When this play is over, conservatives won’t want to speak with me,” writer Gary Earl Ross predicts with a smile. “And neither will liberals. It’s going to be a long time before I will be able to show my face around Democrats or Republicans.”

The show in question is The Best Woman. In it, two female politicians go head to head, the first time two women meet as candidates in a US presidential election. One, a liberal, white senator from the Northeast, easily reads as a Hillary-wannabe. The other, a conservative, black secretary of state, is certainly Condoleezza-ish. Ross invites audiences past these familiarities to examine the nominees beyond skin depth and to contemplate the political culture that brings candidates to the forefront.

“There used to be a time when campaigning was a public event, held in the town square,” exhorts Ross. “Everyone could participate. Everyone could meet the candidates.” Television, Ross suggests, turns politicians into media figures and their primary relationship is with the camera, if not the media industry, rather than with the voters.

Ross will act in The Best Woman, as a CNN-style reporter. With satiric relish, he has written a choice line for himself. Seconds before broadcast, he calls out, “Let’s get this freak show on the road!”

“And it is a freak show,” speaks Ross for himself. He cites the absence of reality when preparing a national candidate. Every facet of that candidate’s life is scrutinized to camouflage reality and to emphasize electability.

This has impacted The Best Woman in ways not touched upon in the script. Ross recalls involved discussions on how to costume female characters for the presidential debate. “A male candidate, you can throw him into a dark suit with a red tie or a blue tie,” he theorizes, “but a female candidate? What colors, what styles? Can she be too hard, or too soft? Too sexual?”

Some of the inspirations for his current play were Fletcher Knebel’s Seven Days in May and Gore Vidal’s The Best Man. Both titles depict presidents, presidential candidates and political partisans who, in extraordinary circumstances, must take swift moral action on behalf of justice, sometimes in spite of their stated political stands.

Ross’ last theatrical outing was the courtroom drama Matter of Intent, which also premiered in a Ujima Company production in 2005. One aspect of Ross’ script-writing has been to revisit popular stories and to provide equal time for non-white, non-heterosexual, non-male characters.

A childhood fan of TV’s Perry Mason, Ross created in his play Matter of Intent, a courtroom drama in which a Chapin Parkway socialite is murdered and her black maid is the accused. Defense attorney Temple Scott, Buffalo’s first black, female public defender susses out the real story.

The script for Matter of Intent was awarded the Artie for outstanding new script of the Buffalo theater season and subsequently won an Edgar Award in 2006. The Edgar, named after Mr. Poe, is a national prize honoring crime and mystery writers.

This was a fine recognition for a life spent writing—fiction, poetry, social commentary, erotica—and as a teacher of writing at UB’s Educational Opportunity Center. Still, Ross was reticent to travel to New York City to receive the award. His wife’s insistence got him on a plane, to the hotel and into a tuxedo for that evening. Meeting well known names in sleuth fiction, reportage and scripting, Ross began to enjoy his good fortune. As the list of nominees in the best play category were read, Ross’ wife leaned over and asked, “Now do you believe it’s a good play?”

Never one to shy away from making a statement, Ross, from the winners’ platform at the gala, commended his hometown and his recent participation in Buffalo’s theater community. “We are a city of 300,000 people,” he recalls saying, “and 17 professional theaters. You should check us out.” Ross made sure that every media outlet in Buffalo at that time—newspapers large and small, daily and weekly, television and radio stations—knew what happened on that occasion.

“Only two papers picked up the story,” he chides. “Artvoice and the UB Reporter.”

The region’s inability to take best advantage of, much less recognize, its assets is what will drive Ross away from this region. He plans to retire from EOC and from teaching in a year or so. He plans to resettle in Maryland where he has family.

He sees this not at all as a personal slight but as an endemic American problem. It is a problem he addresses and tries to resolve in his writing. Ross has at least one more play in him to write before packing his bags, The Scavenger’s Daughter, another murder mystery.

Regardless of his own electoral preferences, Ross hopes this play might encourage those who see it to think more thoroughly before pulling the lever in November 2008, or in any election. “If we do not think about these things, we will only be used by politicians. We will get to a point where we can’t govern ourselves.”

The Best Woman by Gary Earl Ross opens March 9 at TheaterLoft, 545 Elmwood Avenue, near West Utica Street. Performances continue through April 1. For ticket information call 883-0380.