Sex, Lies, and Hollywood Dreams Collide in Craig Lucas’s Disturbing Shocker, ‘THE DYING GAUL,’ Now Playing at Island City Stage

By Mindy Leaf for South Florida Theatre Magazine

Compromise your principles for the almighty dollar. Would you do it? How far would you go? What about the repercussions? … For yourself? Your family? Society at large? Nowadays, it feels like we’re confronted with this question daily – especially when it comes to actions taken by our government and industry leaders. Twenty-seven years ago, award-winning playwright and screenwriter/director Craig Lucas (best known for his 1991 Pulitzer-nominated “Prelude to a Kiss”) proposed this quandary, and a whole lot more, in THE DYING GAUL: a groundbreaking psychological thriller set in the high-stakes world of traditional Hollywood and nascent online chat rooms. 

Hailed in 1998 as the year’s Best American Play by both the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, you can now catch Island City Stage’s lacerating South Florida premiere of “The Dying Gaul” through June 15. The play’s title references a famous, ancient Roman statue that depicts a wounded warrior in his final throes of life. It’s a powerful visual tied to the play’s central theme of dealing with the painful death of a loved one, survivor guilt, and difficulties with moving on. As Island City’s artistic director Andy Rogow explains, Lucas’s script, set in 1995, “examines the complex professional and sexual relationship between Robert, who wrote a screenplay about his boyfriend who died of AIDS, and Jeffrey, a movie studio executive, and his wife, Elaine. Jeffrey will only commission the script if the main character is changed to a woman and the plot focuses on heterosexual relationships.”

Read the entire review here Sex, Lies, and Hollywood Dreams Collide in Craig Lucas’s Disturbing Shocker, ‘THE DYING GAUL,’ Now Playing at Island City Stage - South Florida Theater