Donn Teal “After Stonewall Documents”
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/1969docs.html
The nights of Friday, June 27, 1969 and Saturday, June 28, 1969 will go down in history as the first time that thousands of Homosexual men and women went out into the streets to protest the intolerable situation which has existed in New York City for many years — namely, the Mafia (or syndicate) control of this of this city’s Gay bars in collusion with certain elements in the Police Dept. of the City of New York. A Police raid on the Stonewall Inn late Friday night, June 27th, triggered the demonstrations. The purported reason for the raid was the Stonewall’s lack of a liquor license. – Who’s ‘kidding whom here? Can anybody really-believe that an operation as big as the Stonewall could continue for almost three years just a few blocks from the 6th Precinct house without having a liquor license? No! The Police have known about the Stonewall operation all along. What’s happened is the presence of new “brass” in 6th Precinct, which has vowed to “drive the fags out of the Village.”
Many of you have noticed one of the signs that the “management” of the Stonewall has placed outside stating “Legalize Gay bars and lick the problem. Judge Kenneth Keating (a former US Senator) ruled in January, 1968 that even close dancing between Homosexuals is legal. Since that date there has been nothing legal, per se, about a Gay bar. What is illegal about New York City’s Gay bars today is the Mafia (or syndicate) stranglehold on them. Legitimate Gay businessmen are afraid to open decent Gay bars with a healthy social atmosphere (as opposed to the hell-hole atmosphere of places typified by the Stonewall) because of fear of pressure from the unholy alliance of the Mafia and elements in the Police Dept. who accept payoffs and protect the Mafia monopoly.
We at the Homophile Youth Movement (HYMN) believe that the only way this monopoly can be broken is through the action of Homosexual men and women themselves. We obviously cannot rely on the various agencies of government who for years have known about this situation but who have refused to do anything about it.
How does this apply to the play?
Stonewall Inn was in 1969 in New York City. Peter and Heidi are in Chicago around the same time. Coincidence? I think not.
The homosexuals before this insolence had to put up with laws banning their choice of lie style in most of the fifty states. This was the last straw. This occurrence was simple because the police thought that the gays were freaks or not willing to put up a fight. A lot of the gays around the country starting demanding equal time and consideration after this. This is were most, men mainly, found the courage to speak up and say that they were homosexual.
This could be used for inspiration for the scene between Peter and Heidi when he tells her he is gay. There was a lot more at stake at the time ten a friendship. His life and career was too. At the time, gays were thought to be child molesters. A gay pediatrician?
“A Brief History of AIDS” About.Com ?2000
http://aids.about.com/health/aids/library/weekly/aa060799.htm?iam=dp&terms=History+Of+The+Aids+Virus
In July 1981, the New York Times reported an outbreak of a rare form of cancer among gay men in New York and California, first referred to as the “gay cancer” but medically know as Kaposi Sarcoma. About the same time, emergency rooms in New York City began to see a rash of seemingly healthy young men presenting with fevers, flu like symptoms, and pneumonia called Pneumocystis. About a year later, the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) link the illness to blood and coins the term AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome). In that first year over 1600 cases are diagnosed with close to 700 deaths.
As the number of deaths soared, medical experts scrambled to find a cause and more importantly a cure. In 1984, Institut Pasteur of France discovered what they called the HIV virus, but it wasn’t until a year later a US scientist, Dr. Robert Gallo confirmed that HIV was the cause of AIDS.
Following this discovery, the first test for HIV was approved in 1985. Over the next several years medications to combat the virus were developed as well as medicines to prevent infections that flourish when HIV and AIDS damage the immune systems. By the end of 1987, there were 71,000 confirmed cases of AIDS, resulting in over 40,000 deaths.
So where are we 18 years later? Thanks to an ever-changing array of new anti-retroviral drugs and improved funding for early medical care, AIDS related deaths in the US are declining. People are healthier and living longer. But, in other parts of the world, the AIDS epidemic rages on. Some estimate that 40% of persons in the sub-Sahara region of Africa are HIV infected. Many of these people don’t realize they are infected, resulting in the infection of others, adding to the spread of the disease. Another grim reminder of the epidemic is the number of African children orphaned by AIDS. Streets are clogged with children who have lost their parents to AIDS, have no food, and no place to go. And with no money available for expensive HIV drugs, the epidemic is expected to get much worse, with estimates of 20,000,000 infected over the next 5 years.
It’s impossible to say, but I often wonder if anyone could foresee the mysterious illness affecting a few gay men in 1981, becoming the epidemic that would forever change the way in which we all live?
How does this apply to the play?
This may not be important in the acting process, but this is what Peter would have been looking at in 1989. Most of the people who received AIDS in the beginning contracted it in the 1960?s and 1970?s. This is when Peter was in his 20?s and free love reigned. This was a really fear for the homosexuals in the 80?s. Many people got it and many others feared that they did. No one knew how they were getting it or who had it. This is great for the character research.
Bibliography
“American Literature: Drama,” Microsoft? Encarta? Online Encyclopedia 2000
http://encarta.msn.com ? 1997-2000 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.