Belize

Belize seems to be the one character feeling good and confidant in his own skin. He is black, gay, ex drag queen, and has a job as a male nurse that is usually more common among females. I believe Kushner included him in his play as the voice of wisdom and reason. He represents kindness when he was first introduced to the reader as Prior’s friend when he went to visit him at the hospital. He was joking, trying to comfort Prior about his disease, and making him laugh. He brought with him a special balm supposedly to help Prior’s lesions. He was shown in the HBO movie to rub the special cream himself on Prior’s body, without any fear or repulse. Kushner intended to portray Belize as the sweet individual who can listen, sooth, ease, and reason with anybody, and God knows how the characters of Angels in America are in a great need to be consoled and listened to. He assured Prior that Louis will not abandon him, even though the reader or the viewer could sense a doubt on Belize’s face and tone. He just wanted to make Prior feel good at that particular moment. Kushner particularly, had him listen and respond to the most troubled, tormented, and lost characters of the play and which are Roy and Louis. He listened to Louis for a long time without interrupting him, till he felt that the time to stop him and start responding has come. Again, Kushner wanted him to be the conscience that Louis is blocking and denying. He told Louis exactly what he should not have done, especially walking away from Prior at a time when he needed him the most. In the movie, the viewer could tell that Belize was disgusted from Louis’ excuses, and convinced that Louis himself was not happy about his decision to abandon Prior but wanted to hear otherwise from someone else, to feel a kind of a relief. But Belize never gave Louis the satisfaction to walk away with a clean conscience.
In Part II of Angels in America, there was a very interesting scene at the hospital mixed with truth and humor. Belize was on duty, and Roy was in the same hospital, being treated for AIDS. Once again, Belize was calm, when Roy refused to be treated by Belize because he was black. Even though Roy was very harsh in his words towards Belize, Belize tried to explain the whole procedure of radiation, and tried to warn him about what the doctor might do to him. Roy was confused and did not know what to make of Belize. In this particular scene, Kushner wanted to reveal another side of Belize, who despite the insults from Roy, stayed calm and focused on his job. In his conversations with both Louis and Roy, Belize was the truth that both men refused to see, a truth about their cowardice and their loss in a world full of controversies. Belize somehow reminded me of Tyler in Fight Club, who wanted to see the world from a different angle.

Welcome to the Eighties

The eighties were significant years in the history of America. With a newly elected republican President and fifty two U.S hostages held by Iran set free after more than a year, America was getting ready to enter a new era. Just as we learned about the movement of the “New Journalism” in the late fifties early sixties that effected America’s writing style, the eighties went beyond journalism to touch every single form of art including literature, painting, film, fashion and so on. In his play Angels in America, Kushner tried to talk about various themes that deeply influenced not only America but the whole world. Religion was one particular theme that played a big part in the play just in time when conservatism made a heroic entrance into the White House.

With its diversity, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and liberty and justice for all, America seemed in a continuous struggle when it comes to all these issues since the end of World War II. As I mentioned before, religion was the source of many heated debates in the political arena as well as in the socio-economic one during those years. The characters of Joe and Harper in Kushner’s play were living an inner struggle, a complicated and a tough struggle that was tearing them a part every moment of their life. Both Mormons, raised by very religious parents, Joe and Harper endured a pain that was kept inside. Harper was described as an unhappy wife who was addicted to pills. Joe her husband, was taking nightly long walks, instead of being home with his lonely wife. Religion was the only obstacle that stood in the face of their happiness. It is because of religion that Harper doesn’t want to admit that there is something going on with her husband. Harper knows deep down that her husband might be a homosexual but refuses to admit it to herself since in her church they don’t believe in homosexuality. Instead she turns to pills to appease her pain and her loneliness instead of confronting Joe and make it easier on her and on him as well. Religion also haunts Joe, who just like Harper believes that homosexuality is evil and that the Lord doesn’t have a place in heaven for those kind of people. Instead he takes those long nightly walks in an area in Central Park known to gay people. Once again, his faith comes between him and his desires or rather between him and the peace he was looking for and hoping to find one of those days. It is very ironic how shifting away from religion would give Joe that peace, the joy of life not only to him but to Harper who was suffering and self-destructing. It was his confession to his mother on the phone that set him finally free.

Religion in Angles in America was one important theme that revealed how people pretended to live a life that was not meant to be theirs. Even the character of Louis was in a dilemma when he asked the Rabbi what he thinks about people who abandon their loved ones in times when they needed them the most. I would add cowardice as a trait of Louis whose uncertainty made him the evil person. The insistence of Joe that he was not a homosexual was also seen in his confirmation of his political views when he mentioned that he voted twice republican. Harper was more open to the idea of letting go of her suspicions about the sexual orientations of her husband when Prior told her in her hallucination that Joe was indeed a homosexual.