Jonathan J. Miner
An unkempt room and four people including a person standing on the top of a counter.
Sam White, left, Stephanie Monday, Riz Moe and Abigail Hindle in 'Hir' from Strollers Theatre.
Thomas Wolfe wrote the truism “you can’t go home again,” acknowledging what every college freshman understands after the first winter break; once you leave your family and venture out into the world on your own, they will never look the same to you again. Any idealized fantasies you might have about sleeping in your childhood bedroom or enjoying some home cooking, sitting around the dining room table in the warm embrace of your parents and siblings, will be shattered by a messy, sharp-edged reality, and maybe by the realization that your family members have all changed, just like you have. Some may have even moved on without you.
This cognitive dissonance has never been displayed in a more crippling, painful way than in Taylor Mac’s play Hir (pronounced “here”), presented by Strollers Theatre on the Drury Stage of the Bartell Theatre through February 4. Directed with a deadpan tone by Julia Houck, Hir is a kitchen sink drama turned on its head and thrust into a maelstrom of questions about gender, power, responsibility, and the myth of the American dream.
Riz Moe plays 21-year-old Isaac, the audience proxy and prodigal son who is returning to the tract home in California where he grew up, after three grueling years in the Marines. While in the service, he volunteered to be on mortuary detail in Afghanistan — literally picking up body parts from dead soldiers so they could be returned “whole” to their families. But the completeness he was searching for and couldn’t find in the military is also unavailable to him when he returns home, dishonorably discharged for drug use.
After discovering that his front door is barricaded with furniture and boxes, Isaac forces his way in the back and screams at what he sees — complete chaos. Every flat surface is piled high with discarded clothing, trash and dirty dishes. Art hangs askew on the walls as if a storm has hit the house. Isaac’s father Arnie (Sam White) sits in a worn armchair wearing a voluminous blue housedress, a red curly wig and clown make-up, while his mother Paige (Stephanie Monday) is perfectly put together, holding a spritz bottle at the ready like a weapon. Vigilant and vengeful, she is ready to spray her cowering spouse with water for the slightest misbehavior, like a naughty housepet.
It turns out that while Isaac was away his father suffered a stroke, leaving him unable to communicate clearly or care for himself. Once an abusive, angry plumber full of toxic masculinity and entitlement, Arnie has been reduced to a helpless man-child. He can no longer exert his will on the family after years of taking out his frustration on them through physical abuse. Now he is both controlled and dehumanized by his long-suffering wife, with the help of a daily cocktail of estrogen and tranquilizers.
Along with asserting her dominance over her tormentor, Paige’s complete rebellion also includes refusing to do any of her former duties as a housewife. She doesn’t cook or clean. She doesn’t worry about money. And most of all she doesn’t appease her husband in any way. He liked it warm in the house, so she turns the air conditioner up to 11. He liked homemade fried chicken, so now she feeds him only take-out or cold cereal. He used to berate and humiliate her, so now she showers him off in the backyard with a hose, for all the neighbors to see.
After figuring out his family’s new hierarchy, Isaac is re-introduced to his sister Maxine (Abigail Hindle), who is now Max, a zhe transitioning from female to male and exploring a completely new identity. So from Isaac’s point of view, his father is now a docile toddler, his mother is a slovenly tyrant, his sister is a green haired guy whose beard is coming in, and his home is a garbage dump. Not exactly a hero’s welcome home. (But then, he’s not much of a hero.)
Mac — playwright, performer, satirist and social critic — conceived of Hir as part of a four-play cycle that examines the polarization of American society. In this play Mac has fun going to extremes, playing with a myriad of opposites. Mac brings us to the conclusion that healthy, sustainable relationships cannot succeed on the outer edges of the spectrum. (There are several pieces of heated dialogue that simply volley back and forth from “yes” to “no” ad nauseum, in case the plea for real conversations and compromise wasn’t clear.) Mac does not, however, point the audience towards a solution. Instead the writer presents a worst-case scenario — trading one horrific situation for an equally bad alternative — where simply flipping gender norms does nothing to balance the equation.
As Arnie, Sam White is alternately pitiful and pitiable, as his character is subjected to a laundry list of indignities, just short of being completely emasculated. It is impossible not to feel empathy for him in his impaired state, but as the sedatives wear off we get a glimpse of his former baseness, and understand Paige’s bitterness. To his credit, White doesn’t overplay Arnie's new limitations, but does imbue the former tyrant with stark vulnerability. His timing is also terrific as he inserts one-word echoes on the edges of conversations that are both entertaining and jarring.
Riz Moe is also exceptional as the confused son who is eventually sent away from his bizarre new family. With close-cut hair and a go-to resting stance with his arms behind his back in “at ease” position, we know immediately that he is ex-military. In one of the most affecting scenes in the play, he instructs Max on how to make a bed Marine Corps style with clear instructions, regimented steps, and strong reminders that there is no benefit in asking any questions. The only role of a soldier is to follow orders — another extreme that’s unsustainable in the real world. It becomes obvious how ill-suited this approach is to civilian life as Max and Arnie become entangled in sheets and blankets that they can never coax into military corners.
As Paige, Stephanie Monday has the most difficult role in the play as the once tormented wife, who now enjoys abusing her husband while trying to find a new way forward. She is petty and cruel but she is also lost — a woman who has broken so fully out of her prescribed role that the world no longer makes sense to her. Monday convincingly grapples with new terminology for paradigm shifts that Paige parrots from her teenage child, without really understanding what she’s saying. She supports Max’s liberation from conventional gender roles that she herself suffered under, but can't help policing her child’s present and trying to control their future. Paige admits late in the play that she’s gone “a little batty,” but Monday plays the role completely straight, which at times is frightening and other times simply confusing. While her normality is disarming, the play may have benefitted from a stronger choice towards her new, completely selfish and self-destructive philosophy.
As the younger sibling Max, Hindle does a great job of embodying the angst of a teenager dealing with more than the usual hormonal bodily changes, uncertain about their future, and terrified by the breakdown of their dysfunctional family. Their relationship with Isaac is a nuanced contradiction of sibling love and rivalry, while having to parent both of their parents. Confined to their quickly deteriorating home and learning about the life they want solely through the internet, Max is hobbled by their isolation. But in a phenomenal moment of clarity, Hindle dominates the stage describing the sexual force of rock musicians they wish to emulate, but cannot.
Set designer Teresa Sarkla’s work is delightfully detailed; there is a drab and disorderly feeling to the entire set in act one that cannot be lifted simply through some organization and disinfecting in act two. Outlines of objects that used to line the walls reinforce Isaac’s realization his home can never really be restored to what it once was.
While Hir shines a bright light on a current social problem, there is little resolution. The hero is branded a villain and banished, while no real change occurs in the other characters and there is little hope for the future for any of them, which feels like a cop-out rather than a modern tragedy. Nevertheless, Strollers Theatre should be applauded for taking on such challenging material and doing it very well. Hopefully the audience will leave pondering how we can all move closer to the middle: somewhere between war and peace, bullying and passivity, honor and dishonor, and certainly between the extremes of codified gender roles.
[Editor's note: this post has been edited to correct misuse of a pronoun.]
