I enjoyed this sharply written, well directed and acted little play, even though the territory it covers is not especially new. My question is this - there are four characters. Two young female lobbyists, an old time deal making US Senator, and an altruistic Gold Star mother Congresswoman.
Playwrights write characters for reasons, If one is young, old, black, white, Latino, Asian, gay, Straight, transgender, ill, healthy, married, single etc etc - all of these things are conscious careful choices of the writer.
In KINGS, all the characters are flawed, thats for sure. The two young lobbyists are loud, crass, aggressive, and totally amoral. They do politics for money. Got it. And espouse rather awful causes. For money.
So I was a bit distracted that both of these young women were written as gay (not a couple - they were both in outside relationships). While the LGBT community is solidly 82% in the Democratic column, I puzzled a lot during the 100 minutes of this play.
Was the message to remind us that there are some horrible LGBT people out there? Unless its bad writing (and it doesn't seem to be) there must be a reason, and something that this is telling us. If not, it would indeed be bad writing. IMHO.
Feel free to jump on my head. |
