2015, Vol.28, No.2

Journal of Modern English Drama 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 0.11

pISSN : 1226-3397
https://journal.kci.go.kr/medak

It could be argued that the 1960s was the most turbulent and important decade in the second half of the twentieth century in the United States because the decade has affected the American people and society very widely since then. Ed Bullins, an African-American playwright and the former Minister of Culture for the Black Panthers, dramatizes the failure and positive possibility of liberal movement in and after the 1960s of the United States in his play, The Taking of Miss Janie. In The Taking of Miss Janie, Bullins presents not only the characters that show the failure of the young liberal activists but also the characters that show the possibility of success in their lives after the sixties beyond their failed liberal attempts in the 1960s. Bullins accuses that the liberal activists failed in the sixties because of their lies, hypocrisies, exclusive attitudes and extremist beliefs while he tries to find the hope from other characters since they are honest, flexible to change and open to others. Overall, we have to say that the liberal movement had failed only in the 1960s, but its values and ideals have survived the sixties and eventually prevailed in the American society since then although there are still many problems in the American society.

Tracy Letts was awarded the Pulitzer, the Tony, and the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for August: Osage County in 2008. This play echoed significant American dramas and explored the myth of the American family. Letts describes some of the factors causing family dissolution by representing a traditional American middle class family model. He deals with social issues in the United States such as alcoholism, drug addiction, adultery, sexual misbehavior, separation, and conflict between family members. In August: Osage County, Letts enlarges the scope of his story with a large family consisting of a couple with their three children and the mother’s younger sister’s family. This play is composed of all kinds of characteristics of soap opera such as the secret of one’s birth, love affair, a sudden accident or death, incest, villainess, and obscene scenes. Adultery is one of the most commonly used themes in modern melodrama. Beverly’s love affair with his sister in law is the most direct and fundamental cause of the breakdown of the family. As a result the secret of Little Charles’ birth and incestuous affair are revealed. Further, Violet’s interest in Beverly’s property after his disappearance represents the greed of Violet. Tracy Letts presents the dissolution of traditional American middle-class family without any solution with his own creative method. He provides a valuable opportunity to the audience to think about the true meaning of family values and faith by reflecting the image of the lonely contemporary people that do not communicate with each other.

This article comparatively analyses the Australian film The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (Prisicilla, 1994) and the 2014 Korean production of the musical Priscilla, focusing on the politics of representation and the intersectionality of gender, sexuality, class, race, and nation, alongside marketability. The film Priscilla sought to mainstream gay-lifestyles and gained an international recognition of Australian cinema. Priscilla employs the common trope of a family reunion (gay fatherhood) and uses popular music to make the film accessible to broader audience by relieving the antipathy toward non-conforming gender subjects and queer people. However, it denigrates women and people of color in order to normalize white male queer subjects (gay drag queens and mtf transgender individuals). The film Priscilla foregrounds male bonding beyond sexual identity and positions queer’s place within Australian nationhood. White male queers are accepted as the new representatives of white Australia, which is predicated on misogyny and racism. The musical Priscilla cannot (and did not) materialize barren desert scenes on stage; it dilutes and minimizes the hostility and difficulty of the social atmosphere that queers face. As one primary purpose of the musical genre is entertaining the audience (often, through lavish spectacle), the musical Priscilla tends to gloss over queers’ social reality and to evacuate the queer content in the film. The consideration of global marketability directly affects the musical adaptation and decolors Australianness in the film, which leads to a heteronormative revision of the film.