Hot 'N Throbbing
Hot 'N' Throbbing is a 1994 one-act play written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and Yale University professor Paula Vogel. The play is a confrontational statement on the intersection of pornography and domestic violence. It features adult language, mild violence, and full frontal male nudity.
Production history
The play had a workshop at the Circle Repertory Theatre, New York City, in October 1992.[1]
The play was developed with help from grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, a fellowship from the Bunting Institute, Radcliffe College, and residencies at the Rockefeller Foundation at Bellagio Center, Italy, and the Yaddo Colony, as well as a grant from the Fund for New American Plays.[2]
It was produced at the American Repertory Theater (Cambridge, Massachusetts), in April 1994, directed by Anne Bogart (The Boston Herald, April 18, 1994).[3][2] It was also produced at the Kitchen Theatre Company (Ithaca, NY), in fall 1996, and at the Perishable Theatre (Providence, RI), in April–May 11, 1997. (Providence Journal-Bulletin, April 17, 1997)[4] The play was produced by the Arena Stage, Washington, D.C., in September 1999, directed by Molly Smith, the artistic director of Arena.[5][6]
The play opened
Characters
- Charlene; a middle aged single mother who writes screenplays
- Calvin; Charlene's fourteen-year-old son. Calvin is a bookish voyeur.
- Leslie Ann; Charlene's sexually precocious daughter who dresses in clothing more suggestive than considered appropriate for a girl of fifteen.
- Clyde; Charlene's violent and alcoholic ex-husband
- The Voice-Over; an actress to stand in for Charlene's inner monologue and to enact her screenplay's contents onstage
- The Voice; an actor to stand in for the inner monologue of other characters, primarily Clyde.
Plot synopsis
The central action of Hot 'N' Throbbing revolves around the arrival of Clyde late on a Friday night, drunk and intending to proposition Charlene despite a
Themes
The play is a statement in the vein of thought which
Johnette Rodriguez, in her review in The Phoenix (Providence, RI), writes that "she [Vogel] ponders many questions about male/female relationships, about families and about American society, all related to an observation she makes in the introduction to the published version of the play: 'obscenity begins at home.' "[4]
Critical reception
In Jason Zinoman's
References
- ISBN 0822216698, p. 2
- ^ a b Taylor, Markland. Review: Resident ; 'Hot ‘N’ Throbbing’" Variety, May 2, 1994
- ^ "'Hot 'N' Throbbing' Listing, 1994" americanrepertorytheater.org, accessed September 21, 2015
- ^ a b Rodriguez, Johnette. "All sexed up|Perishable gets Hot 'n' bothered" Archived 2007-10-23 at the Wayback Machine The Phoenix, April 24 - May 1, 1997
- ^ Jones, Kenneth. "DC's Arena Season to be Hot `n' Throbbing `n' Start Sept. 3" Playbill, September 3, 1999
- ^ Davidson, Susan. "A CurtainUp DC Review. 'Hot 'N' Throbbing'" curtainup.com, September 9, 1999
- ^ a b Zinoman, Jason. "Pornography, to Prop Up Family Values" New York Times, March 29, 2005