Mabel Madness

Reviewed by A.J. Muhammad

Image sourced by Urban Stages

There aren’t enough accolades to describe the treasure that is Trezana Beverley who starred as the real life singer Mabel Mercer in “Mabel Madness,” an elegant solo-show that was also written by Beverley and produced by Urban Stages Theater.

Mercer was the biracial British born singer who came to prominence in first half of the 20th century and was the muse to composers and a generation of recording artists. In "Mabel Madness," we meet Mercer in her later years waiting for a meeting with a promoter who promises to revive her career. She then flashes back to her childhood in the U.K. as the daughter of a young single mother who was an itinerate singer, and a Black vaudeville performer. As a young woman she relocated to Paris during the 1920 and 1930s and made a name for herself performing her signature style of singing while seated. It was there that she encountered a host of celebrities including Marlene Deitrich and the African American performer Ada Smith aka ”Bricktop” who took over as the owner of the venue where Mercer sang and also became one of Mercer’s close friends. 

Fearing for her safety, Mercer fled pre-war WWII Europe for New York City where she quickly became a fixture on the nightclub scene. The grueling demands on her and long hours proved taxing on her voice and spirits. A trip to the Caribbean to recover from her health conditions without her identification documents made her unable to re-enter the country for three years. While there, a sympathetic queer singer, Kelsey Pharr, proposed marriage so that Mercer could finally return to the states.  Mercer agreed to the platonic union, but later found love and counted Frank Sinatra, who learned the techniques to deliver a song from her, among her suitors. 

Beverley outlines enough details about Mercer’s life to fill the show’s 90 minute running time and played a host of secondary characters with considerable skill. She recreated a bygone era in two continents and included both racial and familial issues into the narrative to flesh out Mercer. Beverley, in excellent voice, performed a dozen of standards by composers such as Cole Porter, The Gershwins, Dubose Hewyard, and others.  Kudos to musical direction and off stage accompaniment by Tuffus Zimbabwe.

Although in the context of the show having Beverley seated for long stretches makes sense, she could have used staging that was more dynamic and less static, as well as a bigger stage to fit her larger than life talents and Mercer’s incredible stories. Tech quality, including projections and video, underscored Mercer’s recollections nicely.  Here’s to an encore!

"Mabel Madness" written by Trezana Beverley. Directed by Frances Hill and Peter Napolitano. Musical Direction: Tuffus Zimbabwe.  Costume Design: Tabitha Pease. Lighting Designer: Christina Watanabe. Video Designer: Nicholas Blade Guldner. Technical Director: Douglas Mills. Choreographer: Brenna Hughes. Production Stage Manager: Jill Woodward. Ran from Feb 19- April 10, 2016 at Urban Stages Theater.  259 W. 30th St. NYC. 

Head of Passes

Reviewed by Daphnie Sicre

Do you want to take a master acting class with Phylicia Rashad? Then go see "Head of Passes."

Image Sourced by
The Public Theater

Having premiered at the Steppenwolf, and in a co-production with Berkeley Repertory Theatre, The Public opened Tarell Alvin McCraney’s latest on March 15, 2016. Extended after being chosen as a New York Times Critic’s Picks, it will run until May 1, 2016. But before you rush to get your tickets, expect the unexpected.

MacArthur “Genius” Award recipient McCraney starts his story in the distant present Head of Passes, Mississippi, where the tides are growing and storms are on the rise. On the eve of Shelah’s birthday (Rashad), her two sons, Aubrey (Francois Battiste) and Spencer (J Bernard Calloway) have planned a surprise party and invited close friends and family. Unfortunately, having not visited lately, they discover the home has been neglected for years, and torrential leaks have taken over the décor. Quickly assembling buckets and covers, family friends Crier (Kyle Beltran), Creaker (John Earl Jelks), and Mae (Arnetia Walker) assist Shelah with the drips. With the foundations of the home cracking, the metaphors for the play are evident from the get-go.

Intertwined between domestic drama and myth, the first act reads like a typical August Wilson play, but don’t be fooled, the second act quickly turns the play into a Greek tragedy with messengers and all. When you think you are starting to get to know the characters, you don’t. For example, act one quickly introduces Cookie (Alana Arenas) Shelah’s late husband’s illegitimate crack addicted-stealing daughter, whom Shelah raised as her own.  Her arrival causes tension amongst the siblings and one expects a traditional family drama to unfold. Dr. Anderson (Robert Joy) also unexpectedly joins the dinner part and reveals Shelah’s cancer, but instead of unraveling these characters, act two disbands all relationships formed during act one and places Rashad front and center. The disappearance of these characters dissipates character buildup or attachment. Yet, McCraney might have done this on purpose, leaving Rashad for almost the entire second act in a beautiful mystical world submerged by the Mississippi waters.

Although the show feels like two separate plays, director Tina Landau manages to tell both stories and intertwines them thanks to Rashad’s powerful performance. But if not for Rashad’s masterful take on Shelah, the play would not be as successful.

"Head of Passes" by Tarell Alvin McCraney. Directed by Tina Landau. Set Design: G. W. Mercier Costume Design: Toni-Leslie James. Lighting Design: Jeff Croite. sound by Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen; wig and hair design by Robert-Charles Vallance; production stage manager, Lori Lundquist. At The Public Theatre, 425 Lafayette Street, at Astor Place, Manhattan; 212-967-7555, publictheater­.org. Running time: 2 hours.

Daphnie Sicre is a full-time instructor at BMCC-CUNY, where she teaches courses in theatre, social justice, and advanced public speaking.  Some of her NYC directing credits include: "Shower Me" at FringeNYC, "Stranger" for Stage Black where she won a Best Director Award and the Audelco nominated "Not About Eve." 

House Rules

Image Sourced by
A. Rey Pamatmat

Reviewed by A.J. Muhammad

Two close knit and neighboring New York City based Filipino American families whose American born children are faced with the mortality of their elder parents in A. Rey Pamatmat’s new play “House Rules,” a production of Ma-Yi Theater Company. Patriarch Ernie (an impish Jojo Gonzalez) has two sons Rod (James Yaegashi) and JJ (Jeffrey Omura); and matriarch Vera (the always vibrant Mia Katigbak) has adversarial daughters, the neurologist Momo (Tiffany Villarin) and photographer Twee (Tina Chilip).

At the top of the play, Ernie falls ill, leaving his cardiologist son Rod to care for him in the hospital (where Momo is also employed). The thanks that Rod gets is to constantly be berated by his father. Ernie would rather prefer a visit from the “good son” JJ.  Not only is Rod dealing with his father’s declining health, he is also crushed when his wishy washy Caucasian boyfriend and colleague Henry -- who really is twee -- has broken up with him; and JJ loses his lucrative job at a comic book company (think Marvel Comics) in LA then returns to NYC to crash with Rod. Both brothers resent their father for his cruel treatment of them during their childhood.  JJ, who suffers from an early career crisis, can’t bring himself to visit his father and later falls for Twee. Meanwhile the stylish and extroverted Twee, who has blown grant money on a trip to India, returns broke and stays at her mother’s home where she relentlessly taunts the introverted goody two-shoes younger sis Momo who Twee feels is mom’s favorite. Momo’s attempt to preserve their Filipino culture by learning how to cook and teaching herself Tagalog is often the cause of Twee’s harangues. This leaves Vera to play the peacemaker between her squabbling daughters and defend her friend Ernie's legacy to his sons when JJ goes off about his dad.  This places Vera in a health predicament of her own.

The board, card and traditional games that characters play in “House Rules” can be viewed as a metaphor for the games and traditions that we learn from our parents and that siblings and friends teach other. Each generation of parents change the rules of the game of parenting and how do we change the game from morphing into our parents? Or, is this a losing game?

Pamatmat has a lot of ideas in his game book, but the challenge faced by him and his director Ralph B. Peña is integrating these ideas into a wholly compelling stage play, whereas “House Rules” seems like a theatricalized screenplay. It’s hard for us to invest in a play that simmers and doesn’t start boiling in until late in the game.

Pamatmat is served well by his cast who do uniformly good jobs with his naturalistic writing. Reid Thompson’s loft like set design allows us to see simultaneous action; Oliver Wason’s lighting zeroes in during moments of intimacy and adds color and warmth to HERE Art Center’s expansive ground floor black box theater. Veteran sound designer Fabian Obispo’s jazzy percussive score matched the rhythm of the quick scene shifts that initially established all of the characters in different locations, but grew repetitive.

House Rules and Danai Gurira’s “Familiar,” which both ran Off-Broadway at the same time, portray tensions between first generation Americans and their immigrant parents, the cost of assimilation has on the psyches of parents and their children, and sibling rivalries. Both incorporate the beauty and sound of other languages (Shona in “Familiar” and Tagalog in “House Rules”) into the plays. Like “Familiar,” which premiered regionally and was reportedly revised before arriving in New York City, Pamatmat could stand to rework “House Rules” so that it is more impactful and leaves ticket holders feeling like they have the winning hand.

"House Rules" by A. Rey Pamatmat. Directed by Ralph B. Peña.  Costume Design: Martin Schnellinger. Lighting Design: Oliver Wason. Sound Design: Fabian Obispo. Production Stage Manager: Jennifer Delac. Ran from March 25 - April 16, 2016 at HERE, 145 6th Avenue.