Maddie Ginsberg- Laramie Reflection

How did you feel while reading The Laramie Project?

If you have never heard of or read about The Laramie Project, you should look it up. The Laramie Project is about the brutal beating and death of a young homosexual man named Matthew Shepard. Matt, as known by his friends, went to a bar, and then left with two young men, Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson. These two took Matt out in the middle of a national park, tied him to a fence and left him for dead… he was found 18 hours later by a college student riding his bike. This is a very touching story that makes me feel so many different emotions it is crazy.

            When I heard that we were going to read this play, I already knew how upset I was going to get based on how I reacted the first time I read it. The people who put together this play are a theatre group from New York. They traveled from New York to Laramie, Wyoming, conducted over 200 interviews, made several visits, just so that they could write Matt’s story from the town’s perspective. There is a part in the play where I always get very upset, that is during the interviews with the Baptist priest. The way he talks about the situation is so heartless and rude in my mind, I mean I’m all for people having their own opinions; but when it comes to an opinion about someone’s death, have some respect! Lastly I was truly surprised and touched when we find out that the Catholic priest is the one who set up the vigil for Matthew. I really felt like crying, I know that the Catholic Church is against homosexuality, but the fact that he still set something up for him, that shows real compassion.

            In conclusion, the play The Laramie Project made me feel so many different emotions, but in the end I felt only two. Happy and sad, happy because the theatre group wrote the play, yet sad because of what happened to Matthew.