The plot, if that’s the right word for something so scattered, is about an usher named Usher (Jaquel Spivey) who works at a show much like The Lion King. Especially in the Lyceum Theatre: It’s a red-velvet-and-gilt balloon, and Jackson makes it go pop. The shock of that sharp emotion strikes like a lance. It’s less vicariously exhausting than it was Off Broadway, perhaps because the company no longer wrecks itself physically with every performance - but it’s still furious, both with the world and itself. “I was gonna use a bunch of her songs in the show but then she wouldn’t give me permission.”Īt breathtaking speed, for an hour and 45 minutes, Loop continues whirling on like this: the Big Ideas and the petty ones waltzing around in Jackson’s profane, hilarious, meta-musical carousel. “But it’s also the name of this Liz Phair song that I really love?” Usher tells the guy, flirting. That checks out, you think: Loop is an Escheresque musical by a gay Black man about a gay Black man writing a musical about a gay Black man writing about himself. As Usher, Jackson’s composer hero, sits on a subway explaining his own musical (also called A Strange Loop) to a stranger, he cites Douglas Hofstadter’s book about “loops” of identity-constructing self-reference. Of course there would be two - Jackson’s stunning show is recursive, redundant, reflective, reflexive. Jackson’s “Big Black and Queer-Ass American Broadway” show, he gives two explanations for the title. In the course of A Strange Loop, Michael R.
No matter how you slice it, it’s racist.Jaquel Spivey (center) stars in A Strange Loop, at the Lyceum Theatre. You can’t say you prefer one race of people as romantic partners, or anything really, to another because all of the people who belong to one race are not the same. Yes, people like what they like but sometimes the things people like are racist, like lawn jockeys or the current president of the United States. I’ll put aside the fact that broadcasting your distaste for an entire race, or multiple races, in the year 2017 is really dumb in addition to being racist as fuck, and just challenge the reasoning here head on. Almost as if it’s a magic phrase that just kind of ends the conversation and absolves you of your bullshit. Can’t change that.” I’ve heard that excuse, or some iteration of it, used many times. That’s fine and to make you feel more heard I’ll even repeat the most common point used to counter my argument ― “but people like what they like. I should point out that I’ve had this conversation with more than a couple of white gays in person and here is where the debate usually begins, so I’m going to assume that you’re rolling your eyes at me right about now. But you may want to take my words to heart if you’d like to live up to those progressive memes you share on Facebook all the time. There’s only one capital H-i-m and it’s not me. As a black man within the gay community, I recognize that shit all the time and have a few points I’d like to discuss with you. As a result, there are often times when you don’t recognize when your behavior towards people of color veers into problematic territory. the world, you must admit, you have no clue what it means to be racially discriminated against. You mean well when it comes to race relations but, as a white man in. You’re good guys, I know this to be true. I’m talking to you ― the cisgendered, white, gay men out there who hold no ill will towards minorities (especially black and brown ones) but somehow have never found themselves in bed with one. I’ve never been one to throw that word around casually and even though I’m sure there are some that word would fit like a glove, I’m not talking to them. Before I begin, I want you to understand that I’m not calling all of you racist.