Tim Miller performance and talk on Friday, January 29, from 2:00-4:00pm at WIN 2.180

Sponsored by Performance as Public Practice, the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies, the LGBTQ/Sexualities Research Cluster, and the Center for Gender and Sexuality.

Tim Miller will be performing excerpts from several of his shows, including LAY OF THE LAND, which he will be performing in full at the Vortex in Austin from January 29-31. http://www.vortexrep.org/22_2010/22_miller.htm


LAY OF THE LAND is Tim Miller’s saucy, sharp-knifed look at the State of the Queer Union during a time of trial. Careening from his sexy misadventures while performing in 45 States, to street protests for Marriage Equality, to the electoral assaults on gay folks all over the country, to a grade-school flag monitor, to choking on cheap meat caught in his 10-year old gay boy’s throat, LAY OF THE LAND friskily gets at that feeling of gay folks being perpetually on trial, on the ballot, and on the menu! LAY OF THE LAND is a “lay” in all kinds of ways: a sex-assignation, a queer citizenship map, and a narrative ballad with a recurrent refrain! (Miller’s favorite way-down-the-list definition for “lay”!).

“Miller’s LAY OF THE LAND enters  territory as exhilarating as it is meaningful. Miller lays out his  unapologetically renegade viewpoint with exemplary economy and sardonic  humor. Marriage equality is the thematic undercurrent against which  reminiscences of various activist and performance landmarks coalesce into  something larger than the sum of their considerable parts. The final  apotheosis stands high in Miller’s canon, which, together with the  overarching relevance, makes “Lay of the Land” a vivid, must-see  achievement.”

-David Nichols, The Los Angeles  Times

“Miller creates a compelling narrative that blends personal memory with  political history, and he sees the performance as his most structured work  to date. ‘The piece works to negotiate a personal, queer narrative  and coming-of-age story with serious political issues,’ says Miller, whose  work was denied funding from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1990  because of what was deemed ‘indecent’ content. ‘I end up diving into the  crazy haunted house of the country’s history while unleashing a lot of  complex memories.’ Miller explores the manner in which Prop. 8  informed the nation’s current debate on marriage equality, as well as  immigration, miscegenation laws and a history of  disenfranchisement.”

-Nirmala Nataraj, San Francisco Chronicle

Sneak Preview here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYrH-PKJPnA