BASH’d

When naïve small-town boy Dillon meets the sophisticated urban Jack in a gay bar, it’s love at first sight, and not just for a one-night stand either! While these star-crossed lovers manage to bring their initially dubious if not downright disowning families together in celebration of their marriage, their unblemished love certainly hasn’t changed the world—quite the contrary. When Jack becomes the victim of a gay-bashing, Dillon sets out on an indiscriminate rampage of revenge. Unfortunately, the straight men he takes on are neither particularly homophobic, nor are they exactly itching for a fight and the scene quickly turns ugly, teetering on the verge of a slaughter of the innocent until the police intervene. Realizing too late that two wrongs don’t make a right, the lovers, wrapped in each other’s arms, die in a hail of bullets.

Arriving in heaven, much to their contrite surprise, the creator fits the souls of these two Romeos with a set of wings and sends them on a mission of redemption. Condemned to wander the earth and tell their cautionary tale forever to whomever will listen, their angelic personae TBAG and FEMINEM have had no trouble enthralling wildly enthusiast audiences all over North America with the rap opera rhymes of this tragic tale ever since.

While the goal of BASH’d is first and foremost to tell an engaging gay love story, it also flips the music industry’s gangsta stereotype of rap music on its head and returns it to its political roots—in this case to explore the dangers of the kind of attitudes that continue to condone and even encourage sexual discrimination of all kinds in our society.

Not since Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner has a narrative poem inspired such empathy in the hearts and minds of its audience.

AUTHOR

Chris Craddock

Chris Craddock graduated from the University of Alberta?s BFA Acting Program in 1996. He has acted for many theatres all over Canada, and is the author of several plays for audiences of many categories. These include SuperEd , Indulgences , The “Tranny” Trilogy (with Darrin Hagen), The Day Billy Lived , Wrecked , Do it Right , Making Out , Men Are Stupid, Women are Crazy, Ha! (with Wes Borg), PornStar , BoyGroove (songs and lyrics by Aaron Macri), 3…2…1 (with Nathan Cuckow), DreamLife , Moving Along (recently featured on Bravo), and this adaptation of the novel Summer of My Amazing Luck by Miriam Toews. Chris is the former Artistic Director of Azimuth Theatre and the current Artistic Director of Rapid Fire Theatre. He has been nominated for a total of 14 of Edmonton?s Sterling Awards and won four. His first film, Turnbuckle , was nominated for two Alberta Motion Picture Industries Association Awards. Chris is also the winner of the Alberta Book Award, the Embridge Award for Best Emerging Artist, and a 2005 Alberta Centennial Medal for his contribution to the arts in Alberta.

AUTHOR

Nathan Cuckow

Nathan Cuckow is an award-winning actor, producer, playwright and a co-artistic director of Edmonton’s critically acclaimed theatre company Kill Your Television. Born and raised in Calgary, Cuckow moved to New York City at the age of nineteen and studied at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy. Upon graduating, he worked as an administrator in the Education Outreach program for Tony Randall’s National Actors Theatre for the Broadway production of The Sunshine Boys. Cuckow returned to Canada in 1998 and has since then called Edmonton home. In 2007 he received, with Chris Craddock, the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding New York Theater (BASH’d).

Reviews

BASH’d is furious, fast-moving, hip-hop entertainment! As one of the lyrics ­proclaims, “it’s Romeo meets Romeo,” complete with an ample supply of ­scatological language, swaggering attitude and a keen, often hilarious sense of observation about gay life.” —Associated Press


“The idiosyncrasies of gay life are displayed vividly (and sometimes in raunchy ­detail) as Craddock and Cuckow snap from character to character, creating a world full of aggressive drag queens, disdainful lesbians, macho conservative dads, wayward straight boys and one pitch-perfect, loving-but-cringing mother.” —New York Daily News


BASH’d is brilliant … this is a show you don’t dare miss.” —Toronto Star


“Audiences should be impressed by the passion of its convictions. The production … shows its rage, its grief, and its driven, heartfelt determination.” —New York Times


“Besides being hugely imaginative, energized, and brash, BASH’d is also very, very funny.” —Calgary Herald


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Excerpts & Samples ×

When naïve small-town boy Dillon meets the sophisticated urban Jack in a gay bar, it’s love at first sight, and not just for a one-night stand either! While these star-crossed lovers manage to bring their initially dubious if not downright disowning families together in celebration of their marriage, their unblemished love certainly hasn’t changed the world—quite the contrary. When Jack becomes the victim of a gay-bashing, Dillon sets out on an indiscriminate rampage of revenge. Unfortunately, the straight men he takes on are neither particularly homophobic, nor are they exactly itching for a fight and the scene quickly turns ugly, teetering on the verge of a slaughter of the innocent until the police intervene. Realizing too late that two wrongs don’t make a right, the lovers, wrapped in each other’s arms, die in a hail of bullets.

Arriving in heaven, much to their contrite surprise, the creator fits the souls of these two Romeos with a set of wings and sends them on a mission of redemption. Condemned to wander the earth and tell their cautionary tale forever to whomever will listen, their angelic personae TBAG and FEMINEM have had no trouble enthralling wildly enthusiast audiences all over North America with the rap opera rhymes of this tragic tale ever since.

While the goal of BASH’d is first and foremost to tell an engaging gay love story, it also flips the music industry’s gangsta stereotype of rap music on its head and returns it to its political roots—in this case to explore the dangers of the kind of attitudes that continue to condone and even encourage sexual discrimination of all kinds in our society.

Not since Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner has a narrative poem inspired such empathy in the hearts and minds of its audience.

Reader Reviews

Details

Dimensions:

96 Pages
8.5in * 216mm * 5.5in * 140mm * 0.25in6mm
142gr
5.125oz

Published:

January 12, 2011

City of Publication:

Vancouver

Country of Publication:

CA

Publisher:

Talonbooks

ISBN:

9780889226562

Book Subjects:

DRAMA / LGBTQ+

Featured In:

All Books

Language:

eng

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