High at the Booth Theatre

High is a new play by Matthew Lombardo (Looped) starring Kathleen Turner as an unconventional nun in a rehab center.  The producers were kind enough to give me a ticket to a preview performance of the show which opens on April 19, 2011.  The poster for High warns of adult content and full male nudity and the warnings are justified.  Mamma Mia! this ain't.  High is not without its faults, but it is an interesting and engaging play that deserves to be seen.
Kathleen Turner as Sister Jamison Connelly is firmly at the center of High.  Remaining on stage for almost the entire two hour running time of the play, she gives a performance that is gripping, nuanced, and by far the finest in the three-person ensemble.  Not that she isn't given some tough competition from Broadway newcomer Evan Jonigkeit as the troubled, drug-addicted Cody Randall.  He makes the most of his showy role, although at times his performance seemed a little forced or mannered.  It wasn't him stripping down physically, but his stripping away all of the artifice and the nakedness of his emotions in his final scene in the play that really convinced me that he was a terrific actor.  I only wish he could have brought more of this honesty and connection to his earlier scenes in the play.  The third member of the ensemble is Stephen Kunken as Father Michael Delpapp.  He is fine, but doesn't leave much of an impression.  I am not sure if that is a fault of the script or if Kunken simply doesn't bring the same level of emotional intensity and commitment as his co-stars.  I think if he had made Father Delpapp's choices and motivations just a little sharper, pushed things just a little farther, it might have brought more balance to the play.

The twists, turns, and revelations in the script kept me interested and intrigued throughout the play, so I will try to keep the spoilers to a minimum.  I would like to discuss a few really unintended questions this play brought up for me.  The first one has to do with Kathleen Turner.  Her character is described throughout the play as being ugly, or unappealing.  She describes her sister as being the beautiful one, but the descriptions kept making me think of this Kathleen Turner:

from Prizzi's Honor (1985)

Or, from a movie my sister must have made me watch at least 100 times when we were growing up... Peggy Sue Got Married:

from Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)

In the 1980s, Kathleen Turner was a total sex symbol as evidenced by her starring roles in movies like Body Heat, Romancing the Stone,  and even as the voice of Jessica Rabbit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?  Hearing her describe herself over and over as growing up as the ugly sister in High got me thinking about how strange it must be for her over the course of her life to go from one extreme to the other.  I doubt the Kathleen Turner of 1985 could have imagined she would one day be cast as a character that is too ugly to rape (this is in the plot, not some sort of slur.)  Not that she is wrong for the role... her gravelly voice and rough appearance in High make her casting mostly believable (she is still quite handsome.)  Still, I couldn't stop myself from thinking about the 1985 Kathleen Turner and the life that took her from being cast as one extreme to the other.  Maybe I should order her book?

The other unintended question had to do with role of homosexuality in the play. Unfortunately, this is question requires a few spoilers, so skip ahead if you want to avoid them.  High is set in a Catholic rehab center and features a Priest, a Nun, and a drug-addicted gay prostitute.  The question I had was whether the antiquated ideas about homosexuality in the play were intentional, and whether they were meant to be some sort of commentary on or in support of some old-fashioned gay stereotypes.  Cody Randall's mother was a prostitute and one of her regular johns raped Cody when he was very young.  People becoming gay by molestation, rape, or recruitment is one of the oldest accusations around.  It may be that some gay men were abused when they were younger, but I can't imagine a heterosexual sex-abuse survivor's sexuality being causally linked to the abuse.  Seeing this ridiculous claim on stage, even implicitly, I couldn't help feeling annoyed.  Since Sister Connelly is at the center of the show, antiquated Catholic ideas of homosexuality frame the action of the play.  Of course a nun would think that rape made the boy gay and of course, because the boy is gay he can't really understand love.  Cody does find love in his life, but it is not genuine love it is just a repetition of the gay-sex predator behavior that made him gay in the first place.  I am by no means suggesting GLAAD stage a protest, and I think there is room for a diverse portrayals of gay life, but it was still annoying to me.  Knowing the history of depictions of homosexuality in films and on stage in the past, as soon as it was revealed that he was molested into being gay I turned to my friend and said, "What is this, the 1950s? Bet the gay kid dies before the end of the play."  Of course that is exactly what happens.  It is just a tired and old-fashioned depiction that, like it or not, has an effect on people's views.  I guess I will have to wait for the upcoming production of Larry Kramer's 1985 play The Normal Heart for a more empowering and modern view of homosexuality.

All quibbles and unintended questions aside, High remains a play worth seeing and a great addition to the Broadway season.

Want to see for yourself?  Click here for tickets.

Behind HIGH: The Cast & Creative Discusses the Play from High on Broadway on Vimeo.