, on the one hand, and standing up to be counted, on the other, could be an excellent goal in life.
To Be Straight With You is a truly terrifying picture of British society in 2008 and also of social attitudes in the rest of the world. In one instance a dancer illustrates, via spoken commentary and manipulation of a live-action projection of our globe (don't ask how it works, it just does, courtesy video artists Kit Monkman and Tom Wexler) how the world has either never left or, perhaps, is plunging back into the Dark Ages via a sort of Hate-o-Meter of national anti-gay legislation. It is at once enthralling and chilling.
The rise of religious bigotry and hatred as propounded by so-called Christians and so-called Muslims is at the centre of the show, but - significantly - it is not its heart. The real heart is the way Newson and his dancers make the unpromising premise of vicious, mindless homophobia so watchable; that the audience spends as much time laughing as in being horrified.
As Newson has constructed it, the show seems easy, interspersing depictions of "murder music", sharia law-based crime, and insane religious zealotry with episodes such as a skipping rope being wielded as a weapon against hypocrisy and violence. It's impossible to imagine unless you know the performer also happens to be a world champion skipper and a motormouth too. There is so much more in the piece - in which every spoken word (and there are a lot) is taken directly from transcripts and recordings - but in essence, what is highlighted is the company's redemptive and wondrous bedrock of humanity, compassion, intelligence and humour. These factors are the show's most significant and potentially dangerous impetus.
Dangerous? Possibly. To Be Straight With You has been performed just four times in Berlin before its Adelaide season and is yet to be seen in Britain. If Salman Rushdie could have years of fatwa drawn down on his head because he wrote one of the more boring and unread books of the 20th century, it hardly bears considering what might happen to a show such as this, which ridicules in unmistakable and accessible ways the grim stupidity and hypocrisy of so many apparently upstanding, god-fearing citizens; that celebrates kindness, laughter and love and reminds the nigger-haters and poofter-bashers of the world what Archbishop Desmond Tutu said:
"The persecution of people because of their sexual orientation is every bit as unjust as that crime against humanity, apartheid. We must be allowed to love with honour." (South Africa's legal position on homosexuality is a beacon of decency in that continent and well ahead of Australia.)
So, if you happen to be acquainted with a just and loving God you might consider offering up a prayer for the company and the choreographer. And perhaps ask your God to intercede with the vengeful, cruel and senseless god so beloved of Islamic and Christian fundamentalists. It is difficult to believe that either Jesus Christ of Mohammed are less than painfully embarrassed by the antics of their so-called followers. But they would rejoice in the brilliance and soaring humanity of To Be Straight With You and its performers and all its creators.
