The brightly lit stage is adorned with only a stool, a table and a framed photograph of a young boy. In a bathing suit and life vest, he's standing in a beached kayak. The boy holds a kayak paddle above his head in what could be a gesture of tentative victory. His smile suggests a happiness that's unable to fully break through the daunting barrier of youthful uncertainty.
Happiness?
Considering the context of the picture, one can't help but dwell on that which hides behind the glinting teeth and dimpled cheeks. When, really, does childhood end? Is the struggle toward adulthood defined by the sexual maturation of the body? By the attainment of knowledge? By a profound wounding of the spirit? If you don't have an answer already, don't expect one to come easily. It's a tricky question.
The performance begins without a signal. Writer-actor Martin Moran strides briskly onstage, disarmingly greeting the audience directly as he waxes poetic on the beauty of the Pacific Northwest. His seemingly improvised opening remarks flow seamlessly into recollections of his years at Christ the King, an all-male Jesuit junior high school. The house lights fade slowly over the course of about 20 minutes but remain partially lit, cementing the intimacy of the performance.
This direct rapport with the audience is what makes Moran's stage adaptation of his memoir, "The Tricky Part," so effective. The most painful and poignant memories of his manipulative and disturbingly premature introduction to sex by a man twice his age are revealed in detail with candor, honesty, even humor. The monologue is strikingly devoid of bitterness and despair; it offers instead a fierce sense of hope.
Moran's memories serve as frank, poetic testimonials to the possibility of healing. This is not to say that this is an Oprah-esque, feel-good celebration of the triumph of the human spirit. Moran pulls no punches. He describes his victimization while deftly avoiding the temptation to hide behind the dehumanizing, two-dimensional veil of victimhood. He avoids the trap of manipulating the audience with superfluous melodrama at every turn. The heartrending pathos of his experience is allowed to speak for itself.
Between the ages of 12 and 15, Moran was in a sexual relationship with Bob Comisky, a counselor at his Catholic boys' camp.
Bob was the epitome of manhood, a Vietnam vet and rugged outdoorsman who purposed to teach Moran the secrets of confidence and self-reliance while at the same time abusing him sexually. Moran's childhood memories deal with the deep, genuine admiration and respect he felt for Bob, respect that was indelibly colored by the anguish and trauma brought about through the most profound of transgressions against the bond of trust between child and adult.
Moran is able to move deftly through decades over the course of the performance. He calls up his childhood, his career as an actor in New York and his middle-aged confrontation with Bob with a fluidity and ease that belie the difficulty of the subject matter. His two teenage suicide attempts, the dissolution of his parents' marriage and the sexual indiscretions of his own early adulthood are addressed with the same unyielding honesty as his relationship with Bob.
"The Tricky Part" offers a viciously funny perspective on Catholicism at a time when laughter in the face of the church's destructive, criminal shortcomings seems all but impossible. Moran addresses the sexual predations of the clergy, but focuses also on the mundane foibles of schoolteacher nuns and the pitiful inadequacy of his Catholic school's sexual education program. (It consists of a priest telling the boys that semen contains "1,000 expectant Catholics," and that the genitals are to be used "for procreation only" before he beats a hasty retreat from the classroom.)
Moran addresses the hypocrisy of religious dogma without scornful condemnation of faith and speaks with unrelenting nostalgia about his own naïve, youthful piety.
Through his grace, amiability and matter-of-fact strength, Moran demonstrates the possibility of healing from even the most grievous of emotional and psychic wounds. The healing process he insinuates is open-ended but manageable, incumbent on strong relationships and fulfillment through meaningful work.
What is most inspiring, however, is his universal sympathy.
Not once does he address his aggressor with loathing or spite. While he indubitably has dealt with both immeasurable hatred and paralyzing self-pity, these are not the emotions on which he has chosen to dwell. He constantly but evenly reinforces that he is the man he is because of what has happened to him and openly accepts his past without turning it into a burden on his soul.
Moran's amazing performance addresses the depth and the complexity of his experiences with clear and open eyes, and with the unapologetic understanding that the tricky part is simply being alive. No more, no less.[[In-content Ad]]
