Class Blog

Through the experiences of Belize and Roy Cohn, Tony Kushner shows the importance of self-acceptance with the use of power. Belize and Roy show two very different impacts with their power and actions. Roy as a white, closeted, wealthy lawyer harms marginalized people all while being one himself. His internalized homophobia results in him being especially hateful and dehumanizing towards Queer people even when they help him. When Belize advises Roy to use his connections to avoid being scammed by the medicine trials, Cohn still treats him in a demeaning manner despite Belize helping him with medical treatment. He still calls Belize a “ butterfingers sp**k f*ggot nurse” (Kushner 155) and ironically points out that Belize has “little reason to help” him (Kushner 155). Roy uses the slur as his internalized homophobia separates himself from its dehumanizing impact. Furthermore, it prevents him from empathizing with the experiences and feelings of queer people despite being one himself. This leads to him only looking out for his best interests like in the case of him hoarding medication that would have helped many others. Additionally, with his bias towards marginalized people, Roy is unlikely to help them in legal cases for their rights. This only results in a more oppressive and hateful world.

Unlike Roy, Belize faces more severe oppression due to his intersectional identity as a middle-class gay black man. Despite the severe levels of oppression making it difficult for him to have power in his life, he still chooses to use what little power he does have to help others. As a nurse during the AIDs Crisis, Belize aims to help all people affected but especially Queer people. As seen through his interaction with Roy, Belize’s kind actions come from a place of empathy and self-acceptance. When Roy insults Belize’s intentions for helping him, he simply responds with “ Consider it solidarity from one f*ggot to another.” (Kushner 155) Instead of feeling offended by Roy’s use of the slur, Belize reclaims it by turning it into a fact of reality. For him, his sexuality is not a shameful part of his identity and despite Roy being terrible and ungrateful towards him, Belize still helps him with treatment.
Through this scene, Kushner supports his theme of the state of self-acceptance and it’s impact on the uses of power. He shows us that self-acceptance leads to empathetic actions that change the world for the better while the opposite results in harmful results.

In the play Angels in America the character Roy Cohn represents a form of masculinity that society often portrays as very manly but also toxic, to hide his homosexuality by talking down on woman and having a big ego.

In Act 1, Scene 2 Roy argues with a client on the phone because he missed their court date and says “YOU THINK I’M THE ONLY GODDAMN LAWYER IN HISTORY EVER MISSED A COURT DATE?! Don’t make such a big fucking— Hold.” (Kushner 12), emphasizing how he is not treating his client with respect, yelling at him, and trying to present himself in a superior position, which can be read as very “manly”. It contributes to the stigma that still exists in society, that men need to act strong, tough, focus on material success and take a superior role in society. However, this behavior is highly toxic and just strengthens the idea of a men needing to act and present themselves in a certain way for society to accept them as “manly”. Ever other form of self-representation could be interpretated as feminine and connected to homosexuality.

The aspect of Roy having a big ego and acting on toxic masculine behavior can also be observed as the  talks down on two women in the same scene. On one hand, he calls his secretary multiple times “baby doll” (Kushner 12) which shows the little respect he has for her and, on the other hand, he talks down on Mrs. Hollins as he says “Yeah, yeah right good so how many tickets dear? Seven? For what, Cats, 42nd Street, what? No you wouldn’t like La Cage, trust me, I know. Oh for godsake” (Kushner 12). This situation shows how Roy questions Mrs. Hollins capability to make a good choice and instead makes it for her, by not validating her opinion.

Both described aspects are relevant to understand that Roy is trying to cover his homosexuality through his behavior, which he believes underline his masculinity and the associated heterosexuality. I believe that the character Roy is great example of how homosexual men are pressured to have the need to be portrayed with manly considered attributes to not be questioned in their sexuality. In addition, I assume that many closeted homosexuals fear rejection from society if they are associated with female read characteristics.

All in all, I believe that this scene shows how much work we still have to do in society by breaking up stereotypes about “feminine” and “male” behavior and how these characteristics don’t give an answer to people’s sexual orientation or identity.

Struggle is a common factor in The Angels in America, whether it comes in the form of being a minority, power struggles or even a disease crisis. Throughout this play, there are funerals, broken relationships, identity struggles and dealing with certain death. The play covers the personal lives of multiple characters that have vastly different views and ways of life but is all connected through different aspects of every person’s life and journey as they progress.

 

The important factor of this play is the time it’s based in, the 80s was difficult for many minorities that differed from the “social norm” or religion. The 80s was a time when unless you were straight, white, and male you didn’t have power or respect in the workplace, so when someone from the queer community had to live in that society how can they feel accepted. The AIDs epidemic was a thing of mass panic, a disease that at the time felt like it could end the world; But who did the media blame it on, the already hated gay community. AIDs was portrayed as a disease that only was spread in the gay community and not what it really was and could be spread by anyone. Joe is a character that struggles with religion and his place in the world, as a devoted Christian he later finds out that he himself is homosexual and he consistently struggles with what side he must take. In act 2 scene 8 Joe calls his mother Hannah to tell her he is gay and asks if his father loves him and rather than respond she just says, “Don’t be ridiculous”. It’s easy to see where his families priorities are and that the religious life doesn’t accept the idea of homosexuality and if Joe himself is homophobic he would lose his family.

Although Angels in America by Tony Kushner hones in on the tragedy of the AIDS crisis, the play’s absurdism makes the text more accessible while simultaneously creating a binary between fantasy and tragedy.  

One of the reoccurring symbols in the play, the angel, invites camp discussions into the text. For example, when the angel first visits Prior as The Voice, it says, “Soon I will return, I will reveal myself to you; I am glorious, glorious; my heart, my countenance and my message. You must prepare” (Kushner 65). At first, the angel’s voice seems like it will present an outstanding spiritual message that will act as a guiding light for Prior. However, the Angel presents itself in a camp way, speaking elaborately in metaphors, and in Part II addressing Prior as a Prophet, saying wild phrases like, “Am the Bird of America, the Bald Eagle” that don’t make much sense to the reader (Kushner 160). With pieces like this, the angel is reduced to its camp form, as a being inside Prior’s mind that makes the play more accessible and pulls away from the tragedy of AIDS. 

The angel’s camp and sometimes outlandish actions bring balance to the play. Without humor from the angel, Prior’s narrative could be reduced to “another story about the tragedy of AIDS”, however the play refuses to simplify its characters, and the angel aids in that process. 

Even just the word “angel” brings a duality to the play. For example, when Prior tells Louis he has AIDS, he says “K.S., baby. Lesion number one. Lookit. The wine dark kiss of the angel of death” (Kushner 21). Prior’s description of this angel contradicts itself in its beautiful “kiss”, but ultimate death sentence.  

Additionally, although an angel is a holy, godly figure, it visits Prior, a gay man with AIDS. This detail demonstrates that the lines of good and evil aren’t clean cut, which is vital to the story of the AIDS crisis. For years, society viewed people with AIDS as subhuman, as lesser-than, even seeming dangerous to touch, in addition to the homophobia of the time. 

Overall, the angel is necessary in order for the play to interest watchers/readers as well as speak truthfully on the impact of the AIDS crisis. 

The idealistic nature of religion is the barrier that forces people away from their personal beliefs, thus, consequently, blocking them away from their pursuit of happiness instead of helping them to achieve it. This, of course, does not exactly apply to everybody who practices religion but rather points out the idealistic nature of religion which abides practitioners to follow a certain set of rules while forfeiting aspects that the religions deem to be taboos. In this context of Angels of America, the greatest example we could potentially investigate is the character Joe – a Christian who sets the example for what it’s like to be a “good man”. When others look at Joe, they see a true Christian who had been working diligently and doing all the “right” things he possibly could to where he is now. However, it is obvious that in the play, Joe is one of the unhappiest characters in the story due to his obedience to the idealistic nature of Christianity, which caused him to be missing a huge part of his life. To be specific, his struggle is shown in this line: “Does it make any difference?…., with everything I have, to kill it.” (Kushner, 40-41). “It” here implies Joe’s past and things that he aspired to, but according to the Christian doctrine, Joe’s “it” is wrong, and Kushner’s word use heavily suggests that Joe was and still is battling the wrongs in him. At this point it comes to the question for us: is homosexuality wrong? The answer, for people with common sense, is no; however, in the context of Joe, homosexuality is wrong even when it is hinted that he himself is also a homosexual, and this is only wrong due solely to the fact that the idealistic nature of religion dictated so.

Angels in America is a play that demonstrates the struggle in asking for help when one’s voice is hardly recognized. It’s fitting for a play centered around struggle to begin with a funeral, but the funeral differs from what follows in the rest of the play: it’s final. There’s a sense of completeness to the struggle of Sarah Ironson. Even though her journey lives on in her descendants, they “can never make the crossing that she made, for such Great Voyages in this world do not any more exist,” according to Rabbi Chemelwitz. What she has lived and died for is, largely, secure.

The same can not be said for the main characters in this play. The AIDS crisis in the ’80s presented an open-ended threat to the gay community pushed on by forces of negligence and ignorance. When these characters experience loss over the course of the play–whether a life or a relationship–there’s almost always a notion of social forces at play. Looking at Joe, he struggles deeply with the conflict between his sexuality and the influences of people most important in his life. When he drunkenly confesses his sexuality to his mother, she immediately rejects him and his words as “ridiculous,” asking him to return to his wife. When Joe later confesses the same to Roy, seeking an acceptance beyond a paternal blessing–an acceptance of his authentic self–Roy responds angrily and also orders Joe to reunite with his wife.

Neither Joe’s mother nor the closest person he had to a father were willing to recognize him for who he was. Similarly, the AIDS crisis was able to occur because people willingly failed to recognize a growing problem: a problem that only became recognizable once it began affecting straight men and women. Perhaps this is exactly what Roy recognized when he said “Homosexuals are men… who have zero clout.”

Belize’s decision to help Roy Cohn in the hospital with the double blind mirrors the community unification and division occurring in the real world during the AIDS crisis. During their encounter in Roy’s hospital room, Belize and Roy trade barbs back and forth, from race to competence. However, despite his stated hate for the man, Belize chooses to assist Roy to the best of his capabilities. Of course, his position as Roy’s nurse gives Belize power over Roy. Instead of leaving Roy to die like a number of his friends have, Belize advises Roy to “watch out for the double blind” and to avoid radiation therapy (155). When Roy questions Belize’s decision to help him, Belize tells him that it is “solidarity”, from “one faggot to another” (155).  During the AIDS crisis, the queer community pulled together to support each other when the powers at be left them behind. Lesbian women reached out to gay men, providing them with services like haircuts when no one would touch them for fear of transmission. In telling Roy about which treatments to avoid and what to watch for, Belize plays a similar role by reaching out and providing support. Yet, Belize and Roy also represent the larger divisions in the community as a whole, especially considering access to AZT and other life-saving treatments. As a rich white man in a position of power, Roy is able to demand access to AZT in large quantities and actually receive it, while Belize and his friends are left to fend for themselves. Belize and Roy are foils of each other, representing the communities affected by AIDS and the opposing actions taken by society in support or against them.

In the play “Angels in America” by Tony Kushner, the characters of Louis Ironson and Joe Pitt are parallels to each other. These two characters share a common trait of at their cores being guilty cowards. This parallel between the two of them is shown in Act I Scene 4 in the way they both react poorly to their respective partners, Harper and Prior when they come to them with worries and bad news. In this scene, Prior tells Louis about his AIDS diagnosis, and rather than being comforting Louis keeps telling Prior to “stop” (Kushner 21) and repeatedly saying “fuck you” (Kushner 21) when Prior continues. The moment between Joe and Harper in the next scene mirrors this interaction. Joe is trying to convince Harper they should move to Washington DC for his job, and when Harper expresses her reservations about moving he is continually dismissive of her worries, asking her “how many pills” (Kushner 24) she took that day rather than try to understand and listen to her anxieties. The parallel between Joe and Louis becomes even more obvious in Act I Scene 8, a “split scene: Prior and Louis in their bed. Louis reading, Prior cuddled next to him. Harper in Brooklyn, alone. Joe enters.” (Kushner 36). The scene starts with Harper continuously asking Joe, “where were you?” and alluding to asking him about his sexuality and he responds by once again asking “how many pills?” (Kushner 36), doing everything in his power to change the subject and avoid Harper’s questions. The interaction ends with Joe suggesting to Harper that they “Ask God for help. Ask him together” (Kushner 40) rather than honestly answer her questions. On the other side of the split scene, Prior tries to tell Louis about his worsening condition but Louis just gets upset by the information prompting Prior to say how he always “winds up comforting” (Kushner 39) Louis whenever he tries to tell him about his symptoms. As the exchange continues, Louis eventually asks Prior if he “walked out on this? Would you hate (him) forever?” (Kushner 40) to which Prior responds, “yes” (Kushner 40). These mirroring interactions show Louis and Joe’s shared reluctance to be honest with and genuinely comfort their partners. Overall it is very clear that Kushner is trying to set up these two characters as parallels to each other in the very first few scenes.