I think I invented the Confabulations series for events like this: ROCKY – The Musical! And I knew that there was no one I more wanted to confab about Rocky with than Eero Laine, a PhD candidate at CUNY’s Graduate Center, whose work looks at professional wrestling as theatre (and vice versa). And luckily for…
One of the earliest glimmers-of-an-idea for what became Confabulations sparked after last year’s Oscars, when I had a few/many things I wanted to say about that boobs number. I didn’t want to compose yet another think-piece. I just wanted to bounce some ideas off someone, in a semi-public forum. But there was no Confabulations series,…
In the Confabulations series, I instigate a virtual “public conversation” about a “live event” that some interesting person and I both happened to experience. To inspire a Confabulation, a “live event” might be a telecast, a livestreamed webcast, or one of those “live in HD” things at your local cineplex. Or it might be an…
In the Confabulations series, I instigate a virtual “public conversation” about a “live event” that some interesting person and I both happened to experience. To inspire a Confabulation, a “live event” might be a telecast, a livestreamed webcast, or one of those “live in HD” things at your local cineplex. Or it might be an…
Recently, I’ve become increasingly conscious of all I miss by not having a regular outlet to direct my fleeting thoughts about the various bits and bobs of popular culture that absorb my attention (films, tvshows, performances, books, etc). Not only do I miss the pleasures of writing casually about the things that capture my fancy,…
In the Confabulations series, I instigate a virtual “public conversation” about a “live event” that some interesting person and I both happened to experience. To inspire a Confabulation, a “live event” might be a telecast, a livestreamed webcast, or one of those “live in HD” things at your local cineplex. Or it might be an actual…
I enjoy intense interests. It’s not gluttony, exactly. I’ve just got a voracious streak. For food, for culture, for ideas, for projects. It’s part of who I am, how I do what I do, what makes my work distinctive. (If only I had a disciplined-moderation streak to balance my voracious streak.) My voraciously-interested tendencies have…
Every serious student of popular performance — whether an academic, an aficionado, or both — probably has a story of “the one” (film, tvshow, recording) that has for so long so stubbornly eluded capture. Just a few weeks ago, I discovered through a friend’s blogpost that I had — for the 4th or 5th time…
I have felt the touch of Maria Irene Fornés in my life for nearly three decades. The force of her plays, her students, her writing exercises, and her legend has stealthily shaped my critical and creative sensibility in fundamental and sometimes astonishing ways. Even though I never studied or worked with her. Even though I…
The text below captures my first work of autobiographical storytelling, developed about fifteen years ago as part of a performance art workshop taught by Holly Hughes. The photo above is one of my Gramma Tita, with my father Richard, taken a year …
The following is the text and video of a monologue I composed and performed at the invitation of The Encyclopedia Show (Albuquerque) for their show examining the “The Moon” in February of 2011. Today, on the occasion of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon…
I’ve been out for more than twenty five years. Yet, periodically, I have found myself “inned” by friends/family/colleagues. Sometimes, that “inning” came from fear and/or judgment, but, more often, it was an impulse borne of courtesy or a sense of…
I was honored to be invited to deliver the keynote address at the Regional Workshop sponsored by the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC) and hosted by the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on the af…
On the evening of Saturday, May 12, 2012, I was honored to be the invited “Faculty Speaker” at the UNM College of Fine Arts’ Convocation and Awards Ceremony. The following is a transcript of my remarks. Thank you so much. And congratulations to th…
The following rumination was solicited by Charlotte McIvor for publication in ASTR Online, the virtual newsletter of the American Society for Theatre Research, where it was originally posted on 6 May 2012. Pinos Altos Opera House (NM), established…
This essay was selected as the faculty winner in the UNM College of Fine Arts “Future” essay contest and published in the Fall 2011 College of Fine Arts Newsletter. Imagining the future can be a perilous task. As a historian, I appreciate how comp…
Forty years ago this year, Go Ask Alice by “Anonymous” was published. In the intervening years, Go Ask Alice has remained in print and on library shelves, garnering new readers while also sustaining the notoriety that has followed it since its ini…
God of Carnage at FUSION Theatre Company – August 26, 2011 SoloFest 2011 at The Filling Station – July 27, 2011 Shakespeare on the Rail at the Railrunner (ABQ to Santa Fe) – July 14, 2011 The Last Five Years at Duke City Repertory Company – April 5, 2011 Raised by Humans at Vortex Theatre…
07.27.11: There’s Something Wrong with Aunt Diane: What Morality, Medicine & Documentary Can’t Explain 02.25.11: POINTS Guide to the 83rd Annual Academy Awards 02.08.11: RehabTV?
I am not Christian. I was not raised in any church. I am not African American. I do not regularly listen to gospel music. So I consider it a reasonable question to ask: Why have I become such a fan of BET’s talent competition Sunday Best? The real…
This comment was originally posted in April 2010 on another site but was withdrawn for a variety of reasons. Now that some time has passed, I repost it here… Film-acting is something I think about (and write about) a lot. Recently, however, I (f…
Today, I begin my “90 In 90” for myself as a writer. The rules are simple. Every day — no matter what else happens in that day — I am to write for not less than twenty minutes. No excuses, no exceptions, no expectations. If I write more than twe…
Herrera, Brian Eugenio. “How Harvey Milk Recruited Me.” Gay & Lesbian Review. 16.2 (2009): 24. PDF
Invited remarks delivered as part of the panel “Books in the Making” at the December 2009 meeting of the New Mexico Chapter of The Association of Women in Communications. The Luncheon took place on December 9, 2009, at the Hotel Old Town in Albuquerque, NM. Four hundred and forty four days ago I wrote my…
Posted originally to Film of the Month Club blog as contribution to discussion of the 1990 film, Bad Influence. Curtis Hanson’s Califor-noir Bad Influence (1990) impressed me mostly as a “downlow” narrative of male-male courtship, depicting the peculiar perils of same-sex intimacy. I don’t think I read the film as “gay” in any way. Nor…
per•form•ations 