Jitney
Opening Night: January 19, 2017
Closing: March 12, 2017
Theater: Samuel J. Friedman Theatre
Set in the early 1970s, this richly textured piece follows a group of men trying to eke out a living by driving unlicensed cabs, or jitneys. When the city threatens to board up the business and the boss’ son returns from prison, tempers flare, potent secrets are revealed and the fragile threads binding these people together may come undone at last.
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January 19, 2017
Conversation sings and swings, bends and bounces and hits heaven smack in the clouds, in the glorious new production of August Wilson’s “Jitney,” which opened on Thursday night at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater. In Ruben Santiago-Hudson’s vital revival of a 1982 play only now making its Broadway debut, words take on the shimmer of molten-gold notes from the trumpets of Louis and Miles. How sweet the sound. And how sorrowful and jubilant, as life in a storefront taxi company in an African-American neighborhood in Pittsburgh comes to feel like a free-form urban concerto, shaped by the quick-witted, improvisatory spirit that makes jazz soar.
READ THE REVIEWJanuary 19, 2017
Until this year, “Jitney” was the only one of August Wilson’s “Century Cycle” plays to have never been performed on Broadway. Now it’s finally arrived, in an artful and melodic staging directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson, one of the most well-regarded interpreters of works by the “Fences” playwright. Set in a downtrodden corner of Pittsburgh in the churning, post-civil rights era 1970s, “Jitney” tracks a group of men scraping together a living driving unlicensed cabs. Though the business has no formal oversight, its owner, Becker (classical stage actor John Douglas Thompson) tries to instill a sense of pride in his motley crew.
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January 19, 2017
Talk about perfect timing: Immediately following the premiere of the critically acclaimed film version of August Wilson’s “Fences,” “Jitney,” one of Wilson’s lesser-known plays, is receiving its Broadway premiere in a focused and penetrating production directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson and featuring an outstanding ensemble cast. “Jitney” is the 1970s chapter of Wilson’s 10-play cycle exploring African-Americans in Pittsburgh’s Hill District during each decade of the twentieth century. Until now, it had been the only drama in the “Century Cycle” that had not played Broadway.
READ THE REVIEWJanuary 19, 2017
It’s hard to believe that August Wilson’s Jitney has been around for more than 30 years and is only now making its Broadway debut. But given the subjects dominating the current public discourse, the Pulitzer winner’s intelligent, thought-provoking piece couldn’t have bowed at a better time. By turns hilarious and devastating, this is an emotionally bruising gem of a play. Chronologically, Jitney is the eighth in Wilson’s 10-play American Century Cycle, a decade-by-decade series about African-American life in the 20th century, and it offers a glimpse into the daily lives of black cab drivers in Pittsburgh’s Hill District in the late ‘70s. Money is tight and the city is slowly boarding up buildings in the once-vibrant neighborhood, but for the men whose lives revolve around the dispatch office of this gypsy cab company, the hustle continues.
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January 19, 2017
It’s hard to know whether the vehicles driven by the unlicensed cabbies in August Wilson’s 1977 ensemble drama are in AAA-certified top shape. These Pittsburgh hacks are themselves rough around the edges, and their rides could probably use a new carburetor here, a fresh paint job there. However, the show they occupy is built to last and moves like a dream. Jitney last played New York in 2000 and makes its long-awaited Broadway debut to start 2017 right: a soul-sustaining, symphonic piece by a late, great master, about fathers and sons, workers and their dreams—deliverance for audiences hungry for soaring language and tough truths. Director Ruben Santiago-Hudson steers a powerhouse cast through the dense alleyways and along the majestic avenues of Wilson’s language. We live in a time of clever dramatists working wonders with intertextuality and frames, but so few have an ear like Wilson (Fences) had: a voracious organ absorbing the rhythms and poetry of his working-class characters.
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