Warnings and Reflections

Beware the Ides of March or Before It Hits Home

As someone who does not enjoy reading tell-all reviews or watching movie trailers, I often find myself in an predicament whenever I'm in a position to buy a book, go to a play, or watch a movie. I wonder: should I know more before I spend my cash and invest my time?

It is, I suspect, the predicament of living in a CliffsNotes society, where sound bites overwhelm sound storytelling.

More often than not, artistic contributions made to an increasingly hodgepodged culture are:
-- frequently summarized
-- inadequately researched
and then, either discussed in a:
--predictably-controversial
--condemningly-snide
or
--poetically-praised manner.

Mash all that up and you have the modern review, which, essentially, is what a lot of folks want to read. Or is it?

Do folks really want to be told what to think before they experience something?

Shouldn’t the work – itself – educate, entertain and inform?

Isn’t it incumbent for those experiencing art to take a moment and reflect on what they’ve seen, read, or observed?

Shouldn’t individuals come to their own ideas about what they’re going to experience or what they’ve just experienced?

I bring this up because last night I went to see an open dress rehearsal of “Before It Hits Home” which opens today at The Black Rep here in St. Louis. I knew the show centered on HIV/AIDS, as the tickets were provided by an AIDS Service Organizations where I have volunteered my time for more than a decade.

I walked into the show feeling all tabula rasa – wanting to be informed, educated and entertained.

And boy, was I.

After the show was over, I turned to my play-mate and said, “Well…it’s about damn-time the Black community addressed AIDS and homophobia.”

And then I came home and started doing some research for this entry.

And I got humble real-damn quick.

- - - - - -

As it turns out, “Before It Hits Home” was written in 1989 by Cheryl West, who won the Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding New Play in 1992 after its 1991 debut at the Arena Stage in Washington, DC.

I learned that Spike Lee optioned the play for a movie that is yet to be made.

I learned that Cheryl West also wrote the story for Glitter. Yes. That Glitter.

Now that creates a mountain of fucked-uptitude that is not easy to climb.

For me, it is hard to comprehend that this play addressed the issues that it did, way back in 1989. Written in the days of Silence Equals Death protests, this play pre-dated Red Ribbon lapel pins at swanky affairs. Its eerily foreshadowed title and subject matter was a message to everyone, regardless of race. Still...

It was years before anyone ever mentioned brothers living on the down-low…
It was years before HIV/AIDS was the #1 killer of young Black women…
It was years before Angels in America received accolades and awards …
It was years before Tom Hanks starred in Philadelphia…
And it was certainly years before Heath Ledger was high on a hill as a lonely goatherd...cowboy...shepherd...whatever...

And while “Before It Hits Home” is not the greatest play I’ve ever seen – I am left wondering why it is a play that has been seen by so few, so infrequently?

Homophobia in the black community?

White people bullshit?

17 years after this play was written, I’m left wondering why is it that we fail to take heed of messengers like Cheryl West? Should she have slapped a pair of wings on one of her characters to get somebody’s attention? There’s a character named Angel, after all. Hello, Tony Kushner!

And on this day, being that it is the Ides of March and all, I can’t help but think that theatrical warnings are not only frequently silenced – but remain, largely, unheard.

As this play so poignantly illustrates, it is not what we say that creates the most turmoil and drama in our lives. But it is what’s hidden, what’s private that causes us so much pain. Amidst all the clatter, amidst all the noise, it’s the secretive and the shameful that propel the disquieting narratives of our lives. We fail to heed caution, because caution is not a loud emotion.

It is still. And quiet. And aware. And far too frequently, avoided.

With that in mind – wear a rubber and please to God don’t judge that woman for writing Glitter.

Shit...we all gotta pay rent.