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Plot Points in Our Sexual DevelopmentandIndia Pale Aleare teaching plays.
Its lesson comes not by injunction but by example.
The way theTimesphrased it, the very idea of being transgender could be defined out of existence.
Inevitably, the stories get harder, more confusing, more painful.
Oh, are we interrupting now?
Is the idea that stories can guide us through a world of open hostility hopelessly naive?
I could feel my cortisol rising.
But I could also feel the humanity layered, nervous, yearning of both of Halls characters.
That is not an option in the Valentines display at Walmart!
At two hours including its intermission, the show is stretched so thin you might see through it.
She crosses the stage, kneels, then … puts the shovel down.
And opens a trapdoor in the floor and starts removing dirt with her hands.
But Im still stuck on the shovel.
Why carry it out there if youre not going to use it?
Why does it need to sit there, reminding us that youre not really digging?
Things only get worse from the cringey pirate voice onward.
and posing like Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg as theirDick in a Boxduo, sans irony.
Well, not nothing.
I mean like how long have you beenhere?…
You seem like youre from somewhere else… Like, whatareyou?
For all its nudging and winking and posing and dancing and yo-ho-ho-ing, the play is becalmed.
So, just before intermission, Backhaus decides to put some wind in the sails by getting deadly serious.
Like her protagonist, Backhaus takes out her shovel only to leave it unused.
Plot Points in Our Sexual Developmentis at Lincoln Centers Claire Tow Theater through November 18.
India Pale Aleis at City Center through November 18.
