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Hambone
by Javon Johnson |
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HAMBONE is an American-style well-made play. There is exposition, complication, and denouement crammed into two-acts with a fifteen-minute intermission. The play is set in 1988, Anderson County, South Carolina, the hometown of African-American playwright Javon Johnson. In the play, 1988 is a time of the dichotomy of a Confederate flag hanging from the South Carolina state capital and Jesse Jackson running for president. Bishop, the 48-year old "blood-brother" of Henry, is the owner of a sandwich diner. Bishop was a foundling taken in by Henry's family 42 years ago. Bishop has a 17-year old foster son, Tyrone. Tyrone's deceased mother, Greta, was Bishop's friend; his father is in prison. Henry, a former football star, has a son at Morehouse College. Tyrone has a 16-year old friend, Bobbilee, who has just been released from 30 days in prison. These two generations of African-American men are not living idyllic Southern lives. Bishop's diner is a victim of the modern times -- he must arm himself against thieves -- and the uncertain economy. Bishop fears that Tyrone will leave him and the diner. Tyrone wants to change his name to "Timothy" in order to get a job in the city. Henry is crippled from a knife wound in the leg received when he killed a white man. He now refuses to seek traditional medical treatment for his injured leg because of his mistrust of the white medical staff at the clinic, who "take your body parts." He relies on Miss Frances' folk remedies and traditions. The fatherless Bobbilee was sexually molested in prison but vanquished the attacker. He is inspired by James Brown, who he met in prison, to write a song. The godfather of soul becomes his spiritual father.
Complications abound when Harrison, an elderly white railroad man, enters the diner for coffee and has an attack due to his diabetes and kidney ailment; when Bishop accidentally kills Bobbilee as a burglar; when Tyrone discovers Bishop is his biological father; when Bishop discovers Harrison, who is dying, is his biological father. Both sons reject their fathers. The play ends, rather precipitously, with the union of the generations based upon knowledge of the truth of their identities.
HAMBONE is not simply an "exercise in cultural anthropology." (Connor, "Home Cooking," p. 31.) Yet, the play is most successful at presenting the resonance and richness of the African-American culture. The central ritual of the hambone, which is performed with especial gusto, is at first a celebratory ceremony between Bishop and Henry. The ritual radiates beyond them when Tyrone asks his father to teach it to him and Harrison -- a generational passing of the baton. The rhythm of the hambone resonates in James Brown's bebop music, which is omnipresent in Chris J. Johnson's sound design. The image and the sound of the "train" is also artistically woven into the texture of the play. This is the "Freedom Train" that is an icon in African-American culture. Trains heading Northward pass Bishop's diner. The train's whistle and rumble are constant reminders of this passage. The image of the train infuses Bishop's fearful dreams and his memories. It is both the past, the present, and the future. Mary Griswold's set design and Christine Pascual's costumes present myriad details of the African-American culture. Both designs contribute to the authentic look and feel of the production.
The playwright has stated that what he wants people to remember about this play is "mostly truth and how you personally relate to truth in your life, whether it is with family or friends." (Marta Effinger, " An Interview with Javon Johnson," <I>Victory News</I>, 2000-2001 Season, Issue 3, p. 5.) Many of the truths that are finally revealed in this play often seem facile and contrived -- fathers are discovered, rejected, and finally acknowledged, in tandem. This is the result of the well-made structure of the play. Still, the most important element of this production is indeed truth, not the truths revealed in the plot, but the truth of the characters themselves. The five-member ensemble cast, as directed by Ron OJ Parson, is marvelous. All the portrayals ring so true: Freeman Coffey's Bishop is both world-weary and loving; A.C. Smith's Henry is swaggering in Kente cloth, exuberant while hamboning, and dejected when betrayed; Anthony Fleming III and P. Francois Battiste, as Tyrone and Bobbilee, convey a perfect mixture of youthful spirit -- dancing to James Brown, brotherhood, and alienation from the America that can deny their manhood; Tom Roland transforms from a sick old man to a man enriched by his place in the African-American culture of his son and grandson. Ultimately, pride in the African-American culture that is so lovingly presented on the Victory Gardens stage is the most memorable part of HAMBONE.
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BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is also an American two-act drama, with fifteen-minute intermission. Because Thomas Gibbons' drama is not a well-made play, it does not have the contrivances of plot, as in HAMBONE. "Gibbons' play is, if anything, exposition, exposition, more exposition, and then one entire act's worth of discussion. . . . . what's missing from Bee-Luther-Hatchee is a greater sense of the theater." (Cary Mazer, "Faking It," Review of InterAct Theatre Company's production of Bee-Luther-Hatchee, http://www.english.upenn.edu/~cmazer/bee.html.) Nevertheless, even though BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is long on exposition and short on dramatic conflict, the play does not even bring into focus the African-American culture that is its soul. The African-American culture is a mere spectral presence in this production.
BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE opens in the present with Shelita Burns, an African-American woman, accepting an award for publishing the memoirs of Libby Price, a 72-year-old Southern African-American woman. The first act is a series of short vignette-like scenes following Shelita on her quest to meet Libby. The act ends with her discovery that Libby is really a middle-aged white man, Sean Leonard. In Act 2, the two discuss whether a white man can tell an African-American woman's story. This intellectual discussion eviscerates the play. Shelita is obsessed with authenticity of the voice chronicling the culture; Sean believes that the author can remain invisible because the author is not more important than the words. Although Shelita is vociferous in her support of African-American women's right to speak in their own voices and to have those voices heard, she does not follow her own vision. As written by Gibbons, Shelita is not a person whose identity has been formed by the African-American culture. She talks about the experiences that she has published, but has not been touched by them. As portrayed by Shané Wiliams, Shelita does not ring true. Ms. Williams is neither believable as the outspoken Princeton graduate nor the aggressive conscience-stricken publisher. The structure of the play does not assist her. She has few opportunities to develop her character in Act 1 because she is on her obsessive quest for Libby. She has too little to work with in Act 2 -- because she is on the defensive in the debate with Sean, she can merely reassert her position. Lawrence MacGowan is appropriately rumbled as Sean, but also seems to lack the fervor to even want to tell Libby's story, which he heard from her when she lived with him -- when he was 9-years old -- and his widower father, Robert.
The African-American culture in BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is embodied by Libby, who tells her story as a young woman, at various points, from behind a scrimmed platform above the main set. She tells of what it means to live the life of a "Negro woman" on the Freedom train and the death train to Bee-Luther-Hatchee, one stop after hell. Penelope Walker gives a textured performance as Libby. She is not the usual stereotypical Mammy or Vixen or Blues Singer. During the course of the play, she becomes aware of the truth of her identity, as Robert's sister, and as an African-American woman in the South: "I have been a drifter all my life." Yet, the structure of the play, does not let Libby really come into focus.
The set design by Richard and Jacqueline Penrod is slick and flawless in facilitating the dual levels of action--in the present and in the past, in the North and in the South. The original music and sound design by Lindsay Jones alludes to the African-American culture of the Delta, without conjuring it up. Ultimately, BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is only memorable for the elusiveness of the African-American culture that is its subject.
--Sandra Marie Lee
HAMBONE Victory Gardens Theater, first-floor main stage, 2257 N. Lincoln, 773-871-3000. Through February 25: Tuesdays-Fridays, 8 PM; Saturdays, 5 and 8:30 PM; Sundays, 3 PM. $28-$33. Note: The shows at 8 PM Friday, February 23, and 5 PM Saturday, February 24, are captioned. The show at 8 PM Friday, February 23, is sign interpreted. The shows at 3 PM Sunday, February 25, feature audio description. These Access Project shows are $22 for persons with disabilities; call 773-871-3000 or TTY 773-871-0682.
BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE. Northlight Theatre, North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie, 9501 Skokie Blvd., Skokie, 847-673-6300. Through March 11: Tuesdays, 7:30 PM; Wednesdays-Fridays, 8 PM; Saturdays, 3 and 8 PM; Sundays, 3 and 7 PM; Sunday, February 18 and March 4 and 11, 3 PM only. $32-$45.
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