For Tim Miller, performance is all about trust: trust in the writing, trust in the audience, trust in humor and most importantly, trust in yourself. One can easily sense this trust in himself—something rare in people, particularly gay men, who often flood their personality with defense mechanisms that signify a deep-seated lack of esteem more than it portrays confidence. It’s in his voice, his choice of words and it becomes quite clear as to why he is a performer.
As one part of the four-part NEA Four which will be performing at the Carpenter Center on September, Miller is no stranger to having to stand up for one’s self. The group of artists became the center of controversy after their National Endowment of the Arts grants were vetoed due to the performers’ subject matter, driving Miller and his comrades to the peaks of national attention. This trust in himself and his performance has both fueled his art as well as his activism.
“I have traveled and performed so much since I was about 23,” he said. “And if you’re performing in a little crappy college in Alabama—when literally they have never once invited a gay person of any sort on campus—you routinely feel the desire to connect and communicate.”
As Miller continued to travel—an endeavor that he said has never really stopped since he began performing—he realized that travel demanded something of him. And that demand came about via story and humor, what he believes to be practically universal connectives that permit even the most antithetical of audience-versus-performer dichotomies to vicariously communication with one another.
“How does my set of narratives and wild erotics and humor connect with this group of people?” he asks before laughing. “Until you get to the butt love. You kinda lose ’em there.”
Miller’s frankness doesn’t come with an edge more than it does a sense of warmth paired with an intellectual bite. He is incredibly approachable, even more affable and lacks the pretense behind why he does what he does.
“[Intellectualism and accessibility] are a false binary in a way,” Miller said. “There’s such a continuum between being smart and appealing to others. ‘You’re too political!’ or ‘You’re too angry!’ and all these dismisses… The truth is we’re complicated. And anything imagining we have to be stupid or short is actually rather interesting. Performers are painfully aware of a disconnect with their audience and the truth is: you can be charming and you can be political—you can do all that without being so political that you scare them into leaving the theatre.”
It is in this sense that Miller wants to reach more people but not in the name of losing what he is trying to express. He understands the notion that, as a queer person, one can’t simply walk into a space and begin talking about sex and politics while stripping because no amount of charm will get back what you immediately lost within the audience.
“Despite how much charm you give you off, it doesn’t prevent you from getting trashed on the floor of the House of Representatives,” he quickly quipped, with little in professing his politics—in which his performance art is deeply steeped in.
Miller’s work evolves around his identity as a gay man as well as an activist, whose quintessential piece My Queer Body (regard video) was performed on both The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and The Larry Sanders Show. The complexity of that identity has offshoots, in which Miller has also addressed immigration, nationalism, and marriage equality. Given the immensely personal aspect of his activism—him and his partner, from Australia, face the double-edged sword of immigration and marriage politics—Miller feels that varying the creative process gives him specific albeit different ways in which to address his activism.
“I think we take different risks,” he explained. “While my work is full of writerly stuff, our bodies take different risks than our pens. Our body will show a different type of courage. You might take risks on the paper that you would never take in real time just as you might take physical risks that you would never take on the paper. For me, continually changing the venue for the creative act is useful.”
Miller’s inaugural Long Beach performance is still being developed, though his passionate stance against what he calls the “two right wing lunatic points” of gay bashing and immigrant bashing will most certainly be addressed, along with the emerging Undocuqueer Movement.
“Even after 18 years of being with [my husband], he has no legal status to be here because we live in the ridiculous country of the United States. No status as my partner,” he said incredulously. “We don’t know if his visa will be reapproved, we have no security—a kind of humanity that we would be routinely given in every single other Western country. I mean, it’s this right-wing wet dream here in the U.S.: you can simultaneously queer bash and immigrant bash by kicking out couples like us. It’s a huge subject for me.”
In short, don’t expect Miller to be lackadaisical or apologetic with his politics. However, he is not meaning to alienate and, as always, he reverts back to his point about connectivity. He understands there are naysayers and critics, differences in politics and morality. If anything, he seems to enjoy the dichotomies of differences and, more so, wants to engage in dialogue about the ever-altering, slippery slope that is identity—and the many problems, both socially and legally, that come that tricky thing.
“One of the good things about traveling a lot,” he said comfortably, “is that you get to see a lot of different people in a lot of different situations. If you’re in a big city or urban setting, you convince yourself that it’s all been taken care of. I don’t actually believe I have a future in this country; I don’t believe it’s going to be worked out. I assume [my husband and I] will have to leave and go to a civilized country which comes out in my performance. My work is about America and it’s infuriating that I have to deal with the lack of respect I have to hold for my country where my relationship of 18 years isn’t recognized but any straight couple can be together for 18 seconds is.”
But, despite one’s views, at least for Miller, there’s always time to talk about it.
Tim Miller will be performing with Holly Hughes on Thursday, September 27 at 8PM at the Carpenter Center. The other half of the NEA Four, John Fleck and Karen Finley, will be performing Friday, September 28 at 8PM. Tickets can be purchased here or by calling 562-985-7000.