Susan and I went to the Padsadena Playhouse to see Casa Valentina. In 'Casa Valentina,' cross-dressing men show their feminine side.
Kate Bergh's costumes play an especially prominent role. "Casa Valentina" explores a community of cross-dressers at a bungalow colony
in the Catskills in 1962 that has been set up to provide a haven for those men dying to slip into something a little more flouncy and frilly.
These fellows aren't drag queens or transsexuals. Most are married heterosexuals who occupy respectable positions in mainstream society, but each feels a compulsion to set free the woman lurking inside of him.
The goal when sitting around this eccentric hideaway isn't to stand out. "The more you look as if you just stepped away from a bridge table, the higher we grade you," Bessie (Raymond McAnally), a wisecracking regular at the resort, tells nervous newcomer Jonathon (James Snyder).
"Passing undetected is our zenith."
There's no greater compliment I can pay these actors than to say that the clothes each of them puts on reveal both the man and the woman precariously coexisting in a world that imposes harsh penalties for gender freedom and fluidity.
(Excerts from an LA Times review)
Our dresses
At the Pasadena Playhouse
