Grahame Renyk, U of Guelph
“Okay, So If I Don't Really Like Judy or Barbra, Musicals Give Me a Headache, and Heels Just Make my Feet Hurt, Can I Still Be Gay?”:  re-defining queer theatre as something that explores rather than expresses

What exactly is queer theatre or queer performance? Does it even exist as something classifiable? A theatre company that identifies itself based on such a classification, such as Toronto’s Buddies in Bad Times theatre, would certainly argue that it is. So, is queer theatre then defined on notions of its expressing a queer culture or queer sensibility? As indicated by the title of this paper, attempts to define these terms have been contentious. This paper will take the position that queer theatre (in this case, primarily gay male) is perhaps better defined based on function rather than form. Queer theatre, then, is theatre in which the ideological interplay between the queer performance and queer spectator becomes hegemonic, and when the formerly privileged straight spectator, while not necessarily excluded, becomes a sort of cultural tourist. In this model, queer theatre is an exploration rather than an expression of notions of queer culture, sensibility, and identity. However, for such a substantial shift in the hegemony to occur, there must be an equally significant shift in the ideology of the performance site itself; in effect, a creation of a ‘site of difference’ that establishes itself and its borders based on its differences from the norm and in which previously dominant ideologies can be subverted, or at least “left at the door” long enough to enable a dialogue queerness and queer identities. This paper will explore the creation of such as site of difference and strategies for doing so primarily through a discussion of Michel Marc Bouchard's Lilies.