The cast of Uptown Players’ Boys in the Band

Band together

Director reflects on significance of The Boys in the Band before the show opens at Uptown Players

RICH LOPEZ | Staff writer
rich@dallasvoice.com

Uptown Players will finish its season with a classic. Opening Aug. 16, the company will present Mart Crowley’s The Boys in the Band. For director Dennis Canright, taking on this play has multiple layers of meanings — from its legendary beginnings to the show’s pioneering style that echoes in much of today’s entertainment.

Plus, it’s a bucket list show for the director.

The Boys in the Band holds some nostalgia for Canright. As a musical theater and opera kid, it was one of — if not — the first story that truly spoke to him.

Dennis Canright

“I read it in college, and I remember just being blown away by it,” he said. “Then I saw the movie, and I think now how you didn’t see gay representation anywhere at that time.”

At least, you didn’t see the kind of representation that was realistic. For the first time, he saw himself in Crowley’s big gay drama.

“If you saw ‘gay’ on television or in movies, it was either laughed at or with. All we really had was Liberace or Paul Lynde or Charles Nelson Reilly,” he said.

The play opened his eyes to something bigger.

The Boys in the Band centers on a group of gay male friends who gather at Michael’s apartment to celebrate Harold’s birthday. Throughout the night and with a few drinks, secrets begin to come into the light and personalities clash.

A party game takes the night into a dark turn where the friends and relationships are tested.

“It’s a very heavy piece, and some people call it an angry gay play. I’ll agree with that,” Canright said. “You have all this bitchiness and shade, and then you add alcohol. But there’s a lot of love, too. I don’t think it’s so much hateful as much as it is dynamic.”

Crowley’s story is a milestone in queer culture and gay literature, alongside the likes of Tea and Sympathy and Torch Song Trilogy. The play came out in 1968, which was the year after San Francisco’s Summer of Love and a year before Stonewall.

“Tides were turning culturally,” Canright said. “But now, some people say that this show is dated. I disagree though, because I know these people today in all age groups. These archetypes still exist among us.”

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The Boys in the Band
Written by: Mart Crowley
Directed by: Dennis Canright
Cast:
Quintin Jones Jr.
Caddo Lindsey
Ryan Maffei
Nick Marchetti
Ian Mead Moore
Ethan Mullins
Seth Paden
Noah Randall
Clayton Younkin
Through Aug. 25 at the Kalita Humphreys Theater
UptownPlayers.org.

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Canright had his cast take a look at those times to help craft their characters — not only at the year the show came out, but exploring the characters for the 10 years prior leading up to who they are in the show. He gave his cast a list of books, plays and movies to consider to embrace the era as well as the bubble of gay life back then.

“This story isn’t just historic. It’s about the music and the fashion and the art and all that carves out these characters’ paths,” he said. “We’ve had long talks about what it was like in that time period.”

In a day where people come out on the regular or just live out and proud, these characters all struggled with their own identities, and, even after making peace with it, likely still had a closet to be in.

On paper, the play sounds like it’s all about the drama. But Canright feels like he and his cast found different hues to the story.

“”We didn’t want to lean into the drama. The second half gets dark so quickly, but it can be a funny show,” he said. “We’ve spent a lot of time working on the friendship dynamics and finding that humor.

“And these actors are just blowing me away. They have been really incredible taking these relationships to levels I never thought of,” he added.

The trope of a gaggle of gays spilling tea and throwing shade may have started with The Boys in the Band. It’s certainly a formula we see often, from recent movies like Fire Island and shows like Queer as Folk. But Canright would say that we see this more than we might think.

“How many times have we said ‘I’m Samantha’ or ‘You’re such a Blanche,’” he said. “Those shows [The Golden Girls; Sex and the City] are exactly the same —and with gay writers.

“So we’ve been seeing this for a while, but I’d say that Boys has been the basis for everything like that since it came out.”

For tickets, visit UptownPlayers.org.