The Secret Club
THE SECRET CLUB
I’ve never been a fan of the local art scene. As much as I love Malta and the Maltese language, I find its use quite cringeworthy in an arts setting – probably a product of so many TV shows and songs trying too hard to imitate Western media.
I’ve also never been an active member of the local LGBT community. Hell, I’d never even been to Malta’s Pride parade – an event that draws thousands of locals and visitors every year. Being a bisexual man myself, I often feel guilty about this, but it’s simply not my scene. Don’t get me wrong though – I’m 100% in favour of it and I applaud its celebration. God knows there are still strides to be made in this regard, especially here in Malta with all the faux liberals who think they’re so woke and open-minded when it’s convenient for them. Sometimes it feels as though being pro-LGBT, for people who aren’t part of the family or have no direct connection to it, is treated more as a political position than something personal.
Being a stranger to both the local arts and LGBT communities, you can imagine my excitement when my friend bought me tickets to a play inspired by Maltese queer stories – Il-Każin tal-Imqarbin (ka-zeen tahl im-qar-been). I was sceptical, to say the least. That said, I’d heard overwhelmingly positive feedback from plenty of people, and so I decided to give it a go.
Welcome to the Każin (Massive Spoiler Alert)
All seated and pretty worn out after three night shifts in a row, I was doing my best just to keep my eyes open. The set seemed unimpressive – empty save for a shelf covered in photos and filled with random memorabilia. That said, the official synopsis had me intrigued and set the tone perfectly:
1986.
The phone rings. Hello? A voice gives clear directions. Directions to a secret club known as “Il-Każin tal-Imqarbin”.
You must come alone. You must check that no one is following you. You must ring the bell. And once you’re through the gate – you’ll be hit by the scent of people just like you.
You’re at the Każin. A place of irreverence. Where men come to be free.
At the Każin, the world outside does not exist. Men dance. Men kiss. Men tease. And men fall in love with men.
Until one day, the virus arrives. And the music stops.
Inspired by true Maltese queer stories, this show is a love letter to a queer generation that went uncelebrated. Their defiant joy, their deep connections and their resilience.
The Plot
Then in walks this older woman, delivering a stunning soliloquy to someone offstage, telling them to come in as she sees straight through their apprehension.
With that, the prologue gives way to the first act, with Ir-Reġina (Queen), Ta’ Londra (London) and Il-Bambin (Baby Jesus) – three glamorous divas – giving an incredible cabaret-style performance titled Libertà (Liberty). It introduces the secret club as a safe haven for gay men, where they are free to love each other and explore their inner fantasies without fear of judgement or retribution. Is-Sagristan (Sacristan) – a bashful and comedic character – has just entered the club for the first time, teetering on the line between queer and ‘normal’ – as he calls it before being reprimanded. They tell him that what’s outside stays outside, what’s inside stays inside and no real names are ever to be used. Even though they carry themselves as superior to other men within those walls, they know wider society does not see them that way. Homosexuality had been decriminalised in Malta in 1973 – 13 years earlier – but queer people still lived under heavy social stigma and without anything close to the legal equality enjoyed today.
The story then sees the club members having to disperse as the police arrive to raid the underground club. Is-Sagristan and Il-Bambin end up hiding in a church, where no one will find them. This is how they slowly end up falling for each other, with the former hesitating because he had sworn an oath to his patron saint – that he wouldn’t give in to his ‘perversions’ and temptations if she would make him a father and grant him a son he’d call Marċellino – named after The Miracle of Marcelino. By the end of the scene, they’re making love. Throughout the play, they continue their secret correspondence through a series of messages sent via fax machine. With Il-Bambin being a teacher, they refer to a student named Marċellino as a kind of code through which they can express their love.
At the same time, local news outlets in the play are reporting growing fear around AIDS. Reġina – the club owner – insists that the disease did not simply arrive with the headlines. People had already been suffering in silence, their stories hidden away and, as the play tells it, some of their deaths attributed to other causes. Once AIDS became publicly associated with gay men, fear tipped into open hostility towards the community, with prejudice and ostracisation becoming almost as frightening as the disease itself. With Londra being promiscuous, sleeping with British Navy officers and God knows who else, Reġina urges him to be careful – especially in light of the growing fearmongering. His concerns are justified. People talk and Londra’s reputation ends up in tatters. At the next secret club gathering – featuring fewer and fewer men – a glass bottle is thrown at him. Covered in blood, the gang flees the scene once again.
In the meantime, it is revealed that Il-Bambin has had a son with his wife – the double life being a familiar survival strategy for many closeted queer men at the time. Men were expected to be ‘normal’ and perform their duties at all times. Under the cover of night, however, the desires that society branded as perversions and temptations could finally surface, allowing them to become the men they really were. Getting exposed was not an option. While the disease itself could kill them, getting outed would destroy the life they had built around it. And that’s exactly what happened when Il-Bambin is diagnosed with AIDS – practically a death sentence. In a heart-wrenching performance titled Ħames Minuti (Five Minutes), we get to see Is-Sagristan begging him to wait before he leaves, trying to savour every remaining second of their love.
Little by little, the men start disappearing one by one. The next secret club gathering is practically a joke, with only a handful showing up – including Reġina, who eventually succumbs to the disease himself. But fear not – he comes back for one final song called Inviżibbli (Invisible), which beautifully captures the importance of visibility that sits at the heart of Pride. The police show up again, this time arresting Il-Bambin and Is-Sagristan, effectively putting an end to the secret club once and for all.
The play ends with a masterful scene that brings everything full circle. The same woman from the opening scene is once again on the floor, delivering the same speech and urging the outsider to come in. Her place, she admits, used to be a secret club where men came to love each other. She’s an undertaker, and over the years she has buried gay men whose lives and deaths were hidden behind shame and secrecy. She describes churches refusing to allow some of their coffins inside, forcing her to manipulate death certificates and invent different causes of death.
Among the people she buried, we discover, was Il-Bambin – the father of young Marċellino, who now sits there with the old woman some 18 years later.
The Freedom We Inherited
By the first scene, I was covered in goosebumps. By the second, I was teary-eyed. By the third, I was trying hard to contain my sorrow. By the fourth, I was full-on sobbing and grabbing hold of my friend who was a mess herself.
Throughout the play, I felt such an overwhelming mix of emotions that I could hardly put them into words. Everything just worked. The production was polished, the music and choreography were incredible, and their voices? Holy hell. The acting was on point, as were the costumes, with every character feeling larger than life yet painfully human. But beneath all the colour, humour and spectacle was a story about love, fear, secrecy and loss. That was what really got me. Simply heart-wrenching!
But, there was also something strangely personal about the whole thing too. Here I was, watching two worlds I’d spent most of my life keeping at arm’s length suddenly collide in front of me. I’d never really felt part of Malta’s LGBT community, and I’d spent years looking down on the local arts scene – yet somehow it was a Maltese queer production that had me completely captivated. Maybe that was part of why it hit me so hard. These were people telling stories from a community I technically belonged to but never really felt part of.
You see, as a bisexual man living in the 21st century, I’ve had it quite easy. I don’t ever recall being the victim of blatant homophobia – microaggressions here and there, yes, but never verbal or physical abuse. I’ve never had to hide who I was out of genuine fear for my safety, never had to build an entirely separate life behind closed doors and never had to wonder whether loving someone could cost me my family, my career or my place in society.
We’ve made giant strides, true, but we owe so much of that progress to the people who fought before us. Ir-Reġina, Ta’ Londra, Il-Bambin and Is-Sagristan might not have existed exactly as we saw them on stage, but there were real people who lived through the same fears, secrets and sacrifices – if not far worse. People who loved in hiding, who were forced to choose between honesty and survival, who endured ridicule, rejection and persecution, and who kept going anyway. While some fought loudly, others did so under the blanket of darkness – but together they all helped carve out the freedom my generation can so easily take for granted.
To them, and to so many others, I owe my infinite gratitude. The freedom to be myself, to be true to myself, to love who I want and to allow myself to be curious without fear… None of that appeared out of nowhere. It was fought for, suffered for and, in some cases, paid for dearly. It’s all thanks to them.
The Power of Art
Then there’s a whole other thing that got me emotional. The story was being told through an art form I’d once dreamed of being part of, in a language and country I’d never really associated with either theatre or queer storytelling. Somehow, all three of those worlds – Malta, queerness and the stage – suddenly collided in front of me. For the first time, they all felt uncomfortably close to home.
Back when I was a kid, one of my many dreams was to become an actor. I’d perform Shakespeare’s work at the Globe. I’d be clad in regal, colourful costumes, carrying a crown and a skull and a plume and anything remotely Shakespearean. I’d deliver one soliloquy after another as I stood on a dim stage beneath a bright spotlight. I’d connect with his work, give it everything I had and somehow make the crowd feel that same passion. That was my dream. Until I realised I probably wasn’t cut out for theatre. Or the arts in general. As much as I’d love to sing, I’m as tone-deaf as a cat giving birth. As much as I’d love to act, I’m terrible at hiding what I really feel. As much as I’d love to dance, I have two misshapen left feet.
And so, watching this play stirred up one emotion above all else – that strange ache of mourning a life I never lived. I’ll probably never experience a romance quite as consuming as the one shared between Is-Sagristan and Il-Bambin. I’ll probably never become a thespian and perform beneath the lights of a stage. As much as I love the theatre, it has always filled me with a little remorse and jealousy – this nagging sense that somewhere along the way, I left one version of myself behind. If only…
That said, walking out of the theatre, I quickly forgot about all of that. I could barely verbalise how good the play had been. The last time I’d felt something similar was over a year earlier, right after Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. I remember walking out with this strange lightness of being, as though I’d been suspended in another dimension for a few hours and hadn’t quite landed back in reality yet.
That’s exactly how I felt after this play. That, I guess, is the power of art – for a little while I got to live a life I never lived and feel things I didn’t realise were buried inside me. And, I have to say, I’d been a massive idiot for looking down on the local art scene all these years!