REVIEW: We Are Gathered (Arena Stage)

Moonlight (2016) is a contender for my favorite film. (It’s had the first slot in my Letterboxd top four basically since the day I installed the app.) Its uniquely structured storyline, following the intersection of queerness, poverty, masculinity, and Blackness in Miami over one man’s life is revelatory in its narrative and beautifully executed. When it was revealed to be the actual Best Picture winner over La La Land at the Oscars, I was elated. Nowadays, the statue-winning writer behind the film, Tarell Alvin McCraney, is unofficially serving as an ambassador during World Pride. His latest work, We Are Gathered, represents this effort as an attempt at a love letter to the miraculous, yet ever-threatened, reality of same-sex marriage in America.

Book

We Are Gathered opens as a Company-like story of a man named W. Tre (“Dubs”) ruminating on his passionate relationship with Free, his boyfriend of long-enough-time. The two are definitely, maybe, perhaps, in love, and Dubs teeters on the thoughts of a married future. There are some hangups, of course: Dubs comes from a notably conservative family who don’t necessarily approve of “His Lifestyle™️”, whereas Free’s grandparents were probably charter PFLAG members. But while you think that would be a healthy source of conflict on its own, it’s actually sort of a backseat to the real conflict: “How do we tell everyone we know that we met for the first time while cruising in a park, before we even knew each other’s names?”

Have we considered…maybe not? It’s never clear why they’re so intent on telling their immediate family the story of their sexcapades just because it’s technically how they met. (Sometimes lying is fine!) To friends? Sure. 20 years from now, as a funny story? Why not! But this plot point never felt organic to me; if that was genuinely how I met my spouse, so clandestinely and raunchily, I wouldn’t feel the need to tell my parents those details. Dubs, over the entire play, seemingly agrees with me on this, but still is unable to be convinced. Its absolutely colossal runtime — nearly three whole hours, at least one of which did not need to be there— means you get plenty of attempts to know these characters as semblances of real people. Dubs is a neurotic architect and Free a free-spirited musician a decade his junior, both interesting on their own but struggle to maintain a narrative chemistry that could believably evolve into a long-term marriage. And while McCraney earnestly tries to have the central couple be charismatic enough to push things along, a torrid second act completely disintegrates any of the potential the side characters had. There’s a friend who may or may not be real (or is he a ghost?) Dubs’ sister, who is some sort of astronaut, becomes very acutely homophobic and is rewarded with a soliloquy. Xi, one of their close friends, derails the entire wedding narrative by shoehorning in a monologue about the (very real!) struggles of being a fat, Black woman, but in a seemingly antagonizing way that had no pretext and felt very jarring. What disappoints the most is that all of these struggles amount to far lower stakes than one would imagine; at no point does it feel like they won’t actually end up getting married. Chalk that up to Arena’s emphasis on the inclusion of a real-life wedding at each performance, or McCraney’s feathery storytelling, but it never felt like what happened, wouldn’t happen. 5/10

Acting

For a story that is sopping with emotional weight, it was surprising to find an ensemble that didn’t feel as committed to its delivery. Nearly each performer decently acts their own character, but selfishly acts as if they’re their own play within themselves instead of as a network of personas. This is particularly odd to see given the subject of matrimony and romantic union. Of the lot, the most convincing of their character being grounded in the world is Nic Ashe, whose Orpheatic whimsy is a defining charm of the production. 6/10

Production

Kent Gash’s direction tries to blur the line between play and reality, but ends up smudging it more often than not. The play opens with a good degree of interaction that the audience largely seems to forget about until it’s brought back later, sort of suddenly. It’s handled clumsily, sometimes but not always joined with house lights (which I detest unless done VERY well). But for the most part, the staging is effective in its messaging, if not too sparse — Jason Sherwood evokes themes of circuity and togetherness in the big, neon circle that dominates the stage, and Free’s costumes specifically are a fabulous effort from Kara Harmon. 6/10

Viz

There’s something ethereal about all of the marketing for this show, from the violet gloom all over the program to the loud indigo that drenches the stage. Heck, even the promotional images feel dreamlike, showcasing Dubs and Free wistfully embracing in a park. In a way, it works, serving as a reminder of both the intangibly fragile acceptance of queerness and the highs of splendor that true love can contain. 8/10

Verdict

Gathered is a rambling exercise in the discussion of nearly every element of the queer experience at once, capping off with a lovely celebration of real-life love; if only it didn’t sake so long to get there. 25/40