Bathhouse Play Slap & Tickle

Bathhouse Play Slap & Tickle
Bathhouse Play Slap & Tickle

Bathhouse play. As mentioned in an earlier post (Bathhouse Play Coming to Provincetown), the bathhouse play Slap & Tickle is playing at Provincetown Theater July 6 through August 14 Tuesdays through Saturdays at 8:00pm.

The play, according to press notes, is a “sexy and powerful new play about how drugs, politics, HIV and the Internet have dramatically changed the sexual and emotional landscape for gay men in America over the past 25 years. Heightening the theatrical nature of the play, Slap&Tickle employs six actors to portray a total of 20 recurring characters whose lives all intersect in surprising, humorous and revealing ways.”

Past reviews have been excellent. With the Cape Cod Times writing “Revealing, sympathetic and haunting…” While the Weekly Planet says “Theater doesn’t get much more candid than this” And finally Christopher Byrne of the Gay City News says “This is something to welcome”

Though Rick Reed of the Windy City Times writes

Slap and Tickle is supposed to be a comedy, but most of the jokes fell flat, as evidenced by the silence after some of the ‘jokes.’ Perhaps the show would have been funnier if it worked harder to unearth humor that was fresher and more original instead of relying on tired gayspeak such as calling each other by feminine names, having one character wear pearls, having another provide us with a lexicon of terms most gay men are more than familiar with (who needs a cock ring defined?). Although I saw the final preview before opening, it also seemed some of the actors had a long way to go before they had their lines down pat.

Parr needs to sharpen his focus, provide some dramatic tension, have the confidence to let his characters define themselves, and look for more originality before he has a play he can truly be ‘proud’ of.

But get a look at some of this nice eye candy below!

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