Baltimore Center Stage, Maryland’s State Theater, made headlines in March when it refused to comply with newly issued National Endowment for the Arts guidelines designed to restrict arts organizations from presenting programming that would promote ideas like diversity, equity, inclusion, and “gender ideology.” 

While the NEA would later rescind those guidelines, Baltimore Center Stage had already put their shoulder to the wheel. Within a month, they announced a new national initiative that was already in the works, the Trans History Project. 

The brainchild of Baltimore Center Stage Artist-in-Residence Bo Frazier, the Trans History Project aims to develop 10 new plays about the history of gender nonconformity, drawing from a national pool of artist applicants. In all, 10 transgender and gender non-conforming writers will be placed in two-year development residencies across the country. 

The first round of applications closed in May, with 165 applications for five spots in the first cohort. Applications for the second cohort are expected to open in late 2025. 

“We were absolutely astounded by the response to the announcement,” Frazier said. “Obviously there are only a few open slots, but I cannot wait to get to know all these talented artists across the country.”

Playwrights will develop original plays exploring the stories of TGNC historical or folkloric figures, with the goal of telling stories that have largely been lost to history. While people like Stormé DeLarverie, Marsha P. Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, Jackie Shane, and Pauli Murray lead many rosters of significant TGNC figures, applicants were encouraged to draw on stories that delve deeper. 

“The purpose of this project is not only to pay TGNC artists and boost representation, but also to prove, hopefully once and for all, that we have always existed, the binary isn’t real and that anti-trans hatred is the thing that has not always existed,” Frazier said. 

The first cohort of playwrights will be announced in July. Each selected recipient receives a $10,000 commission fee and development support from a coalition of regional theaters across the U.S. In the first year of their cohort, each playwright is guaranteed a reading of their play; in the second, each will workshop their play and explore staging with one of the project’s partner theaters, which include Baltimore Center Stage as well as Diversionary Theatre in San Diego, Rattlestick Theater in New York City, and Round House Theatre in Bethesda.

“Each one of the projects will also be paired with a dramaturg or research assistant to help with the project,” Frazier said. “There will also be a cohort check-in to share our work and create a true cohort experience, and both cohorts will come together for an annual convening in Baltimore starting summer 2026.”

The Trans History Project is something of a dream come true for Frazier, who began developing the idea in 2018. 

“My original vision was to create one play with many playwrights creating a vignette play similar to [Stephen] Sondheim’s ‘Assassins,’ each one of them writing one vignette about a gender nonconforming person from their culture,” they said. “I mentioned it to a dear friend of mine and they told me to ‘dream bigger’ — and thus this specific project was born.”

As Frazier began looking for a home for the project, Stevie Walker-Webb was named artistic director at Baltimore Center Stage. 

“I wanted the Trans History Project to bridge the gap between new play development and theatrical production, so I knew it needed a large theatrical institution like Center Stage,” said Frazier. “I think I waited a month into his tenure to pitch the project and [Walker-Webb] was ecstatic at the idea. It really fit his creative vision.”

Walker-Webb, a Tony Award-nominated and Obie Award-winning director, joined Baltimore Center Stage in 2023, building on a career already devoted to merging theater arts and advocacy for marginalized populations. 

“The Trans History Project is part of our broader commitment at Baltimore Center Stage to center marginalized voices in the cultural conversation,” Walker-Webb said. “We’re excited and expectant that the work emerging from this project will be innovative, visionary, and artistically groundbreaking.”

Baltimore Center Stage’s commitment affirms Frazier’s vision, even as other organizations equivocate under continued political pressure. 

“We stand behind our values so boldly and explicitly in ways that other theaters are too afraid of,” Frazier said. “The Trans History Project unfortunately lost one of our regional theater partners two weeks before we announced the project. Their board of directors saw my quote about Trump’s attacks on the trans community and were afraid to lose their funding from corporations and local organizations who may support theatre, but not true inclusion. It was saddening, but made me truly grateful to work for the theater not afraid to stand up for what is right.”

The U.S. trans community has experienced an increasing barrage of cultural and legislative attacks in recent years. Legislation and guideline changes regarding public accommodation, health care, competitive sports, and arts programming have been introduced more frequently. According to the Trans Legislation Tracker, 910 anti-trans bills have been introduced in the U.S. so far in 2025, with 103 passing into law; up from 701 bills introduced and 51 passing into law in all of 2024. 

“In my lifetime, it has sadly always been scary to be outwardly trans & gender non-confirming,” said Frazier. “At this moment, to see the current administration win on an anti-trans ticket focusing on fake issues and attacking the most vulnerable population is pretty horrifying.”

But Frazier sees this political moment as an opportunity to focus on their work as a way to build community and elevate trans voices in spite of it all. 

“That is why I fought tooth and nail to make this project happen,” they said. “I am determined to keep fighting and make a difference.”

The post Baltimore Center Stage launches national Trans History Project appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

At Everyman Theatre, a hazy purple and tangerine sunset lights the stage as the three-pane backdrop conjures the image of a mountainous Vermont skyline. Under the supervision of dedicated ushers, the crowd settles in for the opening night of “Queens Girl: Black in the Green Mountains.” The play is the final show in a trilogy of solo performances from playwright Caleen Sinnette Jennings. This final entry, performed in front of a live audience for the first time this month, chronicles the journey of Jacqueline Marie Butler at Bennington College from 1968-1972. 

In this run, Deidre Staples stars under the thoughtful direction of Danielle A. Drakes. As a solo performance, the play focuses the audience’s eyes on the comedy and conflict of building a self-identity in a world full of wars and political violence. 

Jennings’ playwriting offers a solo performance made up of many different voices. The result is a collage of characters with dynamic personalities where no interaction or chronological detail is taken for granted. Each conversation, whether aloud or within the confines of Butler’s inner monologue, is evidence of the strife that comes with building a self in a world dominated by U.S. imperialism. Throughout the production, the play’s historical frame features discussions of the Biafran War in Nigeria, Malcolm X’s assassination, the Vietnam War, and the May 4 assassination of four Kent State students at the Democratic National Convention in 1970. And the inspiration for this is the real life of the work’s playwright. 

“Queens Girl: Black in the Green Mountains” is a piece of autobiographical fiction derived from parts of Jennings’ life and events of the late 1960s and early 70s. In her own life, Jennings earned her bachelor’s degree in drama from Bennington College in 1972 before receiving her MFA in acting from the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. Furthermore, before the play begins, Vincent Lancisi — founder and artistic director of Everyman — reminds audiences that Everyman Theatre’s connection to this final play is strong. “Queens Girl: Black Girl in the Green Mountain” was originally commissioned and produced here. 

Under Drakes’ direction, Staples embodies over ten distinct characters. In the show’s 72 minutes, she enters the skin of college administrators, eccentric professors, and many more to deliver a story about Butler’s young adulthood. The Memphis native is a comedic triumph throughout the show. Her sense of timing and mastery of proxemics, meaning the distance she places between herself and another iteration of herself, is a joy to watch. Drakes and Staples credit using rasa aesthetics, an Indian artistic concept that encourages artists to consider the essence of a work, as a key component in their practice of building each character and moment in the production.

While Butler is the dramatic nucleus of the performance, the play is a comedic volley filled with the voices of parents, peers, and elders who shape Butler’s worldview. As a piece of a larger three-part vision, “Black Girl in the Green Mountains” is just one entry in Jennings’ coming-of-age trio. This fact means that each edition in the trilogy is tasked with spanning years at a time with little room to settle into one moment and stay. 

As the production progresses, audiences will come to know many different voices. The interpersonal conflicts between characters catalyze discussions of integration, sexuality, and geopolitics. One moment we’re learning that Butler’s lover is in exile from Apartheid South Africa and the next we’re watching Butler grapple with virginity and women’s sexuality workshops.

My favorite character of the night was Staples’ characterization of Aunt Maisie, a scotch-drinking, chosen elder who isn’t scared to cuss up a storm. While Butler’s parents are away in Nigeria treating victims of war wounds, Aunt Maisie serves as her “mother on this side of the Atlantic.” The character is a nod to the found families that Black people across the diaspora create with each other to keep children safe and cared for when labor may take caregivers far from home. This performance requires Staples to execute varied dialogue, tone, and delivery. And in each regard, Staples is a skilled lead. No line feels lost or redundant in the sea of conversations (a commendable feat when characters cross cultures and ages within seconds). 

As a solo performer, Staples commands the stage with the help of other artists on the Everyman roster. With the support of a crew of talented dramaturgs, set designers, and other creatives, Staples brings us into the world of Bennington and 1960s life. The work of set designer Daniel Ettinger and lighting designer Harold F. Burgess II, both resident company members at Everyman, deepens the performance before any lines are spoken. The design work is incredible as the space transforms from a small stage in a black box theater into collegiate dorm rooms, Vermont mountainsides, and New York City streets. The details of spotlight hues, bookshelf placement, and visual projections ground the play without distracting from Staples’ character work. The balance struck between the visuals is harmonious. 

In addition to the visual offerings of the design crew, Staples’ performance is accompanied by incredible sound design. Sarah O’Halloran’s work shines throughout the performance. O’Halloran’s use of musical refrains, like the recurring instrumental refrain from Moon River when Butler mentions her lover, Gilliam, complements Staples’ acting and Drakes’ direction wonderfully. Moreover, with the number of references to musical talents like Sly and the Family Stone, Aretha Franklin, Sonny Rollins, and others throughout the play, music is a key textual element layered into the production. The inclusion of John Coltrane’s instruments and Otis Redding’s soulful vocals in “I’ll Be Loving You” (1965) further immerse audiences in the world Jennings builds. 

With the trilogy format in mind, this production left me yearning for more insight into Butler’s political commitments. From various conversations throughout the play, we learn that she struggles with her role in political organizing and art as the daughter of a middle-class Black family and yet, we get little insight into what she truly thinks of the wars, protests, and art around her. By the play’s end, I wondered: “What does Butler think about the U.S.’s war in Vietnam? Does Butler dive into political ideology? Where does she align herself in political struggle?” In the wake of the show, I’m still wondering about her journey as an artist amid the Black Arts Movement of the 60s and 70s. 

Despite my hope for more time with Butler’s political ideology, I commend Jennings for crafting work linking political struggles in and outside the United States. Through Butler and her loved ones, we watch a play about how life in New York City connects to the Biafran War and the anti-war protests of the 20th century. This production is one reminder that the contemporary anti-war organizing being done in the U.S., spurred by ongoing funding of genocides in Palestine, Sudan, and Haiti (among others), is a continuation of a long legacy. 

The collective efforts of the playwright, cast, crew, and director skillfully fill out this production. After this performance, I am curious about the other two plays in the trilogy and their thematic journeys. At the reception following the show, I spoke briefly with Drakes about the challenges and triumphs of solo performances. With this production, Drakes has been a part of 10 solo shows in her career (serving as both actor and director across her experience). 

“I’m glad this show is impactful,” she told me. “There’s heavy themes throughout and it takes work to convey that to an audience.” 

Queens Girl: Black Girl in the Green Mountains is showing at Everyman Theatre through November 17. 

The post Out of Many, One appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

With “I Will Eat You Alive,” Katie Hileman, the director, playwright, and intimacy director, presents the story of three fat women’s journey to lose weight, the social pressure they have felt since they were children, and the horrible things people believe to have agency to say to fat people online simply for existing. 

I saw “I Will Eat You Alive” at the Voxel in Charles Village on the opening night of January 26. I am always interested in shows and media that center on fat individuals because they rarely exist without making fat people the subject of ridicule or shame. This play takes those tropes and plays with them in an off-kilter way. On opening night, I watched people around me be moved to tears as they related to what was happening in the play. 

The unique set design added a level of intimacy and audience interaction, allowing myself and the rest of the audience to be folded into the story. The set was two rows of tiered seating to the left and right of a long white table. The three main characters and 11 willing audience members were seated as “dinner guests.” A feeling of heaviness and discomfort hung over the set as ‘dining’ with the main characters made the characters’ shame, pain, and discomfort, shown through tight smiles and overly preppy voices, palpable. 

Written in what could be described as a love letter to herself, Hileman’s “I Will Eat You Alive” is more than fiction; it is a stylized reality that many fat people may find painfully resonant.

Hileman’s role as an intimacy director is particularly significant in this instance because she skillfully facilitates a space in which actors understand what is expected of them in hyper-exposed scenes and ensures there is informed consent. 

“It’s always my intention to make my actors feel like they have a lot of power, even though they’re putting themselves in these really vulnerable spots and saying some horrible things at times in the play,” Hileman told me. 

The day after the opening, I spoke with Hileman and the cast, Vicky Graham, Betse Lyons, and Meghan Taylor, who respectively played Fat Woman 1, 2, and 3. We spoke about our favorite fat characters growing up and how there were not too many of them, our least favorite style options as fat kids in the ’90s and early 2000s, and what it means to be a fat person in this day and age.

Although IWEYA’s run at the Voxel has ended, you can stream it. 

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Individually, what does it mean to be a fat person to each of you? 

Vicky Graham: It just means that I’m fat. I have weight on me, and I got curves with no speed limits. I think when I was younger, it was just strictly derogatory, something that I would avoid saying at all costs or try to defend myself by using, like, chubby or thick. But I think just the word itself is so short, it’s so simple, and it can just be used for what it is and not have any negative connotations behind it. And that’s something that this show has really helped me learn and embrace so that I have less stress and shame. I just can exist. And this is the adjective that best describes my body.

Betse Lyon: I guess it’s still pretty complicated for me. It’s a lot better than it used to be. I dealt with the terrible ’90s stuff as a teenager. And so I do use fat, simply and sometimes proudly. But there are still little knives in the back of my brain, stabbing me every time I do it. 

It’s just a cycle sometimes. It is still hard for me to use the word. But now, at least, it’s more likely that I’ll get frustrated, annoyed, or angry when people are saying bad things about fat folks instead of just retreating into myself, which I feel like getting frustrated and angry is a lot healthier.

Meghan Taylor: I feel like that question’s answer depends on the day. And some days, I don’t know. Being fat means literally nothing to me. It doesn’t define me. It’s just my body. It’s just this vessel that I have to move around in on this planet. But it’s not really indicative of who I am or what I can do or how much I’m worth. But if I’m having a shitty day, then I might be more aware of it. And then it means that being a fat person is like a burden you’re carrying around, and just extra weight, for lack of better terms. 

Lately, I’ve been more in a space where I’m like, it really doesn’t mean shit. My body is not me. I mean, my body is me, but my body is not indicative of my worth, what I have to contribute or what I can do, or anything else.

The show does a great job layering general attitudes and acceptances of fatphobia throughout the show through pop culture references, from Kate Moss’ infamous “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” line to the cultural phenomena that was Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers, in a tongue-in-cheek kind of way. What stood out to me was the litany of increasingly violent tweets and messages to fat people that were projected onto the table. Did those come up during the interview that led to this show, or were those aimed at any of you?

Hileman: When I see something really fatphobic on social media, I will take a screenshot of it. It’s shocking to me that people feel such permission to say such horrible things. People don’t think twice about what is said to fat people online. People don’t think that this stuff is actually said about fat people, but it is, and all the time and very casually, and it’s everywhere. So when I had an opportunity to present it back and show people, I took it. I like the dichotomy of them [the characters] saying this stuff and laughing and sort of eating it.” 

Lyons: I think about the people, like fat women probably, who are on the receiving end of those actual comments. I have a small amount of popularity on TikTok, and so I have trolls. The shit that people think they can say to you is stunning. As a fat woman in today’s world, I learn to let most of it slide off my back. 

It’s awful to include them [the projected messages] because they’re terrible, but it’s also nice because it’s cathartic. Everyone in that room is recognizing how awful they are. And some of the people in that room have never thought about that before. 

There is a deeply intimate and personal scene towards the end of the show where the characters strip and essentially lay it bare to the audience. What did that scene mean to you, and how was it having an audience so close during that moment?

Hileman: The audience did exactly what I always intended for that moment to be. 

That moment felt so perfect because I don’t think it is a moment about them [the actresses] sexualizing themselves. Although if they want to and they go for it, I love that. I think that’s great. 

[It’s about] fat people sexualizing themselves on their own terms. It’s about that freedom. They’ve been so restrained the whole time. By the time they take their clothes off, there’s nothing but them. And we finally get to see them exactly as they are. And so that’s why I love the clothes off moment. 

I think that is so visceral, and everyone, by the end of the play, is just so hungry for it. And the fact that they are right there in your face, fully presenting themselves as they are and telling them that they are going to eat you alive.

It’s always my intention to make my actors feel like they have a lot of power, even though they’re putting themselves in these really vulnerable spots and saying some horrible things at times in the play. 

Honestly, there’s a lot of trauma in the play, and that’s an understatement that speaks to fat folks’ relationships with their bodies. But I always want my actors to feel like they’re throwing it back in the people’s faces. They are not there to be laughed at or to be ridiculed. They’re there to tell them exactly who they are, which we don’t get to see fat people do.

This is one 75-minute play on this topic, but what do you hope that people take away from the show? 

Hileman: I want people to think about how this happens to fat people in their lives, right? This isn’t just a story about these three fat women. I don’t want to assume that it happens to everybody, but I think there are some pretty universal experiences in the play, and I want people to think about how they treat fat people. 

It’s not necessarily your fault that you are complicit in it. All the bad things, white supremacy, and patriarchy. This is just like another arm of that — anti-fatness.

The post I Will Eat You Alive: An Ode To Being Fat appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

When Tatiana Nya Ford wrote “Lyra and the Ferocious Beast,” which ran at The Voxel Theater this summer, it was a way of blending several different parts of herself. 

The play starred actor, teacher, and spoken word superstar Mecca “Meccamorphosis” Verdell as Lyra, an intergalactic scientist who does whatever she can to keep her beloved pet Yucca (the “ferocious beast”) safe. Along the way, she must also grapple with the series of decisions that got her into this predicament in the first place.

Ford, a licensed therapist, weaves lessons about whimsy, redemption, and grief into this story. The tale doesn’t wrap up neatly, but instead concludes the way things end in real life: sometimes you move forward, acknowledge what was lost, and learn from it what you can. Ford’s training as a therapist and her talent as a playwright resulted in a play where characters embodied the full spectrum of human emotions, including more challenging ones — like grief — with authenticity. 

“Lyra” is Ford’s first produced full-length play. It was directed by Tessara Morgan, and features Caitlin Weaver as Lyra’s trusted robot companion Hattie, along with puppeteers Francesco Leandri and Alex Mungo, Isaiah Mason Harvey, David Brasington, and J. Purnell Hargroves. 

On September 24, Ford and I spoke about the experience of bringing the play into reality and her feelings about the show. 

______________________

S. Ireti: How do you feel in those moments, when you see somebody become this thing that you’ve written? How does that writing process differ from actually seeing it? 

Tatiana Ford: Huge shout out to all the actors and also Tessa, the director. It feels amazing. It is one of my favorite things. It really feels like, not to be dramatic, but a motivation for the moments when living is hard and … existing becomes exhausting and we question our motivations. 

It’s always nice because I’ve been writing since I was a kid. And so to think of the little me who was unable to finish stories because I was so excited about writing the next one now being able to witness a fully written piece that is fully worked on by so many different people and given all this love and affection, it is so… I feel so lucky and it’s nice to be reminded of that.

To write is to share parts of yourself that you have spent so long trying to understand and accept and present to the world. What other parts of you do you try to carry or imbue in the things that you’re working on now or in the past?

Ford: So I believe my first time writing stories, I must have been nine or ten. And they weren’t plays, they were little novels, because I would be reading kids books, fantasy books. And it always spoke to me to have my own fantasy telling of either some kid who was like me or some kid who was not like me and just imagining what that was like. 

I think my first story that I wrote was about this group of friends who discover they have powers and they’re trying to not only save the world… but also trying to save their loved ones, save themselves, find some comfort.

I think more than anything as I write, I try to be as vulnerable as possible. I try to be very particular about the words I choose not only in my art but also on a daily basis. And I really just say that to speak on the… power I think that words have. 

The accidental poetry of language is beautiful. And in my storytelling, I want to touch upon all of the beauties and horrors and delights and surprises and everything that comes from life that I’ve known it as I’ve known it, as I’ve lived it, as I’ve seen it.

Do you dabble in other mediums? What does it mean to you to be an artist?

Ford: I tell people, I’m an artist because I am. And sometimes my medium is oil paints on a canvas, and sometimes my medium is my piano. Sometimes my medium is my body. Sometimes my medium is all kinds of stuff. I like sculpting. As I mentioned, I do a lot with puppets. I have so many puppets just all around my home. I love dancing. I love singing. Every way that I can express myself creatively is my favorite. 

Not to blow up your spot, but as a therapist, what perspective does that bring to your work, creating, etc.?

Ford: I think when we are constantly preaching the importance of mental health and social health and interpersonal health, intrapersonal health, all these kinds of stuff, it’s hard to not touch upon it in what we create — at least that’s the case for me.

We know that there are ways that we can be better, and that does give us comfort, and it doesn’t always give us comfort because we don’t always have it. But I think with writing the way that I do, touching upon the realness of what it is to experience life, I don’t know, it makes it all a little easier.

That’s very much why I got into expressive arts therapy. It’s because verbal communication is our main form of communication as humans in today’s world. But it is not the only way to communicate. 

I know that a lot of people, specifically our clients and really any client in therapy, can have trouble talking about a thing, hearing them admit a thing, saying a thing to this stranger who they might have known for a day or two sessions before this, or whatever the case is. And with art, it’s easier to touch upon the same topics, the same learning blocks, without needing to have the specificity of what is going on in order for that to be achieved. 

Even if I, as a therapist, might not be able to understand this painting we did together and this art activity, you, as a client, might have a deeper understanding because you see something in there that maybe you can’t verbally say to me right now, but are still able to connect to and feel and whatever else.

The post Accidental poetry appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

“You get to be mayor, is you gonna be mayor of the black folks or the white folks,” Sterling Johnson,  a resident of Pittsburgh’s majority-Black Hill District asks Harmond Wilks, the main character in August Wilson’s “Radio Golf,” which runs at Everyman Theatre through November 17.

In Blackness and politics you have to choose sides: are you with us or are you against us? Everyone in “Radio Golf”—the last of Wilson’s 10-play The American Century Cycle—seems to know this except for Wilks.

“He is battling morality,” says actor Jamil A.C. Mangan, who portrays Wilks in Everyman Theatre’s production of the play. “He is a real estate developer that comes from a family who have…made and done well for themselves and are very affluent black family and so he sort of grew up with a silver spoon in his mouth.”

It’s the late 90’s and middle-class Wilks wants to redevelop the Hill District and thinks gentrification is the way forward. He also wants to be the first Black mayor of Pittsburgh, and thinks that by transforming the community for the better, he can improve his hopes of getting into office. He wants to do the right thing, it seems, but things get more complicated when he tries to make his vision a reality. It’s a reality lots of politicians must struggle with: is all money good money? Is there a way to balance corporate funds with good intentions?

“He wants to bring the Starbucks, Whole Foods, and what have you, but he’s battling with the fact that he still wants to try and preserve the community and the heritage that was there, you know before the development comes,” Mangan explains. 

On one hand, there’s his fellow Black-and-bougie companions, his wife Mame (Resident Company Member Dawn Ursusla) and his friend and business partner Roosevelt Hicks (Jason B. McIntosh). On the other, there are the poor, Black people of the Hill District who have seen it all and side eye Wilks’ pie-in-the-sky dreams, like Johnson (played by Anton Floyd) and Elder Joseph Barlow, also known as Old Joe (Charles Dumas).

“He is approached by other members of the community — other characters like Old Joe and Sterling —  who are the indegenous, who are the original inhabitants of that community that are saying ‘look, don’t kick us out. We don’t mind that you are here, but see us. Recognize us.’”

As Black Baltimore well knows, nothing is free and the process of bringing outside forces into a community of color can come with all types of baggage. The ramifications of the bargain you make when you gentrify are as true in Wilson’s Hill District as they are in Baltimore City. Here, we watch the Cherry Hill area nervously, knowing how close it is to Kevin Plank’s planned Port Covington. In “Radio Golf”, a piece of property that is scheduled to be torn down represents the kind of change actually coming to the community.

Wilson famously set the plays in this series in working class Pittsburgh, but director Carl Cofield says that the back and forth pull that Willks feels applies here, too. 

“I think one of the geniuses, one of the many geniuses of August Wilson is the existential questions that face the black community but basically affect all of us,” says director Carl Cofield. 

“That is a major sort of tenant in the work and I think it’s going to resonate profoundly with people in Baltimore. August did set this in the Hill District, but that could very well be Baltimore today which is super exciting because it adds to the urgency of why we’re doing the work, you know, talking about gentrification, And what are the collateral damages that gentrification has?”

Radio Golf runs until November 17 at Everyman Theatre (315 W. Fayette St.).

The post ‘Radio Golf,’ at Everyman Theatre tackles the struggle between progress and gentrification appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

Walking in to see Shakespeare’s “Henry IV” plays at the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company, you may think that it is appropriate for plays featuring the bawdy Falstaff, one of Shakespeare’s greatest characters,  to be performed so close to the city’s bawdy-houses on the Block, where Falstaffian hawkers hustle customers off the sidewalk a block away.

But, upon leaving, you may think it more appropriate that Chesapeake’s beautiful theater is a stone’s throw from City Hall—or should be now called it City Holly?—and the BPD headquarters. Because, while the two “Henry IV” plays are papered over with earthy banter, they are about power and the ways it changes the people who have and who want it.

Yes, there is the central, famous transformation of Hal, the dissolute prince who spends his time in the taverns, into the severe King Henry V, who will eventually order a massacre at Agincourt. But he is far from the only character changed by power. And even the delightful scenes of Prince Hal’s wasted youth serves to show how the underworld was affected by proximity to his future puissance. Everyone is driven mad by power.

Here’s the super-quick basic plot summary for both parts: A rebellion is brewing against King Henry IV, (Ron Heneghan) who was planning to go take back Jerusalem from the “pagans” but has to stay home to fight the rebels, led by Hotspur (Gerrad Alex Taylor). The rebels are the very people who helped Henry rise to power—see the Richard plays—but now that he is wielding it as he will, they are pissed.

Hotspur, also named Harry Percy, is a total bad-ass. Righteous and angry, he was gaining glory on the battlefield. Meanwhile, Henry IV’s own son Harry, called Hal (Seamus Miller), is a disgrace, living a dissolute life among a band of rogues led by John Falstaff (Gregory Burgess), one of Shakespeare’s great creations. But once war is certain, Hal turns himself around and saves his father’s life on the battlefield and improbably kills Hotspur in a battle of the Harrys—leaving Falstaff to try to take credit for it.

That’s Part 1. In Part 2, which is a far weaker play, there is a beautiful scene between Northumberland and Lady Percy (Elana Michelle), Hotspur’s widow, who convinces him to head for the hills in Scotland. The rebellion is then commanded by the Archbishop of York (Nello DeBlasio). Hal’s brother Prince John (DJ Batchelor) tricks them and puts down the rebellion. King Henry is sick. Falstaff lives off the glory of claiming to have killed Percy. Hal and his father have a final intense conversation just before Henry IV dies and Hal becomes Henry V. Convinced by the Chief Justice, he rencounces Falstaff, who had hoped to get in on the graft of power. It ends with a dark hint that the only way to truly quell internal dissent is to undertake a foreign war (see “Henry V”).

The Chesapeake productions are characterized by an earthy simplicity. The costumes do not try to be contemporary, but their understatedness would make them more at home in Station North than at a Renaissance Fair.

While they avoid the countless temptations to modernize the stories—replacing swords with guns etc.—Shakespeare always invades our contemporary context. Remember the furor last year when Trumpian apologists claimed that a performance of “Julius Caesar” was calling for the assassination of our dictat-er president?

But, to watch the play in 2019 Baltimore, which the cover of the New York Times Magazine declared an unraveling “tragedy,” will inevitably bring its own associations. This became particularly clear to me in a sort of hallucinatory scene in Part 1, when Hal, Falstaff, and the crew of Eastcheap thieves plans to rob a group of passing pilgrims. Then Ned Poins (Lance Bankerd) pulled the prince aside and proposed a different plan.

“I have a jest to execute that I cannot

manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto and Gadshill

shall rob those men that we have already waylaid:

yourself and I will not be there; and when they

have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut

this head off from my shoulders.”

So they wait for Falstaff and his crew to do the robbery and, wearing masks, rob him in turn.

This kind of double cross is precisely the kind of thing you could hear, a year ago, in a different sort of theater a mile or so away at the Federal Court on Lombard Street where Donny Stepp, the co-conspirator of GTTF mastermind Wayne Jenkins, recounted similar plans that he and Jenkins had made at various times. In one case, after Jenkins arrested a drug dealer and got the address of a house where guns and money were stashed, he stalled his own crew so that Stepp could get there and rob the house first. In another instance, Jenkins, who other cops called the “Prince of the City,” waited for people looting pharmacies during the riot on the day of Freddie Gray’s funeral and then stole the drugs and brought them to Stepp.

The reason that all of this struck me so forcefully was because Bankerd as Poins had the bald head, grinning eyes, and wild enthusiasm of Stepp, who played for Jenkins a role quite similar to the role Poins played for the Prince. It was startling how similar it was, as if Bankerd were trying to make the allusion to Stepp, subtly (if you’ve only seen his mug shot, Stepp did not look nearly so bad on the witness stand in a dapper suit, so don’t look at that mug shot and feel bad, Bankerd). Bankerd played the part so well that it bounced right up against our own reality and the history of crime and corruption in our far more recent history, whether he intended it to or not.

Hal responds to Poins with a kind of detached enjoyment. He is carried away by the prank, but all of this is a prank for him because the consequences are far less serious for him. He is always doubled. Miller plays this version of Henry well, always a bit restrained, never letting his co-conspirators know exactly what he is thinking, always speaking in double-entendres and witticisms that can be read in more than one manner. This is part of Shakespeare’s comic genius on display in this tragedy, but it also says a lot about the nonchalant ways that power can be wielded so that the lives of others seem no more than a game to those who remain insulated by privilege wherever they go.

This ostentatious reserve, as it were, hits on another touchstone for any Gen-X viewer of this play: Miller’s Harry seems much indebted to Keanu Reeves in “My Own Private Idaho,” where he plays out the modernized transformation of Prince Hal into Henry V. Reeves’ wet-blanketed debauchery captures the character so well that it has almost entirely re-defined the role, to the point where the actual contemporary Prince Harry of England seems like an imitation of the actor.  

Miller’s two-faced affectlessness works all the way up to the pivotal moment at the very end of Part 2, when, as a character, Hal makes the transformation forcefully. As an actor, though, Miller falls slightly short. His Henry is not imperious enough by half. His rebuke of Falstaff is muted, muttered almost. Perhaps that was a choice, a way to play it, and it could be a smart one. A Henry still embarrassed by the necessities of the state. For that to work, the reluctance would have to be a bit more obvious.

I caught the double-feature, which was opening night of Part 2 and perhaps Miller hadn’t had the opportunity to develop that part of his character fully. He’d also had to go through all of that in one day and so perhaps the mutedness of the ascension will pass, as the show progresses into a full-blown rebuke and an acceptance of power.

The other striking and instructive parallel was accompanied by a transformation not unsimilar to that from Hal to Henry. Gerrad Alex Taylor played Hotspur with a true, unbridled fury in Part 1. He embodied ambition as anger or anger as ambition better than any Shakespearean actor I’ve ever seen. And, partly because he is black, he showed me how much the Erik Killmonger plot of Marvel’s “Black Panther” movie is based on the Hotspur arc of these plays. And, even moreso than in “Black Panther,” it raises the one false note: there’s no way that this Hal beats this Hotspur in a fight. But because no one in either drama thinks the prince has it in him to win, either, it makes it work—no one in the play believes it either.

The death of Hotspur allows Taylor to co-direct the second play, making, in a sense, the same transformation as Hal. And it is a hard transformation, because Part 2 is a weak play in many ways. The first half could be condensed and recapped in a single speech. But Taylor and Ian Gallagher, who directed Part 1, do a fine job at helping the weaker play stand up to its predecessor. That usually only works if the transformation from Hal to Henry and the renunciation of Falstaff is total and brutal. In this case it was not. And Gregory Burgess as a funny and fulsome Falstaff may not yet have been able to bring the full resonance of feeling to his disappointment in the scene, either. Again it was first performance of “Part 2”—and Falstaff, so vital on the page, is exceedingly hard to bring to life. It is not that difficult to do Falstaff, so finely written, passingly well, but near impossible to make him organic and alive. Like Miller as Hal, Burgess comes close, but seemed to fall slightly short of the emotional range required by the final scene.

Even without that, the Chesapeake team really brought off the double header, and, I suspect the emotional nuances of the characters in “Part 2” will develop over the coming weeks.

There are still a couple double-headers, on March 23 and 30. It is really quite an experience to devote the better part of a day to inhabiting this world, a kind of public binge watching with a big dinner in between. And it was that kind of binging on the Bard that had me back out on Calvert Street staring up at the stately dome of City Hall and simply shaking my head.

The crimes that define a time are sometimes bloody and fierce, while at others, they are pure farce. Imagine the play about Pugh renouncing Healthy Holly. How now.

Henry IV Part 1, through March 30. Henry IV Part 2, through April 7. Chesapeake Shakespeare Company. 7 S. Calvert St.

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The post Dissolute Hal, Hot Hotspur, and Healthy Holly Collide in Chesapeake Shakespeare’s “Henry IV” Parts 1 and 2 appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

“Animal Farm.” A stage adaption of George Orwell’s allegorical story of a group of farm animals who revolt against man. March 1-April 1, Baltimore Center Stage, 700 N. Calvert St., (410) 332-0033, centerstage.org, $20-$79.

BWC’s Gin & Jokes Presents: Drew Michael. Actor and former writer for “Saturday Night Live” Drew Michael headlines Baltimore Whiskey Company’s recurring comedy night. Hosted by Umar Khan. March 1, 8:30 p.m., Joe Squared, 33 W. North Ave., (410) 545-0444, pros.brownpapertickets.com, $7.

“Count Down.” As part of the 2018 Women’s Voices Theatre Festival, The Stand present Dominique Cieri’s interdisciplinary piece about girls growing up in the child welfare system. Through March 4, Strand Theatre, 5426 Harford Road, (443) 874-4917, strand-theater.org, $10-$25.

Drunk Shakespeare. Single Carrot Theatre and Chesapeake Shakespeare Company Associate Artistic Director Lizzi Albert present the first installment of the new Drunk Classics series. Actors will perform fully rehearsed scenes from the Bard, but wasted. March 3, 8 p.m.; Single Carrot Theatre, 2600 N. Howard St., (443) 844-9253, singlecarrot.com, sold out (standing room tickets available for $5).

“Gertrude Stein and a Companion.” The love story of writer Gertrude Stein and her life partner and Parisian avant-garde member Alice B. Toklas as told by Win Wells. March 2-25, Fells Point Corner Theatre, 251 S. Ann St., fpct.org, $19-$24.

“Hand to God.” Stillpointe Theatre presents Robert Askins’ Tony-nominated play about a grieving widow who runs a Christian-ministry puppet club, her teenage son, and his possessed puppet. March 2-17, St. Marks Lutheran Church, 1900 St. Paul St., stillpointetheatre.com, $20.

Huggy Lowdown and Chris Paul. The Tom Joyner Morning Show personalities co-headline. March 4, 6 p.m., Magooby’s Joke House, 9603 Deereco Road, (410) 252-2727, magoobys.com, $20.

“I Hate Hamlet.” An actor who hates “Hamlet” takes on the title role and encounters the ghost of John Barrymore. Through March 4, Spotlighters Theatre, 817 St. Paul St., (410) 752-1225, spotlighters.org, $10-$22.

Jeanne Robertson. The veteran performer and former Miss North Carolina performs family-friendly comedy. March 3, 7 p.m., Lyric Opera House, 140 W. Mount Royal Ave., (410) 685-5086, modell-lyric.com, $31-$51.

“Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” Eugene O’Neill’s autobiographical drama spans one day in the life of a family troubled by addiction and the inability to let go of the past. Through March 4, Everyman Theatre, 315 W. Fayette St., (410) 752-2208, everymantheatre.org, $43-$65.

Nephew Tommy. The co-host of the nationally syndicated Steve Harvey Morning Show performs. March 1-3, Baltimore Comedy Factory, 5625 O’Donnell St., (410) 547-7798, baltimorecomedy.com, $30-$40.

The Peking Chinese Acrobats. The internationally renowned troupe performs gravity-defying feats. March 6-7, Goucher College, Kraushaaur Auditorium, 1021 Dulaney Valley Road, artsonstage.org, $10.

“The Pillowman.” A writer becomes the focus of a police interrogation when his macabre short stories are linked to a series of actual child murders. Through March 18, Vagabond Players, 806 S. Broadway, (410) 563-9135, vagabondplayers.org, $10-$20.

Prim and Proper. Alexa Sciuto hosts an all-women comedy showcase featuring Kristy Belich, Alyssa A. Cowan, Robin Hazel, He He, Diana Keating, and Cristina Payne. March 2, 8 p.m., Charm City Comedy Project at Zissimos Bar, 1023 W. 36th St., charmcitycomedyproject.com, $5.

“Skeleton Crew.” In the third play in Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit trilogy, four workers at the city’s last exporting auto plant face down an uncertain future. Through March 4, Baltimore Center Stage, 700 N. Calvert St., (410) 332-0033, centerstage.org, $20-$79.

Slapstick Jukebox. Happenstance Theater presents a physical comedy mash-up inspired by  19th Century European Circus entrées, Vaudeville, silent film, and early television. March 1-4, Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 W. Preston St., (410) 752-8558, theatreproject.org, $15-$25.

The post Stage: Feb. 28-March 7 appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

I was born in 1980, which makes me a super official ‘80s baby and as such, I’d like to give you a list of the things I usually watch on TV these days: reruns of “The Golden Girls,” reruns of “227,” reruns of “Mama’s Family,” and reruns of “A Different World.” Nostalgia, I’m learning, is comforting even when real life is not (plus “The Golden Girls” tackled subjects like immigration, sexual harassment, and mental illness—everything old is new again). That may be part of the reason why the people behind The Stoop Storytelling Series are putting on an event this week focused on all things ’80s, promising tales of “excess, fear, big hair, and the Bomb.” Storytellers include Robin Yasinow, Gillian Stewart Quinn, Steve Parke, Naomi Cross, Bill Henry, and Louis Hughes Jr. There’s no rule that you should pull out your best neon-colored off-the-shoulder-top, or sport a banana clip hair thingy, but of course you should. And The Beat is a sponsor, so we’ll be there handing out papers and waving hello. Feb. 22, cocktails and live music at 7 p.m., show at 8 p.m., The Senator Theatre, 5904 York Road, stoopstorytelling.com, $20. (Lisa Snowden-McCray)

The post Tonight: The Stoop Storytelling Series presents That ’80s Show appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

Bald & Boujee. Comedy duo Malik S. and Torrei Hart (Kevin Hart’s ex-wife) perform. Feb. 22-24, Baltimore Comedy Factory, 5625 O’Donnell St., (410) 547-7798, baltimorecomedy.com, $20-$40.

The Beanie Bros Tour. L.A. comics Pete Buchbauer and Chip Nicholson perform with support from local comedians including host Nikki Fuchs. Feb. 27, 7 p.m., The Crown, 1910 N. Charles St., (410) 625-4848, facebook.com/TheCrownBaltimore, $10.

BIG Time with Jen Marsh. Baltimore Improv Group performs a totally made up and unprepared tribute to Baltimore Beat’s associate publisher, Jen Marsh. Feb. 23, 8 p.m., The BIG Theater, 1727 N. Charles St., (888) 745-8393, bigimprov.org, $5.

Camp Adventure. Alexa Sciuto hosts a night of improv, stand-up, and sketch from Silversmith, Bad Karaoke Experience, and OLGA, followed by an improv karaoke jam. Feb. 23, 8 p.m., Charm City Comedy Project at Zissimos Bar, 1023 W. 36th St., charmcitycomedyproject.com, $5.

“Count Down.” As part of the 2018 Women’s Voices Theatre Festival, The Stand present Dominique Cieri’s interdisciplinary piece about girls growing up in the child welfare system. Through March 4, Strand Theatre, 5426 Harford Road, (443) 874-4917, strand-theater.org, $10-$25.

“The Death of Walt Disney.” The regional premiere of Lucas Hnath’s biographical play about the megalomaniacal mind of Walt Disney. Through Feb. 25, Single Carrot Theatre, 2600 N. Howard St., (443) 844-9253, singlecarrot.com, $25-$29.

Demetri Martin – The Awkward Tour. The stand-up comedian, writer, actor, and director performs. Feb. 23, 8 p.m., Hippodrome Theatre at the France-Merrick Performing Arts Center, 12 N. Eutaw St., (410) 837-7400, baltimorehippodrome.com, $58.

“A Disappearing Act.” Single Shoe Productions presents a memorial tribute to the deceased fictional magician Philip Winterbottom. Feb. 22-25, Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 W. Preston St., (410) 752-8558, theatreproject.org, $15-$25.

“Everybody.” Theatre Morgan presents a modern riff on the 15th-century morality play following a character named Everybody (played by a different cast member each performance) as he or she travels down a road toward life’s greatest mystery. Feb. 22-24, Carl J. Murphy Fine Arts Center, 2201 Argonne Drive, (443) 885-4440, murphyfineartscenter.org, $5-$15.

Everything Will Be Okay (A stand-up comedy show) [#39]. Chris Hudson hosts a night of stand-up featuring Bryan Preston, Pete Musto, Sahib Singh, Michael Furr, and Natalie McGill. Feb. 22, 8 p.m., The Crown, 1910 N. Charles St., (410) 625-4848, facebook.com/TheCrownBaltimore, $5.

“I Hate Hamlet.” An actor who hates “Hamlet” takes on the title role and encounters the ghost of John Barrymore. Through March 4, Spotlighters Theatre, 817 St. Paul St., (410) 752-1225, spotlighters.org, $10-$22.

Katt Williams. The veteran comedy icon returns to Baltimore, having most recently co-starred in “Father Figures.” Feb. 23, 8 p.m., Royal Farms Arena, 201 W. Baltimore St., (410) 347-2020, royalfarmsarena.com, $55-$128.

“Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” Eugene O’Neill’s autobiographical drama spans one day in the life of a family troubled by addiction and the inability to let go of the past. Through March 4, Everyman Theatre, 315 W. Fayette St., (410) 752-2208, everymantheatre.org, $43-$65.

More Laughs: The Annual Big Fred Birthday Comedy Show. Baltimore native Fred “Big Fred” Watkins, best known as a member of “The Empire” on Oxygen TV’s “Last Squad Standing,” performs stand-up. Feb. 25, 8 p.m., Baltimore Soundstage, 124 Market Place, (410) 244-0057, baltimoresoundstage.com, $20-$35.

“The Pillowman.” A writer becomes the focus of a police interrogation when his macabre short stories are linked to a series of actual child murders. Feb. 23-March 18, Vagabond Players, 806 S. Broadway, (410) 563-9135, vagabondplayers.org, $10-$20.

“Red Velvet.” The biographical play from Lolita Chakrabarti tells the story of the 19th century African-American Shakespearean actor Ira Aldridge. Through Feb. 25, Chesapeake Shakespeare Company, 7 S. Calvert St., (410) 244-8570, chesapeakeshakespeare.com, $16-$43.

“Skeleton Crew.” In the third play in Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit trilogy, four workers at the city’s last exporting auto plant face down an uncertain future. Through March 4, Baltimore Center Stage, 700 N. Calvert St., (410) 332-0033, centerstage.org, $20-$79.

“Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.” Baltimore Concert Opera presents a two-nights-only operatic production of Stephen Sondheim’s horror musical. Feb. 23, 7:30 p.m.; Feb. 25, 3 p.m.; Baltimore Concert Opera, 11 W. Mount Vernon Place, Suite 307, baltimoreconcertopera.com, $29.50-$71.50.

Talkin’ S%\T: A Roast Battle. A comedy tournament in three rounds to find the champion of being nasty, featuring “The Legend” Sonny Fuller, Mike Storck, Kim Ambrose, Leeland Clayton, “Sweet Sweet Baby Boy” Matt Brown, Ian Salyers, Rose Vineshank, and Ben Broedel. Feb. 25, 6 p.m., Magooby’s Joke House, 9603 Deereco Road, (410) 252-2727, magoobys.com, $10.

Totally ’80s, Totally Murder Interactive Dinner. The Murder Mystery Company in Baltimore presents an interactive, ‘80s-themed production alongside a three-course meal from Blue Agave. ‘80s concert attire encouraged. Feb. 21, 6-9 p.m., Blue Agave, 1032 Light St., (410) 576-3938, blue-agave.ticketleap.com/totally-80s-totally-murder-interactive-dinner, $60 or $115 for two people (includes show, meal, and pre-show cocktail).

The post Stage: Feb. 21-28 appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

Crisis exists where answers do not. From there, it grows, chewing at the fixtures that keep you in place till they’re so far apart it’s impossible to piece them together, and you’re left with nothing to hold onto. The old tools—effort, resilience, hope—stop working. “Skeleton Crew,” Dominique Morisseau’s ordinary, monumental drama now being performed at Center Stage, excavates crisis as it expands.

“I feel like nothing’s familiar anymore,” says Faye (played by Stephanie Berry), a veteran auto factory worker staring down joblessness in Morisseau’s Detroit. She once saw herself as a warrior woman, but that foundation is wavering. She’s had some time to sit with the knowledge that the plant is going to be shut down, that she and her fellow workers for whom she’s responsible as union rep will join the casualties of the 2008 recession. In this moment, she says to Reggie (Sekou Laidlow), the plant’s foreman—he and Faye go way back—she recognizes no before and foresees no after. She offers this confessional in the employee break room, where the entire play is set, surrounded by lockers accented with HOPE-era Obama campaign stickers.

In “Skeleton Crew,” the final installment of Morisseau’s Detroit trilogy (a nod to August Wilson’s Pittsburgh cycle) after “Detroit ‘67” (which appeared in Center Stage’s 2015/2016 season) and “Paradise Blue” (set in 1949), crisis has consumed the industry that once made Detroit the Motor City. The play’s title refers the bare-bones assembly line keeping the city’s last exporting auto plant afloat, while also gesturing toward the demise of their livelihoods. All familiarity has disappeared—or become unrecognizable—and that hits particularly hard for this crew, whose labor is based in routine.

At the center is Faye, the workplace matriarch who’s put in nearly 30 years at the plant. She has loved and lost, survived cancer, and as a single parent raised a son who would grow up to reject her as she started dating women—Faye doesn’t hesitate to remind her coworkers that she’s seen it all, or a lot anyway. She wears her conquered hardships as a badge, and the fact that she’s made it through everything in one piece gives her license to gamble constantly on the little money she has and keep up a chain smoking habit while she’s at it, despite her health record and the notice Reggie’s posted in the break room that reads “NO SMOKING FAYE.”

Then there’s Dez (Gabriel Lawrence) and Shanita (Brittany Bellizeare), both younger factory crew members who share Faye’s skill and enthusiasm for the work. A second-generation autoworker who, by the way, is visibly pregnant, Shanita in particular loves the craft and takes pride in knowing her handiwork will go on to bear witness to important moments in the lives of everyday people. She’ll shut off the boombox playing Dez’s pump-up anthem (‘Get Dis Money’ by Detroit rap crew Slum Village, who have also endured plenty of attrition) so she can listen to the steadying music of cranking and clanging on the line: “Sounds like life happening.” Dez too takes pleasure in the grind but aspires to run his own car shop. It’s not even finished yet and he’s already haunted by the “ghosts” on the assembly line. Despite his practical optimism— “better to wait till the last possible minute to start worrying,” he says—fear commands him; he packs a gun in his backpack every day, which inevitably gets him into deep shit.

Morisseau builds up the chemistry between Dez and Shanita—he knows how she takes her coffee!—and, at times, it’s undeniably heartwarming. But the charm is unfortunate: Here we have another representation of a meant-to-be pair that begins with incessant sexual harassment (at the beginning of the play, Dez is at strike number 5,062 by Shanita’s count) and ends with the harasser getting what he wanted and his target realizing this is want she wanted all along, despite resisting all those times before. A tired, toxic trope that mars Morisseau’s otherwise thoughtful storytelling.

In this intimate reckoning of the modern era’s greatest financial crisis, Morisseau pays no mind to the suits responsible for and complicit in the devastation; they’re not worth any time on her stage. They appear only though the battles fought offstage by Reggie, who is charged with the impossible task of pleasing everyone. He comes from the same world as his employees, the same neighborhood; a high school dropout who’s since pulled himself up into white collar comfort more or less, but only to find himself isolated. He identifies with neither his employees, some of whom—Dez in particular—figure he’s rejected where he came from; nor his own employers, who understand nothing of those origins.

Under the incisive direction of Nicole A. Watson, the cast delivers the rhythm in the script’s lyricism while cutting deep into the tension that breaks it up. Morisseau tells each character’s story lovingly—the most notable divergence from her muse and fellow social observer Wilson, who offered just a sliver of redemption to his great tragic hero Troy Maxson. For people inching closer toward rock bottom in a city depicted here as thoroughly “desperate,” all four characters remain true to themselves and to each other, even as they must reassess what all that means. They don’t slump under the weight, although that doesn’t mean they follow the increasingly irrelevant rules keeping them all in line: Among other transgressions, someone has been stealing parts from the plant for resale.

As all this unfolds, a mountain of crumpled car scraps peaks from behind the break room walls, a shadow looming over the brightly-lit, well-loved gathering spot. In the play’s final moments, the factory floor is revealed in full, barren except for the piled remnants. It’s a chilling image, but there’s a sense that this is only a graveyard for the industry; the assembly line ghosts of Dez’s imagination are all but absent. The experiences that took place here—the identities forged, the bonds strengthened—can be taken apart and put back together beyond the factory.

“Skeleton Crew,” a part of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival, continues through March 4 at Baltimore Center Stage.

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