"The Pride" a 50-year journey of self-discovery

It's a remarkable play that can take a small, human story that's been told before and not only tell it in an original way but transform it into a cathartic and hopeful reminder of how the seismology of the world has shifted over the past 50 years.

Paragon Theatre's "The Pride" sounds like a variation on that cheesy 1982 movie, "Making Love," when Kate Jackson discovers her perfect husband has fallen in love with another man. But British playwright Alexi Kaye Campbell's "The Pride" is so much more than a coming-out story. Without waving any pride flags, it's an alternatingly elegant and brutal chronicle of the collective gay journey from repression and even criminality to freedom and self-acceptance — for everyone involved.

Campbell does it by adopting a daring and perhaps unprecedented playwriting structure. In her story, married Phillip confronts his long-repressed attraction for other men when he meets the dashing Oliver, his wife's best male friend. The ensuing story covers just 19 months. But while the play begins in 1958, it ends in 2008.
How? Campbell not only presents her 10 scenes in a juggled order, she alternates the year and societal context in which each one plays out, making this not just the story of three people but of millions over the past five decades.
It starts as a very polite, very British 1958 parlor comedy (almost). Sylvia (Barbra Andrews) not only introduces her buttoned-up husband Phillip (Jarrad Holbrook) to her handsome, Coward-esque young employer, Oliver (Jake Walker), she very much wants for them to "get along" as friends. Of course, they become much more than that.

The next scene fast-forwards to Phillip moving out — on Oliver. They haven't aged, but it's now 2008. Turns out Oliver's lifelong sexual addiction, combined with the cumulative damage of Phillip's lifetime of self-denial, will not make their ride a smooth one.

One of the most remarkable characters ever put to page is Sylvia, who finds a way to apply the upheaval in her own life toward her own liberation, while remaining fiercely loyal to all the men she loves.

Skillfully jutting back and forth in time lets us know early on how these three vastly different metamorphoses will end, while infusing an unpredictable and discombobulating energy into the storytelling.

It's an epic play, and Paragon director Taylor Gonda has elicited indelible, honest performances to go with it. That starts with an unnervingly natural Walker, who wears the deeply flawed but eminently understandable Oliver like a second skin. Walker is utterly convincing in a nuanced, breakout performance opposite a wholly immersed Holbrook as the tortured latent whose fight

Paragon Theatre's "The Pride" examines the collateral damage caused by denying self-truths through the relationship shared by Oliver (Jake Walker, left) and Phillip (Jarrad Holbrook). (Provided by Erin Tyler Photography )

 

against his natural self leads him to a harrowing homosexuality aversion clinic. There are clues in the script that suggest these two actors are physically mismatched for one another, but the total commitment to their nuanced performances is undeniable.

While these are colossal transformations, it is Andrews' part in all this that elevates the play to another level and opens its arms to a wider audience. Her Sylvia calls herself a cliche, an oblivious, cuckolded wife, but this woman of unshakable decency is anything but. And while her path may be unusual, her destination will be knowable to all women.

Life has tossed her a cruel hand, as both spurned wife to one man and best friend to his lover. Andrews delivers a heartbreaking portrayal of a wife who deep down knows everything, all along, and is just waiting for someone to let her in — and thus let her out.

David Cates plays all the support characters, providing both comic relief as a Nazi callboy, and a chilling reality check as the 1958 aversion therapist determined to vomit the gay out of Phillip. These are all brave performances by actors in total command and utter free-fall at once.

The play is prone to repetition and, at nearly three hours, it goes on far longer than it needs to. But its simple message extends far beyond the parameters of sexual preference: It takes real courage for anyone to be happy. The worst possible deception is the refusal to acknowledge the stirrings of your own heart.