Rose City Mama

[February 18th, 2004] I've interviewed lots of queers before, but waltzing into the waterfront offices of Portland Opera, I realized this was the first time I had a sit-down with one of their mothers.

Traci Leigh Taylor, a 54-year-old Hillsboro mother of three, met to talk about her son Daniel Robinson. Robinson, who's 22 and gay, grew up in Portland but is on the road as one of the musical stars in a production of Oklahoma!, now at the Keller. (Gossip alert: Robinson's dating one of the hottest openly gay actors in Hollywood, former child star Chad Allen). Robinson was around for the interview, but only by phone, tethered to the conference from his hotel room while he's on tour kicking up his cowboy boots as the goofy-but-gallant Will Parker.

He sounded exhausted. And his mother? Well, she was beside herself, thrilled her little boy was about to come home. "He's a kick in the pants," Taylor says.

In this interview, I planned to discuss the "Great American Musical" but got sidetracked into talking about a relationship between this self-professed mama's boy and the lady he claims is becoming a stage mom. On cue, Taylor showed off a scrapbook full of memories. She's purchased 66 full-priced tickets to Thursday's show, and plans on going to every one of Robinson's Portland performances. I guess this mother's love--and pocketbook--is limitless.

She doesn't seem like the typical stage mother, though, neither pushy nor manipulative. She seems a bit obsessed, but in a good-natured, smothery, motherly way. She's also a bit of a sacrifice junkie. Evidence? Taylor says she dated her current hubby nine-and-a-half years before marrying him because she didn't want her son to have the burden of accepting a stepfather while he was growing up.

But Taylor says she didn't know how to handle the news when Robinson came out to her at the age of 14. "I felt like I didn't know who he was," she says.

To help her better understand how he felt, Robinson rented The Birdcage. The movie became one of Taylor's favorites and helped her along the path to accepting her son's sexuality.

"We don't have a normal mother-son relationship," Robinson says. "She's the first person I call about everything."

Likewise, Taylor, who works as a real-estate broker, describes the sense of freedom she feels whenever she's around her son. "I can be myself," she says.

She recounts a recent moment when, in the middle of a New York City sidewalk, her son took her by the hand and started singing showtunes to her. She's proud of the way her son's talent is big enough that he can make others feel talented, too. "He makes me feel like I can sing," she says.

The story of this relationship seems related, in a way, to Oklahoma!, a syrupy story of acceptance between a diverse group of people. You could dismiss Robinson and Taylor's own syrupy kind of bond, but, still, it's nice to think about a mother and son who have opened their hearts and minds to each other.

You can think about all that when you're sitting in Keller Auditorium. Chances are, your seat won't be too far away from one purchased by a particularly proud stage mother.