Tolins' Secrets of the Trade

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Remember "The Twilight of the Golds" by Jonathan Tolins? The premise being that there is a genetic test that can be done during pregnancy that will tell whether the fetus will turn out to be a gay kid. What happens when a woman become pregnant and the gay test is positive? She has a gay brother. She seriously considers having an abortion because she wants a straight kid. How will that play out? It was quite an interesting play, with several good regional productions and a nice Broadway run.

 

Now, many years later, a new Tolins play, "Secrets of the Trade." I saw a preview this weekend at Primary Stages, a NYC off-Broadway company. It's opening in a few weeks. I found it very entertaining and thought-provoking. It explores a mentor-mentee relationship over a period of almost a decade between an eager young kid obsessed with the theater and an experienced director. As you'd expect with the gay author of the play, there is a gay theme incorporated in the play, but it's not the primary theme. Worth catching, I think. John Glover plays the director. Noah Robbins, who had a brief run in the failed revival of Brighton Beach Memoirs, plays the kid. Both are very much worth watching, as is a fine supporting cast. It's a rather bare-bones summer production, but imaginatively done.