‘Thoughts of a Colored Man’ Review: A Welcome if Uneven Excavation of Black Masculinity on Broadway
But where “For Colored Girls” assembles vivid and discrete portraits into a kind of cosmic ritual, Scott and Broadnax plant their kicks on the pavement, purveying a streetside take on the men’s daily lives and intersections. The result attempts an uneven sort of naturalism, as the men posit one purportedly universal truism after another, tracing the outlines of life in place of illuminating its substance. Scott’s mode of expositional storytelling can also grow to feel didactic, in a way that feels in conflict with efforts to ground the play in everyday reality.
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‘Thoughts of a Colored Man’ Falters and It Should Be Allowed To
Very few pieces of contemporary art show us Black men who are alive, on the “right” side of the law, and (in their own ways) thriving. ‘Thoughts of a Colored Man’, directed by Steve H. Broadnax III, and written by Keenan Scott II, does. Performed by seven phenomenal actors, the play centers on a cross-section […]
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‘Is This A Room’ Puts Reality on Stage
Reality has become a tricky, increasingly-elusive concept. With heavily-edited “reality” television, overly-curated social media profiles, and politically-minded accusations of “fake news,” the definition of what counts as “reality” is hazy at best. Is This A Room, conceived and directed by Tina Satter, puts this debate center stage by using an FBI interrogation transcript as the […]
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