PAGE 18 HIGH GEAR

Gay playwright Robert Patrick

Author of "Kennedy's Childen"

by George Brown Gay playwright Robert Patrick says that he writes not to entertain but to aid in understanding people and their problems. "We live in a time when people want to be massaged, when audiences want to be pleased, to be made to feel good," Patrick said recently when speaking to an audience after the performance of his play, "Kennedy's Children," at the Theatre Rhinoceros in San Francisco. The important thing is to give truth, to make an audience

aware.

"Kennedy's Children" is a potent play consisting of six characters in a New York City bar who speaks their thoughts to the audience, much in the nature of a soliloquy. Although the characters are on the stage at the same time, there is little movement and

intense admirer of John F. Kennedy. The young bisexual bartender belongs to the 1970's. Patrick said that his five characters of the 1960's are composites of people he knew in that decade -and into the 1970's. He doesn't feel that any of the characters in the play is based on himself.

The ending of the play is not commercially pleasing, and there was a Broadway production only after it had gained attention elsewhere. Patrick's' plays do not thrive on Broadway; it is the little theatres of the nation who present them. Broadway audiences must be pleased even at the expense of truth, and this reviewer feels that the same situation exists in all types of literature, at least in that handled by the large publishers. Yet despite the bleak ending of the play, the spectator leaves "Kennedy's

no interaction between them, Children" with the catharsis one

experiences from a Greek tragedy. Patrick's characters have not overcome their obstacles, and perhaps they haven't gained much in self-awareness, but the spectator experiences awareness--and understanding. Through both of these elements he understands himself and his

except for minimal interaction between five of them and the bartender. Yes, no plot as such. But such is the power of Patrick's words that the dramatic monologues provide a highly illuminating evening. The title refers to the young people of the 1960's and the death of their dreams. These characters, who on a Val-world better. entine's Day in the early 1970's

Robert Patrick lives in New recall their lives of the 1960's, are York City's Lower East Side and an inveterate and itinerant prooften travels to wherever his testor, a soldier of the Vietnaplays are produced. The marvemese War, an unsuccessful lous Theatre Rhinoceros, an smalltime gay actor, a would-beunpretentious little gay theatre in sex-queen who wanted to sucthe historic Goodman Building ceed Marilyn Monroe, and an on San Francisco's upper Geary

Jacques Brel

(Cont'd from page 16) vious interpreters of Brel's songs have tended to succumb--the temptation to over interpret the lyrics.

Exercising dramatic restraint while concentrating on producing clear diction and a wide range of pure tones, Lenne Jacobs produces interpretations of exemplary beauty. Her rendition of "I Loved" shows how much can be gotten from a more clasical approach to Brel's songs.

Jonathan Clark's knockout interpretation of "Fanette," which would have been impressive under any circumstances, is free to have all of the impact it is capable of in this production. When it comes time for this song Clark and the others have established an atmosphere of emotional credibility. The playgoer does not feel embarrassed at being overwhelmed. As the show's musical director Clark deserves much of the credit of how the production's different musical

elements all work together so well.

Howard Cohen, who sings the songs about mobile army whore houses and drunken sailors in Amsterdam, often uses a rather broad delivery, but broad in this production does not mean selfindulgent. Loud, clear, forceful, very emphatic but always wellcontrolled, his voice hits with ease the targets at which he aims it.

The five singers in this production work hard at projecting the songs. Unlike some singers who get a hold of Brel's songs, they

never wallow in them.

Under the supervision of Tom Asad, the cast members directed this tasteful, unified, well-paced production themselves.

You Are Cabaret's presentation will edify Jacque Brel fans and delight anyone who can respond to top quality musicianship.

For tickets and information call (216) 237-3220.

Street, was holding a threeproduction Robert Patrick festival, and the playwright was there--speaking after each performance.

A rotund man in his early forties, dressed in blue jeans, Tshirt, galluses, and work shoes, Patrick sat on a stool under a bright light and made comments about things in general and answered questions from the audience. He has a bright, breezy personality, not looking or acting like a conventional playwright--if there is such a thing. At first one might feel that Patrick comes on too strong, is too exaggerated in manner. But his personality rapidly envelops the onlooker, and he notices, if he hasn't before, the sensitive face and eyes. Although hippy in appearance. Patrick's mind is as organized as an academic's.

"You're wonderful," said young collegiate-type male from the first row. "How did you get that way?" Obviously pleased, for one patron had just walked out, apparently in rejection of Patrick's particular panache, the playwright smiled and said, "Well, I toned it down for California."

Patrick said that he went to New York City in the early 1960's when the, underground social revolution was beginning. It was the time for unconventional behavior, to wear "funny clothes", and to be the things that society had said you couldn't be. "I wanted to be an actor," he said,

"but soon discovered that I didn't have the talent." He found the Caffe Cino, New York's first underground theatre, which was also something of a coffee house, and there he hung out and apparently lived. "I was glad to do anything that was needed, such as cleaning floors and carry-ing out the garbage," he said. During the day he had an

outside job as a typist.

"I wrote my first play and took it to the owner, who promptly threw it into the garbage," Patrick recalled. One of the members of the group told the owner that Patrick carried his own weight around the Caffe Cino and should be given a chance, especially since the owner was presenting new plays by other unknowns. The owner gave the chance, "The Haunted Host" was produced, and Patrick was on his way.

Many other plays followed, most of them in off-Broadway productions. Patrick is constantly revising his plays, pointing out that he had changed and expanded the part of the bartendere in "Kennedy's Children" for the San Francisco production. "All of a suden I knew just how to make it," Patrick said, "someone overly concerned with security-with a bank book mostly for the security it represents." He pointed out that various playwrights, such as Tennessee Williams, continue to revise their plays. "I see no reason why a play must remain the same," he said.

Markedly absent from this play were any traces of black comedy or the theatre of the absurd, two elements which appear in many "new" and experimental plays of this generation. Patrick has his own genre.

Before concluding his appearance Patrick read, rather well, from his new play, "Judas", in which he gives, couched in moderen dialogue and ideas, an unconventional portrait of the man who betrayed Christ. The dialogue was interesting, but Patrick didn't read enough for the listener to form a definite opinion about the play's theme.

I regret that I arrived in San Francisco too late to see "The Haunted Host" at Theatre Rhinoceros and had to leave before the final Patrick production, consisting of two plays, "T-Shirts" and "My Cup Runneth Over", opened. During my eight nights in Baghdad-by-the-Bay I saw three plays, including Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" and Sam Shepard's Pulitizer Prize winning "Buried Child," both presented by the American Conservatory Theatre at the venerable Geary Theatre. I enjoyed all three productions, but it was "Kennedy's Children" by Robert

Patrick that I checked out the

library soon after returning to Ohio. I will seek out productions of Patrick's other plays.

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