A STRANGE LOOP LIMITED EDITION OFFICIAL OPENING NIGHT PLAYBILL
Lawrence, 12 October 2022 – This week I managed to sit down with Sercius Productions and presented to me a summary and pitched the idea on staging A Strange Loop, A Musical by Michael R. Jackson. In this blog we will transcribe what was said and talked, I again recommend on using the Pecha Kucha link above to follow the presentation.
A Strange Loop, A Musical It's a story about a Black gay man named Usher who is trying to write a musical, also called A Strange Loop, about a Black gay man trying to write a musical. Usher is surrounded by a Greek chorus of his obnoxious, self-hating thoughts, which keep insisting that he sell out and write a play for Tyler Perry.
A Strange Loop turns out to be a book written by Michael R. Jackson. Michael R. Jackson holds a BFA and MFA in playwriting and Musical Theatre Writing from the NYU Tisch School of the Arts. As a songwriter, he has seen his work performed everywhere from Joe’s Pub to NAMT. Michael R. Jackson on A Strange Loop: “At the very beginning, it was only a monologue that I wrote during my last year as a playwriting student at NYU. I was 22, 23 years old with a playwriting degree. I didn't know what I was going to do with my life, so I wrote this thinly veiled, personal monologue called 'Why I Can't Get Work.' why life was so terrible. And it was just that. I applied to a bunch of grad schools, and NYU Graduate Musical Theater Writing was the one I got into. The form of musical theater and songwriting turned out to be the perfect container for writing I had been doing since middle school. One of my classmates—a friend of mine was another Black gay man—wrote a song about a one- night stand and feeling deep religious guilt about it and other feelings that I recognized, because I grew up Black and gay around a lot of other Black gay boys. And it just struck me. And I wrote in my notebook, “All those Black gay boys I knew who chose to go on back to the Lord.”
On May 4, 2020, Jackson won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for the musical, with the committee citing the show as "a metafictional musical that tracks the creative process of an artist transforming issues of identity, race, and sexuality that once pushed him to the margins of the cultural mainstream into a meditation on universal human fears and insecurities."
The musical has earned and won many nominations and awards off and on Broadway. For example, the show premiered on Broadway in April 2022 and won the Tony Award for Best Musical. The Play has also received many positive reviews such like: "Broadway's best new musical.", “Screamingly funny. Unmissable.”, “A dazzling ride.”.
Even though A Strange Loop is not formally auto biographical, it was born of the artist's real-life experience. Again Michael R. Jackson on Strange Loop: “I felt determined that I could create something that had as much entertainment value as something that you would expect to see on Broadway, but that it had the sort of heart and intelligence that are in a lot of those classic musicals of yesteryear that are harder to get produced today. I had to learn what the story was. I'm a very story-driven writer, and it was drawn from my personal experience, but it needed to have a beginning, middle, and end, and there was no beginning, middle, and end to my life. It wasn't until I started going to therapy that I realized the problem was, 'Oh, you think something's wrong with you. And there is nothing wrong with you.’ I captured that that was Usher’s problem—something’s wrong with him, he’s got to fix it—and once it was married to this strange-loop structure, I knew what I was chasing.”
Now, why this play? Kansas major population is white. So why present a play of a Queer black body here? This musical is deliberately challenging and boundary pushing. It’s also deeply personal and specific, offering a glimpse into what it means to be a black, gay artist cycling through one’s perceptions of themselves and their own self-hatred.
It is important to create a context to think about the human condition that considers the play on the personal vision of a black and/or queer person. There is something of value in seeing that reflected on stage. Theatre is a test of empathy, and A Strange Loop is a play that tests empathy. It's about someone who's black and gay, and who's also going through the human condition, just like anyone else. Not necessarily in the same way, but the feeling of pain and humor are. Theatre is about reflecting on life. And that is exactly what Kansas needs right now Representation, Empathy and Reflection.
The way to make way of presenting this type of play on a major white republican conservative state is to provide them the facts and what of benefits for them. If we know anything about American history, it's that most Americans believe in ‘freedom for ALL Americans’. By that we can start by mentioning to them that:
1. Conservatives support freedom from discrimination: if they truly believe in the Golden Rule and that is treating others as we want to be treated. Freedom and fairness for all make a country stronger.
2. LGBTQ freedom is good for the economy: discrimination is bad for any business. Administrators agree that anti-LGBTQ discrimination is an economic liability, and that protections matter to corporate culture, values, and bottom lines.
3. People of faith are called to oppose discrimination: If we go back to the Golden Rule where it teaches us to treat others as we want to be treated, including those who may seem different from us. When we do that, we are truly living our faith. By Presenting these points I would assure You that they will agree in some way.
Production wise this play is beautiful in everyway possible, the text, the songs, and the technical side specifically lights. Light technicians play a crucial role here so most of our budget for technicians will go here. As for music we at Sercius production would really prefer to have a live band (all Black musicians) to perform to give the cast and the audience the full Broadway and liveness experience.
The play is proposed to have four presentations ideally Thursday, Friday Saturday and Sunday the hours of the presentations are still in the talks, but it is preferable to have two shows in the afternoon and two shows at night. When it comes to casting, we will conduct auditions for black actors we will try to find and make display work best as possible and to be accurate as possible as stated by the author to create the senses of the characters of the play.
We made a preliminary expense and budget table that is intended for the play to be presented at the William Inge Memorial Theater in KU. There will be four performances at a cost of $25/each. The theater has a maximum seating capacity of approximately 100 people. With no capacity limits and a "full house" for the four performances, we are talking about a profit of approximately $28,250 minus $11,470 of expenses we'll have $16,780 in total remaining. I hope that with all that is mentioned above You the reader can again approve and support on making this possible. Thanks for reading and hope to be having your support.
Sergio, you did a great job. I really enjoyed how you took the type to go though and tell the story about Michael and really focused on his history. I did not look into this side of the story so it really helped me understand more about the source. Great job.
Sergio, I liked how you took time to focus on Michael and his background. It made the intent of the show make sense and gave a level of intimate understanding behind some of the scenes in the show. I also liked how you talked about the three major reasons why we should be producing this show right now in this community.
Sergio, I enjoyed reading the process that Jackson wrote the play. Thank you for bringing this into your dramaturgical presentation. I agree with all you brought as reasons of performing this play in Kansas. There are a lot of racial violence here in Kansas and it is time to talk about these issues broadly. Keep up the great work, Sergio.