I remember being stupefied by Richard Greenberg’s deconstruction of the American Male when Take Me Out first appeared on Broadway in 2003. His unblinking examination of the rampant homophobia that runs through men’s veins, his unsettling exposure of the inherent racial biases that bedevil us, and his indictment of the media’s role in fanning the fires surrounding these issues was breathtakingly bold then. The play seems even more prescient and relevant in 2022, as it insists that it is time for men to tackle these problems so endemic to our dominant culture of masculinity. Twenty years later I hear this revival not as a clarion call to address these issues, but as an indictment for not doing so.
The fact that the play’s plot remains topical is a key indicator of how little things have changed. When star center fielder Darren Lemming of the pinstriped New York Empires makes a matter-of-fact, mid-season announcement that he is gay, his teammates are thrown off their game. With their old patterns of behavior and shared understandings of what means to be male rocked to their foundation by their bi-racial teammate, the Empires go into a slump. Relief pitcher Shane Mungitt is brought up from the farm team to strengthen the roster. It turns out, however, that he is deeply racist and homophobic. As the men regroup and attempt to regain their mojo, we watch them work through the implications of both Darren’s and Shane’s revelations, and the impact of their own dominance-based culture of masculinity on their lives. Although the Empires eventually win the World Series, the team is toast. Only Darren and his business manager emerge unscathed, even better as men, having revealed their authentic masculine identities over the course of the play.
The surprising twist in 2022 is the role that the locker room plays in advancing the story line and revealing character. In 2003, while full-frontal male nudity on the stage might have been a shocker (notwithstanding Hair and Salonika), men taking showers together was not. In 2022, now that communal showers and the bonhomie they can engender is a thing of the past, the scenes of men showering naked take on even deeper levels of meaning, as the locker room itself becomes a dynamic space where change can occur. Besides revealing important truths about men, the shower scenes now remind us of how much we need to continue to work to remove the narratives and bias that we carry in our bodies.
As any guy will tell you, a men’s locker room is a microcosm of the dynamics of being male. It can be a tough place where men strut their stuff — actual and imagined — and jockey for position in the Man Box. At the same time, it can be a tribal, sacred space where a deep comraderie develops that enables men to get naked, baring the ugly truths inside our souls. It can be an intensely humiliating experience for those of us who perceive ourselves to be lower on the totem pole, as it reinforces our feelings of inadequacy as we measure ourselves up against “real men”. Accordingly, it was not surprising that as we watched this production strip guys down, physically and psychologically, the essence of today’s male emerged.
So how do things play out in this space? What do we observe about men in this central gathering place to which the playwright repeatedly returns?
Well, for one, despite today’s vastly different view of gay men’s place in society, underneath it all cis straight men remain homophobic. The players’ discomfort disrobing and showering in the presence of a gay man, though laughable, is all too familiar. Second, although we gasp at the string of expletives that erupted from the triple-A relief pitcher, his words echo the ongoing national conversation about race — we’ve all heard his slurs recently. Third, we observe over and over again that men are ill-equipped to connect and communicate. As Kippy, the play’s Stanford-educated narrator, and Darren’s best friend (on the team) repeatedly laments, “Why don’t we [men] ever talk?”
Greenberg offers a fourth insight that some may find shocking and disagree with: although the locker room is a place where the denigration of women is often rampant, in this locker room, there was none of that. There is probably a point here that we should pay attention to. In Greenberg’s view, cis straight males are decent albeit flawed, eager to engage and connect with women, not to exploit them. (This is a vastly different view of men than some hold today).
Despite men’s reluctance to divulge their thoughts or feelings (because we believe they might reveal a sign of weakness), as events unfold in the play, we begin to realize how much men need a safe space where we can wrestle with our demons. This more than any aspect of this production captures the spirit of the current era. We should hit pause here, and really absorb the value of this space as a place where men can do their work. With the variety of bodies visibly evident on the stage, this locker room forces us to acknowledge that being ripped and rocking a six-pack are not the essence of masculinity. It reveals that there are many ways to be authentically male. And, emotionally and psychologically, it puts us in a position where we are vulnerable and more available for connection.
The revelations that occur in this locker room also ask us to reassess the social convention that the fully nude male must remain safely hidden from public view. This group of male actors make it seem as if appearing in your all together on stage were not a big deal. If only it were the same outside the theater. For many years now, men, especially young men have been taught to feel shame about their bodies. The open, common shower room of this production is a liberating experience for men, and the audience. It urges us to return to the more relaxed days when Life Magazine routinely published pictures of men hanging out naked on the battlefield, or the locker room.
The ensemble cast of Take Me Out deserve a medal of honor for their willingness to take one for the team in order restore a healthier and more balanced view of men. Witnessing this group of guys interact in various stages of undress for over two hours leaves one with the distinct impression that men in their natural state are not the devils that society would have us believe, but creatures of grace and beauty. Fearless and unabashedly male, they stand in their own naked truth, giving us a full-frontal look at what it means to be a man in today’s world. They remind us of the basic decency of men, and the dignity of the male form.
Perhaps this, more than anything else, was the most important net take away from this timely show on Broadway. We may yet see the emergence of a renewed form of masculinity, and learn to appreciate the sacred male in men once again.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Courtesy of the author