Bent. Minotaur Student Theatre Company 1981

I'd seen Ian McKellan play "Max" in this Martin Sherman play in 1979. In my second year at university I persuaded the theatre company I had started to stage "Bent". It was a little sneaky as I hadn't come out yet. I remember that the women in the company were displeased because there were no female characters- the drag queen didn't count! The women decided to rehearse "Slag" in retaliation so we almost had a programme of "Bent" and "Slag", but I don't think "Slag" made it to the stage.

I was watching a biography programme about Ian McKellan recently where he mentioned "Bent" and had the same issue with the end of the play as I had done- applause. Of course, applause is the traditional way for western audiences to show their appreciation of a performance, but the final moment of the play was when the main character "Max" kills himself by deliberately falling onto an electric fence in the concentration camp where he had been forced to carry rocks.

The solution began with our resident technician: John Landymore he was called. He said he had a track which would work fo the show, by Charles Aznivore. We quietly scoffed... One day he insisted we listened to a recording and I was shocked by how appropriate it was, it was called "What Makes a Man a Man?"...

This is what we did:

The actor playing "Max" (Michael Reece) approached the fence where two small flashbombs were concealed. 

As he touched the flashbombs the following things happened simultaneously

- The track was cued

- A third flashbomb ignited below the actor,

- Lights changed so that the actor was uplit in silhouette

- two doors opened upstage.

As "Max" remained 'frozen in death', and the music played, other members of the cast came forward into the light briefly and retired. At the and of the song there was a slow fade to black and when the lights came back, the stage was empty. On each except the last night, there was a stunned silence from the audience. On the last night, we sold out and over-filled the studio theatre. As the house lights came up at the end, someone sobbed loudly and the audience spontaneously ERUPTED! It was an amazing experience. Cast had to come back for an unrehearsed curtain call and it was and remains my favourite ever moment of making theatre. We even got into the Eastern Daily Press: "So sensitive Minotaur" was the headline.

Happy days!

NB: pic is of current logo... I think the original was better (well I would, wouldn't I?), but I can't find a digital copy at mo.