Sky Gilbert Looks at Trans Politics in New One Act Play A NICE DAY IN THE PARK

Toronto's Sky Gilbert continues, even at age 68, to be one of Canada's most controversial artistic forces. His play Drag Queens On Trial was almost banned by Otto Jelenik (then Canada's Revenue Minister) in 1989, and in 2018, his hit play Drag Queens in Outer Space was banned by the theatre he founded, Buddies in Bad Times.

Well, Sky Gilbert is back with a new one-act play that looks closely at his own feelings about his recent crisis with Buddies and trans politics. A Nice Day in the Park is anything but that; instead, it is a confrontation between a young trans man and an old gay man - both of whom work for an AIDS service organisation. There is something going on between them, but it might not be quite what you imagine. In A Nice Day in the Park, Gilbert examines the very essence of desire and explores how we are destined to define it in the future. February 28 and 29 at Chez BonBon.

Written and directed by Sky Gilbert, starring Harrison Browne, and Toronto veteran stage actor Peter Lynch.

Sky Gilbert is a poet, novelist, playwright, filmmaker, theatre director, and drag queen extraordinaire. He was co-founder and artistic director of Toronto's Buddies in Bad Times Theatre -- one of the world's largest gay and lesbian theatres -- from 1979 to 1997. He has had more than 40 plays produced and written 7 critically acclaimed novels and three award-winning poetry collections. He has received three Dora Mavor Moore Awards as well as the Pauline McGibbon Award, and The Silver Ticket Award. There is a street in Toronto named after him: 'Sky Gilbert Lane.' His latest novel Sad Old Faggot (ECW Press) was critically acclaimed. His play about the criminalization of AIDS - It's All Tru - will be published by Playwrights Canada Press in 2019, and his accessible yet well-documented analysis of the appeal of Shakespeare - Shakespeare: Beyond Science: When Poetry Was the World - will be published by Guernica in 2020. Dr. Gilbert is a professor of creative writing and theatre at the University of Guelph.

A Nice Day in the Park

Written and directed by Sky Gilbert
Starring Harrison Browne and Peter Lynch
February 28 and 29th at 8 PM
Chez Bonbon, 234 Queen Street East (just east of Sherbourne)
Tickets: $25 at the door or $20 by making a reservation at lunchontherunproductions@gmail.com
or https://anicedayinthepark.bpt.me

Photo Credit: Sean Leber