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Amos Lassen wrote on 07/05/2011:

When “The Boys in the Band” opened on the New York stage, tongues wagged and controversies began. Now over 40 years later there still is a touch of the controversy left along with the legacy of the first all gay play (and later movie) that was put out there for the world to see. Crayton Robey looks at the play and what came about as a result of it in his new documentary, “Making the Boys”. The play both split and united the gay community and still today is talked about. The author, Mart Crowley, takes us down memory lane with the drama that he wrote and what he went thorough for it to see the light of day.



“Making the Boys” looks at what went on with the play and Robey looks at the complicated way that gays were represented in it. However, it is important to remember that the gay community that it presented was that of the 1960’s and because of that it appears outdated today. Back then, and I remember it well, we were very different and while some were happy, there were many self-hating gays. This is what bothered the gay liberation movement at that time and many wanted to know if those who did not like themselves had the right to fight for freedom. By the time the movie appeared, it was well after Stonewall and the real beginning of our movement.

Playwright Mart Crowley looks back at his drama as do others who were involved with the stage production and they reflect on the history and legacy of it. For some of the actors in it, the play marked the end of their careers because of the roles they played and several lost their lives to AIDS during the heyday of the epidemic. Now some time later, the play is seen as an important step in gay history rather than a play that ended an older way of life.

For me, this is a real treat. Even though I was living in Israel when the play gained notoriety, we felt it there too. Some of us were lucky enough to get American magazines and newspapers so we had an idea what was happening. Now we get to see the different ways people thought about it and that is this documentary’s major plus. We see that not everyone agreed about the impact the play had on the gay community back then and we are privy to that here. Detractors dismissed it because they felt that it “perpetuated the stereotype of the self-loathing male homosexual” yet everyone agrees that because of it, people became aware of us by the “frank description(s)” of gay men. Some called it a breakthrough while others said it was an anachronism of pre-Stonewall. However you may feel, this is a fascinating look at it. Robey interviews Edward Albee, Tony Kushner, Terrence McNalley, Larry Kramer, Michael Cunningham, Dan Savage, Paul Rudnick and Dominic Dunne and their attitudes toward the play and we see that regardless of how they feel about the literary merits, they agree that it was a step forward for the gay community. Albee feels that it set us back because it was a confirmation of the way society felt about us but then there are amazing similarities in his masterpiece “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf”.

The play ran for five years and was performed all over the world. The film was released in 1970 to great success but only two of those who appeared in it are still alive today. The film came out after Stonewall and so it was already considered outdated when the world got to see it.

You will have to decide for yourself how you feel but we are very lucky that Robey brings us this film because with it he gives us an important landmark in our history.