PROTOTYPE

TEXT AS APPEARS IN PERFORMANCE

 

RYAN SPEAKING:

 

Hello, hello, hello, hello, hello

How’re you? How’re you? How’re You?

I’m alright, I’m alright yeah I’m alright thanks.

 yeah I’m good, yeah

It’s a bit like that bit where there’s like no connection

Or there’s a disconnect

Or like the WIFI has just suddenly

You know when the WIFI just cuts out

Now we’re back on

We’re cooking on gas, we’re there.

 

(Ryan walks away from the box but his voice continues)

 

There was once was this man, this boy

And he went swimming in a harbour

And another person saw him,

saw him swimming

saw his little head floating, bobbing in the water

and thought this would be great to direct ships

so the boy became a buoy

And the buoy was invented.

And I always  think about that every time I see a buoy

I think about the body, the body underneath.

 

 

SUBTITLES:

 

(Flashing) Norm 1: A job

Steady, good money, a career path, stability, Beers on Friday

Norm 2: A partner

Norm 3: Mortgage

Norm 4: I do

A nice ceremony, a lovely spread

Norm 5: Birth

Norm 6: Death

A nice ceremony, a lovely spread

 

And I now pronounce Brian and Deborah man and wife  

I baptise thee exPat, daughter of Brian and Deborah

Ashes to Ashes

They remember that time when Brian went swimming in the harbour on the south English coast  

On honeymoon

And he got caught in a rip-tide,

And You could just see his little head bobbing up and down in the water,

And he was fine… in the end

 

Capitalism is not the antithesis of queerness

Queerness is much more…

aloof

Yes, aloof

There is an ambivalence at play

That covers a vast ocean of sexual identity

and dancing,

and being an artist

and dancing

The ocean, the dancefloor, and I

We are the core of queerness

 

I don't know why I got a tendency to run away

Don't know why I'm always pushing for a sweet escape

Even though I feel so close

I just can't control how I feel

And I gotta be free

Need to breathe

But sometimes I need

All night

All day

We could fall in love in new shapes

New shapes

 

​

VOICEOVER (LIP SYNCED BY RYAN):

 

And recently I’ve been thinking about Britpop

And housing and loneliness and why

and feeling like I exist in two separate worlds

And this nostalgic optimism of Britain in the 90’s

and every morning I eat two chocolate croissants from Albert Hein

And maybe it’s just November But I’m feeling cold and out of sorts 

And I’d like it all to change

And love in the 90’s, It’s paradise, is paranoid

And now there is this pessimistic nationalism

And then there is this separation going on, this divorce, this detachment

And I’m really painting a white horse white now

As my friend Danny would tell me

Or painting a white horse, red and blue

And it feels impossible now I’m semi- detached from it

And we shouldn’t laugh, as it’s fucking dangerous

And it’ll only encourage him

But we can’t help laugh at the absurdity

And I should be enraged at such hollow metaphors

And that’s all I’m doing is displaying empty metaphors

And I keep scrolling through Grindr and Instagram

And the heart symbol is stitched into every thread of code

But just the outline

And I heart peoples selfies and nudes and comments

And I’m sad, drained and a little bit empty but of course I have to remain,

Remain, optimistic,

And I plug in my headphones

And I let Damon and Jarvis remind me

And I think I’ve become detached from what I set out to do here,

And I must mention the norms,

And  the hetro’s

And how I think I sit outside of their world

But I know that I don’t.

And I think about how awful it must be to be heteronormative

And the more I question it, the more lost I become

And I feel like I’m performing it,

Like it’s a performance

But I like performing,

And I know the future,

And I know that the future is queer and I’ve got a semi.