The Blue Taffeta Dress Party and Other Stories
About the Playwright / Performer
Dennis Hawkins-Bogle (last at the Sunset in 2024, with Where is Grise Fiord?), returns with a collection of autobiographical stories about growing up gay in small-town northern BC.
He sat down with Tanya Hill, a reporter for The PEAK, ahead of a performance in Powell River.
"My passion for writing was reignited after a transformative summer on Cortes Island," explained Hawkins-Bogle. "I took a workshop at Hollyhock called Meditation, Ritual, Yoga, by a woman named Mara Branscomb."
He said he found himself daydreaming at the workshop and started to write little stories and have a lot of fun with it.
"I shared my writing while we [he and his husband Stephen] were on Cortes," said Hawkins-Bogle. "I came home and I was just on fire, and I wrote probably 30 or more stories, like The Blue Taffeta Party Dress."
His one-person performance is based on 19 autobiographical short stories from his childhood in a small, northern town, to his life as the principal of the high school he graduated from.
"As a gay kid growing up in an era of silence and shame, my voice was misrepresented, undermined, even sensationalized by the dominant culture," said Hawkins-Bogle. "Now, I’m setting the story straight, through moments of resilience, humour, heartbreak and hope."
"The audience will be taken on a journey, and experience the real highs, the humour, the inspiration and the breakthroughs, but they're also going to experience the gut-wrenching imagery around the homophobia I experienced as a child in high school," said Hawkins-Bogle. "But at the end, [the audience] will feel good, because there's such a resolution at the end around my journey."
The feedback so far, from high school students and other community members who have seen Hawkins-Bogle's play, has been positive.
"They speak about the integrity of my character, and how I portray my stories," he said. "There was one really funny comment [from a student] who wrote something along the lines of, 'the stories are so great because they're so short, and you really get on with the point; you don't linger around and make us wait.'"
Hawkins-Bogle said he doesn't necessarily use his writing as a healing tool, but approaches his work as a writer.
"I've always been able to detach myself from that experience and write it from a writer's point of view. I'm able to have a lot of fun with it and not get bogged down in the emotions a lot of the time."
He said for a while he spent a lot of time dealing with how he viewed himself and his own internalized homophobia.
"You adopt the values of your family or your community and so I had harsh, negative beliefs about myself, and it's really about coming to terms with that," said Hawkins-Bogle. "Nowadays, I try to embrace a life rich with purpose, creativity and community."
