Gianni as Gianni; Ghee as Lola.
As the actors at New Haven’s latest Broadway touring show left the stage, two stories of self-discovery emerged on a deep red splash of carpet inside the Shubert Theater’s capacious auditorium.
One, a tale of sexual identity and revelation from a senior at Co-Op High School, came quickly, words spinning it into being before an audience.
The other, an unfolding narrative of clandestine drag performances and a father’s hesitant acceptance, revealed itself slowly in short, polite sentences and laughter-tinged personal anecdote from an actor who had just left the stage.
The two were brought together by a pair of glittering fire-hot kinky boots, and their suggestion that the best long-term life plan may be to “just be” exactly who you are.
The Co-Op student is Gianni Elcuri, a senior who is making the transition from female to male as he prepares for college in San Francisco.
The performer is J. Harrison Ghee, who plays drag queen and extraordinary boot designer Lola on the tour of Kinky Boots, running at New Haven’s Shubert theater through this Sunday.
Thursday afternoon, the two told their stories at a special post-performance talkback between the musical’s cast and Co-Op High School’s Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) as part of the Shubert’s Art in Action project. Some 100 students and adults, including a large group from Roberto Clemente school, were also in attendance.
Kinky Boots starts and ends with lots of shoes, just not the same ones. Handed the Herculean task of saving his father’s shoe factory from bankruptcy, Charlie Price must find a new niche market to appeal to, or fire a slew of employees who have no other option in working class England. He’s in luck: an unexpected run-in with drag goddess Lola and evening in her London club end in the discovery that no one is making sustainable heeled boots for drag performers, sparking the start of an unlikely but endearing business partnership. In the key changing, song making, dance heavy way that fits Broadway like a riding boot to perfect skinny jeans, the two outgrow their daddy issues and mistaken first impressions to take on England, and then Europe, learning gradually that “you can change the world when you change your mind.” There might be pitfalls and skirmishes along the way, but this is musical theater. The guy will get the right girl, the factory will survive, the most base and ignoble among the workers will learn that the key to respecting oneself is respecting others, Charlie and Lola will make up, and everyone will legitimately learn to live happily ever after in the land of drag lite.
He Googled “Transgender”
Lucy Gellman Photo
That alone makes Kinky Boots a feel-good play. Its message of self-acceptance runs deeper for Elcuri, whose journey to transitioning began when his Co-Op creative writing teacher, Mindi Englart, told the class a story of a transgender girl who wasn’t allowed to use the girls’ bathroom. At the time, Gianni was identifying as a lesbian, and going by his then-given name, Gianna. It wasn’t quite right for him, though.
“I felt like something was missing,” he said.
That was, until hearing Englart’s story. Thinking about it later that night, he googled “transgender.” When a video of a young girl named Ryland Whittington insisting that she was a boy popped up, he felt like things were falling very suddenly into place.
“While they [Ryland’s parents] were describing what the son went through, I felt like: ‘Wow. That’s me,’” he said. “The community’s been extremely accepting. My school has been wonderful.”
That didn’t mean transitioning wasn’t without challenges. Until his 18th birthday just three days ago, Gianni’s name was still legally Gianna. There were social stereotypes and pressures to fit in in the community.
Inspired by what he’d learned from Englart, he wrote a poem in April, chronicling what he — and others in his situation — felt they were up against. Here’s an excerpt:
They tell me to sit like a lady
But I’d rather be stuck with Hades
Because lately
My memory’s been a bit
Hazy
And I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t crazy
But maybe
If people were tolerant daily
I could frolic gaily.
Instead
You kill your own
Because they want to wear
Perfume instead of cologne.
Ghee Knew Lola
Kinky Boots Photo
The cast, with Ghee as Lola and Adam Kaplan as Charlie at center.
Those sentiments resonated with North Carolina born-and-raised Ghee. Ghee explained to students Thursday that playing Lola, who struggles with a father who has shunned her, “hit close to home” for him, and not just because he’d been doing drag for six years before getting the part in Kinky Boots.
“My father is a pastor, and he didn’t know I was doing drag until I got this show,” he said. “We had to sit down before he saw it and I expressed to him that I’d been doing drag for years. It’s a part of my creative culture and it’s a part of me. I had to break any preconceived notions he had of drag. He’s seen the show twice. He loves it and is proud of me, and takes every opportunity to tell me that I am his son now. But it’s been a journey of acceptance and understanding.”
For Gianni and other students in the GSA, just knowing that journey can take place is a fundamentally good thing. During the talkback, the completion of a three-part, year-long program that has included student-taught workshops at Connecticut’s True Colors Conference, a Co-Op GSA summit, and collaboration with The Whitney Center, students took control of the room, asking questions that ranged from how to get into performance to the number of cast members who were gay and out.
And cast members didn’t hold back.
Brett.
“I think one of the best parts of this show is it introduces drag to not only people who have known some drag queens, or transvestites, or transgender people, but also people who have never even heard of it and don’t know how to approach that subject,” said ensemble member Damien Brett.
“I think what the writers did with the show is they made such a fun plot, they made such a great show to look at, that it doesn’t overwhelm you if it’s something completely new to you. It’s something that you can watch and have fun and feel good about — wherever you are on that spectrum of understanding. But it also opens the door … we’re talking to people of all different levels, of all different lifestyles and backgrounds, and making it accessible.”
“The students really relate to the story,” said Kelly Wuzzardo, director of education and outreach at the Shubert. “It’s accessible. The crowd today was very diverse — you had a lot of kids, you had a lot of older people — but they all enjoyed it, they all had a great time, they all thought it was fun. They loved it … you saw how much they loved it. They had great questions — art breaks down those barriers.”
For an episode of WNHH’s “Dateline New Haven” on this collaboration, click on or download the audio above, or subscribe to “Dateline New Haven” on Soundcloud or iTunes.
Thank you to Lucy Gellman for this excellent piece. Her sensitivity and skill show in her writing.
All teenagers grow and change during high school and Gianni has experienced an added layer of transformation that has inspired so many of us at Co-op. I want to make mention of the fact that though Gianni is transgender, he is also a normal young man who is so much more than this particular aspect of his life. He is a stellar graphic designer with a lovely portfolio of work, a powerful writer and scholar with awards and publication credits to his name. He is a committed and loving family member and good friend to many. He has been accepted to, and will attend, his first choice college. He has handled his struggles and hardships with an extraordinary level of honesty, bravery, and grace. In short, while Gianni is an extraordinary young man, he is also an ordinary young man and I don't want people to miss the fact that while one aspect of a person may make a compelling story, we are all so much more than what stands out about us at first (as Kinky Boots reminds us). Congratulations to Gianni and all the Co-op artists who are about to graduate and get out there into the "real world." You make us all so proud.