Love is love in “Lilies, or the Revival of a Romantic Drama”

Big lies and religious repression in a small French Canadian town threaten to smother the flames of love between two young men in Lilies, or the Revival of a Romantic Drama. This all-male Off-Broadway revival of the 1987 play by Michel Marc Bouchard (with English translation by Linda Gaboriau) is produced by The Drama Company NYC and directed by Artistic Director Andrew Benvenuti. This timeless story of passion and redemption resonates today.

It’s 1952 and Simon Doucet (JJ Miller) has just been released from prison after a 30-year sentence. He has always maintained his innocence and now he’s back to visit his old schoolmate, now Bishop, Jean Bilodeau (Marc Verzatt) to settle the score. He forces the bewildered bishop to watch a reenactment of what transpired all those years ago.

In a play-within-the play, we are back in 1912 Roberval, Canada at Saint Sebastian’s School for Boys, during a rehearsal of The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian. Young Simon (Hartley Parker) is playing the titular saint and the young Count Vallier De Tilly (Florimond Le Goupil-Maier) is playing his friend, Sanae. During a break in rehearsal, we see that Simon and Vallier are more than just classmates. They are lovers who have been forced to hide in the shadows for fear of castigation. The only one who knows is the arrogant and pious Bilodeau (Grant Hale), who catches them in the act. Secretly obsessed with Simon, Bilodeau threatens to hold this secret over their heads.

Meanwhile, Vallier’s mother, the Countess Marie-Laure De Tilly (Bill Morton), has lost her mind ever since her husband left them in Canada five years ago and absconded to France. She holds tight to the delusion that he will return one day. She believes they are still rich and powerful aristocrats, even though her husband left them penniless. All her hopes lie in a recent arrival in town, the rich Parisienne Lydie-Anne De Rozier (J.P. Ross), who will surely have news of her husband’s return. Lydie-Anne, however, has her sights set on the handsome Simon, who has spurned Vallier under threat of a beating from his father. The web of lies and deceit wrought in this small village unravel one night as Simon and Vallier commit a series of acts that will test their bond and threaten their lives.

Lilies is one of those plays that, despite taking place 100 years ago, still feels relevant today. That is helped by the fact that Parker and Le Goupil-Maier have great chemistry as Simon and Vallier. Sadly, it’s still important to tell these stories because, even with all the progress society has made, LGBTQ rights are still being threatened worldwide. Lilies adds another crucial voice to the litany of lives destroyed by anti-gay crusaders.