Boise, U.S.A.
It’s hard to imagine what would be worse in 1955. Being a Communist or being gay. Worse still, it didn’t really matter. If you’re one, you may be the other, and the tar and feathers of public shame are all the same.
Gene Franklin Smith’s gripping new drama tackles the historic witch-hunt in Boise, ID that marred over a dozen reputations, imprisoned several men on allegations of lewd and lascivious behavior and divided a small-town with suspicion and judgment. Even now, the Boise trials that took place over fifty years ago are still veiled in silence and hushed tones. Apparently, Salem, MA isn’t the only small town with lots of kindling. It can happen anywhere and it can happen to anyone. If you’re in Boise and it’s after 10pm, you better know where your sons are.
Because all it takes is one, and that one is oily street hustler Westley Thornton (Eldon Halverson) naming names in exchange for scraps the fuzz and the Feds offer him in their righteous quest to purge the burgeoning city of undesirables. The witch-hunt fueled by fear and politics finds its way in every household. Everyone is a suspect until proven innocent. Every man is a threat to children walking down the street. It’s war.
Even though many of the townspeople aren’t quite sure “what gay sex is” they know what isn’t normal needs to be expunged. And if you aren’t normal, you better act like it as the FBI agent Will Fairchild (Craig Robert Young) sent in supposedly to detect is just an overcompensating “black hearted cocksucker” called out by the town’s most illustrious, openly gay Herbert Jones (Cameron Mitchell), a contemptuous smoking jacket and martini sipping brother to none other than the mayor. The plot winds everyone into its web of deceit, shame, and the branding of the scarlet “H” on every unsuspecting man’s chest. Even the supposed straightest of the straight, a WestPoint hero, have got a couple of kinks in the chain, sparking enmity between brothers, a father and son, husband and wife.
Caught in the maelstrom of flying accusations is Dr. Jack Butler (Seamus Dever) a psychologist trying to make sense of it all as he interviews the alleged molesters and deviants within their jail cells. At this time, homosexuality was treated as a “mental disease” – something a little shock therapy or marrying a good woman could cure, but through his interviews, particularly with well-respected banker Joe Moore (Kris Kamm) Butler finds compassion and regret for the men whose lives have been ruined. There is a hint of discovery too for Butler’s character, a suggestive acceptance that homosexuality is not easily defined as Moore recounts his sexual tryst with a fellow solider in WWII and reads Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass” in an attempt to understand what it is to be gay.
Is it an act? Is it a lifestyle? Or is it something far more intangible? A connection either severed in fear or stolen in shame. If every man on some level is guilty, then what exactly is the crime? Smith raises these questions without spoon feeding any answers. At the heart of the play is the denial that defines us all. After Moore tries to explain his feelings and his past, his wife shuts him out, admitting “I could’ve lived just fine without the truth.” The admission of guilt is the ignorance fear breeds.
The last play in the Nina & Rajen Kilachand series at the Salem K Theatre Company is a hard hitter reminiscent of The Crucible and The Laramie Project. Much in the same way, Boise, U.S.A. connects the accused and the accusers in a sinister smelting pot that is bolstered by more than just prejudice, it is sustained by personal motives, political agenda and family secrets best left swept under the rug. Director Arturo Castillo vividly recreates the veneer of perfection while steering the action that reveals the spider web chinks winding throughout. The cast is strong and committed overall, especially at the end of Act II, but the polish too often smoothes over the raw emotions. Kris Kamm gives a touching complexity as the tortured banker, George McDaniel and Matty Ferraro are equally heart wrenching as father and son crushed by expectations, and Eldon Halverson oozes with a wily sensuality of a rebel cowboy ala James
Dean.
Boise, U.S.A. deserves to be on the map of plays of blacklisting, finger pointing caliber. There are some tense moments, and powerful dialogue, but it fails to completely move. It is a play to see, if only to remind ourselves that if everyone knew everything about our lives we’d all be tarred and feathered.
Boise, U.S.A.
Matrix Theatre
7657 Melrose Ave.
West Hollywood
Runs through June 29
Thurs, Fri, and Sat at 8pm
Sundays at 3pm
PH: 323-960-4420