Straight White Men

Straight White Men was going to be the play to pull me out of my seasonal depression; instead, it pulled me further into a spiral of increasingly self-deprecating questions like, why on earth did I date the person who recommended this to me in the first place? What does that say about me and my taste in people? What does that say about straight white men? Is this play aiding and abetting them, or does it have actual potential to transform? If the latter, then I am truly lost as to how.

 The show begins with two Black folks, the Masters of Ceremonies, on stage (Note that Young Jean Lee is an Asian-American playwright. Wouldn’t this be an interesting perspective to write from??). They are going to introduce themselves with their names, pronouns, give us a little insight into their geographic and ethnic backgrounds, and then they will leave us for the rest of the show…well, so we are told. From now on, every single character we see on stage will be a straight white man. And it is somehow up to us, the audience, to figure out why? The game the audience is being asked to play is already terribly unclear.

 As the play within a play begins, we are led to believe that the Masters of Ceremonies have a mystical agency over the straight white men. The men are conjured by the Masters and briefly manipulated, as if they were puppets, at the beginnings of both acts. The straight white men are entirely two dimensional. Predictably enough, they follow every stereotype in the book. They are utterly immature, rough and violent, and entirely unaware of their own position in society—including how much space they take up with their bodies, voices, words, jokes, conversations.

 What follows for the next 90 minutes or so is not too different from any Arthur Miller play you’ve seen. It’s a family. 3 brothers. 1 dad. One of the brothers is having a hard time: he’s a thirty-something who has moved back in with dad to save money for the student loans that he pays to Harvard every month. He is in an interstitial moment where he can’t seem to find employment. It’s not that he is incapable of getting a job so much that he is ridden with guilt deriving from his own whiteness. He is confused by his purpose in life. He feels useless as a straight white man. The emotional expression and emptying of is guilt is given a lot of stage time, but is he transformed through its expression? Are his brothers changed at all? No, not really. His dad, sensing his son is useless, pushes him to move out. His younger brother asks that he never speak to him again.

How does Young Jean Lee expect her audience to be transformed by these actions? Should we pity the straight white man? Should we laugh at his ridiculous nature? Should we be inclined to act against white supremacy and the space that white people unavoidably command?

 She seemingly leaves these questions up to us: a more-than-likely white audience. But if this play is to hold onto the relevance it had when it was first published in 2014, then Lee should consider answering these questions for herself.

 In between the scenes of the frame play, which functions more like a standalone play, are nonsensical transitions that are either the fault of the writer or the director of this particular production. One standout is when the Masters of Ceremonies come back briefly to sing and conduct their version of “O Holy Night.” While they simply sing this Christmas Carol, a noticeably white, female (or as I perceive it) stagehand comes to rearrange the set. She removes food, moves furniture, turns on the lights on the Christmas tree, etc.

I am betrayed.

I was not only promised I would only see straight white men from now on, but I am utterly befuddled by the unnecessary presence of the stagehand. This is not the first or fourth time I have seen careless transitions enacted this month. But transitions are for another post entirely.

 So was it worth seeing Straight White Men? I think so, if only to analyze why it doesn’t work anymore. 2014 was a lifetime ago if we’re talking about privilege, intersectionality, white supremacy, microagressions, institutional racism, etc. This text forces us to confront an issue that our society is already keen on confronting, and even publicly condemning. Whether it’s a company condoning racism and acts of police brutality on social media or it’s the equal opportunity memos tacked onto each job posting or it’s the endless tweets by white people talking about how awful other white people are. Even if it’s virtue-signaling, there is still a gesture that we are eager to make progress. We are hardly perfect, and the UK and US will never not be racist. So why not write a play about action instead of presentation? Maybe we could write plays that teach us how to hold conversations with the institutions that are interested in being anti-racist but may not have the proper ideas or tools to go about it? Just a thought.

I saw this production of “Straight White Men” at Southwark Playhouse, where it’s running until 4 December 2021.