Jan 23, 2004  |  By: KEITH A. CAMBREL  | COMMENTS     

COMING TO TERMS with one’s sexual orientation is hard enough for anyone, but for those who have a group of people instructing them to reject their natural instincts, it can be torture.

“Doin’ Time in the Homo No Mo Halfway House — How I Survived the Ex-Gay Movement!” is a serious comedy and one-man show that details an ex “ex-gay” man’s struggle to come to terms with his sexual orientation and the dangers of “reparative therapy.”

During Peterson Toscano’s performance, which is scheduled to take place in Washington at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, Jan. 31, he portrays five characters who guide audience members on a bittersweet tour of the “Homo No Mo Halfway House.”

Toscano describes the house as a 12-Step Christian program that “attempts to save men from the snares of homosexuality through bizarre rules, a masculine resuscitation regime and brain-numbing reconditioning.”

He recently told the Blade that “drawing on my two-year experience in such a program, I tell my story and the stories of others who survived the ex-gay movement and came out queer.”

TOSCANO USES HUMOR, program jargon and personal accounts from characters based on composites of several personalities and people he met while enrolled in “Love in Action,” an “ex-gay” residential program in Memphis, Tenn. Although the piece seems like theater of the absurd, with its peculiar premise, Toscano promises that 95 percent of what he shares actually took place.

After seeing Toscano’s performance in Philadelphia, Rev. Ruth Hamilton, co-pastor at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Southwest Washington, said she asked him to perform it in D.C.

“The show was a huge hit with the 500 or so who saw it in Philadelphia,” she says. “We laughed hard and there were some lumps in the throat, too.”

Hamilton said Toscano’s performance is inspirational and heartbreaking because he explores in great detail what it means to find one’s own identity as a whole and healthy person. It was also an eye-opener for most of the audience, she said, who had no firsthand knowledge of what occurs during reparative therapy, which is based on the premise that a person’s same-sex sexual orientation can become heterosexual with prayer and intense counseling.

“I’ve heard about the ex-gay movement but never really knew the kinds of strategies they use to try to change who people are,” Hamilton said. “That itself was enlightening.”

TOSCANO’S PERFORMANCES BLEND creative arts with biblical inspiration and he often includes his long and complicated journey out of the closet in his works. They include leading drama workshops and “Bibliodramas,” he said, as well as interactive educational theater pieces.

Religion also still plays a major role in Toscano’s life, though he graduated from the Love in Action program in 1999 — but remained gay. He is now a Quaker and says he harbors no ill will toward church members.

“I am not angry at the conservative church for the ex-gay work they do. They are not evil; they are misguided,” he says. “They do not realize the damage they do to others … and to themselves.”

He says there is something in his one-man show for everyone.

“Plenty of entertainment, insight, unbelievable information and even healing,” he says. “I guess, overall, I want people to leave feeling good about themselves.”