A new John Cameron Mitchell-produced webseries explores the perils of revealing too much online

In early 2021, playwright Gage Tarlton came upon a call for submissions from the Misfits Theatre Company. The New York City-based outfit was looking to develop new works for its virtual “Break the Ritual” series, which centered around disrupting everyday activities at a time when we were all mired in the seemingly endless loop of pandemic-era routine. Tarlton’s pitch: disrupting the ritual of masturbation.

The piece that grew out of that idea, xXPonyBoyDerekXx, was specifically designed to play out on OnlyFans, with pre-scripted, pre-recorded installments posted weekly.

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And it may indeed disrupt the ritual of masturbation. The main character’s posts, while sexually charged, are not the sort of thing you typically find on the platform, which allows adult performers and online sex workers to charge their audience a monthly fee for their content.

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xXPonyBoyDerekXx explores what Tarlton calls the “coming of age” story of a young queer man who, on his 18th birthday, starts an OnlyFans account. Through the video clips and other content he posts, we see his evolving relationship with the platform, his subscribers, and the online persona he’s crafting as he navigates how much of himself—his body, his life, his selfhood—he wants to expose.

After xXPonyBoyDerekXx premiered in 2021, Tarlton says he significantly rewrote and expanded the piece. A new iteration, directed by Tarlton and Carlos Cardona, with John Cameron Mitchell serving as an executive producer, premiered in last month with installments running through mid-December. Tarlton recently joined LGBTQ Nation to discuss the piece.

LGBTQ NATION: Tell me about the themes and ideas you wanted to address or play with in xXPonyBoyDerekXx, and how they’ve evolved in this new version.

GAGE TARLTON: What I learned in the expansion is that at its core, it’s really just a coming-of-age story—in a very different way than we’re used to seeing—for the digital age. I was interested in having it take place on the platform where the people in my generation did come of age, which was the internet. It’s about commodification in the digital world. What does it mean when you’re discovering yourself and coming of age online, when you have other people telling you who you should be or what you should do or what content they want to see? You have all these voices in your head, you have a lot of outsider perspectives on that journey for you. That was a big theme.

And sexuality—more than just, Am I gay or straight or bisexual? But sexuality as, like, What do I like? What turns me on? What doesn’t turn me on? I was interested in that on the internet. The obsession with a young, white—or presumably white—gay male body, or just white male body on the internet. Because, especially in porn, when you think about race and gender, those things are always coming into play with who gets the most subscribers, who’s making the most money, who gets the most followers. I was looking at it with that eye. And identity as well. He wears a mask for most of the show, whether that be because he’s closeted or just anonymity on the internet.

So a lot of those themes were the same in the original piece. But the original was only, maybe two-and-a-half, maybe three weeks. And this one, we started at the beginning of October, and I’m posting every day until mid-December. I’m coming up with improv tweets, I’m interacting with people through DMs and through comments. So the themes are actually evolving as the piece unravels.

Courtesy of DKC/O&M A promotional image for “xXPonyBoyDerekXx”

LGBTQ NATION: Yes, I wanted to talk about the interactive element. I believe I’ve read that because it is a play and you’ve already constructed the narrative and all the videos are pre-recorded, the content isn’t actually responding to the actual comments, reactions, etc. in real time, right?

GT: That is correct. The stuff that is reacting to that is just me tweeting or responding to a DM when somebody asks me something. People are actually feeding into some of these themes. A couple of days ago, I got a DM from someone telling me that I delete all of my content and start posting d–k and ass if I wanted to blow up on the platforms.

LGBTQ NATION: Do these people understand what the project is? That an actor is playing this role?

GT: It’s half and half. Some people are coming to this thinking that it’s a real person, and some people are coming to it knowing that it’s a filmed theatrical event. So it’s mostly the people who don’t know that are coming to me with those things. It’s just interesting that they’re actually feeding into the exact themes that I’m trying to point out. [The character] is an 18-year-old who is not ready to show all of himself yet. He’s getting DMs from people saying, “If you don’t post all of yourself, you’re not ever going to make it in this.”

LGBTQ NATION: And you’re responding to them in character, so you’re not telling them that PonyBoy is played by an actor and is not real.

GT: Correct. I’m kind of leading them on saying, “It’s coming soon, I promise! Make sure you subscribe!”

“New Me, New York City” a photo series by me :) Here’s a sneak peek but you can see all of the photos on my OF! pic.twitter.com/hCRjHY0mjU

— xXPONYBOYDEREKXx (@PONYBOYDEREK) October 28, 2023

LGBTQ NATION: PonyBoy is masked throughout, and you’re not revealing the actor’s identity until the end. But can you tell me a little bit about casting the role? What were you looking for?

GT: It was a long process of casting the role, just because of what this project is. Most of the piece is just monologues. It’s mostly just him reciting monologues to a camera, and every time we did a take, because of the nature of what the play is, there’s no edits. We didn’t get the freedom that you get in traditional film where, Oh, they messed up that line, we can go and edit it.

LGBTQ NATION: Like a play onstage, you didn’t cut and reshoot.

GT: Absolutely. The monologuing was intentional. And even though there’s not a lot of nudity in the play, there is a lot of exposing of the self and vulnerability with your body and exposing your body. I also needed somebody who could act that, who could handle the monologues and not get so in their head that if they messed up a little they’d have to start over again. They would actually be able to keep going as if they were the character. Every single monologue we did was one take. I wanted someone who was comfortable in exploring themselves in the room with us, somebody who was brave enough to do that, because it’s asking a lot of someone to do that. So I wanted someone who could do that and I wanted someone who had an understanding of acting and crafting a character and could keep rolling with the punches. In the same way that I’m improving online, I needed someone who was gonna be able to improv with the script some if they needed to.

So the actor that we found is a rising TikTok star, aspiring actor. He’s just phenomenal. He handled everything so well. I cannot speak highly enough about him. I’m so excited for everybody to know who it is.

LGBTQ NATION: It seems to me, this could be a story told through any social media platform. Why did you choose OnlyFans?

GT: I started working on this in the middle of the pandemic with no real idea of when theater in person was coming back. I was seeing a lot of stuff with theater that was intended for in-person performance being translated online, but it was never meant to be online. It was always meant to be in person and we were just using Zoom for the time being. I wanted something that felt more website-specific. I wanted something that felt digitally native. And at the time, 2020, 2021 was when we really saw that rise in OnlyFans and digital sex work, because people were at home all the time. People were home and they were alone and they couldn’t go to their hook-ups like they normally would, if they were doing that. You get online, you watch porn, you watch OnlyFans. There was such a spike in it. And OnlyFans as a platform—you pay for it, you get one person—it already felt like that model was ripe for use and nobody had used it yet.

OnlyFans just felt so relevant, so of the moment. We’re living in such a pornified digital world, especially with young people. Another big inspiration for this was Bad Baby, who was on Dr. Phil. There was this kind of digital grooming happening to her where all these people were like, “When you turn 18 you have to make an OnlyFans.” So, she turned 18 and she made an OnlyFans, and she made, like, a million dollars in six hours. Because everyone just waited for her to turn 18. That was were the idea for the show starting when PonyBoy turns 18 came from, because of this idea of everybody—Technically, you’re legal, but there’s not much difference from the day before. You couldn’t post porn the day before and all of a sudden, 24 hours later, you can. And what does that do to you when you’re so young? And how does that affect you in the long-term when you’re making those decisions at such a young age. And I don’t have any answers. I’m just questioning it.

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