AF ’22: My Cousin Nelu Is Not Gay

This is a two-person show performed by two butch actors. One plays Diana. The other, in drag, plays Nelu and a host of other characters from his life. Both actors wear identical Adidas tracksuits. My Cousin Nelu Is Not Gay features musings on the immigrant experience, an intimate dance with a disco ball, musings on the lesbian experience, two two-hundred-pound dogs, musings on the butch experience, and an epic yet disappointing cousin vs. cousin showdown in the space created at the ~threshold of revelation~. This is an absurdist comedy butting up against a confessional monologue. This is a bilingual play in which English clashes with Romanian and the gays wrestle the straights to take control of the stage. This is what happens when factual family history meets the stories we tell ourselves about how we grew up, or how we wish we had.