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{"id":156,"date":"2012-02-09T10:53:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-09T10:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/evetushnet\/2012\/02\/156\/"},"modified":"2012-02-09T10:53:00","modified_gmt":"2012-02-09T10:53:00","slug":"156","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/evetushnet\/2012\/02\/156.html","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

PUBLIC FEARS IN PRIVATE PLACES<\/span>: After that New York Times<\/span> piece on me<\/a> was published, the best and cattiest response I saw was the comments-box punchline, \u201cShe should join a silent order.\u201d Perhaps the characters in Next Fall<\/span> should also take that advice!<\/p>\n

Next Fall<\/a><\/span>\u2013playing at the Round House Theater in Bethesda until 2\/26\u2013is a play in which the subtlety of what goes unspoken is almost drowned out by the shallow, stereotype-laden dialogue. It\u2019s about a gay couple, generic atheistic Adam and blithely evangelical Luke; when Luke is involved in a serious car accident and falls into a coma, Adam has to deal with his parents, who never knew that their son was gay. (Luke at one point said that he would tell them \u201cnext fall,\u201d when his younger brother was out of the house and in college, so the title of the play itself alludes to something unspoken, unaccomplished, something left unresolved due to fear.)<\/p>\n

There are a lot of problems with the play, especially in the more cartoonish first act. I saw it with two friends, both of whom liked it more than I did; at the intermission I wondered out loud whether it would just be two hours of self-centered people feeling their emotions. They\u2019re just all so American<\/span> in the worst way!\u2013they know that they\u2019re right, and they\u2019re proud of their opinions. I mean, look: This is the second play I\u2019ve seen in a row<\/span> in which not knowing the meaning of the word \u201ctchotchke\u201d marks a character out as gauche, clueless, and generally Not Our Kind, Dear. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile the religious arguments seem to start and stop almost at random. The content will be familiar to anyone who has ever made the mistake of reading the comments: What about really nice people who aren\u2019t Christian, do they go to hell? What about Jeffrey Dahmer, if he accepts Jesus will he be allowed into the pearly-gated community with respectable homos like Luke? Don\u2019t we all have our own beliefs, what about the Jews, and\u2013most poignantly, and least fleshed-out\u2013isn\u2019t it a sin for Luke to sleep with a man? The disputes themselves are so brief that they feel chintzy. Adam comes across like he\u2019s constantly trying to pick a fight but never willing to finish one. Luke comes across like he thinks Jesus is magic, and if you just say you believe<\/span> you can do whatever you want; but if you call him on any of the many ways he takes the easy way out, he gets upset (understandably, given how blatantly Adam is baiting him most of the time, but still!). <\/p>\n

The key moment in their arguments might come when neither of them can sleep one night. Earlier, Luke had compared accepting Christ to taking a pill which could cure one\u2019s cancer, and said that some people are so angry to have cancer in the first place that they\u2019re not willing to just take the cure. So then later they\u2019re sleepless and dejected, and Adam says that he\u2019s going to take a sleeping pill. \u201cMake it two,\u201d Luke says. He reminds Adam of their earlier conversation and takes the pill, looking up hopefully at Adam\u2013who looks back at him with total exhaustion and says, \u201cIf it were that easy, everyone would swallow it.\u201d Adam walks back into the bedroom with the pill still in his hand.<\/p>\n

More interesting than the spoken arguments, though, are the character notes which go unmarked. For example, there\u2019s Brandon, a repressed Christian. (He only wears tightly buttoned-up clothing, because why even have a costumer if you don\u2019t want obvious metaphors?) He doesn\u2019t say much, and in his one big scene, a lot of what he does say is just exasperatedly agreeing with the words Adam puts in his mouth. But he\u2019s there<\/span>. He\u2019s a constant presence in the hospital waiting room, steadfast, quiet, immovable. There\u2019s a solidity to him, a doggedness which is manifested both in his blunt, unimaginative dogmatism and in his silent loyalty. (He\u2019s played by the really excellent Alexander Strain, whom I saw as Spinoza in this play<\/a>. He\u2019ll be reprising<\/a> that role this season!)<\/p>\n

All the play\u2019s religious questions are framed in terms of the afterlife: Is there a Heaven? Will I get there, will you? I\u2019ve already written about why this is not a good way to understand Christian life!<\/a> But it does draw out the deep undercurrents of fear which run through the play. Luke is creepily cheerful, and professes not to fear death at all; Adam longs for that fearlessness. In day to day life Luke is terrified that his parents will find out about his relationship with Adam, and at night he\u2019s sometimes haunted enough that he will pray after they have sex, but he still manages to project a sense of sunny confidence which the neurotic, hypochondriac Adam picks up on. Their relationship makes Adam a bit more free and less fearful, even as it causes Luke anxiety.<\/p>\n

I like a lot of things about this setup. I like that faith doesn\u2019t actually free Luke from fear or distress\u2013it changes his questions and challenges, so it changes when<\/span> he feels fear and why. I like the framing of Christian faith as hospital and cure, something you can only receive if you\u2019re willing to admit that you\u2019re sick, and I like that Adam the hypochondriac is deeply resistant to admitting any spiritual neediness or infirmity. (Luke\u2019s evangelical parents are recovering addicts; his mother Arlene, thoroughly inhabited by the terrific Kathryn Kelley, was the only character I genuinely liked. Even if she doesn\u2019t know what a tchotchke is!) I like the suggestion that Christ the rock can give inherently weak and silly people some depth, solidity, and insight.<\/p>\n

I just wish any of that had been pushed to its limits! I want to see Luke\u2019s faith get really tested, not just harried. I want any backstory whatsoever for Adam, whose background is basically a cardboard cutout labeled, \u201cWhite gay man who came of age in the \u201980s.\u201d Overall it felt like this play pulled all its punches because the playwright didn\u2019t know<\/span> how to portray more intense religious conflict or more uniquely-articulated faith. So all the characters\u2019 religious beliefs seemed to deflate to the level of their self-comforting American emotions, rather than their emotions rising to the level of the exalting or devastating Christian faith.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"