When 14-year-old Leonard Pelkey disappears one day, leaving behind no clue of where he might’ve gone, his friends and family are surprised to discover the many lives he touched in their small New Jersey town. From the cranky clock store owner, to his tough guy classmates, Leonard sure knew how to make an impression. Described by most as too flamboyant and exotic for his town, Leonard was perhaps too bright a light for a place that thrived on darkness. As a detective goes on his search, we accompany him, discovering truths that ring almost too close to home.
Prolific author James Lecesne has adapted his own novel and turned it into The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey an ambitious play which sees him play every single character, from a teenage girl, to a wise widow, and vicious schoolboys, Lecesne eerily slips under the skin of each character through vocal changes and mannerisms. A bravura performance if there ever was one, what strikes the most about Lecesn’e work is that he doesn’t bring attention to himself as a one-man-band, but instead is so devoted to the values of his story that the last thing we think about watching the show is about Lecesne.
I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to meet a fictional character as much as I did Leonard...
That’s very nice.
Even though we don’t really meet him during the show, was he inspired by anyone you knew?
I think that through my work with The Trevor Project I’ve been in contact with so many of these young people who are really so bold and amazing, out in the world trying to figure out who they are authentically and honestly. I think I was inspired by a lot of those kids that I talked to and met in my travels, I just find that there’s something out there and it’s that these kids, not just LGBT kids, but many kids, are trying to find a way to be their authentic selves. I was a Leonard Pelkey a long time ago, I was that kid who people asked to “tone it down”, to be less exuberant or flamboyant - which I think was code for gay - and that was during a time when people didn’t use the word “gay”. They were just cautioning me to be a little more normative.
As the founder of The Trevor Project you must be used to strangers coming up to you to share stories about their own struggles. How do people’s stories affect your performances?
Once you find the vein of the show, they’re pretty reliable, you’re always trying to keep the show fresh, but what keeps it fresh for me is that every night there’s a whole new group of people who’ve never heard the show, and for them it’s a brand new experience, so I try to keep it pretty much the same now that I know what it is. For me there are certain moments in the show that I know where to go inside myself to summon those moments. There’s a moment that feels like the pivot in the show, where a character says she’s trying to come up with a reason but always comes out empty handed. For many of us there are so many mysteries in life we can’t solve, certainly in my life that’s true, but that’s a daily thing (laughs). It’s also really inspiring when young people are in the audience, I know the show to them has a special meaning.
Who is your absolute favorite character to play?
It changes night to night depending on the reaction from the audience, some audiences tend to react to Marian more vocally or they relate to her, when the demographic is younger they relate to Phoebe more, and I can feel that in the response to the characters, because it makes them come more alive. So my favorite is the one who came alive to me, it’s almost like they have a life of their own. Sometimes they come through like “woo” and take over, and some other nights you’re working.
What came first in your mind, the book or the play? Meaning, when you sit down and write do you see yourself performing the show or does it come to you as a novel first?
I wish I had an answer to that, I wish it was so formulaic! I’ve been doing these solo shows for years. I travel around the country and about ten years ago I wondered if I could continue doing this, so I wrote the novel Absolute Brightness, because I thought I could write a monologue and then that would be a book which meant I wouldn’t have to show up to perform it everywhere. The book came out in 2008 but then the world changed, the whole “it gets better” thing, bullying, so I really wanted to talk to adults about how they can look out after these kids and how to encourage them to be themselves and protect them. That inspired me to do the show, I also wanted to get back onstage because out of all the things that I do it’s my favorite, it includes everything I know how to do in one package.
Perhaps because it’s told through the eyes of the detective, the show has a very noir feel which made me think of your work with Lypsinka in Legends. Was this particular work influenced by classic detective movies?
Oh gosh yeah, there’s been so many of these things like Serial, I listened to the whole thing in like two days, I was listening to that while I put this together and while it’s not exactly noirish, it certainly keeps you gripped in terms of what happened. You never really find out the answer but in the meantime you learn so much about human behavior as you’re going along, there’s that, and it’s a whodunit, it’s a good hook.
You’re making art about social issues that we should all work towards fixing. In a very Utopic way, as a creator, how does it feel to think that, hopefully, one day the messages in your art won’t be “necessary” anymore because everyone will accept everyone?
One of the things that the show is about is about the fact that evil exists in the world, it’s a part of the world that we live in, I think in the final speech that Ellen gives I think it’s a little Utopian to think that the idea of why evil exists is so that people will stand up and be better. I don’t think that’s ever going to change, I think evil’s always going to be here, and it comes in many forms. In terms of art, the art that really moves me is the art that actually moves me into action, and makes me want to be better. The purpose of art is to make people pay attention to something that might be too difficult to do on your own, especially in the theater, you have a group of people sitting together in the dark and you hope they will be able to bear this truth together and come out on the other side. I don’t know if that’s too highfalutin an answer but it’s why I like doing it, I want to move people.
Do you have any plans to record the show in any way?
People have suggested that and it’s a possibility, but before I do that I want to give people an opportunity to experience it in the theater, so after our New York run we will go wherever we can go, any place that will have us really, also places in the middle of the country where people might need this story more. I guess what I’m saying is I’ll be on the road again. There’s also some talk of turning it into a film, which would be amazing.
For tickets to The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey visit their official website.
