The Rights Stuff

Comments (0) By Lily Janiak Wednesday, Aug 22 2012

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New Conservatory Theatre Center

25 Van Ness
San Francisco, CA 94102

Category: Performing Arts Venues

Region: Hayes Valley/ Tenderloin

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Rights of Passage, a world premiere, follows one man -- Wayan (Jomar Tagatac), a gay Balinese Hindu -- but its scope is LGBTs throughout the world. With the help of organizations like Amnesty International and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, playwrights Ed Decker and Robert Leone (who are married) interviewed LGBTs in America, Asia, Europe, and Africa; those interviews became characters who share with Wayan three rites of passage that structure the play: childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. At what Decker calls “points of confusion or indecision,” a member of the international medley (RJ Castaneda, Michaela Greeley, Dazié Rustin Grego, Christopher Morrell, Randall Nakano, Anthony Rollins-Mullens, Desiree Rogers) interrupts Wayan’s coming-of-age story. “We might in that moment jump over to Africa and see the experience of a lesbian who’s experienced collective rape,” Decker says. “Or we might go over to Thailand and meet a transgender woman. Or we might go to the Deep South and meet a fierce black drag queen.” Director Arturo Catricala accomplishes the transitions with everything from music to masks to puppetry -- through juxtaposition and solidarity, what Decker calls “the challenges and struggles of the LGBT” become “the triumph of the human spirit.”
Wednesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 p.m. Starts: Aug. 17. Continues through Sept. 16, 2012