Clybourne Park/by Bruce Norris/directed by Pam MacKinnon/Mark Taper Forum/through February 26
Bruce Norris deservedly won the 2011 Pulitzer for his brilliant study of human nature Clybourne Park, which picks up where Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun leaves off. Now at the Mark Taper Forum, Park's director Pam McKinnon holds tight reins over an outstanding ensemble, all of whom play two roles as the play shifts in two acts from 1959 to 2009, Chicago.
The bridge between the two plays A Raisin in the Sun (now playing at the Kirk Douglas Theatre) and Clybourne Park is the character Karl Lindner (Jeremy Shamos here), a Rotarian and supposed pillar of the community. In Raisin Karl tries to convince the Younger family, who are black, not to move to Clybourne Park, an all-white residential community. In Park he attempts to dissuade the Stoller family (Frank Wood and Christina Kirk) from selling their house to the Youngers. He offers the Youngers money to stay put. It's a selfish reason on the part of the whole community. In 1959 if blacks moved into a white residential area, the property value would quickly depreciate, causing the majority of the other whites to move out, pure and simple. Neither family listens. The Stollers move on as do the Youngers. The waters are tested on Clybourne Street, and the Youngers face an historically long struggle for survival and recognition.
Norris portrays 1959 to the letter, showing how neighbors trusted one another, but keeping their true feelings about race under wraps. The Stollers, who are in the process of leaving Clybourne Park permanently, have their own personal tragedy to deal with. Their son after returning from the Korean War committed suicide and father Russ (Wood) has not learned to deal with the loss. Strong Bev (Kirk) does her ingratiating best to cope and make everyone around her happy, including maid Francine (Crystal A. Dickinson), who in 1959 within her station as a black woman would never dare publicly speak her mind about her bosses' attitudes. When Karl enters and puts a damper on the Stollers' move out of Clybourne Street, all hell breaks loose, tempers rage and Russ comes out of his stuper to defend his family against the prevailing racial injustice. Act One could be classified a drama with comedic undertones, but Act Two, fifty years later, is definitely more of a comedy, as the changing mores have allowed much more freedom of speech, especially for the black couple (Dickinson and Damon Gupton) who try to defend their ancestors' struggle to get and maintain a sense of power and prestige in the changing neighborhood. They are no longer afraid to speak their minds, so when white couple Steve and Lindsey ( Shamos and Annie Parisse), who are about to move into Clybourne Park, informally bring up their casual associations with blacks and Steve starts telling racial jokes, he has no idea what a spark he has lit, it strikes a nerve with Lena, the young black woman played by Dickinson, and the air is filled once more with an uncomfortable barrage of racial tensions. So, as Norris points out in the play, yes, indeed from 1959 to 2009, there have been changes but human nature remains unchanged.
I particularly like the ending where we see Dan (Wood) discovering Russ' son's letter in a trunk that had been buried out under the myrtle tree in the backyard in 1959. We see Bev (Kirk) and the son Kenneth (Brendan Griffin) in the shadows behind as he writes the letter the very night he would take his own life. Kenneth was so willing to die for the racial atrocities he unwillingly committed as a soldier, so with Norris passing the letter from one generation to the next, we ask "Will this affect changes in the way people think about others?" Maybe not enough, but it certainly cannot hurt. It's a good gesture and another poignant reminder of past actions influencing the present.
Director MacKinnon ingeniously guides 7 actors, who essay all the roles in both time periods. The entire ensemble is wonderfully sharp and on target: including Dickinson, Shamos, Kirk, Wood, Parisse, Gupton and praise as well to Brendan Griffin who also plays a quiet minister in Act One and an equally reserved gay man, with a terrific comedic retort in Act Two, as well as son Ken at play's end. Daniel Ostling has designed a great set - that receives just the right touches of change during intermission, and Ilona Somogyi, appropriate costumes to show changing trends from the 50s to present day.
