Finding Your Own Song

Joe Turner’s Come and Gone

Goodman Theatre’s latest production is a magnificent revival of August Wilson’s second, chronological installment of his extraordinary and ambitious American Century Cycle. This particular drama, set in 1911 Pittsburgh, is one of Wilson’s ten plays that chronicle the African-American experience, decade by decade. The Goodman was actually the first theatre in the country to present all ten of the Wilson Cycle plays, including the world premiere of two of the dramas. After the Goodman’s recent miraculous production of Mr. Wilson’s GEM OF THE OCEAN, set in 1904, we can only hope that soon audiences will be enjoying a remount of MA RAINEY’S BLACK BOTTOM, the next play, chronologically-speaking, and set in the 1920’s at a Chicago recording studio.   

This stunning production is about African-Americans searching for and claiming their own identity or, as one character puts it, “Finding Your Own Song.” Set fifty years after the 13th Amendment abolished slavery, the Great Migration saw millions of Black sharecroppers leaving the rural South and heading up to the cities of the North, where jobs were promised sparked by the Industrial Revolution. The  life changes for former slaves was, however, slow in coming. This is a play stuffed with history, politics and religion that’s tinged alternately with moments of laugh-out-loud comedy and sad, head-shaking tragedy.

Set in one locale, this play is filled with a large cast of fascinating and diverse characters. Taking place in an African-American owned boarding house, the lodging is run by Seth Holly. Skillfully played by Dexter Zollicoffer, Seth’s an often funny fifty-something factory employee who works the nightshift as a craftsman, while his wife Bertha, played by TayLar, is the beating heart and soul of the household, cooking for the guests and cleaning up their messes. The early twentieth century boarding house seems to represent a microcosm of life, metaphorically representing a crossroads between the real world and the magical and spiritual realm. It’s a bridge between the unimaginable past and a shadowy, unsure future that continually haunts these characters.

 Longtime boarder Bynum Walker is a conjure man in his sixties. He’s a metaphysical man who performs magical rituals to contact the spirits. Bynum, beautifully portrayed with quiet charm by Tim Rhoze, is a man who’s comfortable with his own identity. He’s respected by most everyone and feels that each and every individual should search for and “find his own song,” or his true distinctive existence and purpose in life.

Into the Holly boarding house wanders Herold Loomis, (powerfully portrayed by that force of nature, A.C. Smith) a displaced middle-aged man searching for his wife, Martha. He has with him his young daughter, Zonia (a charming Kylah Renee Jones). We learn that Loomis had been forcibly enslaved by Joe Turner for seven years of hard labor on one of his chain gangs. During that period of time he was separated from his wife and daughter. As a result, he’s now bitter, has completely lost his way as a deacon and especially as his own person. Possessed by spiritual beings, Herold Loomis is like a ship lost at sea, constantly searching for his beloved wife and, as Bynum tells him, a man who has “completely lost your song.”

Other visitors and lodgers who temporarily pass through Seth Holly’s boarding house include Rutherford Selig (talented Gary Houston), a a wandering, wheeler-dealer of a peddler man and a self-proclaimed “People Finder;” Jeremy, a young road worker and would-be guitarist (an enthusiastic Anthony Fleming, III); young Mattie Campbell, a lonely woman who’s looking for a man who’ll love and protect her (sweetly played by Nambi E. Kelley); and Molly Cunningham, a lovely, feisty and independent woman who has a strong mind of her own (portrayed with grit and gusto by Krystel V. McNeil). Young neighbor boy Reuben Mercer is played with humor and gumption by Harper Anthony, and the religious and lovely Martha Pentecost makes an eleventh hour appearance as a strong, self-sufficient woman. She’s played with spitfire and spunk by the always wonderful Shariba Rivers.           

 The production is directed by the incomparable Chuck Smith, an artist who actually knew August Wilson personally, and has now helmed four of his plays at this theatre. The presentation is a feast for theatergoers who have been starved for a play with plenty of meat on its bones. It overflows with creativity, while still honoring Wilson’s story, its themes and its characters. Smith’s passion and great respect for Wilson’s work is clear and concrete. Played upon Linda Buchanan’s splendid and minutely-detailed Scenic Design (the intricately designed and constructed proscenium is pure magical artistry), lavishly lit with luster by Jared Gooding, this is a truly splendid and spellbinding production, certainly one for the ages. Herold Loomis eventually will find his own song, I’m certain. Just as I’m sure that this exceptional production would’ve made the late August Wilson very proud.    

Highly Recommended

Reviewed by Colin Douglas

Presented April 13-May 19 by the Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn, Chicago. 

Tickets are available in person at the Goodman box office, by calling 312-443-3800 or by going to www.GoodmanTheatre.org.

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.