Man in the Ring by Michael Cristofer tells the story of the six-time world champion boxer, Emile Griffith. Throughout the play, Emile is plagued by his conflicting desire to create and the raw instinct for destruction a boxer must rely on. He also struggles to accept his own sexual identity in a society that condemns homosexuality. The play uses two actors, often on stage at the same time, to portray Emile. One actor portrayed the young, optimistic, and eventually, corrupted Emile while the other portrayed an older Emile, plagued by dementia and a life-time worth of emotional scarring.
The play is rich with metaphors, one of the most prominent being the use of baseball bats to represent Emile's struggle with his internalized monologue and the views society imposes on him. At the beginning of the play, a young Emile arrives in America with big dreams. Emile wanted to play baseball, make hats, and sing. Throughout the beginning of the play, young Emile carries a baseball bat with him. This baseball bat represents Emile's inner docility and his desire to create. Baseball is a no contact sport, and Emile's baseball dreams are connected to his artistic pursuits, singing and hat-making. Later in the play, Emile is attacked by a group of homophobic men wielding baseball bats after he spends a night with Luis, his boyfriend. This aggressive use of the very tool that once represented Emile's optimism and strive for creativity is very deliberate. It represents society's molding of Emile into an aggressive entity, a killer. Like the baseball bat's intended use is manipulated to become very aggressive, Emile's potential for good was corrupted by society's desire for violence, hate, and destruction.
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