Ilona Dulaski as Mrs. Katharine Gerard and Tom Story as Cal Porter in “Mothers and Sons,” now streaming from MetroStage.
“Mothers and Sons” is being produced in memory of Terrence McNally by MetroStage, the Board of Trustees, and Carolyn Griffin, who is the producing artistic director. A study in how quickly people have forgotten how the AIDS crisis played out in this country in the 1980s and 1990s, it succeeds best when it focuses on the very fraught relationship between Katharine Gerard and Cal Porter, respectively the widowed mother and the one-time lover/partner of Andre, who died of AIDS in the mid-1990s.
This is a raw script, but these actors are more than equal to the task. It’s definitely worth watching, remembering, and regretting what might have been.
And by fraught, I mean that Mrs. Gerard is bitter and angry and still in denial that her son was gay. She is furious that after a mere eight years of grieving, Cal found himself falling in love and has been together with his husband, Will, for 11 years, and that they have a nearly-seven-year-old son, Bud.
There’s a lot to unpack in the 90 minutes or so of this show. Taking place nearly 20 years after Andre’s death, Mrs. Gerard pops in on Cal. By popping in I mean that she lives in Dallas and is “stopping by” their apartment on the West Side in New York.
There’s a bit of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf” at times in the confrontations, and even a moment of “Streetcar Named Desire” when Cal acknowledges that they’ve been heading toward this confrontation for nearly 20 years.
As Cal, Tom is kind, and very uncomfortable. Mrs. Gerard has blamed him for her son’s death, and seeks to find some closure for her pain by bestowing it all on him. But he’s no pushover. When he has to, he tells the truth and at times it’s very blunt.
His husband, Will, is not as generous. He asks her directly why she is there. She’s not accustomed to being challenged, it seems, and handles it very passively-aggressively. One wonders how many times she can “forget” his name.
Ilona Dulaski manages to humanize the role. With her darting eyes, refuge in her fur coat, and grande dame manner, she conveys a fragility and desperation underneath the rage. It’s a master class by a master actor.
Ewan Chung plays Will and does it with the directness of a younger gay man who never experienced first-hand the horror of the early years of AIDS. He also acknowledges his sometimes jealousy of Andre’s and Will’s relationship. He sets boundaries and makes them quite clear.
Bud is played by Jesse Coleman, the son of a long-time stalwart at MetroStage, Marni Penning. He is charming and direct (but never veers into preciousness), as children are and, as children do, reacts to Mrs. Gerard’s prickliness by offering her friendship, and the best Oreo in the world. He softens the edges and brings a little ray of hope.
The script almost has too much going on. Over the course of this most uncomfortable visit, many of Mrs. Gerard’s regrets over her life choices, and her own guilt about how she dealt with a gay son, come out. The guilt and loneliness would have been enough without tossing in the emptiness of her marriage (at least on her part) and seemingly inability to forge an identity of her own. There are also some really funny moments that have a beautifully natural feel to them, when people can acknowledge, at least fleetingly, the absurdity of life.
The play works best when the relationships are front and center. The treatment of gay men in the early years of AIDS is not presented subtly. But maybe it shouldn’t be. It was a national shame then, and still it. But at times it feels shoe-horned into the script.
Director Stefan Sittig finds the steel and softness in all the characters which brings a welcome complexity to what could easily veer into stereotypes. Wendy Roome does a masterful job of editing the work and obviously, this is all done socially-distanced via video.
This is a raw script, but these actors are more than equal to the task. It’s definitely worth watching, remembering, and regretting what might have been.
This production is being offered free on MetroStage’s Youtube channel. As the theatre is in the midst of a capital campaign to raise funds for moving into their new spaces later this year, donations are welcome. It is a lovely gift, and the first of several filmed offerings by MetroStage in the meantime.
Running Time: Approximately 95 minutes without intermission.
Show Advisory: Blunt sexual references, adult language.
“Mothers and Sons” runs free through January 18, 2020 in a virtual environment, presented by MetroStage, Alexandria, VA. For more information, please click here.
