Transition on Stage: Becoming a Man at A.R.T.

Phil Jones: Carl, you wrote this story as a memoir first. What gave you faith in the idea of making this story a play? What could you communicate differently on stage?

P. Carl: It could be faith or stupidity. One has to really think about that! Putting a book out was vulnerable, but I don't watch people read the book, nor do I watch them play me and my family and friends over and over in a book! Being a theater person, my whole life, I didn't initially think this story could be a play, but having now seen it, some of it's a bit embarrassing, but I'm so glad I took the risk, because trans people never get to see themselves. 

I wondered about how trans people would connect because our stories are so different. But I realize, even from my own experience in a queer life, even if you just see this little inch of yourself, it makes a huge difference. So the people reacting to it have very different stories, but they for the very first time have seen themselves not in a basement, one-person show, but on a major stage represented in some way. The designers were mostly trans and nonbinary as well. It was just a beautiful thing to see.

Phil Jones: Each performance starts with a "Radical Welcome". How have those been going?

P. Carl: The "Radical Welcomes" are relatively short,  but a different person gives a line or 2 about what the book has meant to them, and then just  invites the audience into a conversation after the show. After the show we do "Act 2", and I think after a couple of nights we learned almost immediately that the audience was just chomping at the bit to really engage. And so I think we kind of pivoted and really made space for that. 

Petey Gibson: And can I say, I do a lot of work in independent queer theater stuff, and the interactive conversation afterwards is exactly how queer space goes. So for A.R.T. to welcome fully trans storytelling… it's not just like "we are cis people telling this trans story for Brownie points"... that's not what's happening. We are inviting in so many different types of people and so much conversation, and that is the basis of queer theater at every level. It's the basis for community care. After the show the other day I was talking to this guy who said, "you know I have a trans sister, and seeing this show, made me reflect on maybe how I could have done a better job" and I was like, "go call her!".

Phil Jones: Carl, so much of the show has to do with discovering what it's like to exist as a man for the first time, and discovering what it's like to embody white masculinity for the first time. How do you put  that experience, which was pretty shocking to you it sounds like, on stage?

P. Carl: Well, I went through a kind of adolescence in those first couple of years. And you'll see that in the show, and you may not like some of me in the first part of the show. I hope you stay! I get more likable as you go. I think the thing that you really see is white masculinity, because it's how you're perceived, if people don't know your trans, it's a superpower. My wife will try to do something, call to get something done, and nothing happens. I pick up the phone and boom! Everybody moves. It's a weird thing to be in spaces and really listen to how men talk, in some ways good ways, in some ways terrible ways. I mean the misogyny that goes on behind the scenes is pretty, mind blowing sometimes, and also the gentleness and care is mind blowing. So I think it's a kind of an opportunity to really think hard about the kind of man you wanna be in the world. Many men read the book and said  it changed how they thought about masculinity, and that was one of my hopes for the book.

Phil Jones: Petey, how do you approach putting that adolescence and that exploration of masculinity on stage?

Petey Gibson: What a blessing and a curse to have the very person that I am playing sitting in front of me for every single rehearsal, co-directing the play, saying his actual words back. So I've gotten a quick study in how to embody Carl! One of the really interesting things about this play is that we see Carl as he is now, and Carl is also in conversation with himself pre-transition. And that's not necessarily something that might work for all trans people, especially young trans people. But Carl transitioned at 50, and I transitioned at 37. So I'm also still considered an elder and Carl and I both have this experience of having lived a full life, being perceived as fitting into society in a certain way. 

In our play we have the great Stacey Raymond playing Carl pre transition. So something that Stacey and I have really talked about is, what ways are our physicalities the same? And in what ways are they different? Something I really try to do on stage is take up as much space as possible. It's a classic man-spread situation, Phil. Very chest out. Man, when you transition, you feel so alive for the first time. There's this line in the play: "I feel so different, like, I actually have body mass, I take up space, and people can actually see me for the first time". It's so important to show that confidence. I can feel every cell of blood moving in my body, and I'm alive for the first time. So to me, that has been really important to show to the very back of the house on stage that I'm alive and I love it.