Case Study: The Laramie Project

Moises Kaufman and the Tectonic Theatre Company travelled to Laramie, Wyoming to ‘Conduct over 400 interviews with about 100 Laramie residents’ (Chalkdust Theatre Inc. Riverside Theatre Parramatta, 2010) following the tragic murder of Mathew Shephard, a gay student at the University of Wyoming in 1998, to then create the verbatim, docudrama play, The Laramie Project. The production follows the real residents of Laramie following this tragic event by portraying a large range of views and opinions on the topic of homosexuality and the incident from that of priest’s, the parents and friends of Mathew Shephard as well as Laramie residents who identify as gay or lesbian and many more. The director juxtaposes these contrasting opinions throughout the play to portray the conflicting emotions within Laramie about the event, all the while we follow Mathews last hours and the court proceedings to determine the consequences for the perpetrators as the town begins the healing process.

Moses Kaufman is the producer of the successful play “The Laramie Project” after a horrific incident that occurred in Laramie. Members of the artistic group of Kaufman 's, traveled to Laramie to find out more about the horrific incidence. The main aim of the whole project was to find the emotions, reactions, and reflections that the people of Laramie manifested concerning the beating and subsequent death of a twenty-three-year-old college student (Gale, 2016). A lot of questions were raised concerning the death as people had different point of views. Some thought it was a hate crime, others thought it was just a brutal assault or a form of robbery. Four hundred interviews were conducted so as to come up with the reasons behind the brutal murder straight from the town folks. The main issue was how homosexuality was defined in the crime. The Laramie Project, questioned the rights of the LGBT+ group. For example, why were Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, and Transgenders discriminated by the community and the society as a whole even though their rights were constitutional?

Life is an amazing, wonderful, beautiful adventure that we are blessed with every day. But, we are greeted many times throughout those days with choices we have to make. Most of those choices we make are built by the structure and beliefs that our parents and loved ones have passed onto us. Looking into how we were brought up can we really say what’s right or wrong? Can we positively determine that everyone thinks the same? While watching “The Laramie Project” you see and hear two-hundred different opinions towards the Matthew Shepard’s case. Two-hundred … that’s two-hundred people from Laramie, friends of the victim and attackers, and loved ones fighting for what they believe is right. This case not only caught the whole town’s attention but was recognized on a national level. Labeled as a hate crime you learn so much more about the people’s identity like Matthew Shepard as a homosexual, the tragedy of a man/son/friend that struck a town, and how people see Laramie, Wyoming as their home built by a community.

The Laramie Project is a play written by Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project by interviewing the residents of Laramie Wyoming about the murder of a gay student, Matthew Shepard. The play raises controversy revolving around homosexuality, hate crimes and acceptance. In addition to the various themes suggested by the play, the author wanted to present the varying perspectives toward homosexuality in the Laramie Community at the time of Shepard death. The three main perspectives towards homosexuality were hatred, tolerance and acceptance. The author also wanted to explore how these perspectives may have changed as the result of Shepard’s death.

All individuals possess their set of values, principles, and integrities they have progressed over time, and they have all shaped their experiences and associations in life. The ensuing paper classifies and discusses various worldview models that individuals such as Aunt Maria, Doctor Wilson, Jessica, and Marco identify with and employ, which influences their moral recommendation and perception of the status of the fetus in "Fetal Abnormality," a case study from Grand Canyon University. In evaluating the case study, the essay explores and describes the most appropriate theories and their impact on resolution. Additionally, the paper offers the author 's recommendation on the issue.

Laramie, Wyoming is known as a mostly conservative, republican party majority, which is why there were no hate crime laws that had to deal with sexual orientation or gender identity. Republicans typically were Christians meaning they were against homosexuality and believed it was very wrong. The Laramie officials did not pass any law for about ten years, which showed the Laramie community that their own government did not approve of homosexuals. The government in Laramie is a major influence on a citizen’s political opinion and how they feel on certain topics like homosexuality. If the government does not show approval, how will the citizens of Laramie gain a major acceptance towards homosexuals? Even the governor of Wyoming did not

The Laramie Project is a play written by Moises Kaufman and the members of Tectonic Theater Project. The play is based on the interviews of the citizens of Laramie about what’s happening in Laramie and their responses to the murder of Matthew. In addition to the various themes suggested by the play, the author wanted to present the varying perspectives toward homosexuality in the Laramie community at the time of Matthew’s death. The author also wanted to explore how these perspectives may have changed as the result of Matthew’s death. Even though the citizens of Laramie persisted that hate is not a value they practice, they still showed contrasting and puzzled views

In The Laramie Project, a character name Cathy Connolly claims that gay the people in Laramie feel the oppression from society, and are

Beaten, tortured, stripped of his dignity and essential his life, Matthew Shepard was left on a fence fighting for his life for eighteen hours. What Matthew didn’t know was that those eighteen hours would be the driving force of a theater company’s biggest story. The Laramie Project is a monumental play by Moises Kaufman, this play broke boundaries to portray a story of the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard. The documentary theater aspect creates an experience for the audience to live within that moment. Theatre has the ability to change lives and the audience can experience that exact sensation. All things considered, the theatrical version of The Laramie Project is more effective than the movie because of the focus on the actual text and set design.

The town of Laramie needs to confront their collective responsibility of what happened to Matthew Shepard. This simply means that the community in Laramie were to ignorant about how they treat people who happen to be different than them. Without directly knowing they built a community based on social groups who exclude people like Matthew Shepard who aren’t part of the “norm”. Matthew Shepard was disowned by his community in ways such as when one of the community members are asked what they thought about Matthews sexuality and her response was “I don’t give a damn one way or another as long as they don’t bother be.” (6:40)

The death of Matt Shepard produced a profound impact on the community of Laramie and the entire state. This tragedy provoked numerous discussions and drew the attention of the public to the position of gay and lesbian community at large and individual representatives of the homosexual community in particular. At the same time, the general public was basically concerned on the death of Matt Shepard rather than on the problem of the homosexual community of Laramie. In such a situation, Beth Loffreda attempted to draw the attention of the public to this problem at large. In her book “Losing Matt Shepard”, she does not focus entirely on the death of Matt Shepard and its circumstances, but she rather to lay emphasis on the problem which remained practically unnoticed by mass media and the general public, the problem of hate and intolerance in regard to homosexuals and their position in the local community.

In “The Laramie Project,” written by members of the Tectonic theatre company, aims to examine the Matthew Shepard murder through the use of theatre. Within the play, there are several insights and moments that prove to be surprising, puzzling, useful, new, and interesting.

A lot of the townspeople from Laramie were shocked that the criminals were from their own community. Many people were in denial that something like this could happen in their town, while others wanted to make the townspeople accountable. “My secret hope was that they were from somewhere else, that then of course you can create that distance: We don't grow children like that here. Well, it's pretty clear that we do grow children like that here” (Jacobus 1640). “it happened here...we need to own this crime. I feel. Everyone needs to own it...We ARE like this” (Jacobus 1645). The people of Laramie had once believed that they were a live-and-let-live kind of place and now they were beginning to doubt this. “live and let live. That is such crap...basically what it boils down to: if I don't tell you I'm a fag, you won’t beat the crap out of me. I mean, what's so great about that?” (Jacobus 1645). People were left in a state of confusion. Even the criminals “don’t seem to understand the reasons for their crime any better than anyone else” (Evans). Matthew Sheppard's attack influenced the attitudes of many people in Laramie and forced them to realize the truth of the attitudes of others in the community.

In the 1980’s and 1990’s, society wasn’t the most accepting of places for people who were different from the “social norms”. Now I know, people today still struggle with trying to fit in and be “normal” but it was different. Being a gay man living in San Fransisco at the time, which had a large gay population, Richard Rodriguez had a hard time dealing with the discrimination he faced. Richard Rodriguez was an American journalist who wrote and published a memoir about his life as a gay man. In October of 1990, Rodriguez published his memoir “Late Victorians” in Harper’s Magazine, a critically acclaimed publication of the time. In his memoir, Rodriguez describes what it was like to realize he was gay and watch as the country changed to become a more accepting place. He does this by setting up how things can change and then explaining the actual ways things change for the gay population.

After reading “The Laramie Project” your left with so many questions, ideas and emotions. The play is a series of interviews (reenacted exactly as they happened) to give the audience facts and true statements so that they can form there own opinion. The play takes place in Laramie Wyoming, after the “hate crime” that left 21 year old Matthew Shepard fighting for his life that ended soon after all because the fact that he was gay. Hate is a feeling and hate crime is acting on that hatred, but what exactly is a “hate crime”? What makes it so different from any other crime? Isn't all crime hate crime?