Black Gay Choir Boy’s Blues

TARELL ALVIN McCRANEY — CHOIR BOY — 2015

It probably is not as good, or should I say as best, a play as some critics pretend or assert, but it is an interesting and somewhere invigorating play bringing up fundamental questions in a preparatory school for black boys. The cast is limited for obvious financial reasons but also to get to some concentrated matter and this concentration make sit a tremendous lot more effective?

Boys with boys will always be boys with boys. So, we expect some lack of courtesy, some violence, at least in words, some profane words too, some plain insanity, I mean provocative untrue ranting to make others rave like hell. And it works all the time. All the boys are a dense representation of a school choir with three voices, tenor, baritone and bass. We expect and we get the competition between the members and especially the competition between two tenors for the position of choir leader and first tenor, the one who does the solo performances. There are only two tenors.

The first tenor is the nephew of the principal of the school and as such believes he has rights that others do not have. He is ferociously aggressive end…