“There’s a black man with a gun in Apartment 833 of the Colorado Club Apartments acting crazy.” It’s that single brief 911 phone call that sets the ball rolling in Texas Sodomy, Howard Skora’s wildly entertaining, fact-based look back at the second-most groundbreaking Supreme Court decision in LGBTQ+ history.

Texas Sodomy! (the exclamation point is mine but I like it) takes us back to September 17, 1998, the night that police arrest 55-year-old hospital Lab Tech John Lawrence (Drew Droege) and his best friend’s 31-year-old African American boyfriend Tyrone Garner (Jabari) for allegedly engaging in “deviate sexual conduct, namely, anal sex, with another man” in the privacy of John’s own home just east of Houston city limits.

No matter that the law they are accused of violating is so obscure that, as a court clerk puts it, “the last time we charged someone with this, computers didn’t exist,” no matter that when John hears the term “anti-sodomy,” the first thought that enters his mind is of a drag queen named “Auntie Sodomy,” no matter John’s shock at learning that “straight people can have sodomy in Texas, but gay people can’t,” charges are filed against the two men and a pair of “Not guilty” pleas entered into the court record.

Enter local gay bar bartender (and political activist) Lane Lewis (Matt McConkey), who believes the two men have a case that might well be precisely the right one to take to the United States Supreme Court despite the fact that only six years previously, that same court had ruled that there was no “constitutional protection of sexual privacy.”

Talk about an uphill battle, particularly given that as one of the accused sodomites’ potential lawyers puts it, there’s “nothing like a drunk, psychotic love triangle to take the Supreme Court.”

And while we’re on the subject of love triangles, did I mention that it was Jabari’s “jealous, crazed much older redneck boyfriend who thinks his best friend fucked his black boyfriend” who made that initial 911 phone call?

It was, and did I also mention that for most of its 100-minute-or-so running time Texas Sodomy plays like a comedy?

It does, and perhaps not surprisingly so given the divine Droege’s gift for spouting quips as only a sassy gay man can, which is just one reason why the laughs keep coming a mile a minute until, in its final third, Texas Sodomy allows its star to prove that inside every great comedic actor lies a hidden dramatic powerhouse.

Not only is Droege a perfect choice to bring John Lawrence to sassy gay life under Skora’s adept direction, the dream cast that surround him deliver their own fabulous featured turns as well.

Jabari is sweetness personified as a young Black man with serious self-esteem issues, McConkey (unforgettable years back as The Boys In The Band’s Michael) is the buff gay bartender/activist we all wish we had on our side, and Dylan Vox channels his inner asshole (and I mean this as a compliment) as the vile and volatile Royce Eubanks, who made that 911 call out of jealousy and spite.

Celeste Pechous, Aaron Tone, and Trudgeon all do standout work in multiple roles each, most notably Pechous’s featured turn as butch lesbian lawyer Jackie Rosenthall, who gets to break the wall mid-play to delicious effect.

Dusti Cunningham’s scenic design is black box basic but it works, thanks in large part to John Knowles’s scene-setting upstage screen projections. Mitch Rosander’s uncredited lighting and sound designs are first rate as are Ben Phen and Arron Mendoza’s character-informed costume designs. (Arthur Goldiner receives program credits for “special effects.”)

Indeed my only complaint regards an opening night audience whose wild applause after every single one of Texas Sodomy’s nineteen scenes, no matter how brief, ended up an unnecessary distraction.

Casting is by Michael Donovan, CSA and Richie Ferris, CSA. Scott Victor Nelson is principal cast cover. Deonte Marcel understudies the role of Tyrone. Rosander is assistant director and stage manager. Ken Werther is publicist.

With LGBTQ+ rights once again under attack, the time could not be riper for Texas Sodomy’s arrival at the Whitefire Theatre. That Howard Skora’s latest World Premiere is as entertaining as a fact-based play can be is icing on the rainbow-colored cake.

Whitefire Theatre, 13500 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks. Through October 24. Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00. Sundays September 20 and 17 at 7:00. Sundays October 4, 11, and 18 at 2:00.
www.texassodomy.com

–Steven Stanley
September 12, 2026
Photos: Dusti Cunningham

Visit www.theatreinla.com/nowplayingrs.php for a review roundup of what’s now playing in theaters around Los Angeles.

Tags: Howard Skora, Lawrence v. Texas, Los Angeles Theater Review, Whitefire Theatre