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Blue Surge | Introduction

Rebecca Gilman's Blue Surge, first produced in 2001 (and published by Faber and Faber in the same year), was a bit shocking when it first opened to enthusiastic audiences at Chicago's Goodman Theatre. It is, after all, a play about prostitutes, and it utilizes full frontal male nudity in the first scene. However, audience interest in the play stemmed more from the fact that Gilman is a local Chicago playwright, and her plays are known for their cutting-edge social commentary. Blue Surge is no exception.

The overall theme of this play is the wide gap between the people of upper-class society, with their wealth and seemingly easy lives of opportunities, and the people of the lower, working classes, with their economic and educational limits (at least in Gilman's portrayal). This gap is dramatized through the interactions of a vice-squad policeman and his interest in two women. His live-in girlfriend comes from the privileged class. She is an art student and lives off a trust fund inherited from her grandfather. The young woman with whom the policeman would like to begin a new relationship is a massage-parlor prostitute, whose only ambition is to make enough money to retire by the time she is thirty.

The title Blue Surge reflects a mixture of sadness, poverty, desire, and misunderstanding, other motifs that run through the play. There is mention in the play of a piece by the jazz master Duke Ellington called "Blue Serge." The protagonist, Curt, hears the title and thinks it is "Blue Surge," because he finds the music rather dark and melancholic. When Curt tells his prostitute friend, Sandy, about this misunderstanding, relating that blue serge is really a type of material used to make men's suits, Sandy imagines that perhaps the songwriter felt sad because he could not afford a suit. Thus, Gilman uses the misunderstood title of the jazz piece to pinpoint one of the messages of the play, a play in which her characters have particular longings that are difficult for them to fulfill. As Gilman portrays it, the main hindrance for those who are left wanting in their desires is poverty, and the creators of that poverty are the rich.

Blue Surge Summary

Act 1

Scene 1 of the first act opens in a massage parlor located in a midsize city in the Midwest. Sandy, the masseuse, enters with Curt. Sandy tells Curt to get undressed and then leaves the room. Curt acts nervous while he takes off everything but his underpants. When Sandy returns, Curt tries to make conversation with her, but he is awkward at best. Curt is a policeman, and he thinks that Sandy has no idea of his occupation. He tries to persuade Sandy to admit that her main purpose is not to give massages but to have sex with her patrons. Through their conversation, Curt learns that Sandy actually has no training in massage therapy, but he cannot get her to say anything that he can use in a police case against her as a prostitute. Once Sandy begins to massage Curt's back, Curt decides he cannot go through with the sting operation. He insists on getting dressed. "I don't know what I'm doing," Sandy says, as she watches Curt. Curt responds: "It's okay. Neither do I."

A week has passed when scene 2 opens. The location is the same massage parlor, but the characters are new. Doug, who is Curt's police partner, walks into the room with Heather, another prostitute. When Heather asks Doug to strip, he does so without any signs of self-consciousness. In contrast to Curt, he takes everything off and stands on the stage stark naked. Doug proceeds to ask Heather various questions about sexual acts and about whether she will perform them. While Heather does not admit to anything, she does insinuate that she would be willing to do them. Doug then reaches for his badge and tells Heather she is under arrest. Heather cries out that he has entrapped her.

Scene 3 takes place in a room at the police station. Sandy has been taken to the police station but is not charged with a crime. She is merely warned that the police suspect her of prostitution. Curt is telling Sandy that she is free to go. He warns her, though, that the next time she might not be so lucky. Before Sandy leaves, Curt asks her if she knew that he was a cop when he visited the massage parlor. Sandy admits that she did. When Curt asks how, Sandy says it was because he refused to take off his underpants.

Doug enters the room and is angry because his case has fallen through. Heather's accusation that Doug entrapped her has been upheld. Once Sandy is excused, Doug and Curt discuss how they fouled up the bust. Curt points out Doug's mistakes, and Doug emphasizes Curt's lack of experience. Then Doug talks about his sexual fascination with Heather.

In scene 4, Curt's girlfriend, Beth, is introduced. Curt and Beth are having an edgy conversation. Neither seems pleased with the other. Beth makes fun of Curt's partner, Doug. Then she demeans a restaurant that Curt mentions. Curt calls her on both points. When Curt tries to explain what he has gone through that day, Beth sticks up for the prostitutes and says the police should leave them alone. Curt counters by telling Beth that she does not know the first thing about the hazards of prostitution. When Curt offers further details about his day, Beth becomes jealous that Curt was somewhat intimate with another woman and that he seems to have been drawn to one woman in particular.

As Beth is about to leave Curt's apartment, she suggests that he find a new job. Curt mentions the limited possibilities that are open to him, since he has only a high school education. He also throws out the fact that Beth lives off a trust fund. He does so to suggest that her life is easy, especially compared with his own life. Their arguing intensifies, until Beth admits that she is really angry that Curt chose a particular masseuse at the parlor. Curt denies that he had any interest in the woman, saying at the end of the scene: "I can't even remember what she looked like."

Scene 5 takes place in a bar. Heather has lost her job at the massage parlor and is working as a bartender. Curt is listening to Heather complain, when Sandy walks in. Curt has asked Sandy to meet him there. Heather continues to talk about how Doug has cost her the massage parlor job. Sandy informs Heather that Curt knows all about the story because he, too, is a cop. Heather walks away in a huff.

Sandy and Curt make small talk. Curt tells Sandy that he wants to help her. Sandy tells him that she does not need any help. She likes what she does. The only part of her job that she does not like is turning over half the money she earns to the owner of the... ยป Complete Blue Surge Summary