Mini-Review: _Becoming a Man_

[jducoeur]

Tonight's theater outing was to the ART's current show, Becoming a Man. It's an excellent one-act play; let's talk about it a little.

This memoir from P. Carl starts out when 50-ish Carl has finally finished transitioning. For the first time in his life, he feels comfortable in his own body, and he's on top of the world -- it's great. And then reality sets in.

This is not a story about headline-grabbing transphobia; indeed, while the word gets tossed around a bit, it's striking that the people around Carl are mostly pretty good about his transition. (Even his absolute waste of a father mostly just fails through constant deadnaming.)

The problem is in working his way through the effects on his relationships. Carl is overjoyed about finally getting to just be one of the guys, but his proudly lesbian wife is struggling with the question of whether he is still the person she married.

And the story doesn't shy away from this tension. The Polly-who-was is a major character, not just in the flashback scenes of Carl's history, but still very much in constant dialog (sometimes argument) with him in his head. Which isn't made any easier by the way that Carl, marinating in new boy-hormones, winds up expressing a somewhat unpleasant brew of insecurity and toxic masculinity.

After last month's Real Women Have Curves, this play is quiet, almost intimate in the way that it tells a span of Carl's life as he and those around him work their way through all this, figuring out the new shape of their lives. It's not always easy, but it's honest and free from melodrama, well acted and directed, and nicely thought-provoking.

It's currently in previews, and runs a few more weeks. Well worth watching if you have a chance.