He and Bussy hatch a plot to cleanse America of everyone but white gay men by fabricating the world's most irresistible influencer, Eva María (Cat Rodríguez, terrifyingly embodying this Frankenstein monster with pink highlights). He's been canceled, and he is hell-bent on revenge. Jurgen can't even bother to make time for this long-distance booty call. Patrick expects to party with the gay glitterati, but instead he finds the island practically deserted: The only people left are Jurgen, his incel maid Honney (Breslin), and Jurgen's co-conspirator Lord Baby Bussy (Breslin). It's about Patrick (Foley), an actor who travels to Gaymen Island against the advice of his best frenemy Michael (Breslin), a guy with all the correct political opinions who is married, we are told, to a 'diverse husband.' Michael knows that Gaymen is the lair of meme-producing homosexual supervillain Jurgen Yionoullis (also Foley), with whom Patrick has been having an online flirtation. Seeing it in person feels like attending a taping of the lost gay episode of I Love Lucy.Ĭat Rodríguez, Patrick Foley, and Michael Breslin appear live and stream online in Circle Jerk. Under the banner of the scrappy troupe Fake Friends (that's Breslin and Foley in collaboration with actor Cat Rodríguez and dramaturg Ariel Sibert), they now present it in front of a live studio audience while continuing to stream online using a multi-cam setup. It earned a surprise Pulitzer nod for its writer-performers, Michael Breslin and Patrick Foley. Rather than giving audiences a poor substitute for live theater (which so many streaming shows are), the creators of Circle Jerk were able to tell their story on the screens and through the memes that constitute the Internet culture they so gleefully skewer. This is the smartest, funniest comedy to come out of the pandemic, when the obsessive habits of the very online reached new extremes - making them prime targets for manipulation.Ĭircle Jerk made its 2020 debut in an exclusively online format, which was about all that was available at the time.

I know, I know: TheaterMania never posts positive reviews! But is that true? Or is it the case that you only engage with the negative ones, causing the algorithm to populate even more angry, poisonous content to your news feed as you rage scroll? If you're reading this, chances are I've tricked the Zuckerberg machine into promoting (and you into clicking) this review of Circle Jerk, the spectacular Internet farce currently making its live and in-person debut at the Connelly Theatre.

Circle jerk