Transitioning is hard, as anyone who has stood by a loved one in the process of living as their true gender (rather than the one on their birth certificate) can attest. But what if the person you love claims that their primary identity arises from the mists of mythology? How do you handle “Pass the salt, and by the way, I’m a dragon?”
That’s the conundrum at the heart of William Glick’s “Kin Folk,” now in a thoughtful, if somewhat tentative, world premiere at New Colony under Evan Linder’s direction. Glick’s play explores the world of “otherkin” — those who identify as something other (or more) than human.
Lucy (Annie Prichard) is the youngest of three sisters who are preparing to sell their late parents’ suburban home and use the proceeds to start new lives in Chicago. The show opens at a birthday party for Eleanor (Alexia Jasmene), who herself recently transitioned to living as a woman. Oldest sister Mary (Elise Spoerlein), a budding online Martha Stewart whose blog, “Nest” identifies her as “Mary-Beth,” tries her best to orchestrate the party.
So they’re all crafting new identities in some way. But Lucy is on edge. Uncomfortable in her skin.
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Or scales. You see, Lucy believes she is really meant to be a dragon named Kreeka. With the help of another otherkin, Arethin (Steve Love), she’s moving closer to coming out, despite the initial skepticism of Blubberwort (Andrew Hobgood), who runs an online forum for the kin folk. “This isn’t Dungeons and Dragons,” he tells her, fearful that she’s a slumming poseur.
Of course, when Lucy finally does come out, it’s not what she hoped for. Yes, her liberal Christian minister husband, Toby (Chris Fowler), tries to make a go of it, but he feels shoved aside. Even the sympathetic werewolf, Dusk (Stephanie Shrum) she meets online — a Montana otherkin who longs to see skyscrapers — can’t help Lucy fully integrate who she was with who she’s becoming.
Lucy’s journey to self-actualization comes with a heavy dose of self-absorption, which is one of the more salient and arresting aspects of this show. While she is asking for acceptance and patience from those around her, she’s awfully quick to ignore their own confusion and pain.
The first thing to credit Glick for is that none of this is presented as sniggering voyeurism. Yes, there are laughs, but they are not at the expense of the kin (whose beliefs are, if you really look at them, no odder than those guiding major religions). He’s mostly interested in how belief in being kin mirrors other transitions people make — from suburbs to city, from single life to marriage (and possibly back again), from adult children to adult orphans.
It’s that last item that gets short shrift in Glick’s sensitive treatment. We see the toll that Lucy’s increasing need to be Kreeka takes on her family. Even Eleanor, whom she assumed would be the most sympathetic, tells her that equating gender transition with living as kin is offensive, since men and women, unlike dragons, actually exist.
Mary’s obsession with growing her online brand and her resentment at Lucy’s refusal to sell the house they grew up in (thus denying them seed money for their own transitions to bigger and better nests) suggests power struggles that go beyond Lucy’s newfound identity.
Glick hints that Lucy’s need to be seen as a dragon comes from a deep primal/familial well. She’s the little sister who is both fussed over and overlooked. (Her refusal to eat cake at the birthday party mirrors a later scene where Mary feeds her soup). She’s a married woman whose well-meaning husband finds prayer his go-to for any problem and who resents her abandoning his faith. No wonder she wants to live as a more powerful being.
Glick’s play identifies three steps in the coming-out process: identification, explanation and expression. In a Brechtian nod, those words are projected on John Wilson’s cunning set, which blends the mundane and fantastical. (A large door at the rear of the set feels like a portal into Narnia.)
What we don’t see as of yet in “Kin Folk,” despite Prichard’s often-beguiling performance and strong work from the rest of the cast when exactly Lucy landed on “dragon” as her kin identity.
Identity is mutable, to be sure, but it also has history. Losing one’s parents and moving on without them disrupts identity in all kinds of ways, whether one is kin or not. That part of the family drama (or the family mythology, if you will) is lacking in Glick’s mix of fable and kitchen-sink realism. If he decides to add that in, all the kin connections in Lucy’s story — mythical and mundane alike — can take wing in this unusual but open-hearted show.
Kerry Reid is a freelance critic.
Twitter @chitribent
“Kin Folk” — 2.5 stars
When: Through Aug. 14
Where: The Den Theatre, 1333 N. Milwaukee Ave.
Running time: 85 minutes
Tickets: $20-$25 at www.thenewcolony.org
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