• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • HOME
  • NEWS+OPINIONS
    • NEWS TO US
    • COLUMNS
      • APPARENT HORIZON
      • DEAR READER
      • Close
    • LONGFORM FEATURES
    • OPINIONS
    • EDITORIAL
    • Close
  • ARTS+ENTERTAINMENT
    • FILM
    • MUSIC
    • COMEDY
    • PERFORMING ARTS
    • VISUAL ARTS
    • Close
  • DINING+DRINKING
    • EATS
    • SIPS
    • BOSTON BETTER BEER BUREAU
    • Close
  • LIFESTYLE
    • CANNABIS
      • TALKING JOINTS MEMO
      • Close
    • WELLNESS
    • GTFO
    • Close
  • STUFF TO DO
  • TICKETS
  • ABOUT US
    • ABOUT
    • MASTHEAD
    • ADVERTISE
    • PRIVACY POLICY
    • Close
  • BECOME A MEMBER

Dig Bos

The Dig - Boston's Only Newspaper

DEVIL’S ADVOCATE

Written by SPENCER SHANNON Posted May 20, 2015 Filed Under: A+E, Performing Arts

TR_AfterAll(PaulMarotta)_728

 

“It’s challenging. It’s really strange,” says film and television actor Zachary Booth, over the phone on break from rehearsal at the Huntington. For him, being part of a stage play is both a welcome respite from filming, and a lot of work.

 

Booth will star in the New England premiere of after all the terrible things i do, a drama by A. Rey Pamatmat. His character, Daniel, is a young, gay, aspiring writer, and Booth says that he finds himself identifying with the character a lot—though not in ways that he initially expected.

 

“In the past I’ve always—even when I’ve played darker roles, or characters with dangerous pasts who are in the middle of horrible experiences—I’ve always tried to justify their history, or justify the choices they make, for them,” Booth says. “It’s that idea that the villain doesn’t, unless it’s a superhero movie, the villain doesn’t always know that they’re the villain. They wouldn’t even call themselves that.

 

But I get personally connected to these people. I found myself having discussions [outside of rehearsal] about sexuality, about bullying, about love—and taking points of view that I thought I’d never take. I’m doing it in defense of this character, but also finding that I very much believe what I’m saying.”

 

On the surface, the work centers on two people who meet in a bookstore and discover that they connect in a way that goes beyond their shared interest in literature. Below that surface plot, however, the heart of the play beats in a much more complicated fashion.

 

“I think that really, it’s about two people who think they know, or have an idea of what they need, to move on in their lives—and think they find it in each other … and what that does to a relationship, or what that creates in a relationship,” Booth says. “The expectation that you have for another person that’s not based on who they are, but on where you’ve been or what you’ve been through. Thematically, the play is about forgiveness, and imperfection, and acceptance. Which are sort of big broad ideas, but they’re told through a very specific and very intimate relationship between two people.”

 

The work also is unique in the core crux of its narrative—bullying—a subject with which almost everyone has had some kind of experience, but which remains an issue that is largely ignored or misunderstood throughout society.

 

“I think that by ‘bullying’ becoming a phrase that we use in our everyday language the way that we use it now, it’s empowered a lot of people to bring to light a lot of things that they thought that they had to hide before. On the other side of it, it allows people who have been on the bully side of the experience to really open up that door for themselves and look at who they were, and why they made the choices that they made,” Booth says.

 

“I don’t think that’s something that wasn’t happening in the past, but I grew up in a time where you left school and you couldn’t affect your classmates anymore. You had no avenue to reach them. It was a more clearly or easily defined thing,” he continues. “It opens up the discussion too: How much of it is kids being kids? Yes, we want to teach kids not to treat each other this way, but as much as we want to do the right thing, we harm children all the time—and they learn to harm each other.”

 

Above all, Booth believes that after all the terrible things i do will give audiences pause to consider other perspectives on some age old but nevertheless important adolescent issues.

 

“I hope that they all are inspired to have conversations that they weren’t having before,” he says. “Change happens one person at a time.”

 

HUNTINGTON THEATRE COMPANY PRESENTS: after all the terrible things i do. BCA Calderwood Pavilion, 527 Tremont St., Boston. Through June 21. $25-83. For showtimes and to purchase tickets, visit huntingtontheatre.org.

SPENCER SHANNON
Related posts
  • SPENCER SHANNON
    https://digboston.com/author/spencer-shannon/
    BLACK DIALOGUE: INTELLIGENT MISCHIEF AND THE SUMMER OF RADICAL IMAGINATION
  • SPENCER SHANNON
    https://digboston.com/author/spencer-shannon/
    THE SUBMISSION: ZEITGEIST STAGE'S SPRING CLOSER MEDIATES ON BIG ISSUES
  • SPENCER SHANNON
    https://digboston.com/author/spencer-shannon/
    MOTHERS AND SONS: TEARS AND TRUTHS IN SPEAKEASY STAGE COMPANY'S LATEST
  • SPENCER SHANNON
    https://digboston.com/author/spencer-shannon/
    ALTERNATE UNIVERSE: QUEER/TRANS NARRATIVES MIX FOR FUN EFFECT IN NEW PERFORMANCE

Filed Under: A+E, Performing Arts Tagged With: A. Rey Pamatmat, after all the terrible things i do, drama, Huntington Theatre

WHAT’S NEW

Mass One Step Closer To New-Prison Moratorium, But Not There Yet

Mass One Step Closer To New-Prison Moratorium, But Not There Yet

Congrats To Worcester On Coming In At #69 On Best Places To Live List

Congrats To Worcester On Coming In At #69 On Best Places To Live List

Mass Supreme Court Sides With Asshole Sheriff In Prison Phone Fee Decision

Mass Supreme Court Sides With Asshole Sheriff In Prison Phone Fee Decision

State Wire: Mass Group Says Campus-Based Supports Needed For Former Foster Youth

State Wire: Mass Group Says Campus-Based Supports Needed For Former Foster Youth

Assange Supporters To Protest AG Garland At Harvard Commencement

Assange Supporters To Protest AG Garland At Harvard Commencement

We Turned the North End Restaurant Lawsuit Against Mayor Wu Into a Musical

We Turned the North End Restaurant Lawsuit Against Mayor Wu Into a Musical

Primary Sidebar

FEATURED EVENT

Most Popular

  • We Turned the North End Restaurant Lawsuit Against Mayor Wu Into a Musical
  • Do You Want To Work For the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission?
  • Inbox: Red Bull Cliff Diving Returns To Boston Waterfront
  • How Long Can Major Cannabis Cultivators Sustain Massive Indoor Grows In Mass?
  • Drunk On Drug Money, Easthampton Councilors Approve Second Tesla For Police

CURRENT STREET EDITION

DIG 24.08 – 04/21/22

Footer

Social Buttons

DigBoston facebook DigBoston Twitter DigBoston Instagram

Masthead

About

Advertise

Privacy Policy

Customer Service

Distribution

About Us

DigBoston is a one-stop nexus for everything worth doing or knowing in the Boston area. It's an alt-weekly, it's a website, it's an e-mail blast, it's a twitter account, it's that cool party that you were at last night ... hey, you're reading it, so it's gotta be good. For advertising inquiries: [email protected] To reach Editorial: [email protected] For internship opportunities: [email protected]