It’s about Time: Queer Utopias and Theater Performance

Abstract

There are many antecedent manifestations and representations of nascent LGBT people in theater before gays were “out.” 1 Direct, indirect and oblique, or heavily codified representations of what now are called LGBT people have been on the UK and US stage for over a century. 2 Of course, not all these representations have been positive; indeed lots of historical representations of LGBT people are deeply offensive and problematic, yet some plays do represent a “warm illumination” that might mirror José Muñoz’s description of queer utopia. 3 Yet, not all warm glows are the same as the horizonal image that Muñoz uses; rather the glow from such utopic representations are not the refusal of the present, which is an index for Muñoz of a utopic impulse; rather they can be read as the warm glow of queer romance. That is, direct representations of onstage queer utopias often seem to fall into what Lisa Duggan might call homonormative, the progressive fight for individualized rights-based agendas. 4 These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

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