The Horrors of Obsession and Oppression

Dr. Frankenstein merged with Dr. Laura in “Necessary Depravity,” Michael Mizerany’s new half-hour, neo-Expressionist satire of sexual obsession and homosexual conversion therapies. Presented Saturday at the L.A. Theatre Center, it showed a young man turning into a monster from the betrayal of his need for love and the bizarre brutalities of science.

A Lester Horton Dance Award winner, Mizerany played the victimized youth, lured by the buff-deluxe Bogar Martinez into the clutches of Johnny Tu, a grotesque, blood-stained “processor” who inhabited a lab strewn with hanging corpses and dismembered limbs. Subjected to beatings and electric shock, Mizerany eventually attacked his oppressors.

Reinforced by Marco De Leon’s decor and makeup, the parody of horror film cliches gained force from John Ballinger’s ominous original score. But the relationship between Mizerany and Martinez proved problematic, with the former recklessly throwing himself at the latter and thus arguably inviting his own destruction.

Of course, the concept of “the beautiful bait” turns up in every culture, with examples in Western theater dance including the Sylph in “La Sylphide,” Odile in “Swan Lake” and the title character’s boy-toy in Martha Graham’s “Clytemnestra.” But the seduced and destroyed protagonists in these dance dramas had other possible choices, other plausible partners.

Mizerany’s character had none: Martinez was the only game in town. So “Necessary Depravity” ended up suggesting (no doubt unintentionally) that desire itself dooms gay men.