ArtNow blog post
By Timothy E. Locklear
September 7, 2016
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Timothy E. Locklear is the director of “Mothers and Sons,” which opens September 23 at Raleigh Little Theatre.
I first started volunteering with Raleigh Little Theatre in 2008 after a long absence in the theater community. I was fortunate to find a welcoming family and supportive team at RLT, and, since my introduction, I have been on stage and worked behind the scenes in several positions.
One of my goals since making RLT my theater home was to one day direct a production. I knew it had to be a very special show, one that spoke to me on a very deep level. A show where I could show my dedication and love for directing.
“Mothers and Sons” is this show.
In 2014 I was in New York City to marry the man with whom I have shared 18 years of my life. Two days before our wedding we attended a production “Mothers and Sons” and the 90 minute play seeped into my soul and I knew I had to tell this story.
“Mothers and Sons” is a story about humans — in all walks of life — being able to deal with the past, continue to live in the present and be hopeful for the future. It is more than a play for gay audiences, rather a play which happens to have gay characters. This play puts a mirror up to the audience and asks, How do you deal with what life has dealt you?”
[Related: Watch this preview of “Mothers and Sons”]
For weeks after seeing the production, I kept thinking back to 1983 and 1984, my junior and senior years in high school. It was the beginning of a time when folks were fearful and scared. People were getting a deadly disease for which there was no cure. We were young and living in a time when people were afraid to hold hands, kiss each other or sit on a public toilet. The medical community had no answers. From ’81 to ’96, contracting HIV was a death sentence. People were in a panic, ignorant and uninformed. The government wasn’t helping and thousands of people were dying. Gay people were rallying to find medications, along with marching and protesting trying to get the government to help with funding for research to find a cure. An entire generation of people were lost. Gone.
With my thoughts turning to the LGBT youth of today, I realized those who were in their 20s and early 30s had not even been born yet. How could they have realized the sacrifices made by those who came before them? Were the LGBT youth who were born during those years educated about this epidemic? I think the plays written in the ’90s about the AIDS crisis are just as important and relevant today. There is a history that must be preserved so those lives lost were not lost in vain.
While it is an honor to direct the first production of this play in North Carolina, it is more important to tell the story which hits at the heart of our society today. To somehow bring to our audience this story about normal people who have had extraordinary circumstances in their lives. For Raleigh Little Theatre to produce such a significant piece of theater in North Carolina is beyond brave; it is to be applauded.
Today I feel like we have moved forward, albeit in small steps, but we have moved down the road. Same-sex couples can be legally married. Medication is now available for people contracting HIV and it is no longer a death sentence. However, we still have roads to travel and mountains to climb to somehow achieve that basic civil right: that everyone is created equal.
This story could happen in Anyplace, USA, not just the Upper West Side of Central Park in New York City. It could happen to you and your family. And if it does, what choice will you make?
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