Review: WET's STRAIGHT WHITE MEN Examines Privilege but Takes the Long Way Around

As you enter the theater for Washington Ensemble Theatre's "Straight White Men", currently playing at 12th Ave Arts, you are greeted with Hip Hop music with questionable lyrics amped up to the point that you can feel the bass in your filings. You're told at the outset of the show that the reason for this is to take away the privilege of being comfortable from most in the audience who wouldn't care for that. What follows is Young Jean Lee's overly stereotypical and cliché examination of four straight white men and their privilege. So, I can only assume seeing an interesting play with a point was also a privilege we were denied.

At the top of the play we are greeted by Persons in Charge 1 and 2 (Nina Williams-Teramachi and Nicholas Japaul Bernard) who share with us the aforementioned explanation of the music and also explain to us which pronouns we should use with each of them (they and he respectively) lest any of us fall into a cis-normative trap. Then they disappear into the audience and are relatively underused for the rest of the play which is a shame since they were the most interesting characters in the piece. What we're left with are three brothers, Matt, Jake, and Drew (Frank Boyd, Andy Buffelen, and Sam Turner) who are spending Christmas with their widowed Dad Ed (David S. Klein). But not all is perfect with this seemingly perfect family as Matt bursts into tears for no reason at dinner. So what could be the problem?

This paltry plot point is the trite Afterschool Special that Lee has tried to turn into a statement on privilege. We sit and watch these four men talk about how woke they are in this unfair world, in between dance parties and wrestling matches where these brothers and their Dad bump and grind all over each other. (I'm not sure what Lee thinks happens between white male family members but this, thankfully, has never happened in my family.) All culminating into a "point" in the last 10 minutes of the play where we discover that all four men may talk a good game but each of them, in their own ways, fails to actually DO anything to fix the broken system.

I cannot fault director Sara Porkalob or the ensemble of fine actors with any of my qualms with the piece as they present the piece well. The pacing is good, the intentions of the characters are mostly clear and they present the play as it was written. It's the play itself I have issue with as you can see that Lee feels the play is evocative but takes such a long way to get to the point with such hackneyed moments and jokes begging for laughter that it's really just boring.

I'm sure many will attribute my feelings to me being a white male and that my white male privilege feelings were hurt by the play. No. My feelings were not affected in the slightest. This play made me feel nothing and that should not be the goal of any play. The only thing the play left me with is wondering "why". Why is this being done (not only here but in New York as well) and what was the point? And so, with my three-letter rating system, I give Washington Ensemble Theatre's production of "Straight White Men" a bored NAH. The director's notes in the program say we should not feel bad for Matt. I don't. I don't feel anything for any of these characters. I guess in that vein, the play worked?

"Straight White Men" from Washington Ensemble Theatre performs at 12th Ave Arts through January 29th. For tickets or information visit them online at www.washingtonensemble.org.

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