OPINION: Don’t get cross about cross-acting

Last weekend, my parents made the trek from Wisconsin to spend time with me. We stayed in Des Moines, visiting attractions that were even new to me, including Pappajohn Sculpture Park, the State Historical Museum of Iowa and Salisbury House and Gardens. On Saturday, we also attended one of the last performances of “Men on Boats” at the Des Moines Playhouse.

Though the rest of my family may not be as passionate as me about it, my family has attended theater productions pretty consistently through my life. While I’ve been blessed to attend many traveling off-Broadway productions, I’ve gone to my fair share of local and student shows as well.

The Des Moines Playhouse has a good mix of local and children’s performances throughout each season. The theater space is small and intimate, meaning the actors don’t need microphones and you can easily see the whole performance.

“Men on Boats” is a historical comedy following a team of explorers on the Colorado River as they explore the American frontier. Set in 1869, the cast contains a motley crew, including “a maniacally talkative youth, an old Civil War vet who doesn’t like people, an overexcited Brit and a hunter who wears only beaver skins, to name just a few.” The play is based on the true story of John Wesley Powell leading an expedition west.

The play was performed in the playhouse’s black-box theater rather than a stage. While black-box theater spaces can vary depending on the performance, this configuration had scenery on one side of the room with a square in the center in which the performance took place. Patrons were seated on the other three sides of the square on risers.

While I had certainly heard of this type of performance space, this was the first time I actually experienced a show in such. I enjoyed it, particularly because it was so easy to see everything on the makeshift stage.

The theater setting wasn’t the only new things for me, or my parents. This particular production of “Men on Boats” was made up entirely of women or genderfluid actors, something one might not expect when every character is a man.

No, the playhouse was not pretending that a team of women went out to explore the American frontier in 1869. These women were still playing male characters. I think they did a fantastic job. Both my parents enjoyed it, despite saying it took a little bit to get used to. We didn’t go into the play knowing this would be the case, but I thought it was an excellent choice.

I can already here the complaining: They took the roles from men, you shouldn’t have a woman pretending to be a man; this was done just to make a political point.

To the first point, did you know that only 37% of roles cast on Broadway are for female characters? Considering the U.S. population is 50.47% female according to the U.S. Census Bureau, I think men have more than enough parts. And while they weren’t actors, there were still plenty of men involved in the production behind the scenes.

The age-old topic of cross-casting, or having a person play a different gender in a theatrical role, should be a non-issue. During the day of William Shakespeare, every single role was played by a man. Women were not allowed on the stage, so every female character was a crossdressing man. No one ever has any problems with that.

Some characters in popular theater have become synonymous with cross-casting, including Edna Turnblad in Hairspray and Miss Trunchbull in Matilda. Notice how every example given so far is a man in a women’s role in theater? While many drag queens have become a huge topic of conversation, when it comes to everyday theater, people don’t seem to care.

Finally, everyone’s favorite topic: politics. Unfortunately, any time a woman or a queer person is present, the topic comes to politics. These people are somehow unable to simply exist without someone else making their life a chess piece in someone else’s board.

Maybe this was a political decision, having people who go through daily struggles of simply living as themselves portraying those struggles on stage in a different setting. Maybe these were simply the actors best suited for the roles. Does it matter?

When we went into the play Saturday night, we didn’t know what to expect, either from the plot or the actors. We left happy with our experience. While there were likely plenty of people in the theater who went in without open minds due to the casting, every person I saw leaving the performance had a smile on their face.