Arts/Entertainment Source: ‘The Laramie Project’ honors Vallejo’s fight for gay equality

In the upstairs theater at the Naval and Historical Museum in Vallejo on Sunday night, the walls were covered in words. Letters hung on string and plastered on posters, each word shroud in grief and sympathy.

I was there for On The Fringe’s one night only production of “The Laramie Project,” which tells the true story of the life and death of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man in Laramie, Wyo., who was brutally murdered in 1998. Those letters were written from all over the country to Shepard’s family following his death.

Director Maria Stats says putting on the show felt more like a “need” than a “want.” In January, President Trump and his staff removed a website dedicated to Matthew Shepard’s legacy and Stats decided her community needed this.

“The Laramie Project” isn’t like most plays. Not only is it based on a true story, all of the dialogue is pulled from real interviews and tape recordings, with nothing embellished or stretched.

“You can’t look away from it. You can’t dismiss it as a biased opinion by a writer or a woke theater group that came out there to prove a point,” says Stats. “Keeping it verbatim, keeping it transcribed, that was so pivotal to keeping it real. You can’t shy away from the truth.”

When Shepard’s violent assault began to make the national news in 1998, Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project stayed in Laramie, interviewing friends of Shepard and community members on both sides of the political spectrum.

After three separate trips to Laramie following his death and the trials of Shepard’s killers, Tectonic Theater Project wrote “The Laramie Project.”

The play discusses in depth who Matthew Shepard was, but also the attitudes and prejudices that go unnoticed in towns across America, the culture that allows for violence of the kind Shepard experienced.

On The Fringe’s production featured a 13-person cast whose members play a variety of roles, changing their accent or physicality to deliver their lines as different locals in Laramie.

On the Fringe’s production of the play was invite-only and not made aware to the public, a choice that felt important — if not the best call financially, joked Stats. She wanted the cast and the audience alike to be able to relax throughout the show without fear of backlash, she says.

Her decision to do so came from personal experience. Ten years ago, On the Fringe put on “The Laramie Project” for the first time. It was during the fight to legalize gay marriage in the United States, and although there was hope in the air, Stats says, she faced criticism from various organizations and individuals — including the extremist Westboro Baptist Church.

When they first started rehearsals for “The Laramie Project,” this time around, it was only meant to be a reading of the play. But during the rehearsal process, Stats decided to go bigger. “I’m a sicko,” Stats jokes, in regards to pushing her actors harder than initially thought.

While their production 10 years ago had over 100 hours of rehearsals, this year’s show had just 40. Although some actors had some trouble remembering their lines, the power of their statements and the sentiment of the show didn’t waver.

The cast included actors that have been with On The Fringe for years, many of them being family: Charlotte “Coco” Stats, Brighton Fuller, Candi Fuller, Sharlynn Willingham, Danielle Culberson, Zack Bender, Molly James Stats, Paige Whitney-White, Magdalena Stats, Xathanael Todd, Maria Stats, Luke Winders and Jack Willingham.

Just as the stage was full of family and lifelong friends, the audience reflected the same familiarity. “I was just so grateful,” says Stats.

The show was also a fundraiser for the Solano Aids Coalition, which supported “The Laramie Project” 10 years ago when local venues wouldn’t host the production, says Stats. Fifty percent of the proceeds went to the local organization while the other half went to keeping On The Fringe’s kids programing free.

The money for kids programming is in the form of a scholarship program honoring Bobby Finney, who was in the first production of “The Laramie Project” but has since died. “So much of who we are and what we do goes back to the first time we did this,” says Stats.

Even though On The Fringe is more established now, Stats says it’s harder to do the show today than it was 10 years ago.

“Ten years ago we were on the precipice of marriage equality, we were looking at the barrel of all sorts of hope,” says Stats. Today however, “I’m living in a time when my kids have less rights than when I was born.”

Although it may be more challenging to do so today, Stats holds on to the idea of hope — a central theme in the play. It’s also an idea that was on ample display on the walls of the theater on Sunday, in the words of people who felt called to action by violence.