Y’know what? I don’t have a good lead-in for this review. Just see this show, it’s really, really good.
In February of 2008, an openly gay student, Larry King, at EO Green Junior High in California was shot. He died from his wounds on Valentine’s Day. The student who shot him did so at least in part because Larry, who sometimes liked to wear makeup and high heels to school, had asked him a day or two before to be his Valentine.
It’s a very sad, very upsetting news story that I really don’t recall hearing much about at the time, which I’m kind of ashamed to admit. Maybe it’s because I was living in Calgary and it didn’t get a lot of press there, maybe my head was just buried in the Master’s thesis project I was doing at the time. After a whole lot of postponements and various issues, including the death of the accused’s father, the case actually just had it’s preliminary hearing last month; it had originally been scheduled for October 14, 2008.
Anyway, My Funny Valentine is a solo show written and performed by Dave Deveau. It’s a very personal trip as Deveau tries to make some sense of Larry’s death; even though he didn’t know Larry directly, he feels so much resonance with the story that he imagines he’s starting to see Larry slowly materialize in his living room. Deveau also spends some time playing some of the people involved, in the days before and after the shooting: Larry’s brother, a teacher, a girl who received a liver transplant from Larry, the priest at his funeral, and I think one or two that I’m forgetting.
The strength of the show is definitely Deveau’s personal take. Deveau’s anguish over the senseless death is palpable, and when he challenges the audience to think about it’s own humanity, it rings true. That’s not to say his portrayals of some of the characters aren’t very good as well. For one, his delivery of the eulogy the priest gave at Larry’s service is one of the highlights of the show. But a couple of them are a bit inscrutable, at least at first; it took a few minutes for me to figure out the boy in the hoody Deveau was playing was Larry’s brother, and I didn’t figure out the girl who got the liver transplant from Larry after his death’s relationship to the story until later in the play, well after her segment.
That doesn’t stop My Funny Valentine from being a great, emotional show, though, and certainly a highlight of the festival so far.
My Funny Valentine has two shows remaining at SummerWorks: August 15 at 6:00 and August 16 at noon, both at Theatre Passe Muraille’s backspace (grab one of the complimentary Obusforme backrests before you sit down, those bench seats are HARD). See the SummerWorks website for complete schedule & ticket info.
