TRAFFICKING IN BROKEN HEARTS
Bailiwick Repertory at the Theatre Building
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Consider Papo: he’s both sensual and sexual, the quintessential Latin lover, capable of getting it on seven times a day. We’re supposed to believe he’s a sexual magician terrified of emotion, yet everything in the play indicates he’s not at all terrified. Although he’s been hustling on Times Square since he was 15, Papo’s still enough of a softie to take in Bobby (Woodrow James Bryant), a psychotic 17-year-old runaway. Years on the street haven’t affected Papo’s ability to fall in love, either: he does so at first grope with Brian, even though Brian is having a not particularly attractive anxiety attack. As if all this weren’t enough, Sanchez actually wants us to believe that Papo sends his earnings from hustling home to his poor mother, who lives across the river in the Bronx.
By the time Papo and Brian get together at the end, we’re not at all surprised that Papo’s able to love. Instead we’re wondering how the hell he survived all those years without getting eaten alive. The guy’s a pussycat–not underneath it all, but right there on the surface.
VOCES Y CUERPOS IV
Latino Experimental Theatre Company at Link’s Hall
Voces y Cuerpos IV features seven pieces by six male writers, two of them involving white men’s direct domination of black women, and one by a woman, a drippingly sentimental piece about lost love. Why present such blatantly sexist material? Why continue to underscore these horrible stereotypes of Latin machos and whores?
