The August Wilson Theatre hosts the production of Dog Day Afternoon, directed by Rupert Goold, based on the Warner Bros film of the same name and inspired by the true story of the August 1972 attempted robbery of the Chase Manhattan Bank in Brooklyn, New York. This production plays up the comedic undertones of the 1975 crime drama, lightheartedly touching on themes of gender identity and love, as well as the signs of the times. The heat of the summer, the weight of the Vietnam War, and the scandal of Watergate all encapsulate the irrationality of the unfolding events, leading to the question, how much external chaos can one absorb before it becomes what they do, or who they are?

As a girl who grew up learning of the classics in the most impermanent ways, an interest in live theater wasn’t expected of me by anyone, least of all an interest in the densely worded and very particular world of Shakespeare. As I’ve experienced it, there’s an air of pretense and snobbery that lies adjacent to the theatre and even more so as it pertains to anything written by the Bard—so much so that people whose presence is more accepted at the theatre than mine whisper their confusion at the not easily digested language, for fear of looking as pretentious as they feel for saying it any louder. There’s an invisible ‘whites only’ sign and an unspoken “we don’t want you here”—though not expressed or felt by all—that becomes evident in scathing reviews of work that is objectively good.