Displaying items by tag: Charly Evon Simpson

As the audience takes its seats we are greeted by an atmosphere of foreboding, a trestle bridge girder to the left, and in the evening air, foggy wisps drift about the stage. Already something is up, but we don’t know what. Just something in Charly Evon Simpson’s captivating and mysterious “Jump.”

Soon enough Fay (Jazzma Pryor is dazzling) takes to the bridge and vapes, her smoke blending into the foggy night. Her vaping becomes ritualistic. Squat, in a high tops and jeans jacket, her braided rows tipped in blonde, Fay takes a drag, then tosses her vape into the gorge like a discarded cigarette butt, then reaches skyward and another vape appears, and she repeats this sleight of hand multiple times. Periodically lights flicker, then the stage goes dark.

Running 90 minutes with no intermission, “Jump” relies on a slow (perhaps too slow) and steady build to a climactic reveal for its forward momentum. And in the next scene, action begins. The porch of a white clapboard house is now the focus. This is Fay’s childhood home, and we learn that her mother passed away some weeks ago. She is to meet her family here to dispose of the household possessions, Dad (Alfred Wilson) is due to arrive soon, but is reliably late.

Then Fay’s older sister Judy (Jennifer Glasse) appears. The two check-in with each other, in a verbal joust that suggests years of tension and a different outlook on life. Judy is polished and well groomed. But they are here for the same purpose, wondering aloud what surprising news Dad will have for them when he arrives.

Oddly, the lights flicker now and then. Fay remarks on it but Judy, oddly, doesn’t register the phenomenon or even respond to Fay’s question about it. Judy disappears into the house, and Fay awaits the arrival of her father, alone.

In later scenes, Judy and Fay explore their shared bedroom from girlhood—Fay is more wistful, Judy less engaged in looking back at their time together, and the loss of their mother and home. When Dad does arrive, he lays out the news alone to Fay on the porch: he is planning on selling the house.

Later, Fay is back on the bridge, alone, vaping again and perhaps meditating on these moments of loss, when we meet the most significant character, the long-haired slacker Hopkins (Jeff Kurysz). A cigarette smoker, Hopkins and Fay find a chemistry in smoking and feeling blue on the bridge. We learn that Hopkins was contemplating a jump from the bridge but Fay’s presence thwarted his plan.

Scenes of these two on the bridge are the best part of the play: a natural engagement of two people, each in their own grief, and the mutual support they glean from knowing at least we are not alone. Kurysz is quite perfect, and Pryor’s performance is exceptional.

The sets by Regina Garcia and Lindsay Mummert are beautifully done, and the lighting by Levi Wilkins and sound by Christopher Kriz are perfectly synched: the flickering lights and crackle of electrical shorts are almost another character in this play.

The acting and sets are really good, the climax gives a surprising and satisfying resolution. But with so little real action, the pace given “Jump” by director AmBer Montgomery leads up to the resolve much too slow. And while “Jump” is about grief, the playwright doesn't register the internal emotional suffering of these grieving individuals. We’re only given the outward effects.

Still, “Jump” is a good theater experience. “Jump” runs through June 1, 2024 at Theater Wit in Chicago.