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The arrival of a new theater company in the Potomac Region is always reason
to rejoice and to approach the inaugural production with high hopes and
crossed fingers. Zebra Stage is a new African-American professional theatre
company formed by Jarrin Davis who directed the Gay Men’s Chorus of
Washington’s last two winter musicals, Nunsense A-Men! and Little
Shop of Horrors. Davis takes on a distinctly different type of
theatrical event here as he directs his own darkly literate script, a
troubling drama of people trapped in their own problems.
Storyline: Three young
black women struggle with the demands of life and the failings, foibles and
promise of the three males in their lives – a predator, a weakling and a
boy.
The individual characters
are each interesting in their own right and part of the pleasure of the
first act is trying to put together the pieces of their stories as they are
dropped in the dialogue. Davis avoids obvious breaks for exposition, opting
instead for the kind of “eavesdropping on strangers” structure that feeds
the audience hints, rather than setting out the history of these people in
either narrative or flashback. We don’t actually see many of the important
events and we aren’t told about them either. We just need to figure it out.
That task is intriguing at first but begins to be tiring after intermission
when too many threads seem not to connect. When a playwright is taking this
approach it sometimes helps to have a different artist direct. Coming to the
story with a fresh eye such a director can insert clues into the staging.
Davis is directing his own script here. As an author he seems to have
immersed himself so deeply into the world he’s writing about that as a
director he can’t see where missing pieces can confuse or confound.
He has an excellent cast to
work with although they seem to go for line readings that emphasize
exasperation rather than understanding. Dionne Audain invests her
character’s deep religious longings with a sometimes touching dignity.
Chamblee Christian finds the right tone for the impatience of youth trapped
in the responsibilities of adulthood and Cody Jones offers a glimmer of hope
for the future of this extended family in the face of tragedy. The men in
their lives, however, are less fully formed in both the script and in the
performances of Felix Stevenson as the over-bearing corrupter, Frank Britton
as the weakling “Bobo” and a middle school-age actor Jeffrey Wise.
The challenge of coming up
with a satisfying set design for the restrictive space in Theatre on the Run
has been met by Daniel Olds whose substantial, highly detailed single room
set seems to connect well to the world beyond its walls. Larry Rosen adds to
the effect nicely with his lighting design’s inclusion of a porch light
visible out a curtained window on one side and a highlight behind a stained
glass window leading to the symbolic “Mama’s room” to the rear. No credit
appears for costumes, which usually means the cast contributed their own
wardrobe, with the director helping with the choices. The costumes here show
a lot of thought about just how each character would dress. Stevenson’s
manipulative nature is captured in his attention to appearance while
Britton’s slovenliness creates the perfectly opposite impression. So too,
the women’s clothes speak volumes.
Written and Directed by
Jarrin Davis. Design: Daniel Olds (set) Larry Rosen (lights). Cast: Dionne
Audain, Cody Jones, Chamblee Christian, Felix Stevenson, Frank Britton,
Jeffrey Wise. |
