Presenting: The Pledge for Full LGBT Equality by 2014 The 50th Anniversary of the 1964 Civil Right's. IN ORDER TO FULFILL the promises of life and liberty, and to ensure equal protection of the law as guaranteed by the United States Constitution; TO PROTECT the inalienable human right to be safe from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity as required by international law and treaty; and TO END the systemic stigmatization, cease the societal rejection and heal the suffering of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans as mandated by conscience; WE, the undersigned, pledge our support for the passage of omnibus LGBT equality legislation that grants full non-discrimination protections on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity equal to those accorded other statuses under existing civil rights laws and Supreme Court jurisprudence, specifically including: 1.
Public Accommodations (Title II, 1964 Civil Rights Act)(e.g., restaurants, hotels, theaters) 2. The Madness of Lady Bright. The Madness of Lady Bright is a short play by Lanford Wilson , among the earliest of the gay theatre movement. [ 1 ] It was first performed at Joe Cino 's Caffe Cino in May 1964 and went on to tour internationally, appearing in revivals to the present day. It has been cited as the first Off-Off-Broadway production to receive mainstream critical attention, and earned its original lead actor, Neil Flanagan , an Obie award. The play, substantially a monologue delivered by its aging drag queen protagonist, has been characterized as among the first to portray gay characters in an unsensational way, and as one of the last of Wilson's oeuvre to make substantial use of experimental devices before his adoption of a more realist approach. Background [ edit ] The Madness of Lady Bright is among Wilson's earliest produced plays, following Home Free!
, and So Long At The Fair . [S]eeing this silly black girl flip out in her room was the most uninteresting idea. Themes [ edit ] Production [ edit ] 1964: The Birth of Gay Theater | The Gay & Lesbian Review. IF “GAY THEATER” is defined as being by, for, and about uncloseted gay people, then 2014 arguably marks the 50th anniversary of the genre’s existence. In 1964, despite a social climate of homophobia that pervaded American life for the second third of the 20th century, two one-act plays presented Off-Off-Broadway at the Caffe Cino revolutionized how gay characters could be represented theatrically. The plays were Lanford Wilson’s “The Madness of Lady Bright” and Robert Patrick’s “The Haunted Host.” Premiering four years before Mart Crowley’s Boys in the Band opened Off-Broadway, Wilson’s one-act was the longest running play ever to appear at the Caffe Cino, where it was performed over two hundred times to consistently packed houses.
These plays marked a major cultural turning point, considering the outright censorship that gay playwrights faced in the preceding decades. Tom Bigornia, Neil Flanagan, and Lucy Silvay in“The Madness of Lady Bright.”Photo by Conrad Ward from the 1964 revival. Randy Wicker. Randolfe Hayden "Randy" Wicker (b. Charles Gervin Hayden, Jr. 3 February 1938) is an American author, activist and blogger. After involvement in the early homophile and gay liberation movements, Wicker became active around the issue of human cloning. Early life and LGBT activism[edit] Wicker was born Charles Gervin Hayden, Jr. in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1938.[1] He was raised in Florida by his grandparents.[2] His first exposure to the homophile movement came while he was a student at the University of Texas at Austin in the mid-1950s, when he discovered a copy of the ONE, Inc. magazine One.[3] Wicker affiliated himself with the New York City chapter of the homophile Mattachine Society (MSNY) in 1958, while still a UTA student, spending the summer in the city to work with the organization.
As he became more active in the movement, Wicker apprised his family of his activities. Cloning activist[edit] Every person's DNA is his or her personal property. [edit] Notes[edit] References[edit] List of LGBT actions in the United States prior to the Stonewall riots. Homophile picket at the White House, 1965 Although the June 28, 1969, Stonewall riots are generally considered the starting point of the modern gay liberation movement,[1][2] a number of demonstrations and actions took place before that date. These actions, often organized by local homophile organizations but sometimes spontaneous, addressed concerns ranging from anti-gay discrimination in employment and public accommodations to the exclusion of homosexuals from the United States military to police harassment to the treatment of homosexuals in revolutionary Cuba.
The early actions have been credited with preparing the LGBT community for Stonewall and contributing to the riots' symbolic power.[3] Actions[edit] See also[edit] Notes[edit] References[edit] Allyn, David (2000). External links[edit]