by Samantha Sumler
It is Dec. 1, 2024, the day that would have marked Matthew Shepard’s 48th birthday. However, in rural Laramie, Wyoming, on Oct. 7, 1998, an anti-gay hate crime would lead to his death five days later.
This would become known as one of the most notorious anti-gay hate crimes in American history.
Matthew Shepard’s murder and the immediate reaction are the basis of the play, “The Laramie Project.”
The Monticello Opera House is producing the play, which opened Jan. 10 and runs through Jan. 26, with several local performing artists, including Jimmers Micallef, who spent a crisp winter afternoon over coffee, sharing his context and connections to the play and his own life.
Micallef was born in Carneys Point, New Jersey, where he did the occasional show in high school. “Traditional off-off-off Broadway versions of things,” he said. Life took him on various adventures, ranging from Philadelphia to London. Yet, the universe guided him toward something different in 2004 ― moving to Tallahassee. Micallef fell in love with many things here, including the local arts activist theatre company, the Mickee Faust Club. A passion ignites in his voice at the first mention of the company. “The first weekend I moved here, my friends brought me to see a Faust show.” Suddenly, he gasps. “It’s been 20 years.”
More memories played out on the stage of nostalgia before him: what made him laugh, who invited him to stay, and his favorite productions over the last two decades. When pressed on his favorite, Micallef balks.
“Come now, you have to give me a top list.” He continues by naming a few of his favorites. Two are original Faust musicals, “The Cursed House of Ravensmadd” and “The Ugly Girl: A Musical Tragedy in Burlesque.”
Others include a production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” performed around Railroad Square. His eyes sparkle as he remembers learning the improv of turning palm fronds into stage wings. “And being part of a foursome mudwrestling match,” he said.
The last production Micallef focuses on is “Queer as Faust IX,” a show Mickee Faust produced in June 2016, a week after the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando. “That show will live forever in my memory. It became (more) important than we ever thought it would be.”
Those are the types of productions that move Micallef. The ones one can’t help but notice match the aura radiating off him: brilliant, scheming, risk-taking, shameless, yet with a refreshing kernel of truth. It’s what led him to be part of MOH’s production of “The Laramie Project.”
For him, it was about making sure the uncomfortable conversations continued.
“People need to recognize that hate crimes and violence… are a current threat to a lot of us in the queer community, from so many different directions.”
Read more on the Tallahassee Democrat.
Learn more about The Laramie Project.
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