By: Paulanne Simmons
December 18, 2019: Greater Clements, by Samuel D. Hunter, directed by Davis McCallum; and Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven by Stephen Adly Guirgis, directed by John Ortiz have both opened this season, the first at Atlantic Theater Company’s Linda Gross Theater, the second at Lincoln Center’s Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater. Both are about three hours long But the shows have much more in common.
Both shows deal with important social issues.
Greater Clements is about economic injustice. The economically depressed former mining town has voted to unincorporated because the residents fear gentrification, the collective equivalent of shooting yourself in the foot. Even the town’s one stoplight will no longer brighten the forlorn streets. The play is also about mental illness. Maggie (Judith Ivey) is a single mother (her husband left after coming out as gay) raising an emotionally troubled son, Joe (the extraordinary Edmund Donovan), who is occasionally violent. It’s about racial injustice. Billy (Ken Narasaki), Maggie’s high school boyfriend who comes to visit with his 14-year-old granddaughter, Kel (Haley Sakamoto), in hopes of renewing their relationship, is Japanese and bears the scars of his family’s internment. And finally, it’s about alcoholism. Kel is in the care of her grandfather because her own father (never seen onstage) cannot control his drinking problem.
Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven is about the plight of those who just can’t make it or just can’t take it anymore. It’s set in a halfway house inhabited by an assortment of emotionally and physically traumatized women who alternately abuse and support each other. Sarge (Liza Colón-Zayas), an Iraq veteran with anger management issues, doesn’t think the transgender Venus (Esteban Andres Cruz) belongs in a home for women and lets her know it every time she can. Sarge is in love with Bella (Andrea Syglowski), a single mother and drug addict who happens to be friends with Venus, who gives her the drugs she craves. Venus also befriends Betty (Kristina Poe), a woman so ashamed of her obese body she will not take off her clothes to bathe. Wanda (Patrice Johnson Chevannes), once a dancer and actress, is now confined to a wheelchair and only wants to end her life. Even the director of the halfway house, Mrs. Rivera (Elizabeth Rodriguez), is an alcoholic, who keeps a bottle hidden in her desk. And Joey, the janitor (Victor Almanzar), has fallen for Venus even though “she has a dick.” One could go on.
Miraculously, both shows are often funny.
Greater Clements owes much of its humor to Ivey’s Maggie, who is spunky and resilient; and Halfway Bitches depends on Guirgis’s ability to capture the tone and content of urban street talk, and the cast’s talent in delivering it. But while it’s easy to laugh with Ivey, the audience’s boisterous appreciation of Guirgis’s zingers is somewhat disturbing One can’t help but wonder in what other situation would we tolerate a group of mostly white people (in the audience) laughing at the problems of a bunch of troubled black and brown people (onstage).
And finally, both shows overreach in their own way. Their overreaching is a product of their length. Or maybe their length is necessitated by their overreach.
In Greater Clements the various plot lines do not support each other. Nor do they always make sense in the context of the play. Much of the drama proceeds at the speed of soap opera, which it resembles in many ways. Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven has enough characters for a Russian novel, without the 1000 pages to give each of them their due. Although Guirgis sketches each character beautifully, he doesn’t have the time to add the details that make for a satisfying picture, and the enormous efforts of the more than capable cast can only go so far.
Greater Clements, coming after Pocatello and Lewiston/Clarkston, is the latest of Hunter’s plays exploring the geographic, economic and cultural landscape of the United States. Guirgis, In Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train and Between Riverside and Crazy, gave voice to people in many ways similar to those we encounter in Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven. It’s always a good thing to watch playwrights digging deeper. But we need to be wary when they plow the same field until the soil is exhausted… or critics and audiences find something new.
Greater Clements ***
Lincoln Center
Mitzi E. Newhouse Theatre
150 W 65th St, New York, NY 10023
(212) 501-3100
Photography: Charles Erickson
Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven ***1/2
Atlantic Theater Company and LAByrinth Theater Company at the Linda Gross Theater
336 W. 20th Street in NYC.
Tue 7pm, Wed 2pm & 8pm, Thu—Fri 7:30pm, Sat 2pm & 8pm, Sun 2pm & 7:30pm.
Running time: two hours and 45 mins. including intermission. $81.50—$101.50. (866) 811-4111. www.ovationtix.com.
December 9 -29, 2019
Photography: Monique Carboni
