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    Theater Review: Short North Stage’s Regional Premiere of ‘Slave Play’

    For those of us who have been missing Short North Stage’s streak of raw, edgy non-musical plays, in addition to the musicals they’re known for, their production of Jeremy O. Harris’ controversial debut work Slave Play, directed by Nakeisha Daniel, is a mixed blessing. Nominated for 12 Tony Awards in its Broadway run and heralded as the introduction of a vibrant, young (the play was written in Harris’ first year at Yale) voice, it’s exactly the kind of work I cheerlead for and want to see more of, even with the mixed feelings I had about the work itself.

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    The first third-to-half of the 100-minute play (with no intermission) features three couples in individual scenarios combining raceplay, Civil War reenacting, and a master/slave BDSM dynamic, with the amped-up levels of degradation and language those three things imply. There’s no spoiler in stating that. Beyond the screen at the top of the stage showing the action as though on surveillance cameras, within the first few minutes of the first couple we see, Kaneisha (Candyce Adkins) and Jim (Samuel Partridge), Jim’s facial expressions and hesitation make abundantly clear we’re watching them try on roles he’s not as into as his partner.

    We cut from the stumbling of Jim and Kaneisha to Alana (Kayla Ryan Walsh) and Philip (Taylor Moss) in a slave mistress/tables-turned scenario they seem to be having a better time with, though Moss (in a staggering performance throughout) uses eyebrows and subtle gestures to show the fissures in a relationship they’re using this to try and repair. On the surface, Gary (R. Jahan) and Dustin (Matthew Sierra) seem to have a more carefree time, aided by charming and nuanced performances, with their indentured servant/slave romp in the stable, but an early finish uncovers deeper cracks.

    After Partridge’s Jim cries out an anachronistic safe word, Teá (Lisa Glover) and Patricia (Gabriela Gomez) rush in and call everyone together for a group therapy/debrief of what we see is the fourth day of a workshop/data collection for their shared thesis on Racialized Inhibiting Disorder. The crux of what ambiguity there is in Daniel’s production of Slave Play rests on these two “therapists.”

    With their rat-a-tat rhythms – watching Glover and Gomez volley and hand-off to one another is frequently dazzling – entrenched buzzwords they don’t deviate from, and utter lack of listening to any of these people they’re claiming to help, the characters feel like a parody of the therapy process. What gets interesting about them is the progressively clearer implication they’re getting off on this, the pain of these couples, and the racialized contortions to feel something – each of the Black-identifying members of the couples is diagnosed with sexual anhedonia (anhedonia without the modifier gets used repeatedly, but there’s no indication that the partners can’t find pleasure in food, drugs, socialization, etc., only that they can’t get off) – hinging on the tell that “When we discovered RID, our relationship improved.”

    My main problem with the material of Slave Play was that once I got past the shock of the conceit and execution – as a white man in his early 40s, it should always feel uncomfortable to sit in a theater with (estimating) 85% white audience members and hear white actors throw around “Mandingo” references and worse, this is not a complaint about the play using shock and my discomfort to make a point – it’s pretty thin. Emphasized by the ba-dum-bum underlining of the screen on the stage periodically turning its camera on the audience to emphasize our complicity.

    I had a drink with my partner after seeing the play to organize (anyone reading this is forgiven laughing) our thoughts, and she summed it up in 20 minutes with, “I really thought I’d have more to say about that.” Sexuality is a fascinating lens to explore human behavior, but the play doesn’t let us see anything else about the people in front of us, despite uniformly stellar performances. By indicating the couples signed up for this survey after long droughts, it doesn’t even give the characters the dignity of owning these kinks because – aside from a heart-wrenching Moss and Walsh exchange about their characters meeting through Alana’s previous husband’s cuckolding fetish – we don’t get to know if this is what turns any of them on.

    The structure also alternately bored and annoyed me. The three roleplay scenes feel like they go on too long and are too static, their sets (nicely appointed by Teresa Williams) arranged like a tableau, only to dump the audience into scenes of the characters sitting in chairs at a therapy group, where we only see Glover and Gomez stand and move. It’s a lot of sitting that reminds those of us in the audience how long we’ve been sitting.

    Similarly, the cutting back to their sex scene, and, later, the uncomfortable catharsis of Adkins and Partridge’s characters – her “Thank you for listening” is one of those heartbreaking moments on stage that will live with me after most of this play has faded from memory – sent me into the night frustrated that neither of the other two couples got arcs of their own; the attempts at balancing between the three get thrown away in a way that almost made me feel like I was being made fun of for the limited extent I did engage with them. And Walsh, and Daniel’s direction, do an excellent job trying to make up for the sinking feeling that the play has a particular loathing for Alana, singling her out for a greater degree of ridicule than the other characters get.

    Those moments I mentioned earlier, and a few more, signify a powerful voice, and this cast makes the most of them. But I couldn’t shake that this feels like what it is, someone’s first play. There are incisive questions raised about how we – white people to Black, men to women, doctors to patients – deny others the humanity that should be without question and about how what turns many of us on is tied up in things we didn’t want to examine under too much of a microscope. But, despite a pretty exemplary production, those questions get lost in sagging, talky melodrama.

    Slave Play runs through February 19, with performances at 7 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and 2 p.. Sunday, with talkbacks after every Sunday performance. For tickets and more information, visit shortnorthstage.org/slave-play.

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    Richard Sanford
    Richard Sanfordhttp://sanfordspeaks.blogspot.com/
    Richard Sanford is a freelance contributor to Columbus Underground covering the city's vibrant theatre scene. You can find him seeking inspiration at a variety of bars, concert halls, performance spaces, museums and galleries.
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