A Theatre-Goer's Thoughts

The cast of The Second City's  Dance Like There's Black People Watching , (L to R) Breon Arzell, Julius Shanks II, Tameika Chavis, Max Thomas, Jillian Ebanks, and Arlieta Hall. Photo credit: Teresa Castracane. Clearly, the Second City production of Dance Like There’s Black People Watching (hereafter referred to as Dance ) is more of a “show” than a play. Perhaps the most appropriate way for me to describe it is as an experience, unlike any you probably have ever seen. Developed improvisationally by its cast and director Rob Wilson, it provides for an outrageously funny - but also pointedly political – evening of theatrical entertainment. Woolly Mammoth welcomes this production by the Chicago-based company in a very liberal political city just as a presidential election has been held. First, let’s deal with that title. Intriguing, but somewhat misleading, though for one moment in the show, during improvisation with an audience member, a White person does, in fact, dance for the...

Karan Brar as Maneesh and Rob Yang as Alex in Data . Photo credit: T. Charles Erickson Photography. “What are you?” I recall an experience from my college days, when I was part of a touring company playing various locales in Alabama. On one occasion, the accompanist was separated from the rest of us when a stranger asked her that very question. She explained that she was a visiting college student and the pianist for the play that was to be performed that evening. The stranger persisted in asking the same question, “What are you?” She repeated the information she had shared previously, but he asked a third time, “What are you?” Both unnerved and uncomfortable at this point she finally replied, “I don’t know!” His response was “I’m a Libra, what are you?” Astrological sign is one way of defining what you are, though I doubt many of us today would start defining ourselves according to the zodiac. Depending on the context in which the question is asked, I believe the most common respo...

  L to R:  Bradley James Tejeda (Eddie), Luna Lauren Velez (Patti), Rosa Arredondo (Norma), Rebecca Jimenez {Toni), and John Leguizamo (Nelson) in The Other Americans . Photo by T. Charles Erickson Photography. John Leguizamo is a multimedia multi-hyphenate: a stand-up comedian, actor, monologist, social activist, voiceover artist, host, and playwright whose work has been seen on the stage as well as in film and television. He wrote and is currently appearing in the current offering at Arena Stage, The Other Americans , in its world premiere run (continuing through November 24). It is 1998. The Other Americans focuses on an upwardly mobile Colombian/Puerto Rican family who have moved from Jackson Heights, Queens, to Forest Hills, Queens. Leguizamo stars as Nelson Castro, the family patriarch, who owns and operates a number of laundromats in New York City. Nelson instigated the move from the cramped apartment in Jackson Heights to the house in a tonier neighborhood over the...