Invisible People

            Apparently, a simple word like "the" can change everything when researching plays. That one, seemingly meaningless word can influence the mindset when going into a production. Specifically, it made me believe that the brand, new play "Invisible Man," an intense look at racism and belonging, was actually called "The Invisible Man" and was, in fact, about a crazy murderer that could not be seen and like to be naked. Needless to say, I was surprised when the actor was not only visible, but also tackling important issues. I think I liked being surprised, blindsided, like that, though. Instead of being able to predict every twist and turn of the plot, I was forced to experience every facet of the story "blind." It was nice.

            One of the main themes I drew from "Invisible Man" was the idea of cultural and social invisibility, not quite as cool as actual invisibility. This idea seemed to permeate itself into everything that we experienced in Chicago, until it was very apparent that this was not just an issue that existed inside of the theatre but in the real world, as well.

            Invisibility from the "Invisible Man" is the central issue of the play. Throughout the play, the main character, an African American named Invisible Man, (henceforth, known as Inv. Man) tries to find an identity to call himself and become visible. There are many times when the issue of invisibility are uniquely present. The subject is first brought up when Inv. Man takes Mr. Norton, a rich trustee of his school, on a car ride through the campus. We start to see evidence if Inv. Man invisibility as Mr. Norton begins to treat him less of a human and more like a project. Inv. Man seems to shake this off and keeps driving around the campus. He eventually reaches the house of Jim Trueblood, a black man that has impregnated his own daughter. Trueblood has been rendered social invisible by this act, as no one wants to see him. He tells Mr. Norton his story, although I'm not sure if it was true or not, and asks Norton to give him money. Norton gives him quite a bit of money in order to take care of his future kids. Inv. Man takes him away as he starts to pass out. This scene shows the reason for invisibility, bad social image, cultural faux pas, mistakes that make us want to forget the person that made them. Perhaps in this instance, the forced invisibility is warranted, as Trueblood seems to be a detriment to African Americans if they want to advance farther in society. The scene shows this masterfully as after this scene Mr. Norton cannot remember his creed and "destiny" to help the African American community. At the end of the play he cannot even remember Inv. Man.

            Another scene that demonstrates invisibility well is a scene near the end of the performance. One of the characters, Tod Clifton, a member of the Brotherhood, is shot to death by the police. Inv. Man is rightfully upset by this but wonders about what could be done or who would care, they both were invisible. It's an excellent and cutting monologue. He continually says lines to the effect of  " Tod Clifton's dead, He was shot. Who care, go home." The way the actor said it, it kind of hurt. He sounded accusatory of the audience and seemed to be calling the us to action to change this horrible situation. It showed how it felt to be invisible; no one looks at you , no one talks to you, no one listens to you, and no one cares about you.

            That was the first play we saw, and it probably influenced my entire trip. First thing we did the next day was to go on an inner city tour with Steven Saunders, a member of Featherfist. During the tour, he kept mentioning ideas of invisible people, like the homeless, that the so-called normal people ignore every day. By the way, about five years ago, the mayor then promised to lower homelessness by 2012 in a Times article, I do not think it is working.  Next, we saw a play called "Time Stands Still," which could be interpreted to be about how we make the people that are important to us feel invisible and less important when we mindlessly pursue a goal or when we trivialize their dreams and ideals. It was an okay play; great script and excellent set, but the actor playing Susan Goodwin could have used some polish.

            Anyways, perhaps the real world example that struck me the most was the visit to the Center on Halsted. Perhaps, it was that the Laramie Project: 10 Years Later was fairly fresh in my mind (by the way, way to go Dalton Smith) or the fact that I am a Blue Liberal in a Red State, but this was the most impactful place we visited. This was a great place for people in the LGBT community to come and find support. It was really refreshing to have this kind of place open for anyone and to be assisted and supported by a lot of people from the community. The Center on Halsted helped people discover themselves and put them on their feet again. The Center also increased awareness of LGBT issues to the city, making the people less taboo and thus, less invisible.

            Going onward, we went to see the brand new play "Home/Land." It was a documentary piece about undocumented immigrants in America. The play was phenominal, perfect set, great actors, and an excellent script. The stories that they told hit hard at times and were very emotional. They perfectly demonstrated just how unimportant and invisible that we sometimes make immigrants feel, like they do not matter at all. We make them feel invisible by saying that your need to take care of your family is not as important as making sure that everyone that enters America pays taxes, by the way, they do, in fact they pay about $73 billion worth of taxes and they will not even benefit from it. The play shows us that these people want the same thing that everyone does, to be able to help their family and not be persecuted.

            Thinking back to the actual work part of class, there were a lot of plays we read that dealt with the idea of invisibility, specifically, "Translation". It is a play about the anglicizing of Ireland, and in a way it's about turning a culture into invisible, socially speaking. The English come in and decide that everything needs to be changed to their system. This causes the people that follow the old ways to feel invisible and they react violently, like the in "Invisible Man" when the African Americans rise up and fight against their oppressors. Both of the rebellions either hinted at, in "Translations," or seen, in "Invisible Man" ended up failing, although, an argument could be made that after the rebellions failed, the doors for peaceful negotiation was opened again, but I digress.

            The main issue is that the people want to ignore the undesirables, make them invisible so that we no longer have to look at them and feel bad, or angry, or disgusted. But it is in making these people invisible that we see problems. Tempers are flared, relationships are broken, and families and damaged. These plays show that we can seriously hurt people by turning them invisible. We need to stop ignoring the hurt, the down trodden, and the different.

            On my last day in Chicago, a group of us went looking for a coffee house called the Wormhole. The journey there was long and arduous and we almost gave up. We were standing at a corner trying to find the bus stop that would take us there when a homeless man came up to us and asked for money. I ignored him, even with all these thoughts of making the invisible visible. He asked us where we were going and we told him we were looking for a bus stop that appeared not to exist. He looked at us strangely, and said "That bus stop is just down the block, the way you was headed." We looked down the block and there it was, the bus stop, right in front of us, made visible by the invisible.

Sources:

Lantigua, John. "Nation & World | Illegal Immigrants Pay Social Security Tax, Won't Benefit |     Seattle Times Newspaper." The Seattle Times | Seattle Times Newspaper. Seatle Times,    28 Dec. 2011. Web. 26 Jan. 2012.             <http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2017113852_immigtaxes29.html>

Ferkenhoff, Eric, and Matt Bigelow. "Can Chicago End Homelessness? - TIME." Breaking          News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews - TIME.com. 27 May     2007. Web. 26 Jan. 2012.             <http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1625097,00.html>.         

Knight, Meribah. "Youth Homelessness On The Rise In Chicago." Breaking News and Opinion    on The Huffington Post. Huffington Post, 4 Nov. 2011. Web. 26 Jan. 2012.      <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/04/youth-homelessness-on-       the_n_1076011.html>.