Anita Bryant’s Playboy Interview

This funny, touching, and thought-provoking play chronicles Anita Bryant’s campaign to repeal gay rights in Dade County, Florida in 1977.

Less than 10 years after the Stonewall Riots, Anita Bryant’s nationally notorious campaign gave legitimacy to a new style of right wing politics and helped launch the Moral Majority and other right-wing movements that continue to the present day. But she also had a major impact on the modern gay rights movement, propelling Harvey Milk onto the San Francisco City Council and reviving enthusiasm and anger at a time when it was most needed.

In 1978, Anita Bryant sat down for an outrageous and memorable 8-day interview with Ken Kelley of Playboy Magazine. This is that interview, recreated on stage with additional material that sets the historical scene and brings the issues raised by the interview to the present day. Anita didn’t hold back in her interview, and neither does this funny, touching, and thought-provoking piece.