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For GLBTQ Americans, there is much to celebrate this year after the Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality, not to mention basking in other recent victories like the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. But the fight to assure GLBTQ civil-rights must be ever vigilant as the antigay backlash gets louder than ever.

In her stirring new book The Gay Revolution | The Story of the Struggle historian Lillian Faderman asks “How does the amazing evolution in image and status of gays and lesbians, as well a bisexual and transgender people, affect all Americans. And what remains to be done before they will truly be first-class American citizens?”

Faderman is an out gay scholar and the depth of her research is breathtaking, as is her engaging style that illuminates the individual stories of many who faced countless injustices because of their sexual identity. Her cogent investigative style encompasses the breadth of a hidden, disparate and despised community that transformed itself into a powerful civil-rights movement.

The book opens at the arrest of a beloved college professor receiving an academic award for his for his achievements in 1948, only to be facing prosecution for being homosexual. Aside from the public scandal, the charge of sodomy ended his career. That story is positioned next to the ceremony in 2012 that advanced army colonel Tammy Smith to rank of General with her wife officially at her side to be part of it.

It seems inconceivable that as recently as the 60s, gays could be thrown in jail for talking or routinely denied employment, housing, parental rights, medical care. Gays and lesbians were arbitrarily characterized by the medical and psychiatric professions as mentally and emotionally unstable, seditious and amoral.

Against this social backdrop and against all odds, the gay civil rights movement was born and eventually grew into a national movement millions strong. Starting with the nascent organizations in the 50s and 60s like Mattachine and Daughters of Bilitis, Faderman recounts how the first activists connected a disparate community into a national network of hope for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender people.

As ideologically contentious these groups were in the beginning, they eventually inspired hundreds of other organizations working for a common civil-rights cause. Faderman’s brings fresh perspective and connects so many dots in how the movement was succeeding, however fractiously. Along the way, she details the many set-backs, failures and missteps. But from the beginning one thing was clear, gay America was not going to be at the mercy of a oppressive laws any longer without a fight.

Faderman’s laces in bio-histories of legendary activists like Frank Kameny, Barbara Gittings, Phyllis Lyon, Del Martin, Silvia Rivera, Larry Kramer, among scores of others. Just as impressive are the stories that Faderman tells of the countless unsung heroes who fought along side them.

The author covers much familiar ground but always with new facts and analysis. She illuminates the often over-looked post-Stonewall groups like The Gay Liberation Front and Gay Activist Alliance and writes powerfully of the transformational rallying cry for Gay Power.

Even though Harvey Milk wasn’t the first out gay politician to get elected, Faderman reminds, he was the most famous. In San Francisco the Castro district was becoming so organized that politicians could no longer ignore their voting power. You got to love the ironies in the chapter titled ‘How Anita Bryant Advanced Gay and Lesbian Rights’

One of the most moving chapters in the book is Faderman’s the AIDS epidemic and the unprecedented establishment by the gay community to provide AIDS social service organizations to take care of ill and dying people with HIV/AIDS, when the Reagan administration stood by and did nothing.

Faderman deftly chronicles the turbulent histories of the activist groups like ACT-UP and other fiery gay political action groups that took on the government, the drug companies and the church and whose actions changed the course of the epidemic.

The final chapters of the book cover the slate of hot-button national issues as the repeal of DADT, the military, the striking down of state sodomy laws, anti hate-crime legislation and marriage equality.

Throughout,Faderman tracks the rise of the powerful antigay movement, who will obviously go to any lengths to oppose any pro-gay law or civil-rights protection.

The Gay Revolution is a cogent, definitive history of the movement and a towering achievement by Lillian Faderman. It belongs in every GLBTQ home, definitely available in every public school library and sent to every homophobic politician in Washington.

Stage

Philly Fringe 2015

Los Angeles Philharmonic Association – Available Light Dress Rehearsal
Photo by: Craig T. Mathew/Mathew Imaging

Philadelphia is gearing up for a million or more visitors arriving for pope Francis’ appearance on the Parkway in late September, meanwhile artists, musicians, actors, dancers, poets, singers will occupy the city as the 2015 Fringe Festival launches this week.

The festival’s new waterfront home — The FringeArts Theater-La Peg-Haas Beergarten has emerged as a prime arts venue all year round and is the festival’s hub. The building is in the shadow of the Walt Whitman Bridge and houses a 332 seat amphitheater and state of the art technical accoutrement.

Fringe director Nick Stuccio assures that the theater doesn’t replace the festival’s reach to neighborhoods all over the city, which even extends to the suburbs this year and beyond via ‘Digital Fringe’ world wide with new web apps. Stuccio said it is modeled on festival sites around the world that foster a non-commercial theater driven arts community and a nexus where audiences and artists will hang out.

“We do envision a future where there is unlimited amount of artists (who) can present their work…all over the city,” Stuccio said at the festival press conference.
Below is a sampling of the shows getting the most pre-festival buzz.

The Norway based Jo Stromgren Kompani presents a trio of shows in repertory at the FringeArts Theater. Founder Jo Stromgren mixes elements of physical theater, vaudeville and political satire in his dance-theater work ‘There’ about a troupe of theatrical dissidents stranded on a journey between east and west. ‘The Border’ a caustic exploration of a male-female couple. And the premiere production of Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ with American actors in a surreal morphing doll house installed in the theater.

“Strongren’s work is intensely physical. He looks at humans in isolation,” Stuccio observed.

Ivo van Hove’s Toneelgroep Amsterdam presents “After the Rehearsal/Persona” stage adaptations of Ingmar Bergman’s film scripts. ‘Rehearsal, explores ugly relationships of theater artists and Persona explores the implications of an actress who refuses to speak. Bergman was one of the world’s greatest filmmakers, but he was equally revered as a theater artist Stuccio said these two works is meditations about “the place and necessity of art in the contemporary world.“

“Underground Railroad Game” a new play by Philadelphia-based writer-actors Jenn Kidwell and Scott Sheppard, and directed by Sarah Sanford. It is inspired by Sheppard’s actual experience in the 5th grade in a lesson where half the school played confederate soldiers and half the union soldiers, with re-enactments of the Underground Railroad in which teachers hid black dolls as their visual aids.

“Jenn and Scott are two of the bright lights of the next wave of theater artists in Philly,” Stuccio said. “They have been working on this piece about race, all the taboos all the things we don’t talk about.”

Former Philadelphia actor-writer-director Thaddeus Phillip’s has presented many hits at Fringe over the years, including premiering his Obie- award winning “Red-Eye to Havre de Grace” about Edgar Allen Poe’s final days on a train to New York. Phillips now lives in Columbia and has been on a TV series about the exploits of American pilot Barry Seal, alleged drug lord, informant and Iran-Contra deal broker. He has made a stage work about the experience called ‘Alias Ellis MacKenzie’ and is joined onstage by some of the TV cast. Stuccio observes “Thaddeus theatricalizes his experience being in this show playing this crazy character,” Stuccio said, adding that Phillips is “one of the most inventive stage artists I’ve ever met.”

“Still Standing You” is a scabrous, macho and otherwise homoerotic pas de deux conceived by Belgium artist Pieter Ampe in a duet with Portuguese artist Guilherme Garrido. “It is about masculinity, about all the crazy ways men relate to each other. Pieter is emerging internationally as a force in contemporary performance,” Stuccio said.

One of the most highly anticipated events is the full restoration of the dance piece “Available Light” choreographed by Lucinda Childs in collaboration with composer John Adams and architect Frank Gehry.

“This is a seminal work of art by one of most important American choreographers. Her work is rarely seen in the US. “Available Light” premiered in San Francisco in 1983 and its elaborate reconstruction will be will be performed at the 33th St. Armory on the campus of Drexel University.

“Soul Project” is Venezuela-Netherlands choreographer David Zambrano’s international assemblage of virtuoso independent dancers from different cultures. Their indigenous dance vernacular is perfumed in a series of solos set to music by soul singer superstars such as Aretha Franklin and James Brown. The audience is up close and personal and Zambrano devises ritualized, sensual dance communion.
“Zambrano is a dance teacher highly sought after for his improvisational structure. He’s also a great choreographer who gets the most out of his dancers,” Stuccio said.

http://www.FringeArts.com for a complete listing of performances and events.