So I tease out those contradictions. The play is a reverse syllogism. It constantly pulls the rug out from under our emotional responses by going back earlier and earlier in time. The play moves in reverse. Earlier you said we are starting to see a sexual gaze turned towards young boys.
Drive eroticizes the male.
American playwrights have generally shied away from the eroticized male, even overtly homosexual playwrights like Tennessee Williams or William Inge. In Williams and Inge the sexualized male is dangerous or dysfunctional. So even gay playwrights are terrified of eroticized men. In my plays, I want to present women as desiring subjects, which means that men sometimes become the object of the female gaze. But this also goes back to Baltimore Waltz , in which I wanted to pay homage to my brother's desire for men.