Gender
a
Rob Becker:
"Vive la
difference.
SUZANNE CHESSLER
Special to The Jewish News
ender gap?
Not for Rob Becker and
his wife, Erin, before their
wedding 12 years ago.
The two, college students in the
'70s, were quite confident about the
kind of marriage they would have and
the kind of children they would raise.
Reason, forthright communication
and equal status would reign in their
warm and nurturing home. Sexual
stereotyping would be out in the cold.
Wrong.
The more time they spent with
each other and the more time they
spent with their growing children,
the more they became convinced that
there was no such thing as unisex.
The male-female issues that faced ear-
lier generations hit them head-on.
Not one to stay down, Becker took
their experiences, did some research and
put his findings into a comic, one-man
show — Rob Becker's Defending the
Caveman, which became the longest-
running solo production on Broadway.
The theater piece, at the Fisher
Theatre Feb. 2-21, explores the way
men and women struggle to relate and
has built a loyal following in the ther-
apy community. It recently was per-
formed for more than 2,000 therapists
at the American Association of Mar-
riage and Family Therapy Convention
in Toronto.
"The different traits come out more
when you're married, and I think the
situations are timeless," said Becker, a
former stand-up comic in town to
offer some media teasers for the show.
"I don't give advice to the audience. I
just try to get them to a place where
they can understand the differences,
and I think any relationship has to get
better with that."
The writer-comedian describes
what he considers traditional gender-
defining traits and gives them a cur-
rent and personal slant. He categorizes
men as not-very-talkative hunters,
speaking about 2,000 words a day,
and women as very talkative gatherers,
speaking about 7,000 words a day.
how to communicate and
men complaining that
women's needs are insa-
tiable.
"Rob, in a comical
way, shows that the dif-
ferences between men
and women don't equate
with being bad," said
Davis, who also main-
tains a Web site for cou-
ples in distress,
www.divorcebusting.corn.
"In the '70s, women
went off for assertiveness
training, and men had sen-
sitivity training. Now, peo-
ple have realized that there
are gender differences, and
we laugh at ourselves and
our partners by hearing
Rob's comments. Couples
come to Caveman not
knowing what to expect and
leave arm-in-arm."
Davis relates gender differ-
ences described in the show to
her own family, including the
observation that women con-
nect through words and men connect
through actions.
On a recent vacation plane trip to
Colorado with her husband, Jim, she
sat beside their daughter, and he sat
beside their son. When they got off
the plane, the women said they had a
great time because they could talk
non-stop. The guys said that they had
a great flight because they could read
magazines non-stop.
"We should celebrate the differ-
ences," said Davis, who conducts sem-
inars on divorce prevention. "In Rob's
case, comedy is the sugar coating that
makes these ideas easy to swallow."
"Rob Becker's Defending the Caveman,"
a one-man show coming to the Fisher Theatre,
proves there's no such thing as "unisex."
Elements of anthropology, psychol-
ogy, sociology and mythology enter
into the conclusions made by this for-
mer drama student at Redwood
Empire Acting Studio in. California.
Color blindness, for example, com-
mon in men and virtually non-existent
in women, according to Becker, can
bring about a lot of male-female tension.
He thinks back to the time when he and
his then fiancee were selecting wedding
invitations in varying shades of white.
"I was astonished how she could
tell the difference between those col-
ors," recalled Becker, 42, who took
three years, 1988 91, to write the
script for Caveman. "When I told her
to choose whatever she liked, she felt
abandoned. If I told a guy to choose
whatever he liked, he would have been
glad to do that."
The spotlighted issues have nothing
to do with ethnic background, insists
Becker, who is not Jewish. Michelle
Weiner Davis, a Jewish marriage and
family therapist in Illinois, is not quite
so sure. In her practice, Davis has
-
noted that Jewish men seem more in
touch with their emotions, attributing
that to the strong influence of women
in Jewish families.
Regardless of that counseling expe-
rience, Davis believes that every cou-
ple can benefit from the show.
"I saw Rcib Becker at a comedy
club in San Francisco before he did
Defending the Caveman and laughed
so hard I was crying," recalled Davis,
author of Divorce Busters (Simon &
Schuster). "I've seen his current show
at least four times and have sent
clients to see it."
Davis, who practices Solution-Ori-
ented Brief Therapy, gears her profes-
sional approach to helping troubled cou-
ples establish quickly applied goals. She
is against lengthy analysis, which she
believes distracts spouses from the prob-
lems they need to address immediately.
Davis' counseling method is but-
tressed by Becker, who presents the
light side of the most common con-
cerns Davis hears about — women
complaining that men don't know
❑
Rob Becker's Defending the
Caveman runs 8 p.m. Tuesdays-
Fridays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays
and 3 and 7 p.m. Sundays, Feb.
2-21, at the Fisher Theatre.
$34.50/$38.501$44.50. (313)
872-1000.
1 /29
1999
Detroit Jewish News
83