Displaying items by tag: Goodman Theatre

It’s a tough time to be a straight white male. Playwright Ellen Fairey returns to Chicago with a new play called ‘Support Group for Men’ now running at Goodman Theatre. Fairey’s work was last seen in Chicago when the now defunct Profiles Theatre produced her smash hit ‘Graceland’ in the mid-00s. Directed by one of the city’s foremost directors, Kimberly Senior, this of-the-moment play is certain to hit home for locals.

‘Support Group for Men’ isn’t exactly a winning title, but it does fit the bill. In it, four men of various ages and ethnicities meet weekly to discuss personal problems they’re having. Fairey took the idea from a real-life friend of hers who told her about a support group he went to for lonely men. Without that piece of info from the playbill, this scenario would seem somewhat unplausable. That said, how sad that there are so many lonely people out there that don’t seek company?

Fairey sets her four characters in Wrigleyville. There’s tough guy Roger (Keith Kupferer), new agey Brian (Ryan Kitley), sensitive Delano (Anthony Irons) and token millennial Kevin (Tommy Rivera-Vega), but it’s the entrance of Alex (Jeff Kurysz) in drag that changes the course of the evening. While most of the dialogue is topical and relevant, the jammed-in Chicago references ring very false. Suburbanites may appreciate the cultural shout-outs but really, how many locals actually go to Weiner Circle?

This is not to say the play is bad. Fairey’s characters discuss the things in everyday pop culture that are so fluid for the young, but so confusing for the middle-aged. Her points about middle-aged men feeling winnowed out are devastating. It almost answers the question of “why do people commit mass shootings?”

Roger is established as the main character and his monologue about the realization of middle age and the feeling of being invisible is heartbreaking. Keith Kupferer is perfectly cast for this role. When the Chicago stage needs an everyman, Kupferer is the guy for the job. There’s a toughness to his look, but a wealth of sensitivity just below the surface.

This is a comedy and though it does try to reach for depth, it often comes up empty. The problem here is that Fairey isn’t saying anything that hasn’t already been said better by other writers. Though, it is important for mainstream, suburban audiences to see themselves in a play. If they can’t relate, then how can a play make them see the world differently? Fairey’s play is a light-hearted referendum on male privilege and it’s easier to swallow a little criticism with some comedy. Is this a play everyone in America needs to see? No, but it’s a play that has themes everyone in American should be discussing.

Through July 29 at Goodman Theatre. 170 N Dearborn. 312-443-3811

“I don’t speak for people, I speak to people.” playwright Dael Orlandersmith says in conversation about her new play ‘Until the Flood.’ Orlandersmith’s one-woman show is a docudrama about the ordinary citizens in and around Furguson, Missouri at the time of Michael Brown’s death. ‘Until the Flood’ was shortlisted for the 2018 Pulitzer in addition to its off-Broadway run.

‘Until the Flood’ is a lot like Anna Deveare Smith’s ‘Twilight’ in that it tells a story through monologue's of those involved. Instead of actors playing the people Orlandersmith interviewed, she does them herself. Though the set is sparse, her performance is transformative. With little segue, she moves through a dozen or so monologue's of people from all walks of life. In her play, no one is spared. She shows the depths of unadulterated racism as well as the subtle ways in which people may not even be aware is racism. She never presents a caricature of a type of person, but rather the human quality that has made this person who they are. Orlandersmith’s talent as a performer is that she never loses you. Through gesture and movement, she paints an entire portrait. You know these people.

‘Until the Flood’ concerns itself with the immediate aftermath of the Michael Brown police shooting, but it seems like an allegory for the place we’ve arrived as a country. It’s hard to believe that four years after the riots in Ferguson, there’s still so little accountability in law enforcement. It’s also hard to believe how politicized race relations have become in America since 2014. This play shows us why Trump won, and also hopefully why Trump (and his brand of government) will be tossed out. Even at the darkest moment of this play, there’s still a few moments when Orlandersmith makes you connect with a character. That’s empathy.

This is a brief play. Clocking in at an hour and fifteen minutes, ‘Until the Flood’ makes its point. It’s the kind of play that has so many specific character moments that it would be impossible not to unpack on the way home. That’s exactly what theater should be doing, creating a dialogue about things that are hard to talk about. It’s when we have those discussions that we learn empathy.

"In real life, you're exploited by the moneyed class and then you die." says Petra in Robert Falls' new production of 'An Enemy of the People' at Goodman Theatre. His adaptation of Ibsen's 1882 play, spends two and a half hours exploring the theme of freedom.

"An Enemy of the People" is set in an ambiguous time and place but the highly conceptualized world in which this production exists is familiar. In it, idealistic small-town Doctor Stockmann (Philip Earl Johnson) discovers the water supply is poisoned. Hoping to save the town, he's politically thwarted by his brother the mayor (Scott Jaeck).

Robert Falls adapted the script from a translation by Eleanor Marx-Aveling and it's got some teeth. As Arthur Miller adapted Ibsen's play in 1950 to fit the McCarthy era, Falls aims his at Trumpism. Despite some occasional lapses in subtlety, this version chugs along at an urgent pace. Some liberties are taken with Ibsen's script but, given the current political climate, the topical dialogue fuels the thrilling intensity. Even 130 years later, this play is still a warning.

The square-off between Philip Earl Johnson and Scott Jaeck for the town's soul is all too relevant. Johnson physically exhausts himself trying to scream the truth while a calm and dignified Jaeck lulls the townspeople into submission. They're both so convincing you're almost able to see both sides, which is precisely the danger. Many of the most provocative lines come from Petra played by Rebecca Hurd. Her performance is sincere and brings more depth to the character than just what's in the dialogue.

It's an event when Robert Falls produces a classic at Goodman. 'Enemy of the People' lives up to the hype. As he's done with Chekhov, Falls has a vision for these plays that is far from the faithful productions of yore. It's essential for directors to reinterpret these classics for new eras. It's how a younger generation will connect with Ibsen. This version is well designed and brightly colored. Almost too cheerful for the subject matter. The costumes will leave you unsure of the time period, but that's the point. Whatever the era, the costumes are chic and the sets are memorable. This isn't your average period piece melodrama.

This production is exciting from beginning to end. There's not a moment of dead air. The dialogue is fresh and mirrors the absurd hypocrisy of our times. There's a lot of lightness in this play, and it's not until afterward that the darkness of its themes settle in. That might be one of it's strongest assets, it's so engaging you forget how bleak the conclusion is. If you don't leave this play angry, there's probably something wrong with you.

Through April 15th at Goodman Theatre 170 North Dearborn. 312-443-5151

Before I set foot in the Goodman’s Owen Theatre to see the Chicago premier of Sarah DeLappe’s acclaimed play The Wolves, I tried not to read or hear or learn too much about it. I knew it had been a finalist for a Pulitzer, and won other awards. I knew it was about a girls’ high school soccer team. And that was about it.

The first tidbit informed my own expectations – this ought to be good, I figured. And the second informed who I’d bring along – my own 14-year-old soccer-playing daughter. I was excited that the subject matter might excite her, sure, but was more intent on using her as a litmus test for not just the play’s quality, but its authenticity. And boy, did we both find that it delivered on both counts.

While the play’s 20-something playwright and cast might seem like whippersnappers to an old dude like me, their ilk are positively elderly to a teen. After the play, my daughter admitted she’d been worried that the presentation would be the usual – what old people think young life is like these days. But The Wolves portrayed young life – the young life of today, of yesterday, of time eternal – in a way both dad and daughter found realistic. That is, the play portrayed life realistically.

Sarah DeLappe’s script sets up this portrayal like a champ. After the play, I read that DeLappe was influenced by old war movies – the kind where a gang of guys gain personal revelations in the face of greater situations – and I can see that. I also sensed the influence of 12 Angry Men or Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs – art that finds greater truths by plopping a disparate troupe of characters into a script. But instead of machine guns and military rations, instead of a jury room or a bank heist, the troupe on the Goodman’s stage was armed with shin guards and phones and backpacks and headbands. But the idea was the same – flesh out a story by fleshing out the people telling it. DeLappe tells her story through her girls’ banter as they stretch and warmup before a series of soccer games. Her gift for said banter is something else – making it sound like how not just girls talk, but how people talk, as the characters flit from discussions of world events to feminine products, from hopes and dreams for the future to the sex and sexuality that seems so pressing in their present. Talk goes from Pol Pot to periods, from weirdoes who live in “yogurts” to punk rock chicks who lick coffeehouse microphones. The stuff real people talk about. And how real people talk about that stuff.

And, more than any play I can remember, director Vanessa Stalling’s production of a team shows it takes a team to pull it off. First off, the cast is great. Those grown-up ladies onstage could totally, like, pass as a gaggle of teen girls. And that’s not to belittle them or the material they’re working with. Most likely because I’m a nerd, myself, I connected with Sarah Price’s neurotic know-it-all, #11 (yes, the characters are only identified by jersey number, further enforcing the team concept, and further highlighting how both script and cast breathe life into these nameless roles). As the team captain, #25, Isa Arciniegas is – to continue the earlier war motif – Pattonesque in a Napoleanic package. Cydney Moody’s #8 is the moody one. Angela Alise’s #00 is the lonely goalkeeper. Erin O’Shea is the red-headed, homeschooled, yogurt-livin’ outsider (think Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls, except with mad ball-handling skills). And the heart and soul of the team are Natalie Joyce and Aurora Real de Asua. Joyce’s #7 has the mouth of a sailor but the problems and insecurities of a girl, while #14 is the ego to 7’s adolescent id. The teammates kick around conversations as feverishly and randomly as they do their soccer balls, again making it sound not just like how high school girls talk, but how people interact.

The teamwork on display does not stop with the script and its interpreters, however. Collette Pollard’s set gave this soccer dad, who’s spent too much time hanging out at fields both outdoors and under domes, flashbacks. Lighting by Keith Parham is spot on, as are the musical choices by sound designer Mikhail Fiksel, both providing energy and intensity that match the actors’.

And so, this whole team comes together to not just tell a story of young girls, but of people. What starts as dissonant and diverse digressions between types and tropes turns into a realistic back-and-forth you’d hear not just on the field or in the mall or in a classroom, but at work, on the train, in the checkout line, on the street. Given great material to work with, the cast and crew of the Goodman Theatre’s production of Sarah DeLappe’s The Wolves give us something that’s funny, sad, uncomfortable, cute, ugly, and beautiful – that is, art that pulls off the rare feat of feeling like real life. And, like, my teen daughter seconds that!

*Extended through March 18th

Who’d have thought a Cuban-born playwright could endear an auditorium of liberals to Ronald Reagan. Rogelio Martinez’s new play ‘Blind Date’ is a fictionalized account of the very real first meeting between Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev (William Dick) and President Ronald Reagan (James D. Farruggio). Robert Falls returns to the Goodman to direct this world premiere.

Billed as a comedy, some will wonder what could be funny about a world on the brink of nuclear war? As it turns out, quite a bit. ‘Blind Date’ is basically a drawing room comedy. Most of the scenes are two-person conversations between the various historic players of the time. Beginning with US Secretary of State George Schultz (Jim Ortlieb) and Soviet foreign minister Eduard Shevardnadze (Steve Pickering) all the way up to the fateful meeting between Gorbachev and Reagan in Geneva.

The narrative structure of this piece is interesting. In some cases, cast members speak their opinions directly to the audience. In other instances, there’s narration by way of British biographer Edmund Morris (Thomas J. Cox). The narration serves the playwright’s thesis that even his own biographer didn’t really understand Reagan. The asides are more often a conveyance for one-liners. Though, they do provide insight into the mindset of the Soviets and Americans in these meetings.

It’s no surprise that Falls has assembled some of Chicago’s foremost actors for this new play. Deanna Dunagan plays Nancy Reagan, in a nearly perfect likeness no less, while Goodman favorite Mary Beth Fisher plays Raisa Gorbachev. The two first ladies share a scene in which almost nothing of consequence is discussed, but the slight backhanded compliments and fuss made over tea bags versus loose leaf underscore how tenuous relations between the super powers were. Each thinking themselves superior in domesticity and political ideology. Scenes featuring Dunagan and Fisher are the most engaging as the dialogue sharpens to a point. What few may consider is how much influence these two women had over their husbands. Despite contradicting opinions, both sides desperately wanted to see an end to the nuclear arms race. A noble idea that has unfortunately taken a wrong turn since the mid-80s.

There’s danger in glorifying Ronald Reagan as an innocuous savior from nuclear war. His optimism regarding the Soviets was certainly helpful but in the end, the Soviet Union collapsed from a failing economy, not Reagan’s pro-Democracy initiatives. And yes, it’s easy to look at Reagan and think, at least he’s not our current president, but let’s not forget the homophobic blind eye his administration turned toward the AIDS crisis, and the lasting effects of the unsuccessful war on drugs.

This play is a lot like an average Oscar-bait movie. You know the type: polished historical drama about a specific section of history, usually starring high profile British actors like Judi Dench. Ones that you know you should see, but probably won’t. It’s okay for a play to be ephemeral. In this case, the global nuclear stakes are so high right now that it’s vital for Americans to understand how serious even the tiniest miscommunication could be. It’s important for Americans to remember what diplomacy looked like. Think of the current president’s impulsive behavior on Twitter. Rogelio Martinez’s play may make you giggle at Reagan’s loveable weirdness, but the gravity of this meeting with Gorbachev in 1986 should frighten us all. These were poor leaders who made a very smart decision. It’s a terrifying shame our current leaders would rather go back in time.

At Goodman Theatre through February 25th. 170 N Dearborn. 312-443-3811

Chicago has no shortage of Christmas traditions. In other words, if you’re looking for holiday fun it’s not very hard to find something to do with your friends, significant other or family. Rich traditions such as Zoolights at Lincoln Park Zoo, Joffrey’s Nutcracker, Christkindlmart, Christmas film classics at Music Box, and the official Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony in Millennium Park are fantastic choices that are sure to put a little zest into your holiday spirit, but Goodman Theatre’s A Christmas Carol might have to top the list.

Celebrating its 40th year of warming hearts through the holidays, this year’s production of A Christmas Carol might just be the best yet. Larry Yando returns to Goodman as Ebenezer Scrooge, a role he has taken on with brilliance for the past nine years. Yando is just about as fun to watch as it gets from his miserable, miserly like behavior to his reborn childlike love of humanity after three spirits visit him to show him his past, present and future.

As the story by Charles Dickens goes, Scrooge is a man with little heart. He is a man who pinches every penny, treats his employee like a flunky without mercy, as he works his fingers to the bone, wants nothing to do with his remaining family and has nothing but miserable rebuttals for those who wish him a Merry Christmas, replying with “Bah Humbug!” When his former, and now deceased, partner, a man much like Scrooge appears to him on Christmas Eve to warn him of his horrid ways and the cost it has on so many and will on himself, we learn that Scrooge will be visited by three spirits – Christmas Past, Christmas Present and Christmas Future.

As each spirit visits Scrooge, more and more is revealed about his nature. He remembers he didn’t start out as he is now. He was a good-natured boy with hopes and dreams once upon a time. In the present he sees how those who know him feel about him. Though mean and cruel to many, they still thank him and toast to him. He see’s the hardships his mistreated employee Bob Cratchit and his family face on his meek salary. He is obviously embarrassed as they still find reasons to be thankful to Scrooge. He sees a future that is bleak. He is just a miserly old man quickly forgotten.

“Are these the things that will be or the things that may happen?” He asks the spirit, hoping for a chance to redeem himself.

While Yando undoubtedly is a tour de force in the role as Scrooge, the entire cast is a powerhouse. Ron E. Rains is highly believable as the tenderhearted Bob Cratchit and is easy to feel for almost immediately. Joe Foust as Jacob Marley is also tremendous as is Lisa Gaye Dixon who wows the audience with her incredibly strong performance as the Ghost of Christmas Present. Kareem Bandealy also gives the production a strong assist as he skillfully fields a handful of roles including that as the show’s narrator, Topper and a hopeful young Scrooge who misses his chance at love choosing a chance at making more money instead -a decision that haunts him his entire life.

The ever-changing set is visually stunning as it changes from Scrooge’s house interior (curtains surrounding his bed and all) to the Cratchit’s humble kitchen where the room is crowded as the family sits around a table to eat a meager portion of roast duck for Christmas. Stars shine amongst the blackness as Christmas Present takes Scrooge on a ride he’ll never forget.

Goodman also breaks the mold casting a girl in the role of Tiny Tim Cratchit. Fourth grader Paris Strickland who delivers the famous line at show’s end “God bless us, every one” is excited to play Tiny Tim telling the Chicago Tribune, “I feel excited and proud of myself for getting a really inspiring role. Tiny Tim can bring hope to everyone, and I can bring hope to everyone.”

Goodman’s A Christmas Carol is not only rich tradition in Chicago, it is a fun-filled holiday treat that is sure to warm the heart and remind us that giving is better than receiving.

Highly recommended.

A Christmas Carol is being performed in the Albert Theatre at Goodman Theatre through December 31st. For more show information visit www.goodmantheatre.org.

Playwright Rohina Malik and director Ann Filmer have reunited and have collaborated on something special. Goodman Theatre’s current run of Yasmina's Necklace is one of my favorite plays of 2017. Here's why. 

In Yasmina’s Necklace, we are treated to a uniquely told love story that is as moving as it is thoughtful. It is funny, and it is beautifully staged. A story this wonderfully crafted and so well acted that delivers such a poignant message only comes around so often.

Yasmina and her father, Musa, are refugees from Iraq and they meet an upper middle-class family in Chicago who are looking for a wife for their divorced son Sam. We are reminded that it is very common in the Muslim faith to have an arranged marriage, prompting one of my favorite lines from the play, "real love comes after marriage, not before." 

Sam, played to perfection by Michael Perez, had moved away from the Islamic faith and married a non-Muslim American. He talks a bit about the challenges he had after the marriage and the many medications he had to be on due to his infidelity. Yet he strives for all things you would see in someone who is first generation like acclimating to the Western culture by changing his name, as well as pushing himself in his career. 

The true magic happens in the connection Sam makes with Yasmina, who is wonderfully played by Susaan Jamshidi, but the two didn't start off so smoothly. Yasmina is a thirty-four-year-old woman who is empowered, self-aware, an artist. This is not a common perspective you see of Muslim woman and I loved how Yasmina pushed back on what she wanted and strived to help others not only in Baghdad but also in Chicago. 

What drew me to the play immediately was the simplicity and peace shown around the Islamic faith. In today's society, I believe this is the most misunderstood religion even with close to two billion followers globally. The journey Yasmina and her father made to the United States from war torn Baghdad was something no human should ever experience. War is ugly, cruel, and unjust. The play is able to highlight the challenges of being a refugee and painted a vividly raw picture of what they went through. 

You have a bit of everything in this play that I could go on and on about but want you to experience for yourself. All the ingredients are in place for a thoroughly engaging production that will touch your heart, make you laugh and is sure to enlighten. I highly recommend Yasmina's Necklace.

Yasmina’s Necklace is being performed at the Goodman's Theatre through November 19th. Tickets range from $10-40. Yasmina’s Necklace has an approximate running time of two hours including one intermission. Oh, there is a special surprise at the closing for all the Bruce Springsteen fans out there. 

For more show information visit www.goodmantheatre.org.

The Goodman Theatre almost never includes a show in their subscriber season that they haven’t developed themselves. Dutch director Ivo van Hove began his vivid production of Arthur Miller’s “A View from the Bridge” in London before bringing it to Broadway in 2016. It went on to win the Tony Award for best revival. Goodman artistic director Robert Falls requisitioned the work for Chicago prior to the Broadway run. Some may remember van Hove’s contribution to the Goodman’s 2009 Eugene O’Neill Fest. His arresting version of “Mourning Becomes Electra” performed entirely in Dutch was a sure stand out.

Ivo van Hove’s vision for Arthur Miller is uniquely his own in that it’s nothing like you’ve ever seen. If a standard Miller production bores you, then imagine an electric guitar version of Miller. The scenery and scene changes have been cut and what’s left is a minimalist masterclass in strong directorial choices. Minimalism doesn’t mean a lack of spectacle. The white cube contains the play to a small portion of the stage, allowing for audience members to sit right on stage. Each movement of this highly choreographed production creates a stunning visual.

Suffice it to say, you’ll never see “A View from the Bridge” like this again. van Hove’s intention is to create an “ultimate” version of classic American works through a European lens. What he reflects back is interesting. The concluding scene is a work of installation art, and leaves you with an unsettling feeling that we are but animals battling it out at the bottom. As with his interpretation of O’Neill’s “Mourning Becomes Electra”, van Hove is unafraid of heightening the subtle sexuality in the script. The blocking between Catherine (Catherine Combs) and Eddie Carbone (Ian Bedford) is highly suggestive and pushes the envelope even further than Miller had in 1953.

There’s no scenery, no costumes and no tricks for this cast to hide behind. Since the New York production, some of the parts have been recast, but many have not. Catherine Combs reprises her role as Catherine, but is no stranger to the Goodman stage. Combs’ performance is transfixing. She’s able to balance the juvenile qualities of a young girl in a falsetto, but convey the deep-voiced desires of a woman with an unexpected control. Playing her adoptive mother Beatrice, Andrus Nichols, commands each scene. The script would make this character a weakling, unable to stand up to her hulking husband. Nichols brings a hardened strength to the role that propels the final scenes to full throttle.

This production will stick with you. With our nation’s president touting severe immigration reform, this play comes at a critical point in history. Arthur Miller wrote plays that addressed social issues. In many ways Eddie Carbone is how Miller saw America, as something afraid of change. When we hear white supremacists chanting “You will not replace us” on national TV, it’s hard not to draw comparisons. This is an essential play for our times. Ivo van Hove has created a striking and extremely intense version of “A View from the Bridge” that Arthur Miller himself would applaud.

Through October 15th at the Goodman Theatre. 170 North Dearborn. 312-443-3811

*Now extended through October 22nd

In Ah Wilderness, Eugene O’Neill tackles the emotional struggles of an upper middle class family, with sibling rivalries and marital and romantic dynamics that ring true today.

Goodman Theatre’s current production struck gold, however, with Niall Cunningham - he's a TV star of Life in Pieces - in the lead role as a teenage boy struggling to establish his independence from his family, amid the discovery of romance.

The play is set on July 4, 1906, though it was written in 1932, and was said to be dashed off rather quickly by the playwriight. O’Neill is more familiar for his darker, plays like The Iceman Cometh, Mourning Becomes Electra, or Long Day’s Journey into Night. Ah Wilderness is a lighter affair, O’Neill’s only comedy and produced less frequently, it throws a different light on his mastery as a playwright.  

With a 15-member cast, Ah Wilderness centers on the tribulations of the 16-year-old Richard Miller (Niall Cunningham's role), whose fevered passions have been ignited by emotionally charged and sexually suggestive writing of Byron and Wilde. Their poetry was considered risqué in small town America. At the time the country was swept up in efforts at prohibition, driven by the rise of evangelical Protestantism and its view of saloon culture as corrupt and ungodly.

It’s a perfect summer play, set at a waterside cottage, and Ah Wilderness contrasts this young love with the unrequited passion by the teen’s Uncle, and the mature and settled love of his parents. The show is a major production, and Steve Scott’s direction is pitch perfect.

The big score, though, is Cunningham as a poetry-obsessed teenager who is driven to a night of rebellion, expressed in this case by accompanying a buddy of his older brother (Travis Knight plays that pretentious, pipe-smoking collegiate brother, Arthur Miller) to a bawdy house – where he drinks and gets himself into trouble.

Cunningham, 22 in real life, gives a most credible and informed performance to the conflicted teenager riddled with angst. He is butting against the newly found hypocrisy of everyday life, and has been driven off the edge when his young neighbor and romantic interest, Muriel McComber (Ayssette Muñoz) sends a Dear John letter. As we suspect, her father made her write it, and the two are later reconciled, with Shakespearean-flavored romantic jousting.   

The rest of the cast is evenly excellent. While the characters on some levels must play foils for Cunningham's Miller, O'Neill explores with some tenderness the seasoned love of the family patriarch (Randall Newsome as Nat Miller) and matriarch (Ora Jones is wonderful as Essie Miller), and that of the unrequited love of the maternal uncle (Larry Bates as Sid Davis) and paternal aunt (Kate Fry brings depth to Lily Miller).  

The set (Todd Rosenthal) is classic and beautifully portrays its time, while also functioning seamlessly (along with lighting by Aaron Spivey) to move us from scene to scene. Costumes (Amy Clark) are exquisitely detailed.

Ah, Wilderness!, which runs at the Goodman through July 23, shows off O'Neill's skillfulness and his ability to charm the audience. It is highly recommended.

Objects in the Mirror, an outstanding play having its premier at Goodman Theatre, will soon have you wanting to know more about its author, Charles Smith, a Chicago playwright.  

Starring Daniel Kyri as Shedrick Yarkpai, this play springs from the true story of the real life Yarkpai, a refugee who fled Liberia in the aftermath of its first Civil War, struggling for 12 years across hostile terrain and through refugee camps in Guinea and Cote d’Ivoire.

Excellent performances and a creative set and lighting make this a show not to miss, especially for the wonderful writing of Charles Smith. Breon Arzell plays cousin Zaza Workolo; Ryan Kitley is Rob Mosher; and Lily Mojekwu as Shedrick’s mother Luopu Workolo is just spectacular – she steals all her scenes.

The real life Shedrick Yarkpai eventually made his way to Adelaide, Australia, and as fate would have it became an actor. And so, playwright Smith met him and heard his tale while staging another of his plays there - Free Man of Color (it won a 2004 Jeff Award and has been staged widely, including the Goodman).

Shedrick Yarkpai’s passage through the wilderness alone would be a worthy story, bringing our attention to the privation in Liberia wrought by years of civil chaos. But this play would not succeed as it does, unless it can hold our attention and keep us in our seats. 

And here Smith’s skillful craft shines through, along with director Chuck Smith and the creative team, who have turned the years-long odyssey of the protagonists, Shedrick and his uncle John Workolo (Allen Gilmore is terrific) – they ate grass, lived in the bush, both life and limbs, literally, endangered by violent, machete wielding warriors – and condensed it into an engaging trek, showing geography, educating us on the history, but all in an entertaining way, unlikely as this may seem.

Objects in the Mirror is so much more than a topical recount of Liberian suffering and struggle. Smith also puts before us the psychological and emotional toll on all refugees who must give up so much of their culture, and themselves, in resettling. Among the things so striking about Smith’s play is how he holds our interest in Shedrick’s odyssey. But he subordinates it to a more charged dramatic concern: the personal compromises refugees must make in escaping, and losses that can never be reclaimed.

In a way that only theater can, we engage and experience the personal emotional stress. And while we know of the trauma, what Smith conveys is the suffering from loss of identity, and of dreams. Shedrick has adopted a false identity to make it through border crossings – but he regrets the loss of his name.

Shedrick is a dreamer. He is also a storyteller, as is Smith, and the characters he has created. "Through storytelling, the play ascends to a powerful examination of truth and falsity, and the powers of persuasion. All good stories tell a strand of the truth," says Uncle John.

Once in Adelaide, Yarkpai finds work with a supportive Australian government agent – but Shedrick’s uncle John is fearful it will blow their cover. The debate through several scenes in which different characters tell their version of the parts of Shedrick's story is the stuff of great theater. 

The creative team includes Riccardo Hernandez (set design), Mike Tutaj (projection design), John Culbert (lighting design), Birgit Rattenborg Wise (costume design), Ray Nardelli (sound design). Briana J. Fahey is the production stage manager.

Objects in the Mirror runs through June 4 at the Goodman Theatre. It is highly recommended.