It all started with a quote.
“I said to the sun, ‘Tell me about the big bang.’ The sun said, ‘it hurts to become.’” -Andrea Gibson
This quote actually embodies the theme of the play “Weaving” quite beautifully and fittingly, a story about becoming one’s true self and finding a place of belonging as that acceptance starts to settle in.
Vero and Bastion are two best friends in high school, both struggling to accept an identity that is true yet scary. Avery starts talking to Vero, lending her many books. Dominic and Bastion have been friends for a while, playing basketball every so often, but as Dominic is in his senior year of high school and Bastion is a year younger, confusing tensions and dynamics start to flare up.
In this play, Vero and Bastion were experiencing similar journeys in their denial and reluctant acceptance of their sexuality. However, they both couldn’t bring themselves to admit this to each other, showing how isolating such a revelation can be. It can be hard to admit something that the government and society has deemed as a sin or a vice or an indecent and inhumane act, whether it’s to yourself or your closest friend or your potential love interest that has sparked this all within you.
Bastion delivered a moving soliloquy during his history presentation, using prohibition as a metaphor for the LGBT community. The government can try to restrict people with all its power and the law, but the people will always persevere and push back. There was a rhythm and emotion to this speech, giving it a slam poetry-esque vibe that Sébastian Butler nailed with every trembling word and frantic pace.
Books played an important part of this play, with Avery giving Vero many books as her way of dropping a hint. For her paper, Vero wrote a literary criticism from a feminist lense, and while her teacher failed to appreciate what she had to say since she didn’t follow the prompt and quickly dismissed her objections to the heavily male-dominated curriculum in literature, Vero expressed the frustrations and the desire for recognition that many women feel today.
Hodges Adams wrote a chillingly realistic play of the everyday life of high schoolers in a town they couldn’t stand any longer. Every character in this story had some struggles. No one’s life is perfect, not the bullies or the happy, supportive friend. Natasha felt the pressures of applying to colleges and a suffocating grandfather. Though Marcus beat up Bastion in an act of homophobic violence, he was struggling with a substance-abusive family, having his own powerful take on prohibition. While this doesn’t excuse his intolerable behavior, it just shows that everyone is dealing with something under the surface others can’t see, accurately capturing the complexity of life and people.
I am incredibly grateful that Hodges Adams wrote this important piece of art and that they got to see it come alive in the Keene Theater by the RC Players. This play was incredibly moving and difficult to watch, precisely because it portrays the hard and strong life people of the LGBT community have to live to survive within themselves and within society.
