McKinley Belcher III (left) as Teddy offers a beer to Jeremy (Uly Schlesinger) in Ken Urban’s play A Guide for the Homesick.
For a while in Ken Urban’s play A Guide for the Homesick, the author’s subject seems predictable. Set in Amsterdam, near Schiphol airport, the two-hander opens with a tall, strapping black man named Teddy (McKinley Belcher III) inviting a younger, white backpacker into his room. They’ve just met at a hotel bar, where the backpacker, Jeremy (Uly Schlesinger), has lingered after missing his flight. Teddy offers his guest a beer and a floor to sleep on, but the situation vibrates with sexual tension.
Teddy’s friend Ed (Schlesinger, seated) becomes obsessed with whales before the two men have a rancorous split.
The presumed good deed throws up some warning signs early on, when the controlling Teddy warns Jeremy about sitting on the comforter, which he believes may carry bugs; he also insists that Jeremy guzzle a beer. And Jeremy has his own issues, exploding when Teddy calls him “kid” (he’s about 10 years younger than Teddy). He has been working at a clinic in Uganda, which seems like a benign job, but he is returning to the States unexpectedly, cryptically adding, “When they find out what happened, no one back home is gonna be proud of me.”
When Teddy grabs Jeremy and kisses him, Jeremy pulls away and is outraged, and it seems as if Urban’s play is about the overworked issue of repressed homosexuality, but he’s really after something else. Mixed into this brew of testiness and confessional are two secondary characters, embodied by the actors in flashbacks. Belcher is also Nicholas, a soft-spoken gay Ugandan who shows up at Jeremy’s clinic to be tested for HIV. Nicholas is in a relationship with Martin, a married Ugandan. Even though Uganda’s government has one of the most viciously anti-gay policies in the world—goaded by American “missionaries”—Jeremy takes an optimistic view:
Jeremy: Just remember … change takes time.
Nicholas: I do not think you understand.
Jeremy: I know there’s been talk. That homophobic bill, but your congress shot it down. Don’t forget the flip side of that stuff. Increased visibility means some people get upset. But they’re the fringe. Everybody else comes around. …
Nicholas: Change is coming, but I worry it might not be change for the good.
Urban parcels out the specifics cannily to keep the audience in suspense about what both men have done, as the words “don’t know” echo throughout their dialogue.
Jeremy: You don’t know what I did.
Teddy: Then tell me.
For his part, Teddy’s cell phone keeps ringing, and he refuses to answer. The calls are from Margo, the fiancée of his friend Ed, played by Schlesinger in flashbacks, who was in Amsterdam but departed four days earlier after a row with Teddy. He knows that Ed has disappeared, and Margo is calling to find out why.
As Ed and Nicholas enter the story, scenes alternate quickly in Shira Milikowsky’s production: Teddy and Jeremy, Teddy and Eddie, Jeremy and Nicholas. Belcher and Schlesinger skillfully differentiate who’s who, although at times the audience may take a beat longer to figure it out. (Moreover, the night I attended a lighting malfunction halted the show; after the actors reentered, Belcher had to call for the house lights to be dimmed; despite those interruptions, both actors slid back into character with consummate professionalism.)
Schlesinger and Belcher each play two characters in the work; all four struggle with sexual identity. Photographs by Russ Rowland.
Urban is less concerned with his characters’ sexual orientations than with the overwhelming guilt that good people carry after making horrible, even fatal, decisions. Sex becomes a means of comfort. Yet the initial situation muddies things. Jeremy sticks around far longer in the hotel room than any perceptive straight man would. It’s clear from Teddy’s coaxing him to guzzle beer what Teddy’s ulterior motive is, and, given that Jeremy admits (to Nicholas) that he’s been mistaken for gay before, it’s odd that he wouldn’t go.
Schlesinger is particularly good at conveying Jeremy’s hysteria and anguish. Belcher’s Teddy is more stoic and in denial that his fight with Ed may have resulted in a tragedy. It’s unfortunate that Ed, the least convincing character, jumps around as if he has ADHD for most of his scenes, which become jarringly poetical and stream-of-consciousness:
but this whale this one whale
his frequency is like much higher
so the other whales can’t hear him
every year scientists record his songs
they get longer and longer
because he wants so badly for someone to hear him
Still, both men handle their roles with aplomb. If the journey is occasionally bumpy, the late revelations about the missing characters make the trip worth taking.
The Gold Milikowsky Group production of Ken Urban’s A Guide for the Homesick plays through Feb. 2 at DR2 Theatre (103 East 15th St.). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and Sunday and at 8 p.m. on Saturday; matinees are at 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday; there are no performances on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1. For tickets and more information, visit aguideforthehomesick.com.
Playwright: Ken Urban
Director: Shira Milikowsky
Scenic Design: Lawrence Moten III
Costume Design: David Woolard
Lighting Design: Abigail Hoke-Brady
Sound Design: Daniel Kluger
