Here’s
a play dedicated to anyone who’s gone on a laughing jag at a funeral, or who
jokes with the doctors as they’re preparing her for open heart surgery. Indeed,
it’s for all of us who deal with pain, loss or tragedy through laughter, as
well as all the other more expected emotions.
The
play is Sons of the Prophet by
Stephen Karam, now at Dobama Theatre. And while it’s often hilariously funny,
it is also touching as we watch 29-year-old Joseph, his younger brother Charles
and his Uncle Bill grapple with various serious (along with some petty)
problems.
Trouble
is, the play is something of a dog’s breakfast in terms of structure, with
scenes loosely strung together and many storylines never explored or resolved
even slightly. In short, it’s a happy mess, made even happier by some excellent
and well-modulated performances.
The
above-mentioned trio is part of the Lebanese-American Douaihy family, residing
in Pennsylvania under a cloud of doom and gloom. Joseph has an encroaching
undiagnosed illness, Charles has a fake ear, their father has just died after
crashing his car into a stuffed deer, and elderly Uncle Bill, hobbling on a
walker, is challenged in myriad ways.
Add
to all that the fact that Joseph, who is gay like Charles, is being hectored by
his blacklisted book-packaging boss Gloria to write a memoir. The reason:
Joseph’s family is a marketing coup since they are distant relations to the
philosopher-poet Kahlil Gibran.
Karam
spins laugh lines like a pro (“Our family has a history of dying tragically.
We’re like the Kennedys without the sex appeal.”). And he has a sure touch for
natural dialogue, the kind that often spills over itself as people try to make
their separate points.
Karam
does well by characters, too. Gloria is a relentlessly focused entrepreneur
with ADD—she can’t remember anything about her employee Joseph for more than a
nanosecond—and she has many of the best lines. Anne McEvoy downplays her
nicely, allowing the woman’s eccentric nature to bloom naturally.
Chris
Richards is equally adept at undercutting Joseph’s travails, allowing the
playwright’s humor to sneak up on the audience, as it should. He is nicely
matched with Christopher Sanders as Charles, who develops a crush on Vin
(Johnathon Jackson), the high school football hero who put the deer in the road
as a prank.
Bernard
Canepari blusters amusingly as Uncle Bill, although this fine actor could
perhaps have been given more levels to explore as the man who wants to lead the
family but is no longer is able.
Some
of the most exquisite moments of comedy are delivered by two women, Laura
Starnik and Jeanne Task, who play multiple roles with delightful and inventive
precision.
The
only character who doesn’t ring true is Timothy (Aaron Mucciolo), a gay man who
Joseph meets in a bus station. But their attraction to each other is never well
defined, leaving this relationship hanging in the wind.
Overall,
this assemblage of humorous snippets fails to leave the impact it might, since
the shape of the play feels almost randomly fashioned. This is especially true
at the end, when a scene lands from out of the blue, leading nowhere in
particular. We don’t need pat and tidy endings, but a little more structure
wouldn’t hurt.
Director
Scott Miller guides his cast through this landscape of pain and giggles with
skill. But he and scenic designer Laura Carlson seems hamstrung by Dobama’s
stage—a space so big and awkward that the actors are often either smushed together in upstage corners or arrayed with yawning stretches of stage between
them.
Sons
of the Prophet
Through
March 17 at Dobama Theatre, 2340 Lee Road, 216-932-3396
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