Displaying items by tag: Ron OJ Parsons

Decades before the enactment of Title IV, famous for its impact on expanding opportunities for women and girls in sports and well before the inaugural game of the WNBA, an African American women became the first to play for a professional baseball team.

“Toni Stone”, written by award winning playwright Lydia Diamond is receiving a rip-rousing production at the Goodman Theatre. Arguably, this is Lydia Diamond’s finest work, and that is saying a mouthful. She has consistently written engaging, thought-provoking work, adding beauty and depth to the American theatre canon.

We meet Toni Stone as she introduces herself and her teammates in a circus like atmosphere. She narrates the story of her life with The Indianapolis Clowns, a baseball team much like the Harlem Globetrotters. Although they play baseball and are darn good at it, their main job is to entertain. This was before African Americans were allowed to play in the all-white baseball leagues. We meet a cast of characters that are the most interesting characters I’ve seen on stage in a very long time.

Diamond wrote Stone as a beautifully complex, conflicted character. I don’t believe Toni Stone ever saw herself as sexual. She knew she wasn’t a man, but she also knew she was so much more than what was expected of a woman. She saw herself simply as a baseball player. She expected everyone to see her as a baseball player. When she meets Alberga, a male suitor that falls in love with her, she is thrown a curveball. Along with her only woman friend Millie, she navigates life as a baseball player and wife. Baseball came easy, being a wife was a bit more challenging.

This is Toni’s story, but it couldn’t be told without the assistance of a team of rambunctious, opinionated, athletic men. Under award-winning director Ron OJ Parsons’ assured and exuberant direction we are transported back to the late 1940’s.

With the help of movement director, Cristin Carole, Parson’s has his cast dancing, singing, juggling and doing acrobatics as if by second nature. This is a fun show to watch. The Actors morph into a variety of characters with striking ease.

It would be unfair not to mention some of the uniformly excellent the cast by name. Tracey Bonner is a joy as Toni Stone. Her warmth and enthusiasm are evident in this role. It’s hard to think of another actress embodying this character. The outrageously talented Edgar Miguel Sanchez plays a bookish Spec with steely resolve. Kai A. Ealy fresh off the Court stage in “The Island” gives us an energetic King Tut. Travis A. Knight goes from team bus driver Stretch to team owner Syd Pollock effortlessly. Chike Johnson brings a tender effect to Alberga, Toni’s admirer/husband. It was good seeing Chike on stage in Chicago again. Jon Hudson Odom plays a drunk ballplayer and Millie, Toni’s friend and confidant. The character of Millie could have gone too many ways of wrong, but for the writing of Diamond, the direction of Parsons and the acting expertise of Odom. Odom played Millie so understated that it was sublime and never caricature.

Todd Rosenthal’s set of a dugout with bleachers is masterful. This set has lots of surprises, with projections by Mike Tutaj it becomes the team bus, a boardroom, a bar but mostly a baseball playing field. Keith Parham’s lighting design was as high energy as the set, blinding white lights reminiscent of a summer day in the ballpark, quiet country roads at midnight.

Toni Stone was honored by the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991 and was inducted into the Women’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1993. Although we have made inroads in sports, to date there are no women playing professional major league baseball.

Not only is this an entertaining piece of theatre, it’s also an important piece of theatre. How often does that happen?

When: Through Feb. 26

Where: Goodman Albert Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn

Tickets: $25 - $45

Info: goodmantheatre.org

August Wilson is best known for a series of 10 plays known as the “Pittsburgh cycle” which chronicle the African American experience in America. For me, Wilson’s greater achievement is giving voice to African American men. Grown African American men over a certain age. Wilson allows his male characters to achieve something he didn’t achieve ...old age. Mr. Wilson died in 2005 at the relatively young age of 60. It is unfathomable what he would have written if given another 10 years. Sadly, too few playwrights write and value older Black men as Wilson did.

“Two Trains Running” takes place during the turbulent 60’s. 1969 to be exact. A time when for every action there is an equal and opposite action. Think Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King. Think LBJ’s war on poverty and Black neighborhoods being burned to the ground. The 1960’s was a time when there were always two distinct trains of thought running at the same time. Wilson made the best of these times without making a boring historical drama. Let’s face it, Black folks had a hard time in the 60’s.

The setting is the Hill District diner of Memphis Lee, scheduled for demolition but not before the city pays the asking price. Memphis (A.C. Smith, in a performance he will be long remembered for) is a recently single man since his wife walked out on him. It doesn’t take long to figure out why. He treats his sole employee Riza like she is a maid. Memphis is a man who remembers what it was like to live in the south, he often mentions it. You would think that he would treat his employee better because of what he has gone through, but no, he subjugates her until you almost feel sorry. Almost.

Riza, (in a strong performance by Kierra Bunch) gives as well as she can take, and she takes a lot. Nothing bothers Riza she has seen it all. She has scarred her legs to deter the attention of men to no avail.  Although she wants the best casket for her friend, she refuses to view the body. Again, those two trains of thought at play.

Holloway (played with wisdom by Alfred Wilson) has some of the evening’s most profound lines as well as some of the funniest. There is a line about the Undertaker West burying people with the same suit that is hilarious. Alfred Wilson has a finely developed sense of humor, and it is put to excellent use here.

Ronald L. Connor cast as neighborhood predator/numbers runner Wolf is a stroke of genius. In a big ass afro it would be easy for Connor to slip into caricature, but he keeps this character real and recognizable. Despite constantly being told not to play numbers in the diner by Memphis. Memphis is one of his most reliable customers…again, two trains of thought. Wolf knowing how seemingly dangerous Sterling is has no problem selling him a gun, on credit no less.

Some of the most beautiful scenes in this play were done by Jerrod Haynes as Sterling and Joseph Primes as Hambone.  Jerrod is a scary Sterling on first meeting him. He has no problem telling anyone who would listen he just got out of the penitentiary. He’s the kind of guy that takes what he wants and is very sure of himself. He operates on no pretense. Joseph Primes has a face that tells one everything they need to know. His Hambone was aware. His Hambone was a fighter. Since I’ve seen the play several times before I concentrated on Hambone when he wasn’t talking. A million things were going thru his head, and they all came back to “I want my ham”. The story of the ham is two trains of thought, Lutz offered Hambone a chicken to paint his fence and if he did a really good job, Lutz said he would get a ham. Hambone felt he did a really good job, Lutz thought different.

Rounding out this coterie of characters is West, the Funeral Owner. In an unrecognizable role Cedric Young reminds us of how he got rich and how he’s gonna stay rich.

The period costumes were done by Christine Pascual…They were excellent. The costumes never got in the way of the story. These characters were real. A special shout to Christine for making sure Riza wasn’t in an afro. In 1969, women were hot-combing their hair and trying to look like Diana Ross and The Supremes. The set by Jack Magaw with the small details informed you that this is Pittsburgh.

Ron O.J. Parsons has done a marvelous job as usual. Proving he knows this language better than just about anyone in Chicago. There are performances here that will last forever “Two Trains Running” is a play one listens to. It stays with you a very long time.

Thru June 12^th at Court Theatre.