THE BENT: 2023 - 2024 SEASON PASSES

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GROSS INDECENCY, based entirely on facts, is a blueprint for the price Oscar Wilde paid for his status as a gay icon. In 1895 the Marquess of Queensberry, the father of Oscar Wilde’s young lover, left a card at Wilde’s club referring to Wilde as a “Posing Sodomite.” Wilde sued for criminal libel which set off an avalanche of ruin for Wilde in all aspects of his life. Queensbury was acquitted and Wilde was put on trial for “gross indecency with male persons.” With characters that range from Wilde, his lover Lord Douglas, Queensbury, Queen Victoria and London rent boys, Wilde’s story is told through courts transcripts, newspapers and other first person accounts. Playwright Moises Kaufman is also the writer of THE LARAMIE PROJECT, a beautiful play about the reaction to the M**der of Matthew Shepard.

The Washington Post calls GROSS INDECENCY…

“A triumph…truth, purity, and simplicity suffuse this thoroughly engrossing new play…sweeps away cobwebs and distortions, allowing complex, credible human beings to emerge from history.”

DATES

Friday, Oct. 13 - 7pm

Saturday, Oct 14 - 7pm

Sunday, Oct 15 - 2pm

Thursday, Oct. 19 - 7pm

Friday, Oct. 20 - 7pm

Saturday, Oct 21 - 7pm

Sunday, Oct 22 - 2pm

Thursday, Oct 26 - 7pm

Friday, Oct 27 - 7pm

Saturday, Oct 28 - 7pm

BLUEFISH is considered a landmark play in its portrayal of lesbian characters as happy, sexy, healthy, successful and richly crafted women. Broadway World says “We know these woman… we ARE these women.”

The story features a close knit group of 7 friends on their annual vacation at the beach, but this year a straight woman, who has left her husband,

unwittingly wanders into their midst. Jane Chamber’s comedic dialogue, sensitivity to human nature and tender treatment of her characters transcends previous preconceptions and shows the universality of these women’s journey.

DATES

Wednesday, Nov. 1 - 7pm

Thursday, Nov. 2 - 7pm

Friday, Nov 3 - 7pm

Saturday, Nov 4 - 2pm

Saturday, Nov 4 - 7pm

IT’S ONLY A PLAY is a deliciously hilarious comedy by iconic gay playwright Terrence McNally. A wealthy, naive, first-time Broadway producer, Julia Budder, is throwing an amazingly star-studded party in her luxurious Manhattan home, but the sounds of the party can only be heard because the play takes place entirely in Julia’s bedroom, where an eccentric cluster of hysterical characters huddle for various reasons and grievances while waiting for the opening night reviews to come in. There’s a pill-popping leading lady, a TV actor that turned down a role in the play and is secretly hoping it gets panned, a very anxious playwright, a critic who wished he was a playwright and a director who is begging for someone to be brave enough to finally tell him that his pretentious concepts are full of crap.

Playwright Terrence McNally is arguably our greatest gay playwright with classics like LOVE! VALOUR! COMPASSION!, CORPUS CRISTI, THE LISBON TRAVIATA and many more. He’s also written the book for musicals such as KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN, THE FULL MONTY and RAGTIME.

DATES

Friday, Nov. 24 - 7pm

Saturday, Nov. 25 - 7pm

Sunday, Nov. 26 - 2pm

Thursday, Nov. 30 - 7pm

Friday, Dec. 1 - 7pm

Saturday, Dec. 2 - 7pm

Sunday, Dec. 3 - 2pm

Thursday, Dec. 7 - 7pm

Friday, Dec. 8 - 7pm

Saturday, Dec. 9 - 7pm

Sunday, Dec. 10 - 2pm

When the playwright is Paul Rudnick, expectations are geared for a play both hilarious and smart, and THE NEW CENTURY is no exception. It is a funny and outrageous comedy, but it doesn’t stop there—it also raises questions that aren’t easily answered. Helene Nadler from Long Island, a Jewish mother who has weathered the uniquely varied coming outs of all three of her children (we get to meet her leather slave son); Ellen Diggs, a home-crafts fanatic from Decatur who originally thought the World Trade Center was attacked by people in cheap cotton fabric when she heard they were “muslin” terrorists (but she will tug on your heart when she talks about her late gay son); and Mr. Charles who was run out of Manhattan for being too stereotypically gay and now has a cable access show in Palm Beach where he is billed as “The Gayest Man in the Universe” and his very, very sexy assistant, Shane (who we get to see a WHOLE LOT of) are the delightful characters mixed together for this hysterical night of theater.

Rudnick’s other plays included JEFFREY and THE MOST FABULOUS STORY EVER TOLD, the Adam and Steve story.

DATES

Friday, Mar 29, - 7pm

Saturday, Mar 30 - 7pm

Sunday, Mar 31 - 2pm

Wednesday, Apr 3 - 7pm

Thursday, Apr 4 - 7pm

Friday, Apr 5 - 7pm

Saturday, Apr 6 - 2pm

Saturday, Apr 6 - 7pm

The Bent is thrilled to present THE INHERITANCE (PART 1) which The Daily Telegraph called “perhaps the most important American play of the century.” It won the 2020 Tony Award for Best Play.

Decades after the AIDS epidemic, three generations of gay men grapple with the tragedy of their past and what it means for their future. Eric is a New York City lawyer trying to keep his family’s apartment; his boyfriend, Toby is a successful but abrasive writer, living in a state of denial. From there, a web of touching and

heartbreaking stories unfold, remembering the dead and calling on the living to keep looking forward. Inspired by E.M. Forster’s HOWARD’S END, THE INHERITANCE is a fearless examination of survival, healing, class divide, and what it means to call a place home.

As with ANGELS IN AMERICA, this epic story is told in two parts. THE INHERITANCE (PART 2) will be the opening play for The Bent’s 2024-2025 Season.

DATES

Friday, Apr 26 -, 7pm

Saturday, Apr 27 - 7pm

Sunday, Apr 28 - 2pm

Thursday, May 2 - 7pm

Friday, May 3 - 7pm

Saturday, May 4 - 7pm

Sunday, May 5 - 2pm

Thursday, May 9 - 7pm

Friday, May 10 - 7pm

Saturday, May 11 - 7pm

Sunday, May 12 - 2pm

Host or Publisher Palm Springs Cultural Center