Theater productions strive to be topical and sometimes they hit the mark with uncanny timing. Rep Stage's long-scheduled, civil rights-themed "Sunset Baby" had its opening night performance on a night when Baltimore City residents were living with a nocturnal curfew.
Although this play is not specifically about the aftermath of a riot, it does concern underlying social issues that have simmered for decades within the black community. So, yes, you're likely to sit up and take even more notice of an assured production that's already likely to get your attention.
Playwright Dominique Morisseau establishes a pressure cooker of a situation here. Nina (Valeka J. Holt) has a borderline-abrasive personality that serves as protective armor for her personal circumstances.
Her mother recently died, she's estranged from her father, her boyfriend is a less than trustworthy drug dealer, and she lives in a small Brooklyn apartment that seems even more claustrophobic as the dramatic confrontations escalate.
It's really significant that Nina was named for the late great Nina Simone, whose fiercely soulful singing commented on what it was like to be a black woman in a country where skin color historically has mattered.
This play's numerous short scenes often incorporate songs by Simone, for whom some of us harbor feelings akin to worship. One of the songs heard during the evening, "Please Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," seems especially pertinent for a play that thematically makes sure it will be understood.
Nina's father, Kenyatta (Jefferson A. Russell), is a famous black activist from the 1980s who has earned the right to take a relatively long view of the civil rights movement. Nina, who accuses him of having abandoned the family, does not welcome his sudden reappearance in her life; and she's suspicious of his curiosity about the status of letters he exchanged years ago with her mother. These letters now have both historical and financial value.
By introducing the letters as a specific point of conflict, the playwright deftly makes this family squabble resonate in a larger political sense.
Kenyatta's personal ruminations on this subject, however, tend to be treated in an overly didactic manner owing to the frequent insertion of monologues he delivers to a video camera.
Although this sort of confessional device initially may seem valid, after awhile it seems like his monologues simply repeat thematic points already well-established by the directly confrontational conversations between characters.
Some of the most emotionally charged of these conversations are between Nina and her boyfriend, Damon (Manu Kumasi). Nina is so complicit in Damon's illegal money-making activities that the play admirably makes it plain that it can't be schematically reduced to a good woman/bad boyfriend scenario.
Whether Nina and Damon will stay together is one of many sources of tension in "Sunset Baby."
It's also interesting to follow the uneasy discussions between Kenyatta and Damon, because the much younger Damon represents a hip-hop generation that does not necessarily see eye to eye with the earlier black liberation movement epitomized by Kenyatta.
For all the profane ferocity of the play's language, those strident words are merited by the world inhabited by Nina. Also, she does have more closely guarded tender emotions alluded to by the play's title. You can discover for yourself exactly why Nina was called a "Sunset Baby," but rest assured that she has a nurturing side that she prefers to keep to herself.
The Rep Stage production confidently directed by Joseph W. Ritsch maintains its focus on the charged interplay between these three characters; and the actors playing them all give intense performances. Even though Holt's articulation and vocal projection occasionally could be sharper, this is something likely to work itself out. Integral to the production's success is a set by Daniel Ettinger that emphasizes the compressed living space occupied by Nina. Her tiny New York apartment is flanked by a cityscape whose tilted angles suggest a place in which the architectural and presumably social lines are severe.
Rep Stage's "Sunset Baby" runs through May 17 at Howard Community College's Smith Theatre, 10901 Little Patuxent Parkway in Columbia. For ticket info, call 443-518-1500 or go to http://www.repstage.org.