‘Hir’ unveils a singular family in transition
When the right one comes along, it’s hard to say no. So when the rights to Taylor Mac’s “Hir” came Patrick Jordan’s way — very late in the game to mount a spring production — he gulped and said, “Yes.”
If you haven’t heard of Mr. Mac, well, the play coming to barebones productions isn’t what the avowed nonconformist is best known for. His 24-hour performance in “A 24-Decade History of Popular Music” was a 2017 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for drama. He has written other plays but mostly performs solo and in drag. He uses “judy” as a gender pronoun.
“Hir” isn’t quite what you would expect from barebones, either.
Mr. Jordan’s press release describes the dark comedy as, “The classic dysfunctional family drama has just crashed through into a wholly original place.”
In “Hir,” the family includes Paige (Helena Ruoti), a wife and mother liberated from an oppressive and abusive marriage; Arnold (Doug Rees), who has been mostly silenced by a stroke; Max (Liam Ezra Dickinson), a teenager in the midst of gender transition; and Isaac (Tad Cooley), Max’s PTSD-addled older brother, “who discovers a brand new war zone when he comes home from Afghanistan.”
The New York Times’ Charles Isherwood called the play “sensational — in all senses of the word … audacious and uproarious black comedy, a daring combination of realism and madcap absurdity.”
As Isaac, Mr. Dickinson “brings a true and raw authenticity” to playing Max, who is transitioning from Maxine. Mr.
Dickinson, a Point Park University acting major, has transitioned from female to male, and his shared knowledge “has been like having Google right there” for director Jordan and the cast.
Mr. Dickinson is active on social media, chronicling his transition and opportunities as a transgender actor. Previous acting credits include “The Censor” for Pittsburgh’s Throughline Theatre.
The title of the play comes from a combination of “his” and “her,” or “hir.”
Ms. Ruoti, in the raucous, matriarchal role of Paige, returns to barebones for the first time since “Frozen” (no, not the musical “Frozen”) in 2005. She co-stars with veteran Pittsburgh actor Rees — both have been Post-Gazette Performers of the Year — and Mr. Cooley (City Theatre’s “Tribes”) as Isaac, who has left the chaos of war for the loony happenings of home.
Casting and finding dates happened very quickly for “Hir.” After the three-week run, May 11-26, the play loses Mr. Rees to another regional production.
In one way, Mr. Jordan points out, “Hir” is a back-tobasics play for his company, which most recently had a double-digit cast for the action-packed “Rules of Seconds.” A four-hander is more in line with “barebones,” he said.
It also has in common something Mr. Jordan often says about choosing a work — he reads it and leaves it, then can’t get it out of his mind.
“This one stuck with me and something just hit me — I knew I wanted to do this play,” he said. “Taylor Mac, I think he said that this is not his take on a Sam Shepard play, but his version of a Sam Shepard play. It takes that whole familial vibe that attracts me and flips it on its axis. It’s full of surprises and loaded with awkward humor, but then has really touching moments, too.”