“Trophy Boys” at MCC (Photo: Valerie Terranova)

The culturally accepted gulf that has traditionally separated male and female genders is examined with rambunctious energy, humor, and not a little pathos in Emmanuelle Mattana’s play Trophy Boys. The undefeated debate team from an elite private boys’ high school is preparing for the final debate in the season against the rival girls’ school. As they try out different arguments on the assigned topic (to reveal exactly what it is would be to spoil the surprise in the play), their attitudes toward women, their own masculinity, self-confidence, and identities are all challenged. Written with an ear for the pretentious verbal acrobatics favored by debate teams and performed with breathtaking agility by a non-binary cast, none of whom are cis males, the play takes a penetrating look at the roles we assign to gender.

Playwright Emmanuelle Mattana who also stars as Owen, the priggish would-be leader of the boys’ debate team, has captured the hothouse, self-absorbed, yet undeveloped and awkward tenor of high school kids to a tee. We meet the team as they start to prepare their arguments for the imminent debate on a topic that has only just been revealed. They are in a classroom plastered with images of inspirational women including Amelia Earhart, Oprah, and Gloria Steinem. A poster of Michelle Obama will be moved to humorous effect and a white board becomes a central prop as the action unfolds (the scenic design is by Matt Saunders). The “boys” are dressed in school uniform – reflective perhaps of Mattana’s native Australia – with short pants, stiff wool blazers, and ties common in British and formerly colonial schools.

It is preppy territory, though, that is perhaps familiar to members of the cast including Louisa Jacobson whose mother is Meryl Streep and who attended PolyPrep in Brooklyn. Jacobson embodies Jared so fully that a casual observer would be hard-pressed to discern that the actor is in drag. Jared is the too-cool-for-school member of the team. He’s the only one with a girlfriend and professes to “love women”, a fact he believes will be key to helping them win the debate. The others are less certain of their masculinity. Owen describes himself as effeminate, while Scott, played by Esco Jouléy, may have a secret hankering for Jared.  Meanwhile, the fourth member of the team, David (Terry Hu) is revealed to have a creepy stash of lurid social media photos in an “encrypted” folder. All these details emerge bit-by-bit as the boys discuss how to win the debate despite the fact that the topic appears stacked against them.

Their self-confidence in their abilities is hilariously portrayed as they break out into thrusting and grinding dance to a pounding soundtrack while they are ostensibly preparing ideas on paper. Soon after, they settle down to embark on a heated discussion of how to present their arguments. Here’s a representative gambit: “So our case has to be more feminist than the pro-feminist side. We believe feminism has failed women from the perspective that we are actually more feminist than the feminists.” The quickfire dialogue is sometimes on the verge of to being too fast to follow, but otherwise Danya Taymor’s direction rarely falters.

Just as they may be close to landing a winning line of attack, a surreptitious check on social media throws them into frenzied self-doubt. The widespread fear among young men of missing non-consent cues is in the air as is the possibility that any whiff of bad behavior may scupper not just their chances of winning the debate, but of achieving their dreams of becoming president, CEO, and superstar celebrity or athlete respectively.

Gender differences can be heavy-going material for the stage, but here Mattana manages with real wit and insight to highlight the warping and depressing affects that gender norms can instill on young minds. In program notes, the writer asserts that gender is “not only learnt but taught” and urges us to examine our deep-seated notions about masculinity and see it for “a comical, absurd and ultimately disturbing performance.” The same could be said for this play.